On Thu, Jan 11, 2007 at 06:09:27PM -0800, Judy Ryder wrote: > >> For the most part, the iceland-style training works on forcing gait (for > >> example, with the heavy contact), or obtaining gait mechanically, by > >> manipulating shoes, angles, weights, concussion, etc. > > > > so you say. i did not, however, see this evident in the one > > shod-by-a-holar-alum horse i've viewed extensively, nor did i > > see it in the other horses at his barn, who all appeared to have > > quite straightforward "four plain shoes all around" > > How many of his horses gait at liberty? How many gait on a loose rein?
i didn't observe his horses enough to say, except for stjarni, who gaits both at liberty (though maybe not as much as he trots) and on a loose rein (first demonstrated to me by gudmar; now stjarni will do it for me, too, if i make sure he still knows i want tolt -- i use a voice command to reinforce this, which gudmar did not). > Were the horses ridden with boots? not that i ever saw, in my couple of days there. i did put boots on stjarni once, rear ones over his cannon bones, after he stocked up from being kept in a stall for two days. i don't think it changed his gaits much, but it did bring the swelling down, and i haven't used them since. this btw was on the advice of a friend with 35 years of horsekeeping and barn management, not a gaited-horse person and certainly not gudmar. --vicka
