Saddleonline-Saddle exertion & Initial Rides

When the colts are accomplishment riding age, I like to return to some of the things we have enclosed before.  We’ll work them at independence in the round corral, making sure we have nice transitions, good, horizontal turns, that the colt is moving forward with power, and that he is paying concentration to our body language.

I want these colts to jump in, stand in silence, and come out softly when asked to do so. Then we’ll ride them.  I until the end of time do the first one or two rides in the halter, with a single rope lead.  We get good, soft sideways flexing this way and it keeps us honest by disallowing us to cheat and try to stop them with 2 reins. We go through all 3 gaits, sometimes several transitions up and down, and we go both directions.

After a ride or two in the strap, when they are moving off our legs well and stopping with one rein nicely, I’ll put the snaffle on.  Again, we never try to stop these colts with two reins this early. An additional ride or so, and then they’re really listening and ready to start vertical flexing, stopping, and backing.

The 4 colts we started at the same time this meticulous year were ready for the trail on the second ride. We played around and over some obstacles in the arena first and they were so soft   we just took them for a cruise around the ranch. 

Sometimes we’ll drag substance with these colts this early. We try very hard to expose them to many poles apart things early on - when they are in a super-learning frame of mind.

After about ten rides, they are doing basic lateral arrangements like side passing and leg yields, stopping off a shift of our body weight, and are by now very, very soft in the snaffle. They will back nice circles, and do simple lead changes. From this point on we might start some work on cows, get them out on longer trail rides, perhaps head off into the Sequoia National Forest or Kings Canyon National Park.

We think this program really mechanism. And we are tremendously proud of the colts we are selling - they have superiority, emotional response, and a high-quality work ethic.