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Re: [RC] [RC] [Guest] making horses braver - Deanna GermanSteph - I *like* my animals to be *too smart for their own good*. I'm wired to deal with that. But I agree totally with you about the blonde part. As you can see from my posts, I'm not wired to deal with that. My 1/8 Saddlebred mare is very "blonde" (the chestnut gene is very close to palamino after all); not stupid, just ditzy and overly dramatic. She comes by it honestly since her momma (where the ASB comes from) is even blonder (even though she's a bay pinto). Salina can stand in a pasture all day with her blanket all wopper-jawed, with leg straps dangling around her hocks, get her lead rope hung up on all sorts of things while standing tied, wrap her legs up with lunge lines in training, have coolers and rain sheets slide off her back or get blown over her head while camping, all without making a fuss, just waiting patiently for a human to come along and rescue her. Give her an audience and some ride excitement and she turns into a blonde drama queen. The birdie flies and it can take some stern commands to get it to come zinging back. I've been around lots of purebred Arabs and lots of Arab/ASB crosses and the ones with ASB all seem to act a little blonde and the birdie flies far and often. About gaiting, the funny thing is, I think I could get Salina to do some sort of a running walk with a little work if that's what I wanted. The part-ASB brain makes me crazy, but I love the fast walk and the big gaits that comes with it. At this CTR we just did, we followed a beautiful moving TWH on trail for a while. He was really moving out and the next time we walked, Salina immitated the head-bob and stride and matched his walk stride for stride. It was cool. I *like* seeing breeds other than Arabs and Arab crosses doing distance riding sports. So I'm not knocking gaited horses, folks. If you're here on RC and y'all have gaited horses, get thee to an endurance ride, LD or CTR! Just do it! Deanna ------------------------------------ I was trying not to comment on this, but I can't resist. Saddlebreds are not all *gaited* breeds. There is are a few five gaited stud lines where they've been crossed with Racking horses way back, but the majority of Saddlebreds are *not* gaited animals. 5 gaited saddlebreds bring a premium price and I would be quite shocked to find one in endurance, just because they're so expensive. I've seen one mare go for less than 10,000 and she was a psycho that came near to killing a few people. Saddlebreds do *not* think like Arabs. Everyone I've known, probably somewhere close to 60 were the dumb blondes of horses. Every Arab I've known was too smart for it's own good. You can (and people do) beat and abuse Saddlebreds into doing what they want. Try that with an Arab! Steph =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= http://www.endurance.net/ads/seabiscuit.html Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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