By: Lisa Schiestel
Can you catch and throw with both hands equally? Probably not. Well, horses are a lot like people, and also predominantly right or left-handed (hoofed), which means that, for them, picking up the correct lead on cue is usually easier on one side than it is on the other.
With that in mind, AQHA Professional Horseman Lisa Schiestel, shows us an exercise that will help even the most awkward of horses pick up either lead properly when asked.
Leg Contact
The first thing you need to do is make sure that your horse will allow you to put your legs and pressure on its side without it overreacting. You can practice this with your horse standing still, and also while at the walk and jog. Spend time gently, but firmly, rubbing your legs on its sides, back and forth until he becomes used to the contact.
If, while practicing this at the stand still, your horse reacts to the leg pressure by moving, tell it to whoa, take control with the bridle, and continue rubbing with your legs. As the horse starts to relax, release the bridle contact and keep saying whoa.
After the horse has stood still for a minute, stop rubbing your legs and release all contact with the bridle and give it a break. As your horse masters this at the stand still, move on to the walk and jog.
The key here is that if your horse won’t allow you to hold your legs on its sides, then it will not allow you to teach it how to pick up the correct lead or any other advanced maneuver.
So, once your horse will stand quietly, as wel as walk and jog with leg contact, you can move onto the next step.
Hip In
To teach your horse to move its body into the correct position and pick up its leads properly you have to teach it “hip in.” The goal of this exercise is to keep the horse’s front end on the rail while pushing its hip in only far enough to have the outside hind foot step into the inside front track.
This allows the horse to be in the same frame it will need to be while loping. Any more of a hip in angle and the horse’s body is in an unnatural position, making it harder for him to lope properly.
To start with, you should have access to a long wall or fence to work on, which will make it easier for both you and your horse.
Walk your straight line back and forth so that the horse knows that you want it to stay on the fence. Establish a nice tempo at the walk; your horse must walk forward enough to maintain that tempo.
Now, you can start teaching the horse to put its hip in. Do this at the walk on the rail by keeping the front end (head, neck, and shoulders) straight on the track, and maintaining enough contact through your hands.
Move your outside leg back on the horse’s side behind where you would normally let your leg hang, and gently apply pressure and maintain this pressure with your leg until you get the desired result and the horse moves its hip to the inside (away from your leg).
The first few times you try this, your horse will try one or a combination of several things:
• Speed up; trot off (run through your hands);
• Put its head in the air and wiggle its body around; and/or
• Push back against your leg.
When this happens – and it will – tell your horse to walk, increase the contact on the horse’s face with your hands, have the horse put its head back down, and maintain the leg pressure with the outside leg.
If you release all your aids when your horse has a problem, you only teach it that it can get out of doing the exercise by behaving badly.
Walk the length of the wall/fence, maintaining the hip in aid. Be patient; you may only get a small step or two at first. When you get to the end, turn around and go back down the fence the same way, making your horse move off your outside leg.
Do this two or three times each way. Then, as your horse starts to respond correctly to your aid, you can release the contact on its face and ease off on the leg pressure. Let your horse walk for a couple of strides and then repeat the hip-in.
As your horse gets more comfortable doing this exercise at the walk, and can walk the length of the fence with its hip in quietly and easily, move onto asking for this at the jog.
Use all the same aids as before, but make sure that you have the horse jogging well before you ask for the hip in.
You may find that your horse will react as it did when you first started at the walk, but again, be patient and your horse will figure out what you are asking. When your horse will walk and jog quietly and comfortably, you are now ready for the lope.
Work on the Circle
Now move onto a circle, about 60 ft. across. Walk the circle doing your hip-in exercise the whole way around the circle, making sure the head, neck, and shoulders are straight with the hip in.
Move into the jog, doing the same exercise until the horse will jog quietly on the circle with the hip in.
Important: Remember to give your horse a break. If they are doing what you want, give them a break before they mess up. A horse will learn more with positive feedback rather than feeling like there is no release. Let them walk on a loose rein and relax, or let them stand still and relax.
When your horse is relaxed doing the hip-in at the jog on the circle, the next step is to lope. On a green horse, you will have to allow them to jog more forward than it has before, but not to run off at the trot.
Keep the horse straight up front, soft in its face, and then add your outside leg. Give the horse your cue to lope (ie. a kiss noise) and keep asking until the horse lopes.
When he lopes, ease off on your hands and your leg, but don’t take your leg away totally as your horse needs your leg there for support, and you’ll need it to get your horse to lope correctly down a long wall.
Your horse may only lope for a couple of strides (on a young horse) or on an older horse, it may lope up to a complete circle. However, if your horse breaks, don’t worry about it. Organize yourself and your horse and try again.
Keep working the circle until every time you ask your horse to lope, it takes the correct lead. If you find yourself or the horse getting frustrated, take a break, walk around and do something different, or even put the horse away and try again tomorrow. Horses always learn more if you quit on a positive, rather than a negative, note.
Just remember, this will take time as nothing happens overnight and this is just one method of many to choose from.
Lisa Schiestel is a recognized AQHA Professional Horseman training at Silver Line Farms near Sylvan Lake, Alberta. She raises and trains Quarter Horses with western pleasure and hunter under saddle influence. Her band of broodmares has raised futurity winners, NSBA money earners, and several AQHA show point earners, not to mention an AQHA Congress finalist. For more details, her website is linked to www.cowboyin.com.
