Teaching A Horse To Back-Up
When you think about riding a horse you naturally imagine sitting on the animal’s back and moving forwards. However, internationally acclaimed horseman Pat Parelli says that it’s also very useful to be able to ride your horse to the left, to the right and backwards, without using reins.
Love, language and leadership
To teach a horse to back-up, Pat begins by standing on the ground in front of the horse. He bases his lessons on the premise that horses are looking for love, language and leadership. He develops a language, or line of communication, by showing the horse that lots of different signals mean to back-up:
waving the horse back with both hands shaking the horse’s lead rope putting his hands on the horse’s chest, then pushing gently slapping his hands where the stirrups are, indicating to the horse to back-up similarly tapping the stirrups to ask the horse to back-up
In no time at all, Pat is able to ride the horse backwards by putting his feet forward of the cinch. When he puts his feet behind the cinch the horse moves forward. Soon these signals feel natural for both horse and rider. Pat says that if you can back your horse up without using the reins you won’t damage your horse’s mouth and you’ll be able to stop more effectively.
Further information
Pat Parelli’s courses are run Australia-wide under local approved instructors. For details contact:
Parelli Natural Horse-Man-Ship,
PO Box 2232, Gosford, NSW, 2250
Phone: 1800 627 404
