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  Discussion on Weaving along the trail
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Posted on Monday, Jul 3, 2000 - 10:31 pm:

Hello--I know very little about horse training, so would be most interested in some advice.

My mare does enjoy trail riding, with or without other horses. However, (and I realize this must be some kind of highly effective horsey-stalling tactic,) when I do take her out alone it is nearly impossible to get her to "walk a straight line". She constantly goes to the right, then the left and on and on,and usually at a snail's pace to boot! On the positive side , I get a good work out just trying to keep her moving along in a straight direction, but geez, it's getting annoying. Suggestions?

Posted on Tuesday, Jul 4, 2000 - 1:27 pm:

Hi Beth/Jacque :-)

I know just how annoying that is---I had a gelding once who would do a "snake trail" when we were out alone on the trail and it was work just to make any forward progress! One thing you might try, and it worked on this gelding, is to pick a point in the distance--a tree, post, whatever, and *ride to it*. By that, I mean aim your body at it and lock your eyes on it. I found that as I focussed on a very specific destination, my gelding began to line out and follow that focus. Almost immediately he ceased making those big left and right swings, and then it became just a little side to side motion that eventually straightened out. I think part of it is that when you feel you've given as small a cue as possible and the horse is still way over-responding, there's a tendency to keep looking at his head. ("What's up with you--you know I didn't want a whole turn!" :-D) When your eyes are on his head, it's harder for him to get a feel for where you want to go.
When I got to my tree, I'd pick another point and ride to it, and so on through the ride. It really seemed to help; I also think that when my focus was on the destination rather than being annoyed at my horse, my cues probably stayed a little softer.

There is another thing you can try if this doesn't solve the problem. A technique Mark Rashid uses that works beautifully, is to simply let her turn in the direction she thinks she wants to go, only *continue* the turn until you are back traveling in the direction YOU wanted to go again. This way, there's no fighting, no constant correction, no annoyance. Do this every time with a pleasant attitude of "okay, if you want to go left, we'll go left", and pretty soon she'll see that she's making a whole lot more steps and still ending up going the original direction. Plus, you get practice at making nice, light circles.

It sounds like you have a great attitude and haven't let this spoil your rides, but I hope these ideas will be of some help.

Amy Coffman

Posted on Tuesday, Jul 4, 2000 - 3:24 pm:

Thanks Amy! Those are wonderful suggestions! I'll give them a try and let you know how things go! Wish I could ride today, but too many firecrackers going off for my comfort level!'
Thanks again!
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