Hunters - What Are They REALLY All About?

[loshad]

Many years ago, when I used to teach college freshmen, I would tell them (frequently) that a simple word used correctly is worth more than an entire thesaurus of long and complicated ones. I cannot image why that particular piece of advice keeps coming back to me today.

Trixie – you can wear things that aren’t functional as long as you mix sartorial styles in such a way as to create a pleasing aesthetic for your professional milieu that is representative of an appropriate design scheme. But it should not be derivative, because that inadequately reflects your own personal prereogatives.

Or, you know, wear something that keeps you warm.

[LulaBell]

[QUOTE=goodlife;7201697]
That’s because all of the eventing cavalry masters from the olden times already rode better than Scott Stewart and every other hunter pro AND rode side saddle, won all da Maclayz and didn’t even use perfect prep or a Pelham.[/QUOTE]

No, they used acepromazine and a double bridle.

[alterhorse]

[QUOTE=meupatdoes;7201925]
I didn’t ask about “hacking out”, I asked whether you think the initiates at the SRS uld learn more efficiently if they practiced eventing. You know, jumping across uneven terrain and water obstacles and all that.

Do you think a lippizaner could have the same quality one tempis through a water obstacle?[/QUOTE]

That’s a hard question to speculate on. I’d think the SRS training program is probably one of the most comprehensive in classical horsemanship given what they do there.

If you need an answer, I’ll have to say I don’t know enough about the SRS to guess.

And additionally I am curious to know where this Viennese hacking out is apparently happening. Around the Kaerntner Ring? In front of the Hotel Sacher? Past the opera house?

If I interpreted what I read about that correctly, I think they hack the horses during the summer at the SRS stable in Heldenberg.

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=alterhorse;7202046]
That’s a hard question to speculate on. I’d think the SRS training program is probably one of the most comprehensive in classical horsemanship given what they do there.

If you need an answer, I’ll have to say I don’t know enough about the SRS to guess.

If I interpreted what I read about that correctly, I think they hack the horses during the summer at the SRS stable in Heldenberg.[/QUOTE]

But you know enough about hunters to suggest the knowledge base of the discipline ought to be judged by whether they can perform as well outside the arena on uneven terrain as within it.

And also, PIBER.

[alterhorse]

[QUOTE=meupatdoes;7201931]
You weren’t there for a lot of the sh*t you are saying forth about on this thread and yet here we are.[/QUOTE]

Your feedback is much appreciated.

I like constructive criticism better however.

Can you point out something in particular I said that has absolutely no possibility of having any truth to it at all?

[RugBug]

[QUOTE=hntrjmprpro45;7201781]

The point is, all of the show disciplines have evolved. [/QUOTE]

Exactly. Hunters has evolved. Dressage has evolved. Even Eventing has evolved…last time I checked we didn’t really need many calvary horses any more. Nothing is as it once was.

Oh, and FWIW: While I won’t post pictures because they are not mine to post, but my Show Hunter also Field Hunted for 4 years. I can’t say if she was super successful at either because it was before I purchased her…but she can certainly do both. Her previous owner sort of does the old school thing: Shows her field hunters in the off season. She just has horses that can succeed at both.

ETA: Oops. I somehow missed 2 pages of trying to decipher the tenants of riding and empathizing with someone, I’m not quite sure who. It could be the SRS or maybe even a western horse. I need some clarifying. I thought everyone let their eyes glaze over when reading AH’s post. No? It’s just me?

[Coreene]

“Pass the Dutchie” earworm. Great.

[loshad]

[QUOTE=alterhorse;7202061]
Can you point out something in particular I said that has absolutely no possibility of having any truth to it at all?[/QUOTE]

Sweetie. Darling. Of COURSE she can’t. But then neither can any of the rest of us because 99% of what you have written has absolutely no possibility of making any sense.

Also: Coreene, YOU’RE WELCOME.

[alterhorse]

@loshad;7202084

Sweetie. Darling. Of COURSE she can’t. But then neither can any of the rest of us because 99% of what you have written has absolutely no possibility of making any sense.

All I’m saying is that each discipline places requirements on rider education relative to what the rider does.

[alterhorse]

@meupatdoes;7202054

But you know enough about hunters to suggest the knowledge base of the discipline ought to be judged by whether they can perform as well outside the arena on uneven terrain as within it.

I’m merely making the observation that hunters and field hunters each require a different kind of ride due to what the horse is supposed to be doing.

[alterhorse]

[QUOTE=Ghazzu;7201830]
Well, there’s a bunch of existential navel gazing packed into one sentence.[/QUOTE]

So I’ve been told.

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=alterhorse;7202061]
Your feedback is much appreciated.

I like constructive criticism better however.

Can you point out something in particular I said that has absolutely no possibility of having any truth to it at all?[/QUOTE]

Somewhere on the spectrum between absolutely true and absolutely false lie several levels of convincing, persuasive, quite possibly and likely.

The goal is to be a bit more plausible than merely a hair’s breadth to the left of “absolutely no possibility of having any truth to it at all”.

Though I’d speculate that claims of hacking the Lippizaner stallions through the mid city may actually do it.

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=alterhorse;7202134]
I’m merely making the observation that hunters and field hunters each require a different kind of ride due to what the horse is supposed to be doing.[/QUOTE]

Right.

And modern jazz vs hip hop each require a different kind of dance depending on what the dancer is supposed to be doing.

In other news, bananas are bent and the sky is blue.

[alterhorse]

[QUOTE=doublesstable;7201831]
It already has. It happened when the automobile was invented. One thing we can never do is stop progress from happening.

Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater ;)[/QUOTE]

I just hope that progress doesn’t create horses that are genetically altered to be more like amusement park rides.

[alterhorse]

[QUOTE=meupatdoes;7202140]
Somewhere on the spectrum between absolutely true and absolutely false lie several levels of convincing, persuasive, quite possibly and likely.

The goal is to be a bit more plausible than merely a hair’s breadth to the left of “absolutely no possibility of having any truth to it at all”.

Though I’d speculate that claims of hacking the Lippizaner stallions through the mid city may actually do it.[/QUOTE]

So what’s the weakest point that I made?

[2bayboys]

[QUOTE=alterhorse;7201607]

I doubt you’ll say yes to that. So my point is to examine why the show hunter must preform in the ring to preform as intended, and then you may hopfully begin to see how the classical tenants of horsemanship are devided and segmented to fit the set of “chosen” ideals for a discipline.

I apologize for being an idealist and a purest, but I believe the classical tenants of horsemanship represent the path to the highest level of function for the horse and rider, and that function would probably be represented most fully by a discipline that includes a broad scope of requirements such as eventing.[/QUOTE]

Well, this one.

[meupatdoes]

[QUOTE=alterhorse;7202149]
So what’s the weakest point that I made?[/QUOTE]

Perhaps you should do your own work and identify which argument it is that you made which you feel is strongest and most pertinent to the subject of this thread, and then tell us all why we should agree with your assessment.

[Madeline]

[QUOTE=GoneAway;7200878]

There are always going to be ignorant idiots like those hunter princesses I grew up with and that eventer who knows nothing about riding a hunter. [/QUOTE]Taken to a further extreme. there are hunter princesses who really believe that the good hunter riders are more skilled than our USET show jumping riders. Sheesh.

[ChelseaR]

[QUOTE=alterhorse;7201636]
Evolution is what created the hunter discipline. It’s an adaptation from one form into another,

So if hunters are not actually representing the ideal field hunter, then what is the discipline actually representing?[/QUOTE]

If you are looking for ‘function’ you won’t find it here. Other than a small percentage of true working horses, horses are an entertainment industry.

There is no true practical purpose to any horse sport, including the SRS, eventing, field hunting etc. Is there a function to football? What does baseball represent? Or golf?

If you want to be a purest perhaps you need to start riding western as one of the few ‘real functions’ in the sense you seem to be using the term left to the horse can be found in a western ranch horse.

Should we all model our disciplines after the ranch horse? Or maybe Amish driving? Or work horses log pulling in hard to reach areas?

After all everything else is just a derivative of a long obsolete original function.

[Trixie]

So what’s the weakest point that I made?

Well, most of them. The majority of your posts read like gibberish. Perhaps if you edited for spelling and some degree of clarity in your messaging, we wouldn’t be having so much trouble understanding what the heck it is you’re “trying” to say.