Every Horse Should Learn How To Pony

A couple weeks ago, my sister and I practiced ponying with our horses. My horses do not know how to pony and I want to pony Chance this summer, so I figured we better get them used to it. We also talked about ponying and how all of our horses should know how to do it. We do a lot of trail riding and IF something should ever happen to one of us on the trail, we would need to pony the other horse out. Hopefully that will never happen, but I'd rather train them here at home, then in an emergency situation out on the trail.

So after our ride, I handed Brandy to my sis. You will see in this first picture that Brandy was unsure of what was going on. She had her head held high, and my sis was having to drag her along. This happens at work with some horses that have never been ponied before. They eventually relax their head and keep up with the pony horse. Note: The lead rope is just laying around the horn, we never tie a horse to the horn while ponying. If a horse freaks out, we can let go of the lead rope. This has happened at work, and if the horse gets loose, so be it. We just catch the horse and start over again.



My sister's boy has ponied before. He used to be owned by my really good friend that is the assistant trainer at the farm I work for, and she had done quite a bit of ponying. You will see Brandy's head coming down a little. She is starting to relax and understand what is going on. We only walked, but one of these days we will step up to the trot.



See how much more relaxed Brandy is? She adjusted quite well.



Then it was my turn to pony my sis's boy. Remember, Brandy has never done this before, so she was really unsure of what was going on when we started walking off with a horse attached to us. Since Brandy doesn't neck rein, I had to rely on leg, but she just wasn't getting it and would cut off my sis's boy.



I think Brandy's confusion with the whole process confused the silly Appy. He kept giving me "the look", as in "why the heck are we doing this?".



My sister had to step in and help Brandy out. She put her hand on Brandy's bridle and led us around.



Eventually my sister could take her hand off the bridle and walk along with us. Brandy will need some work, so we will definitely be doing this again. We will also be training Fritzy to pony. After a few more ponying lessons, we will be pony ready for trail season, and for when it is time to pony that wild Mustang of mine!



In other news: I am going to another horse show, so I will be out of town until next week. This is a much smaller show then Scottsdale and I am sure it will be different, but probably just as hectic. We are taking 12 horses, 3 less then what we took to Scottsdale. I am sure I will be just as exhausted after this one too, but at least I won't be gone for a month! So I will talk to you all when I get back!! Have a great week everyone!