smellshorsey

Be Careful How You Tie Your Horse

  You don't have to fall off a horse to get hurt. A girl on the University of South Carolina Equestrian Team (pictured jumping grey horse) is in critical condition after the horse she was grooming spooked, pulling loose the rail he was tied to. The rail hit Victoria Middleton in the face and knocked her to the ground, where she hit her head on concrete. You can read the story here. She is now able to track visitors with her eyes and they may take her breathing tube out tomorrow. So sad and scary!

This could have been my daughter, Lily. I can't remember to tell her everything and I certainly don't know everything to tell her. A couple of years ago she tied her horse to a fence board, not a fence post. He spooked, the board came flying and hit Lily in the face. It hurt, her lips bled and she received some cuts. But she was okay. And did learn not to do that again.

There are so many ways to look at how to tie your horse. Generally, make sure if they spook that they can get loose -- we use breakaway halters in general and little loops of hay twine that will break when we tie them to the trailer. I wish we had cross ties at home but we don't -- so we tie the horse to a fence post, not a rail, so that if they decide to "leave" unexpectedly, they will not take the fence with them. I keep a supply of halter headstalls. If somebody makes this a habit, well, they get the unbreakable halter and the unbendable tree. But I haven't had to do that with any recent horses.

And then there's the magnificent Tree of Shame. It's not ours. It's a giant oak where a friend ties her horses when they need some thinking time. And no horse is pulling it down. I don't know what they're thinking about but I've seen them there, standing quietly, I assume repenting their current transgressions. But I think the Tree of Shame is a training tool, not a tying issue. Just couldn't resist mentioning it.

Then there are the knots you use to tie your horse. Use a quick release knot, though no knot is quick enough for an event like what happened to Victoria Middleton. Lily uses a quick release she learned in 4-H and Pony Club. I use the one my father taught me -- a bowline that's modified on the last step so that you loop the rope back into the hole, leaving the end loose for a quick pull. I like it because I can remember "the rabbit comes out of the hole, goes around the tree, and back into the hole again." Instructions are here, though you need to modify the last step to make it a quick release.

Keep Victoria Middleton in your prayers. She could be any of us -- or our kids. There's a CaringBridge site you can access from the newspaper story.

Stay safe!

What Should Really be Tattooed on a Horse's Lip

It's hot, we have horseflies as big as horses and the barn fans got struck by lightning and I haven't fixed them, or the dog's invisible fence, which was on the same circuit. Poor Markus, our lovely new horse, thinks he has been sold down river. (Photo from Pony Club camp.)

Seems like everything we do to take care of him backfires. I got him way expensive gel galloping boots to protect his beautiful, precious legs. At Pony Club camp we used them for the first time. He tried to outrun the rear ones, galloping forever in a circle while the Pony Club instructors stopped all the classes nearby and Lily pulled and pulled and pulled. She looked stable and safe, in that way you tell yourself when you see your daughter on a runaway racehorse pulling to stop him to absolutely no effect. She didn't have that "I'm about to fall off look," and she looked scared but didn't panic. She couldn't hear the instructor yelling, "pulley rein!pulley rein!" and honestly I don't know how she stopped but she became famous for not dying and is greatly admired, or something, by the little girls who kept coming up to her afterwards and saying, "You're the one with the really fast horse."

The only thing worse than watching this was seeing her old horse, Buddy, come out of the woods without her. The mother sitting next to me kept saying, "Breathe! Breathe!" And I don't think I would have if she hadn't continued to remind me.

Lily thought of turning Markus into the fence to stop him, but that would have been a mistake because it was not a big fence (for him) and he would have jumped it -- and I hate to think what would have happened next. So they went round and round and round. As fast as he could go on what must have been about a 60-meter circle. I think they must have done about 30 laps but surely not. But they went round and round and Lily looked like she was getting worn out and I prayed for her safety and for her to have the sense not to bail out. He couldn't go on forever, she was stable, they were on a track of sorts, and I kept saying they can't go on forever. She's been taught the pulley rein and to pull him in a circle, but I think she lost IQ points with every lap. Neither one of us remember how she got him stopped. I am here to tell you that it wasn't because he was tired or gave up. He's not that kind of horse.

The instructor got them to stand in the center, that is, after Lily got him stopped, and that's when she noticed that he was kicking at his rear boots. So she took the fancy, save-his-legs, million-dollar, brand-new gel boots off. And he was fine from then on. Anybody need some million dollar gel boots? Will make your horse go faster!

His former rider, who was instructing from a nearby ring, watched the whole thing. And that's when she remembered the time they put rear boots on him for a show and he quit jumping. They took the rear boots off and he started jumping again.

So, while I've been trying to decipher the tattoo on his lip, just for fun, to find out who he was in the race world, I've had an epiphany: forget his Jockey Club number. What should really be tattoed on his lip is: DO NOT PUT REAR BOOTS ON THIS HORSE.