"Natural Horsemanship" Part 2
Case in Point: Client from Hell When I was still training professionally, I encountered a client who was every serious trainer’s worst nightmare. She was an utter novice with little to no experience with horses who decided one day to purchase a poorly bred grade horse from a picture on the internet. As if that wasn’t enough to make one cringe, this horse was still a foal; weaned and shipped cross-country at three months old. And this owner, who had no experience, apparently decided she’d become his surrogate mother. But, unlike an equine mother – who instills discipline and knowledge in her offspring – this owner simply coddled this foal as if he were a puppy for four years in her backyard until he was dropped abruptly on my doorstep. You see, this owner was an armchair equestrian . With no experience and no education in riding or training horses – much less raising and producing youngstock – she undertook the huge responsibility of developing a young horse through his most form...