Re: stumbling words

["Karen Sullivan" <greymare@jps.net>]

----- Original Message -----
From: <DAldr94141@aol.com>


> Hi. A friend of mine took me under her wing and introduced me to the
> wonderful world of endurance. (I won't mention Barbs name) At my first
> endurance race, we were going on trail in the dark. The horse I was riding
> had poor sight in the dark so he was about running into trees and tripping
> over everything. Now I was nervous as it was not only because I was pretty
> new to riding with my hair on fire on trail and scared to death of
tripping
> and falling head over heels but because I was riding a horse who was as
new
> as I was to this. Anyway, my friend told me she knew someone (who's cousin
> was a good friend to someone who was related to their friends cousin, blah
> blah blah) who had a trippy horse and she used to say "HUP!" everytime she
> came to a root, large rock, etc. Well I tried it and by golly it worked. I
> wasn't nervous anymore because of his tripping and he actually listened.
> By the time you say "watch your feet" or "be careful" or "there's a root
up
> ahead so you'd better watch out for it", that horse hears "blah blah blah"
> and is tripping over that root already. So "HUP" works better for me. Try
it,
> you'll like it.
> Deb
> By the way, HUP means "Heads Up Please"
>
>
On the other hand......horses have better vision than we do, especially in
the dark.  No, I would rather
expose the horse to situations that REQUIRE it to pick up it's feet and
learn that behavior, WITHOUT
depending on me!  If it can't develop that essential survival skill in a
year or so (being able to travel rough
country WITHOUT falling down), then it is not a horse for me!  I just don't
want to worry about a horse falling
with me-been there, done that.

Plus, I eventually expect a good trail horse to truck on down the trail, on
a loose rein, at the gait I tell it too... while I drink water, turn around
and retrieve items from my cantle bag, and especially, chat and gossip with
my friends!  I'm not about to say "pick up your feet" or "hup", everytime
there is something in the trail!!!

Just my opinion,
Karen

I'll bet Bob Morris's horses, with all that ranch turnout, are relatively
surefooted.