The sliding stop depends primarily upon the horse's ability to relax and sit down on his hocks through the stop, while still keeping his front feet lively, or "peddling."
   
   One of the things that I have personally found useful for teaching this concept to a  horse is to be sure to only ask the inexperienced horse to stop at an exact moment in his loping stride. For the first few months (or longer depending on the horse) I'll ask them to stop, at a lope, just at the moment their hind feet hit the
ground.  The very moment I feel the hind feet tough the ground, I put my feet a little further forward and  say, "Whoa." Asking for the sliding stop at the moment the hind feet touch the ground  gives the inexperienced horse an entire stride to first hit with his front feet, then come in under himself with a good sliding stop on his hocks. This timing also allows the horse to grow in his confidence in the stop since, even though we are asking for him to stop when we tell him to, he still has an extra half a stride in which to prepare himself. This reduces anxiety and allows him to use more power through that stop. The idea of using such timing is something I learned from Arnold Rojas in his book, "These were the Vaqueros."  

   This exact timing of asking for the stop when the hind feet touch the ground, however, is only a good idea for a short time. Once the horse has learned to confidently use his hocks during the stop every time you ask him to, you will want to do the exact opposite and ask him to stop the moment his FRONT feet hit the ground, and that is the timing you will use for the rest of the horse's life. If you continue for too long to stop with the HIND feet on the ground, you will likely teach the horse to lunge into his stop more than you want and he will likely get into the habit of bracing with his front feet like a calf roping horse would do, rather than staying light on his front feet through the stop. Once the horse is confident in stopping on his hocks, asking him to stop at the moment his FRONT feet hit the ground will take away that half-stride of preparation and cause the horse to learn to melt into his stop immediately, which in turn works well to keep the horse light on his front end.  

   This is Klay Klemic and I hope you enjoyed this little article. If you are ever near Zion National Park, I hope you will drop by for a visit at Rising K Ranch!

   A common question from our horseback riding guests is, "Do the horses enjoy coming out here on the trails and being ridden?" 
   
   The answer is that every horse is different. People, in general, are not around animals all that much; and are much more used to being around dogs than any other animal. It is natural, then for most people to assume that horses are just like a big dog. However, horses are quite a bit more subtle in their likes and dislikes than a dog is. Horses rarely enjoy going out on the trails as obviously as a dog enjoys taking a walk. While the sign of a dog enjoying a walk will be that he runs to you excitedly and maybe even brings you the leash, the horse's enjoyment will be seen in such subtle cues as a relaxed tai and ears that are perked forward.
   
   While a dog will want to be right by the master's side and go for a long hike, I think that just about any horse at any given moment, if really given his druthers, would just stop eat grass. Whenever it was a cold morning, be would run and kick up his heels for a half a hour or so; but then it would be right back to the grass. The main exception I know of to this is the cowhorse, especially in the cutting. A good cowhorse really does enjoy working a cow in as obvious a manner as a border collie enjoys it.

   Horses do, however, in their own quiet way, truly enjoy a job and a routine. Horses that have a regular job to do, such as, ranch horses, pack horses, and our trail horses, tend to be much calmer and happier in their demeanor, and even tend to have a much healthier digestive system and to be much healthier all around than a horse that does nothing but graze in a pasture year after year.

   In many ways, a horse that is treated right will like going on a ride in about the same way as you hopefully enjoy your own job. In one sense, at any given moment, you would probably rather be on a vacation somewhere; but at the same time, you want to grow in your career and find a certain enjoyment in it. It is not the same excited enjoyment as a child at Disneyland; but it is an enjoyment nonetheless.

    If you are ever in the Zion National Park or Bryce Canyon National Park part of Utah, I hope you will visit us here at Rising K Ranch and enjoy some horseback riding here on our Utah trails!

  When leading a horse, and especially when you are teaching a horse to lead correctly, you want to make it clear to the horse that, as you lead, the horse is never to go further than having the point of their nose parallel to the point of your shoulder.

   In order to teach this, I will simply lead the horse forward a few steps, and abruptly stop. I make my own body cues very clear to the horse at this stage by leaning forward a little while I am walking forward and by being abrupt and standing very erect when I stop. Keep the lead rope slack, both while you are walking and when you are stopping. We want the horse to learn to pay attention to us and our body cues; not just to learn to be dragged around with a rope. If (and when) the horse does not stop when I stop, or if the horse walks at a faster pace than me and gets her nose beyond my shoulder, I will rather abruptly (but not violently, as that will likely create problems rather than solve them) take the slack out of the lead rope to pull on the halter and back the horse up. The horse will probably still not back up, or will be very sluggish about it so I will use the tail end of the lead rope as a quirt on the horse’s chest to create some backwards momentum and back the horse up several steps. I will do this every single time the horse’s nose passes my shoulder. After a while, I will begin to have the horse also back up on a loose lead rope whenever I back up, and I will pull on the lead rope less and less, going straight to using my body position, and the lead rope as a quirt on the horse's chest rather than making the horse dull in the face. The horse must learn to read my body rather than learn to be pulled on all the time.

   When leading the horse through the gate, I will make sure that the horse learns to patiently be led rather than franticly rush past me. I will do the same thing here at the gate that we have already been doing: lead a few steps, stop, back up, and wait and be petted. If I know the horse has anxiety problems like this while walking through a gate, I’ll make sure that, for a month or so, I will make it a habit never to just walk through a gate; but to mix it up by walking partway in, then stopping, backing out and being petted at a standstill. Horses are creatures of habit, always looking for the next step, so sometimes a horse that rushes at the gate is not really even trying to be rude and is not really even scared; but just wants to do what he knows is coming next. Well then, if we make being backed up or stopped and petted in the gateway a habit, then the horse will think that what is coming next is simply to relax and take a deep breath, so he will have no reason to try to rush past you. (By the way, the same is true for horses that won’t stand still while you get in the saddle or dismount.) 

   In regards to good ground manners, leading your horse is not about being mean or rough; it is simply about being consistent and having a clear requirement for where your horse is to walk. Being strict about where your horse walks goes a long way towards making him a good horse in general. By giving your horse clear, consistent direction and a good routine full of creating good habits, your horse will begin to trust you as a leader, and have confidence in what he should doing, and will actually begin to enjoy being a good horse for you.

   If you are ever out in Utah, in the Zion National Park or Bryce Canyon National Park area, I hope you will drop in to Rising K Ranch and take a horseback ride with us!

   One of the most commonly asked questions I hear from beginners to horseback riding is, "If I am afraid, will my horse act differently?"

   The answer is ,"Yes". If you are afraid of horseback riding, the horse will certainly behave differently with you than he would with a confident rider.

   This does not necessarily mean that the horse will hurt you or run off with you; it just means that the horse will take advantage of the situation to do whatever he wants. For example, with regards to most of the horses that you would ride along the trails here at Rising K Ranch, this simply means that your horse will be a bit slower and stop to eat grass much more frequently. 

   If a horse is "green" (new to the experience of being ridden), you would have an entirely different situation. A green horse does not yet feel confident under saddle, so is much more likely to spook at a rabbit, or jacket, or even just a large boulder along the trail. For a horse like this, he will sense your fear and think to himself, "If the human, my leader, the alpha, the top of the food chain, is afraid, then there must really be something scary out here." For the green horse ,your fear will very likely cause him to want to run off towards the home barn, jump away from every bush and tree he sees, and perhaps even buck. This has been the experience of many beginner horseback riders with a well-meaning neighbor, uncle or grandfather who owns a horse and decides to let them ride. In many cases, such a person who is offering horseback ride has a horse that either never was  quite as well-trained as he likes to imagine; or the horse has just not been ridden for several moths and now is being pulled out to be ridden without any warm-up exercises.

   Such is the case of a "green" horse and such is the case with a horse that hasn't been ridden for a while. Here at Rising K Ranch, however, our horses are so used to being ridden by first-time riders, even by small, screaming children, that they no longer think in terms of, "If a human is afraid, there must be something to be afraid of." They now think instead in terms of, "The human is afraid, so I know they won't actually pull on the reins to make me stop eating. Now is my chance to eat, eat , and eat until the wrangler comes to make me stop. I bet I can get at least three mouthfuls of grass by then!"

   If you should find yourself visiting Zion National Park, or Bryce Canyon National Park, I hope you will drop by our ranch for some horseback riding out here on the Utah trails!

   The difference between feeling worn out and feeling good at the end of a horseback ride depends largely upon how you sit in the saddle. The following is advice from Klay Klemic on how to sit in the saddle:

1. Keep your heels down and toes up. This will keep your balance proper and make your horseback ride much more comfortable. Riding a horse with your heels up will take a definite toll on your back, give you a horrible leg cramp, and will make you more prone to fall off the horse if he stops suddenly (even from a walk) or if you are going down even a tiny hill or dip.

2. Sit up. You don't quite need to sit like you're on parade, but you will probably feel like that is how you're sitting. If you slouch while you ride at a walk, you will eventually hurt your back,.

3. Look where you want to go- not just at your horse's ears. This will assist you in your efforts to sit up, will help you communicate with your horse when it comes to telling him where you want him to go, and will also make your horseback ride a lot more memorable because you will be seeing so much beautiful Zion and Bryce Canyon type of country rather than just seeing your horse's ears and whatever is five feet past your horse's ears. If you're anywhere near Zion National Park, you're in some of the most beautiful country in the world, so enjoy that view!

4. Breathe. Whenever we try anything new, we have a tendency to strain, to get tense and to hold our breath. The best way for you to resist the natural tendency of tensing up is simply to force yourself to breathe. You cannot force yourself to relax, but you can force yourself to breathe, and breathing will make you relax.

5. Do not balance with the reins or the saddle horn. You will have a much better horseback ride here in Utah if you will simply trust both your horse as well as your own balance and quit gripping onto the saddle or reins for dear life.

   You physically cannot keep yourself in the saddle by means of your arms anyway. Even in a true saddlebronc/rodeo situation, balance is maintained by proper use of the seat and one hand on the bronc rein lifting straight up- never by holding as tight as you can and using brute arm strength. In addition, using the reins for balance unfairly pulls on the horse's mouth for no reason. The reins are there for communication with your horse; not for your own balance, so try to remember, your horse's mouth is sensitive- it's a mouth. You can't use it like it's a third stirrup for your balance or your horse's mouth will become desensitized and he will never know when you really want to stop or back up.

 


    Lastly, if you are horseback riding with us here at Rising K Ranch, you can be pretty confident, as our horses have all taken many first-time horseback riders of all ages on the Utah trails. 

   If you keep these five tips in mind, you will be a good ways toward having a wonderful, memorable horseback ride. If you are ever out here in Utah visiting the Zion National Park area or the Bryce Canyon National Park area, I hope you will drop in and make use of these, and many other, horseback riding tips. 

See you soon!

   Just as it would be with with us, it would be unfair and unreasonable to have a horse rest for most of the winter, going largely unexercised, only to pull him out in the Spring and expect him to be able to carry you up a mountain for twelve hours a day. Just like us, it is best to prepare a horse for physical work, conditioning his body.
   Back in the 2007-2010 range, when I was a teenager, I rode a horse named Angel almost every day, summer and winter, all over the Utah mountains and trails that surround us at Rising K Ranch. Angel is an AQHA register quarter horse and at the time she was about 10 years old. She was in average shape to begin with and is a pleasing horse to look at as far as conformation is concerned, so I wasn't starting with a lame horse or a truly out of shape horse to begin with, which is very important.
   I watched a few old western movies back then and, what was more influential, read a lot of Louis L'Amour books, leaving me with the notion that I wanted Angel to be able to ground tie anywhere no matter what, think nothing of gunfire, climb up an down practically any mountain, and be able to run for a long distance without tiring. I then read several magazines such as "Perfect Horse," "Western Horseman," and even a few Performance Horse magazines from the 1970's (I believe the best one was actually called "Performance Horse.")

    At any rate, I eventually formed an exercise regimen for my horse that consisted of walking, trotting, and loping over the course of about an hour. Thankfully, I was able to use mountain trails and valleys rather than circling the arena over and over again, which made it a lot more fun as well as better for my horse's mind. 

    The horse exercise regimen was pretty simple. I do not remember it exactly but it basically went like this:
   With a stopwatch or timer in my vest pocket I would, for the first week or so, walk a 5 minute warmup, trot 20 minutes, lope 5 minutes, trot another 20 minutes, walk the last 10 minutes to cool her off.
   The next week, I would trade some of the trotting time for loping, so that it was 7 minutes of loping instead of five. Over the course of about four months, Angel was at the point where she cold lope across the valleys for 45 minutes, and as long as the temperature was 65 or lower, she wouldn't even break a sweat doing it. Everyone who ever happened to see Angel, even if she was simply tied to the hitching rail, would undoubtedly remark how muscular she looked and how shiny her coat was, especially in the summer.
   As with all things that relate to horses, preparation, diligence, and patience are keys to success.
   Thankfully, here at Rising K Ranch, we are open all year for both summer horseback riding as well as winter horseback riding in the snow. We are certainly not as busy in the winter; but  our horses never really have to go into retirement for months at a time. 
   I hope this article has helped you in some way and I hope to ride with you someday on our Utah mountain trails, right here at Rising K Ranch!

   If you are hauling horses around; be sure to take into consideration their need to. feel well-balanced and safe. Drive without relying too much on your brakes, and be as slow as necessary on curves and switching lanes so that your horse feels safe and secure.

   It is not terribly uncommon for a horse to learn to resent the horse trailer and to learn to panic while being hauled if the horse is driven around with a bad driver. Sharp, jerky motions, turns, and stops, will not do your horse, your equipment, yourself, or other drivers on the road any favors, so take it easy and remember, you have a horse on board!

   The heeler has quite a bit more to think about than the header. The following is a description of good positioning for a heel shot.

   In the best of all possible worlds, for a good run, the steer will leave the chute and run straight in a left lead. To help ensure the steer departs on the left lead, the steer should be hazed a little toward the left. The heel horse will be about 10 feet to the right of him and will have his head alongside the steer's RIGHT hip.

   Once the steer has been headed and is being turned to the left, the heel horse should tip his nose to the left a little and his body should be in the same position as the steer's, as though mirroring the steer's movement. That is, as the steer is being pulled to the left, the heel horse should cross behind the steer so that the horse's head is now at the steer's LEFT hip.
   
   After the steer is again straightened out in a line,  the heel horse should remain in position to the side of the steer's left hip, setting the heeler up for easy speed and accuracy.

   Such positioning allows the heeler to better help direct the steer's movements and will give the heeler enough space to make whatever slight adjustments might be necessary in the moment; yet without ever getting out of position for a good heel loop.

   For many horse owners, a horse is thought of as a good friend. Unfortunately, for most of those same horse owners, that idea of a horse being a "friend" is taken to such an extreme as to create a great deal of rude, and often dangerous, behaviour. 
   While the relationship between  a horse his owner can be made into a willing partnership, this is not achieved by treating the horse like a little pet or by coddling him. It is not at all that horses are mean, it is just that they are much larger than us and they have a different set of values and a different style of communicating. If you are trying to communicate with your horse merely through "affection" or "love", you are probably speaking your own language, or a Disney language, rather than speaking a language the horse can actually understand. 
   If you want to be able to have a truly loving, willing partnership with your horse, it behooves you to learn the horse's language. This means get with a good horseman and learn from him. If you truly love your horse, see that he is trained well and, more importantly, see to it that you yourself are trained well.

   A saddle pad that fits right is an essential piece of tack. With the right saddle pad, saddle, and riding posture, you can ride a horse for tens of thousands of miles over the course of the horse's lifetime and never cause a single sore on the horse's back.    However, with a poorly fitting saddle pad, saddle, or poor riding posture, you will certainly cause sores along the horse's withers, or spine, often within an hour or less.
   For my own part, I have, for the last several years, used only two types of saddle pads. For the horse that is either very small or else is very mutton-withered or overweight, I use a "Casa Zia" saddle pad. These are simple, alpaca-wool pads that are not too thick and help keep a saddle from rolling on the back of such a horse.
   For every other horse, that is, about 95 percent of the time, I use a blanket-top felt saddle pad by "Classic Equine". These pads fit well, and are slit down the middle with a hole over the withers to allow for plenty of breathing. The wool blanket-top comes in several colors and designs so they also look very nice. Whenever I sell a horse, or help someone train a horse, especially if they are new to western horsemanship, I advise them to purchase such a saddle pad.