Buckaroo Leather Newsletter Issue#23 Vol. 1

Published: Sun, 04/24/11

Buckaroo Leather Newsletter-the Newsletter to Demand!!!!

Issue #23

Western Lifestyle

Amy Allen-barefoot trim

Farah DeJohnette

Denny Chapman

Kathleen Lindley

What do Latigo , Cinch Straps and Billets have in Common?

In the horse tack world Latigo, Cinch Straps and Billets are synonyms.

They typically refer to the leather or synthetic material straps that fasten the Saddle around the horse's girth.

On western style Saddles, the latigo, or cinch tie strap, is the strap that connects the cinch to the saddle's rigging. They are usually 1 ½ to 2 inches wide and about 6 feet long. In addition to the traditional leather, they are now also being made of synthetics such as nylon webbing. While nylon is strong and wears well, many feel it is prone to causing sores.

The Barefoot trim - the sole

An important part of the natural barefoot trim is how the sole of the hoof is trimmed (pictured above). This horse was in shoes, I should say a shoe as only one was still on, and I am going to do a natural barefoot trim. As you can see in the photos, the sole was not trimmed as there was no reason to take any sole. Live sole should be left intact, any cracking powdery sole can be removed, but live sole should not be removed as the horse needs it for protection, support and proper hoof function. I trimmed the hoof wall and bars, balanced the heels and rolled the entire wall. I set the horse up to heal and for the hoof to change from long toe and under run heels to a correct, balanced hoof.

Again a long stretched toe, you can see the stretched white line (picture above), the heels are too far forward, look at the heel and then look at the back of the frog, the heel bulbs are sticking out, also notice one is bigger than the other. The next photo is the same hoof three trims later. Again, only trimming hoof wall and bars, balancing the heels, rolling the hoof wall and not removing live sole. This horse is starting to develop a calloused sole and instead of being flat its starting to have concavity, the contracted forward heels have come back to where they should be aligning with the heel bulbs. There is more happening inside that we can't see, the changes on the outside show us the inside is realigning for correct bone alignment and a correct balanced, functional hoof.

This oblique view (pictured above) of the hoof shows us the toe callus that is building and the concavity this horse is developing as he grows in a new healthy hoof. The weight of the horse is supported by the frog and heel bulbs combined as he lands heel first, then the combination of the hoof wall, and the sole that is along the hoof wall. You can see in this photo where the horse is landing and building that calloused sole around the outer rim of his hoof. Again, there is no reason to remove the live sole, if I did I would make the horse sore.

Think of your own feet. If you were to take off your shoes and start walking around barefoot, at first you would be tender footed, then you would start to develop callouses and soon you would be able to walk around on most anything. If you then went in for a pedicure, had all your callouses removed plus a few layers of skin, your feet would hurt and you would have to rebuild all that skin and callous before you could walk on most anything again. This is how it is for the horse. To remove live, and or calloused, sole will make a horse sore and require shoes.

Makes you wonder, why are we trimming and thinning the soles of horses when they need that sole? There is an old saying that form follows function. The form of a healthy, balanced, bare sole has some concavity, thickness and callus. The function is to allow a horse to move in comfort and is an integral part of a healthy bare hoof.

Farah DeJohnette
St. Vincent's Clinic

4/24/11

Farah DeJohnette

Jack, Elena, and Darling in their pasture overlooking the ocean

St. Vincent' Clinic

Farah has recently been involved with a clinic in St Vincent's by Stina Herberg. On Farah's blog she wrote a 6 part series about her experiences. Including wonderful videos and photos. Here is excerpt from this series......

I met Stina through Carolyn Resnick as I have met many great people through her work. I knew I had to go to St. Vincent as soon as I saw Stina's videos. Who doesn't think that! I couldn't remember exactly how we connected but I do remember her asking me about doing a clinic about a year ago and I said YES immediately! Where do I sign up?, how do I make this happen?!

There are times in your life when you "know" something is meant to be and you are not sure why but you just know you are supposed to do it and it will be a great experience and you trust that.

This first clinic was exactly what I envisioned and so much more! Stina and I share a vision, passion, and spirit that was inspiring, fun, and magical to create around. Her herd was incredible to work with as I got to know each one during the clinic by working with them on various Rituals and Exercises. Darling, her lead mare was especially wonderful to have as a teaching partner and I dubbed her my Caribbean horse partner! The people that attended the clinic some of which were students of mine and some which were new to me, were a wonderful mix horse lovers who share the same ideas about how we want to be and work with our horses.

We inspired and learned from each other and the horses. Once I studied the environment and mix of people and horses I had, I was able to let the students and horses guide the lessons and teaching. As always I learned by staying open and flexible, valuable lessons presented themselves in each moment and we explored them as such. I could not have done this without having such a great combination of participants because although we had a program, we had some great spontaneous activities woven in too which added to the magical fun.

I know we throw around the word Magic a lot and I'll tell you why it was magical. Time seems to stand still there, it allows us to fully explore things in the moment, the environment is so beautiful, it soothes you mind and soul. The freedom of the horses to express who they are and participate in the class as willing teachers makes the exercises a joy and full of unexpected surprises and offers from them. It shows me yet again the Magic that horses bring to all those who are blessed enough to share their lives with them.

Once Stina and I got together it was clear that we had kindred spirits and vision and an insatiable appetite for fun and adventure! I knew this was the first but certainly not the last clinic. In fact, I think we came up with about 900 plus! I had to tell her to write them down because we kept coming up with so many! So we'll keep you posted on our next one which could be as soon as November 2011. Please contact me if you are interested at this link http://fdhorsetraining.com/Contactfdt.html

Visit Farah DeJohnette's website, blog, and video horse training. You can also follow her on facebook

Denny Chapman

Congratulations!!!

4/24/11

Buckaroo John

Buckaroo Leather endorsee Denny Chapman is on a winning streak!!! Buckaroo Leather would like to congratulate Denny on his many outstanding accomplishments.

Denny won his division at the Cowboy Mounted Shooting Association's South Central Regional Championships as well as the Reserve National Rifle Championship, Top Cowboy and top lever-action rifle shooter in the CMSA Rifle National Finals.

Denny Chapman was also crowned the 2011 Eastern United States SASS Men's Open Class Extreme Mounted Shooting Champion.

He also hit another grand slam by winning Men's Level 5, High Point Cowboy, Mounted Rifle Champ and Overall High Point competitor at the Bay Area Bandits SASS Mounted Shooting event in Florida

And of course all using Buckaroo Leather Tack!!

Are You a Fan of Denny Chapman?

Enter the Gift of the Horse Contest- Here is the information-

Tell us why you are Denny Chapman's biggest fan and you could win the ultimate Denny Chapman prize package!
Click Here to find out how to enter, rules, and prize package.

In case you are not familiar with Denny he is a national champion of mounted shooting and a world famous specialty trainer, who has endorsed Buckaroo Leather's quality leather horse tack!

Denny Chapman is a professional announcer and equine entertainer, trainer and clinician with more than 20 years in the industry.

A member of the famed Old Timers Rodeo and Wild West Performers Club and the prestigious former Wild West Arts Club in Las Vegas, Denny has served as a mounted shooting, trick horse and trick riding clinician and performer for many major equine events including Equine Affaire in Columbus OH and the Can-Am Equine Emporium in Ontario, Canada. He has entertained at professional sporting events and has also served as the featured performer as the "Singing Cowboy" in the famous Kentucky Horse Park's "Best of the West" show.

Denny also stared in the TV Show "Top Shot" by The History Channel.

He is one of the most recognized figures in the sport of Mounted Shooting as a competitor, announcer and clinician and recently won the title of 2009 Florida State SASS Rifle and Open Class Extreme Mounted Shooting Champion. Denny has also competed within the ranks of the American Quarter Horse Association, the National Reining Horse Association, the World Foundation Quarter Horse Association, the United States Team Roping Championships, and is one of the few certified male side saddle instructors in the country.

I encourage all you buckaroo and buckarettes to visit Denny's website, DennyChapman.com, follow him on facebook and sign up for his blog. His website has some videos of his performances and more information on his classes and clinics.

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Kathleen Lindley Horsemanship

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4/24/11

Kathleen Lindley

Buckaroo Leather is proud to work with Kathleen Lindley. She has worked with another horse trainer, Mark Rashid. and has 10 years of horsemanship and is a true credit to the horse training profession.

Kathleen has lived, breathed and dreamed horses all her life. She spent much of her childhood in the American Midwest showing hunters and jumpers and riding the farm roads of rural Wisconsin in the summer. After her graduation from high school, she became a professional hunter/jumper trainer, taking horses and clients to shows in the Midwest.

Kathleen relocated to Colorado in 1994, and there met the horse who would change the course of her horsemanship. Ashcroft was a sale project, who Kathleen intended to train and sell as a show hunter. Kathleen worked with Ashcroft for two years with little progress. When everything she knew how to do didn't work, she figured she'd have to perhaps do some things with him that she didn't yet know how to do.

Once the decision was made to improve her horsemanship, she found author and clinician Mark Rashid, with whom she spent the next 10 years studying horsemanship, the last two years as his full-time assistant. During her time with Mark, Kathleen wrote her first book, "In the Company of Horses" and with Mark co-authored "A Life With Horses".

In 2007, Kathleen embarked on a solo career offering horsemanship and jumping clinics in the US and UK. She completes about 32 clinics each year and winters with her horses in South Carolina where she foxhunts with The Camden Hunt and shows hunters.

Kathleen still lives, breathes and dreams horses. She has dedicated her life to finding clear, fair and honest ways of working with horses. She works at her craft every day, with horses, with riders and in life.

Below is an excerpt from Kathleen's blog. I encourage you to sign up for her monthly training newsletter and take a look at her monthly training clinics.

What is"Broke"?

I was talking to a friend of mine on the phone this year. I was driving somewhere on the east coast, and several of my friends were preparing to load up and head off to Mule Days in Benson, North Carolina. My friend was trying to decide whether to take his older, "broke" horse to Benson or his younger, less "broke" horse. In the end, he decided he better take the older horse because, "Things could get pretty sideways and a guy could fall off that horse and he plumb won't leave you in the street."

We had a good laugh about that at the time. It kind of stuck with me though, and I got to thinking about it a bit more, as I sometimes do with stuff like that. Sometimes the profound is hiding in the mundane.

Isn't that what we ALL want, in one way or another? We all want a horse who won't leave us. We'd like him to stay with us physically, of course, and better yet, we'd like him to stay with us mentally.

So I got to thinking about what a "broke" horse is. Now, I don't tend to get hung up on that word anymore. That's not to say I like it, but it's the term horsemen usually use to describe a good, solid, well-trained horse. Rather than fight about the word, let's just move on and talk about the concept.

I'd guess that a broke horse is different for different people. Actually, I'm pretty sure about that. "Broke" does mean different things to different people. The important thing is that WE know what broke means for us and our horse.

So maybe each of us needs to go through at some point and look at what it is our horse needs to be, to know and to be able to do to be considered broke in our world. If he's not broke, then we need to help him with that to the best of our ability. It could be that he simply doesn't have the mind that we wish he had (but someone else would think is perfect), or maybe he doesn't have the training or experience that would help him be broke in our world.

Now right here one of the things we're touching on is something my friend Jim calls "deciding what the standard is". Jim's got in his mind ultimately how he'd like a horse to do all the tasks he's being asked to do. That's "the standard". So Jim might ask me how my new horse loaded, say, and I might answer, "We've got a little ways to go to standard." Or we might look at a quiet, hipshot horse tied to a hitch rail and point it out as very "to the standard".

So as I think about how broke my horses are (or aren't), I'm talking about that standard, really. Here, I will use myself as an example, because I'm not that comfortable speaking for anyone else. I mostly clinic with my horses, but then I do some other things as well, like foxhunting, starting colts/ponying babies, jumping and horse showing.

So this is what I'm going to look for in my broke or potential-to-be-broke clinic horse. This is by no means a cut and dried thing because there are so many variables. It might be okay for a horse to be weak in one area if he's super-strong in another. And I'm certainly not going to worry about something that's superficial and easily changed. What follows is certainly not an exhaustive list of what makes a broke horse in my world, but it's a start and a general framework for the sake of provoking thought and discussion.

I'm going to start with the mind. Sometimes we can get distracted from this by a horse's resume, his history, his physical talents or even his color. I want a horse with a quiet basic disposition, a horse who's quiet in the pasture when he thinks no one's looking. He gets along well with other horses and is quiet around food. If he can share food that makes him even better as a traveling clinic horse. When things are going on around him, his predisposition is to think and figure things out rather than panic.

My broke horse is good on the ground. He ties, anywhere, any time. He's quiet when he's tied, he doesn't chew on anything or paw or get impatient. He doesn't tear up my stuff. He leads softly, gives me my space, and can yield his when asked. He doesn't run people over or bang into them. He catches and halters any time any where. For me, my broke horse accepts a blanket loose in the field.

More than anything my broke horse doesn't hurt anyone; in particular, my equine health care professionals like the vet, chiropractor and/or farrier. This, for me, is non-negotiable. We'll be talking more about this in the future.

My broke horse loads. Any time, any where, without a struggle. He's quiet in the trailer and only comes out when he gets the cue.

Then there's riding. My broke horse saddles, bridles and mounts quietly. He goes, stops, turns left, turns right and backs up as softly and nicely as he can for the level he's presently at. The "standard" for this work will change as the horse advances in his age and training.

Depending on what "extra" job my horse is going to do, there'll be some other stuff in which he needs to have or to gain some degree of mastery. For example, horses who pony other horses need to be relatively "flat" (emotionally unresponsive) to the other horse while doing that job. That's not the time for herd dynamics. Horses who jump need to be careful with their legs and soft in the bridle in front of and after the jumps. Foxhunting horses need to be terribly kind to hounds no matter what the hounds do.

At the end of the day, my broke horse seems to exude a patient, "what can I do for you today?" attitude and he has the skills, training and experience to deliver more times than not.

Your description of what a broke horse is in your world might be very different than mine. A working cowboy is going to have a different description of a broke horse, as will a Grand Prix dressage rider. Neither description is "wrong" nor "right", they're just different perspectives, that's all. Different perspectives from different worlds; all valid to those who hold them.

I think like most all things in horsemanship, we need to know what we're looking for. If we don't have a clear picture of what we're looking for, this can lead to frustration, disappointment and general unhappiness for everyone involved. I don't know that it's fair to the horse to not know what we want/need and how we're going to help him get there (or not, as the case may be).

In the end, I think what we all want is a horse who won't leave us, who can stay with us, who WANTS to be with us. That doesn't just happen. It seems to come from a slightly mysterious combination of natural predisposition, training, and experience. That goes for the person AND the horse.

So, what is broke in your world?

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