---- Nancy Sturm <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: . . . I really think they do better if they go out alone early and often. <
I think you are on to something there Nancy. That was one big mistake I made when starting Soley -- I took her out on the trail almost exclusively with a "buddy horse". Even though she led the way and was actually braver than the buddy horse we most often rode with, it still created a problem later on when I tried taking her out alone. She STILL (at 19) does not like to go riding alone. I can ride her around the property out of sight of the other horses, but I can tell she is thinking about where they are. And when I would trailer her out alone to ride, (before kids) it took almost a whole summer before she would stop calling out and listening for another horse. I am hoping to start trailering to our local riding park again this summer later on, and I'm betting Soley will have regressed again to calling out for another horse. Meanwhile, Eitill went out on the trail alone right from the git-go in his training. A friend / horse trainer put his first 8 weeks under saddle on him for me (She weighed all of 100 lbs. at the time and I thought that would be a nice introduction to carrying a rider rather than ME!) He remains my best horse to take out alone and / or with strange horses as he doesn't pay a lick of attention to them. So Nancy, based on my own sampling of two <smile>, I think you are right. -- Renee M. in Michigan
