New Buggy Club in Indiana

 New Buggy Club in Indiana

Written By: Bonnie Marlewski-Probert

"Hello, I have recently started a buggy club in Southern Indiana and I am also a new subscriber. I have enjoyed your articles since I am trying something new in breaking my own horse to drive. So far the only problem I have encountered is she paws a lot when standing tied. If you have any suggestions they would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks, Ed"

Dear Ed,

Thank you for the kind words and congratulations on starting your buggy club. If you need help or would like to connect with other buggy clubs around the United States, let me know and I would be happy to include your club?s name and address in an upcoming column so that others can contact you directly. Incidentally, I am happy to do that with any other clubs that would like to connect with driving enthusiasts around the country.

As for breaking your new driving horse, I would make several suggestions. First, as it pertains to the growth and development of your club in the years to come. You will always have members who are training their first driving horse and for their benefit, I would recommend to them and to you that you work on building a library of books and videos that could be rented by your future members. The American Driving Society (ADS) has an extensive to choose from.

Also, I would recommend that you seek out the help of driving professionals in your area. By professionals, I mean, folks who make a living with their horses. This could include farmers who use draft teams to plow with, show ring trainers or the Amish. Since you are starting a new club, it would be helpful for you to interview as many professionals in the area and start to build relationships with those that you feel comfortable with. After all, in the years to come, you will have many club members who will be in need of those same services, so, if you are nervous about exploring these things for yourself, think of it as information gathering for your members.

From your note, it sounds like you are enjoying success with your horse. The general trick to training any horse is to have a plan, be patient, have a backup plan just in case things don?t go according to plan and always leave the training session on a good note. As for the pawing, this is generally a sign of boredom or anxiousness. In both cases, it reflects a lack of concentration on the part of the horse. If the horse were totally focused on you or on the job at hand, she wouldn?t have time to paw at the ground. I would suggest a few things that will help solve the problem. First, recognize that if you are working with a young horse, you are also working with a shorter attention span than you will find with an older, seasoned animal. For this reason, I recommend keeping the training sessions short and concentrated. Start by asking the mare to stand for just a few seconds in harness before asking her to walk off. Each time you stop her, ask her to stand for a second or two longer. If she is particularly antsy, you can enlist the help of a groundsperson. They can either clip on a leadline and help you encourage her to stand still while in harness or often times, just their presence at the head of the horse will be enough to keep the mare focused and steady.

Another trick is to put verbal commands on your mare, including stand and whoa, along with the normal driving verbal commands. Stand is a great word to use when you need to steady a halted horse in harness or under saddle for that matter. It also works on the crossties. Quit is another verbal command that I use on all of the horses that I work with. Quit is a "cease and desist" command that comes in handy when a horse is pawing, trying to bite, or just misbehaving in general.

The Whoa command is very handy when you are trying to communicate to the mare that even though she is stopped, that doesn?t mean she can allow her mind to wander. By saying WHOA to her when you start to feel or see her rocking forward or back in preparation of taking a step, you will keep her mind focused and when you do that, she won?t be interested in pawing.

In may book, "Debugging Your Horse," there is a lot of information on the use of verbals and a step-by-step explanation of how to put them on your horse.

As a trainer, the more levels of easy to understand communication you can establish between you and your horse, the better. Especially when you are working with a green animal. So often is the case that as you move forward in the training process, you are entering territory that is completely new to your horse. It is at these times that all those layers of communication will pay off big. In my case, I build at least four major levels of communication on each horse that I work with. This allows me to bridge the gap of confusion when we enter into uncharted waters in the horse?s training. In brief, I establish a full set of verbal commands, a set of physical body positions on the lunge line, another set on the lead line and another very full set under saddle. There are additional levels that are establishing when in harness and the combination of all of these will help you clarify any new request by minimizing the confusion for the horse.

The easier and less complicated you make the training, the sooner you will own a well broke horse. As a rule, horses are happy to please, but if you confuse them or make the exercise so difficult that they can?t find success, you will have a sour horse in a short time.

One final training tip I would like to share with you has to do with re-hab work. It is always easier to train a horse than it is to untrain one. By this I mean, if you take short cuts in your training program, or have no plan, you will teach your horse bad and sometimes, dangerous habits. In order to fix those, you will need to un-train the bad habit and replace it with a good one. This is what I call re-hab work and it is the hardest job in the horse world (short of running a barn!) Whenever you can train a horse right in the first place, that is always the easiest road in the long run. Take your time, think things through, have a plan and a back-up plan, be patient and always leave it on a good note. If you incorporate these ideas into your training program you will find that training a driving horse is like playing a good game of chess. It is mentally stimulating for everyone, will completely focus your concentration and it is exhilarating for you and your horse.

I want to hear from you! If you have any questions, comments or suggestions that you would like to share with the rest of us, drop me a line at:

Bonnie Marlewski-Probert

P.O. Box 548   

Yellville, AR  72687

Or you can contact me directly on the Internet at BRMP@AOL.com