Actually, I don’t really “train” my horses to stand still at liberty for grooming, etc., they just seem to do it. Usually I spend about 20 minutes grooming before I ride or play with each horse. I bring them into the parking lot and use the back of my SUV as a tack room to take advantage of sun or shade as weather dictates. When I moved to this farm, I started using a halter and line and just dropping the line when I groomed and tacked up. When the horse stepped away, I just brought him back gently as often as necessary, saying “come back here, darling” in a conversational voice and rewarding the return to the original position with a treat. That was how it started. Over time, as I got used to doing it, I stopped using the halter with new horses very quickly and used just body language and occasional treats to keep horses with me.

Now, when they are standing “naked,” if they leave, most of the time they turn around and return to their spot as soon as I ask them and I don’t even have to move to get them back. It feels so cool. By the way, I find using the endearment helps me keep my tone in a soft pitch. This ritual has become so habitual that even new horses stand at liberty for grooming and tacking without my consciously training them to do so. I don’t even think about it any more.

A recent case-in-point is this story. I have two thirty-something rescues in my care. A girl I know adopted them from a local rescue operation last spring. They were her first horses and way too much for her. First, they were in bad physical shape (body score 1 and 2). Second, the old chestnut TWH gelding is proud-cut or a ridgling with plenty of testosterone and no manners. Third, the black Morgan-cross mare is a chronic founder horse prone to abscesses which my friend was clueless about treating (and her vet was not much better!). Fourth, both horses were so wired they who would walk right over you when you tried to constrain them. Fifth, the two were inseperable — literally. They were much too challenging for a complete novice to deal with. The rescue organization (too many horses and no sense of responsibility) refused to take them back. They arrived at my farm last August, still body score 1 and 2 despite the girl’s best efforts. Getting and keeping them healthy has been time-consuming, not to mention expensive. I have not spent as much time with them as they need, just enough to win their trust and make them easier to handle.

After a few months of rehab in a small 4 acre paddock, I turned them out with my herd. Big mistake! That unattractive, skinny old TWH turned out to be a babe magnet. In a short time he had himself a small harem of four magnificent 3 and 4 year old TB mares. All the weight he’d gained melted off his frame from his non-stop efforts to keep the other geldings away from his gals. And the old black mare re-foundered trying to keep up.

After addressing her laminitis (this bout resolved relatively quickly thanks to IV DMSO, Bute, Ulcerguard and a genius farrier, although there is evidence of degenerative bone disease in her right fore coffin bone from which she will never recover), the pair went back to their small field, where they remain. They come into the barn when it storms, where they happily share a 12 x 24 foaling stall. Usually I walk with them at liberty from paddock to barn, a distance of just about 100 yards. Just the other day, as I was returning them to their paddock, I decided to groom the gelding.

The point of my tale is this: When the old horses walked out of the barn with me at liberty, I put the mare into the paddock, closed the gate, and began to groom the gelding as he stood in the open area in front of the paddock. He stood relaxed and still, calmly watching some yearlings frolic in a nearby field, clearly enjoying the curry and brush. I rubbed off pounds of shedding winter coat, which fell in small hills of orange-grey fluff. Ten minutes into the grooming, the old horse had still not moved a step. I suddenly realized I’d never before groomed this horse at liberty.

I just joined the Box program to start this November… I am very excited and figuring things out on the website.

Reading this blog, I am intrigued.. grooming at liberty is what I have done all my life. Out of necessity. I have not ever had the opportunity of a barn, stall or arena.. As a young teen back in the late 60′s and early 70′s I would pour over the Western Horseman magazines as a little girl and dream of a barn and stall. I would draw and design what it might look like and some day have one..

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Yet, I realize, I was blessed with making do with just a huge field and barbed wire fence and 9 horses when I was young. WE fed at liberty.
We had nothing to tie too. So the horse would stand to get groomed. We would find a rock to stand on to get up on our horses. or I asked my gelding to drop his head, and would climb up on his neck. He would lift his neck and I would slide to his back.. Cross -tying, I did not understand..I was told that is so the horse can not pin you against the post…

Dear Carolyn,

I am excited to join your group in learning more about my self and my horses..
Horses in some way have always been apart of my life..
If I did not have one, I found a way to be around them….regardless, I just did what I felt was right,
 No formal training of any kind. I had a great 4- h program growing up.. But No $$ or parent support.
My father sold my horse twice.  once, I came home from a week at summer camp and my horse I had had since I was 9 was sold. That horse broke out of his new home and ran 6 miles home 4 times. When ever he got out, he ran away.
I was able to buy him back at age 23 skinny and dull in his eyes. I was able to give him a home, until one day I came home from College at Thanksgiving and all the horse were gone… !!
Dad had sold them at the auction yard.
 
I  did what I could as a kid. I rode  bareback, did not have a saddle at the 4- h shows.  In my teens I rode and conditioned for a family that trained for the Tevis Cup that was in the 70’s. Then in my 20/s I was given my gelding “Sun”…he was 1 years old…He was given away due to the fall out of the Arabian breeding era… .He came from Carmel Valley area. I have had him ever since.. Photo’s attached from last fall.

When I hike, he runs free, I tail him up the hills, ect.. I hop on when I want to ride or trot out and make time. He is now 27 and our outings are fewer, he is still sound.
I made some type of mistake some where along the way in the past years.. He is concerned and not trusting when it comes to his food.
He puts his ears back when I walk over and pour his treats into the pan, He is fine until I walk away then he throws his head up and puts his ears back. Expressing “go away… this is my food”
I had two molars pulled and now maybe his teeth need floating again. This is the only thing I can think of.. He is protecting his food… I have an older gelding on the property as well.
Sun  will walk over to the other gelding when he is done and slowly pull the pan away as the other gelding is eating.. No aggression there.. Just “ I will sneak in here and share with you”!  The other gelding is a 24 year old police horse.. He is learning about being at liberty in a field, feeding time and other kind things while being a companion horse to my gelding. Horses come and go to my pasture. For injury rehab and temporary pasture situations.

I am now presented with a 4 year old gelding needing a home.
He is  a conamara/arab on the sire’s side and TB on the dams. He needs a home. Horse seem to find me…
What I did with my gelding over the years, I just did… We are like two buddies. I am now helping a 9 year old daughter of my friends be introduce to horses. She has developmental disabilities and my Gelding “ Sun”  just loves her. He is sweet as can be with her. She is gaining all kinds of confidence in her self!!

I have not ever had a barn or stable setting. The horses have always been  in an open field,  39 acres with a a water trough pond, hills and riparian area with lots of Oak trees. and that is it.
Horses are at liberty feeding time and when ever entering the property. Or when I work with them. We hike around, lead, ride and just hang out.
I want to bring the new gelding along in a positive manner to his new home.  Just as I did Sun when he was one..

I am older now, and want to do things safely and helpful for this young gelding…I work full time, so I do not have the same flexible hours of a young college student. This gelding I feel is my next love… A waif that needs a home. I met him for only 20 minutes and had to leave.

 The young gal who owns him, breed and breed her stallion and now has 7 horses on the property. NO one is trained and they need homes. She has her own children 2 & 6 going to school and trying to run a business.  She is kind and doing all she can to keep everyone happy and healthy.

I signed up for the box program… Wanting to learn more.. At age 53, slow down tune in to my love of horses.. I was thrilled to come across your website.. Hear the stories, view the video’s and view the watering hole. Now I need to read your book. I have read Tom Dorrances book now looking forward to reading yours.

Until next time,

Celia McCormack

So I spent the next week just hanging out in the pasture 8 hours a day learning to read the horses and what they were telling each other. Well I learned she was telling me extreme fear. But it did not make her bolt away type fear it was something else and it was up to me to figure it out.

Thanks to you I finally did. The poor girl is having massive hormonal problems she would cycle thru false pregnancys monthly and her mamary glands were so swollen and full it was painful for her. We now have her on meds to prevent this and she is a new horse. No more pain and no more wild hormone swings. I just ordered your at the watering hole dvds and can’t wait to learn more

I have passed you Naked Liberrty book on to several other people who after reading it thier experience with ther horse has changed. As a group we are going to work together learning to be more attuned to what our horses are telling us..
Thank you!!!