That is more than I can say for many of the Big Name Gurus I have seen. I suspect the colt I saw Parelli work over was never a solid citizen in a round pen. His brain was fried.
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I had a good experience with Buck last year. Maybe he was on his best behavior, but I felt like he was honest, helpful, and though he was tough (my rope handling skills were shoddy, and he corrected me pretty good), he was fair. I did struggle a bit with the transformation of mechanics to feel, and it’s taken me about a year of really working with the horse that I took to the clinic to “get” what some of the exercises were actually accomplishing. I got a lot out of watching Buck work his horse - that being said, I’m no rank beginner and was watching VERY carefully to see a lot of things that he didn’t or probably couldn’t articulate. It’s hard when you’re an experienced person to put into words some of the things you do related to timing without dumbing it down. I tried to teach my husband how to longe my horse that doesn’t require a longe whip (when I was down for surgery) and it proved a lot harder than I thought it would be to teach the body language necessary because a lot of it is energy not mechanics.
Anyway, I don’t know if I’ll go again until we get a lot further, but it did solidify my desire to go down the Californio/Vaquero path, which I am really enjoying. It’s got to be super difficult to be a clinician, especially a big name one, with people coming from all sorts of understandings and backgrounds. You’ve got to sift through the clothes and the “mechanics” to get an idea of how much the individual knows, and even then you still can’t get an understanding necessarily of their philosophy in a group of 35.
I went in part to get my horse some experience with chaos. Being able to trot around on a loose rein while 35 other horses were doing whatever crazy stuff they were doing was a HUGE win for my anxious guy (and for me). And riding with Buck was a bucket list item. Now I’ve got a few others to check off the list before they pass on.
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I had a clinic like that. Actually it was a demonstration, same idea of the first touch/join up hour in the round pen. The man was given a two year Suffolk Punch mare to work with, first time the mare had been off her farm and possibly even haltered, we could hear her most of the morning trying to tear down the walls of the fairground stall. It sounds almost corny, but that man worked with her a little, then he stopped, turned his back on her, lit a cigarette, and proceeded to explain to the crowd why he would not be working this horse today. It wouldn’t be fair to her, to him, or to us. ‘Sorry, no show today’ to say that? Takes courage.
I’ve since watched him work horses (drafts, logging) in very difficult situations. Those horses will do anything he asks, by voice alone. It was a good lesson that day.
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But they only teach beginner level riding so I don’t know how they expect to get advanced riders? Advanced riders can already handle and ride their horses as well or better than Buck can. I have seen this many times with western personalities who think they have invented horse training for the first time, they are really only medium skill level at best.
I was surprised by his documentary which I watched during Covid times- learned nothing but I did see a lot of people in danger and overworking young horses till they shut down. The man who was kicked by the stallion? that should never have happened. To begin with he should not have been accepted to the clinic and certainly not pushed to be ridden the first day. And yes, I have worked with aggressive and mishandled stallions when I was younger successfully.
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Dan was not kicked, he was bitten and had 60 stitches. Yes, he turned his back on that stud.
FWIW, Stud’s owner did not have the horse PTS. She went home (nearby) and moaned and groaned to everyone about how mean Buck was to her.
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My point is that stud shouldn’t have been put in that situation and neither should Dan. Accident waiting to happen.
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I totally agree. The woman is known locally and is really into attention. She ruined the whole clinic for everyone.
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That was my guess as to the outcome of the whole drama. Thanks for this information.
She comes not just a little bit late, but right in the middle of sessions after everyone else was already well into the flow. Then she unloads a horse that is in no way suitable for the clinic. That horse can’t even be led around the other horses – or led at all.
Well, she got a starring role in the movie, anyway … not the way she thought, I’m sure! But she probably enjoyed it anyway.
Whoever accepted her clinic entry, I wonder if they had any idea what they were in for.
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What happened to that unbalanced (dangerous) yellow horse from the documentary? Someone mentioned that she didn’t put him down…did she keep him?
Jeepers. That was one mean horse.
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Probably had no idea. There is something about the Dunning-Kruger effect for horse owners that makes people bring green/unsuitable horses to clinics and shows (Buck wrote that it’s not the first time; he tells a story of a lady bringing an unstarted filly to a class where she had little to no riding experience nor balance and he tried to do the best he could by both horse and rider to get them started on a safer path)
My take on it was that Buck got the horse started so he could at least give that gelding a real chance at showing that it could be helped. Yes, ideally it is not how you’d approach a horse like that, but I think it was more a case of “this might be the horse’s best chance”. It was concluded that it was in the horse’s best interest that it be PTS as it was just too badly mucked up.
Monty Roberts (and yes, OK some of what is in his autobiography has been widely disputed and I agree that some caution needs to be applied to any story he likes to tell!) wrote of a similar horse called Barlet. Again, completely mucked up by people loving on him and treating him like a puppy. Became so vicious and unpredictable that he was kept in an electrified pen for stud purposes. The horse was apparently a big-time stud in the day so I imagine if the story was incorrect, someone would have said something to refute it. It was also a creamy horse.
Edit:
Barlet Quarter Horse (allbreedpedigree.com)
Not in Mr Ed, was (allegedly) in “Horse with a Flying Tail”
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Yes, she kept him, who BTW was a Curly horse (they’re sleek in summer). She has a long and presumably successful career in breeding Curly horses, many of them crossed with gaited or baroque breeds. A niche market, not my thing, but everyone is entitled to their dreams.
I remember when she had the local TV station to her house to show off the house pet…
The creepiest thing about that clinic was stud would get a hard-on whenever she got near him. Never seen anything like that in my life.
Oh. Geez. Ew. That’s just…ew. Agh.
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The man killer studs I have known have been made that way by people treating them as cuddly do no wrong babies when young.
Similar to how many orphans have a different attitude no matter what their gender.
I have surprised folks when I used to have a horse practice and point blank asked someone if their horse had been an orphan before I even examined it. They always questioned how I knew…well the way he acts around you is a big give away…
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There is even a name for this in llamas
But I suspect that certain llama people probably call it BS because well people.
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I have a horse that had I known he was an orphan, bottle raised…I would never ever have even looked at him. I found that little bit out after the deal was done. Probably should have walked when I first saw him climbing the gate to see his people but it took two people to bridle him! 
; but he was so fantastically responsive and so good once harnessed…mostly… He also weighs 2000lbs give or take. After a number of years working with him he is better, but still has zero concept of personal space or patience and has huge anxiety issues. I never, ever feed him by hand and he is much better now that I have another horse who has taken charge of things in the herd.
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That is very interesting. The biggest issue I have with my horse is the lack of awareness that people are not horses when it comes to hierarchy. He simply does not see people as different and responds to people as he would horses. It is a weird thing, but when you see it, you know it!
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yep I guess it may be hard to understand if you haven’t seen it but to me it is very obvious and I have left people with their mouths agape when I asked them minutes after seeing the horse and owner interacting.
Full disclosure I raised a foal by hand. The mare was agalactic so at least said foal had horses around but she still was an issue mentally and ended up flipping over backward and breaking her neck during what can only be termed a tantrum.
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This is very interesting! Glad you shared it and I read it.
I am currently interacting with a horse that is not mine, who shows some of that behavior. His owner puts it down to previous bad training. No doubt that has its part. Owner knows well-trained horses very well, but she does not intentionally do behavior projects.
During feeding I’ve identified him as ‘food aggressive’, but not sure that’s exactly what is going on. I have been thinking that he must have been raised in a ‘competitive eating’ situation where all the weanlings (or yearlings or 2 yos) are out in the same large pasture, and feed is poured down a long common trough that all the horses share. Common around large breeding operations in certain segments of the industry, can be found in this area.
But that’s not really the whole story because he is this way in every situation and not just food. It’s more that he behaves as if people are other horses in his herd and he has to make his place clear. In the stall, bringing him in from pasture, grooming, etc. Always. Lots of head slinging, lots of shoulder pushing, etc. & so on. Feet always moving. Defensive. Hard to get him to relax. Can be a bit bitey but hasn’t gotten anyone hard - yet.
He’s not mean at all by nature. He would already have hurt someone at this barn if he was. He’s not ‘bad’, he’s not truly aggressive. He could be much, much worse. He would actually really like to have some friends, human and horse (he has a horse friends in his pasture, thankfully). I think underneath his scatty behavior, he actually has a sweet personality.
After months of consistent handling he’s better and safer. But not trustworthy, ever, because he doesn’t really get it. I never, ever turn my back on him when in biting distance. Even in cross-ties (which he barely tolerates).
He’s really just not convinced that people are not other horses. “Convinced” is not the right word, it’s more that the concept doesn’t exist in his mental landscape. Horses and humans are the same to him. We are in his space so he has to deal with us and make his place in the pecking order.
The higher-ranked horse gets a better life and he’s making sure of his place – that’s his landscape.
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[quote=“OverandOnward, post:79, topic:772434”]
He’s not mean at all by nature. He would already have hurt someone at this barn if he was. He’s not ‘bad’, he’s not truly aggressive. He could be much, much worse. He would actually really like to have some friends, human and horse (he has a horse friends in his pasture, thankfully). I think underneath his scatty behavior, he actually has a sweet personality.
[/quote].
That is fundamentally my boy. His problem is that as an anxious horse, if you push him out of his comfort zone; he does what an insecure horse does: turn and kick. Although he Is aggressive on the lunge line, truly terrifyingly so. I don’t lunge him. But yes, mostly he wants friends, horsey friends. But he doesn’t really know how to make friends. Unfortunately people aren’t horses. I don’t know if all of that is attributable to being a bottle baby, but it does seem like it might be part of it.
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