Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

> In the old Tony Gonzales horse shoeing book he claimed that the horse 
> wo=
> uld have the bigger foot on his favorite side, and his mane would fall 
> t=
> o his "low" or unfavored side

I always heard this too.... and I also heard that you can tell the 
horses dominant side by which direction the cowlick on their forehead 
swirled.  I figured both were just old wives tales UNTIL I had a horse 
whose mane fell on both sides, and her cowlick went both directions.  
She was absolutely ambidexterous.

It was impossible to tell which lead she was in when you were in the 
saddle unless you watched her shoulders very carefully.  She could 
switch back and forth, and you'd never know it...she felt the same in 
each lead.  She could counter-canter in a six foot circle and never 
lose her footing (Something a cutter friend of mine envied no end)

This mare had spent her first 9 years doing nothing but arena work, and 
when I got her, it was everything but.  She never lost her 
two-sidedness, and was a dream to ride through tree lined serpentines 
at high speed.  Talk about bugs in the teeth! (Remember Heidi? Alan 
STILL talks about that gallop at Kalama as being one of his favorite 
Nirvana rides *grin*)

So, anyone else out there ever run into an ambidexterous horse? Any 
truth to those old wives tales?

Julie


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