Having Some Turbo Powered Fun with my New Horse!

I want to tell you all a little more about Turbo.  Turbo is a really, really a special, special colt.  It’s hard to describe how Turbo nourishes my soul.  Turbo does things, I tell people he’s the best I’ve ever had, I’ve had some really good ones, but Turbo does some real specific things, and Turbo, putting it bluntly, is a pet!  Turbo is in your pocket all the time.  He always knickers when I head towards his pen – he puts his face on my shirt and if I move he puts his nose right on my shirt again.  He doesn’t nibble, he just puts it there and he likes that comfort and he just adores being petted, but he likes his nose in contact with me.  I’ve never made him quit, some guys would, but he’s expressing himself and its part of my day I spend a little time everyday with him when I catch him or put him away.  And he will actually walk away from his dinner to come over to me to put his nose on me.  We’re pretty good buddies! 

I would have to say he’s a very good minded horse, he’s very programmable.  You have to be careful for what you wish for, because you might get too much of it.  But at this point in time, Turbo he’s a really nice horse to be around.  He never aggravates you.   He never causes you to wish he would move over, and he doesn’t stand on your toes and he doesn’t blow snot in your face, he’s just a nice nice mannered horse.  He’s pretty, so I enjoy cleaning him, enjoy brushing him and he stays real sound. 

So Turbo has been working out of the herd, and while I went to Australia, for three weeks or more, Kate Neubert had him.  And Kate did a nice job, he was better when I picked him up than when I left him which is thrilling and gives me a lot of confidence in Kate.  So that’s a blessing for someone like me to be able to have a substitute trainer that does really good things that you can really trust.  And I’ve been through a lot of my friendly horse trainer buddies in different times in my life, and I’ve not always had good success, but with Kate I sure do. 

So anyhow, Turbo’s status is that out of the herd Turbo works good enough to show tomorrow for sure. He’s very competitive the way he is right now.  He’s not really cutting horse style, he works more upright, more bridle horse style, but he’s a big hock user.  He gets on his butt and makes deep moves, but mostly deep behind – he doesn’t ever get down real low in front.  He’s not really particularly a clever horse, but he’s plenty quick footed and he’s a big mover – so he can pick himself up and make big turns with his butt way deep in the ground, and it looks pretty good.  I think he’ll be good out of the herd.

That’s the big thing about Turbo, there are no issues.  I’ve been very careful in his training program, it’s been just dialed in straight from what I share in the Cowhorse U programs, so you know exactly what I’ve done with him, and to him if you’ve seen Cowhorse U.  Turbo is a horse that wants to be a good horse, but not ever enthusiastic, and he doesn’t want to be opinionated particularly about anything.  So that means he’s right down the middle and that makes it really nice.  He’s nice in the face and he’s got a lot of lateral control and collection on him.  Yesterday, when we had people out here for the filming I ran him down the pen which I’ve done hundreds of times – I don’t run him a lot, but I run him every day once or twice across the arena.  And I ran him down and asked him to stop, and God he stopped as good or better than any open horse I’ve ever had, and turned likewise.  He can get in the dirt and turn around. 

I’ve been going down the fence with him a little too; he’s been down the fence a dozen or more times.  I’ve held him out away from cattle like 15-20 feet and the last two times I let him close in.  I leave him out so I can keep him stopping  straight – I don’t want him dropping in.  A result of the last two times where I let him drop in around the corner and stop cattle, was that out of the herd, yesterday, he would have a tendency to drop in just a hair when he stopped on the ends, so that would be something you should sure look for because it is not really what we want; we want him to stop straight.  So Kate and I talked about it, and we straightened him up real easily and casually. So he did what we wanted him to do.

So it’s good to alternate back and forth, going down the fence to the right I think that horse is really really good and he circles cattle really really good.  I think he’s pretty much of a speed horse too – this horse can run too.  He’s got a lot of leg under him and he can move out, and he enjoys running up and catching cattle and circling them.  He’s getting that down – he has no fade to him – he feels like he’s got glue from him to the cow.  That’s a good thing.   And then his left turn – my God I tell you he just wants to swallow the cows up!  It’s a harder turn.  It’s a lot harder to ride that is, he drops down real low and he uses a little more front end, not that he props at all.  It’s just like the horse kind of almost disappears. Anyhow he really does it, it’s a crowd thrilling left turn and there is a lot of stress.  But not so much on him I don’t think, but it gets to me.  That’s where I tore my leg muscle! I thought I really wrecked it, but I’m going to be ok in a couple of weeks. 

So that’s Turbo’s stuff, he could go show tomorrow and be competitive; there’s no question in my mind.  I know that most Futurities are won or lost down the fence, so I’ve got more work to do down the fence.  I’ve got a lot of time, I’ve got two months actually more than two months.  Someone asked me yesterday, well how do you keep him peaked out like he is for that length of time?  Well we all know that there are more Futurity horses ruined from June on into Futurity time than there is in the whole 18 months of training prior to now, so how do I keep from ruining him and keep him peaked?  Truth is he doesn’t think he’s peaked, I’ve done so much alternate training and by that I mean alternatives training I do other things with him.  I don’t just practice maneuvers, I practice fundamentals and the fundamentals is what his whole program is built on, and he thinks he’s just doing fundamentals –  he doesn’t know he’s doing high powered maneuvers and I don’t ask him for his life.  I have never asked him for his life.  Never ran him as fast as he could go, and I never tried to make him turn as fast, he’s a good lead changing horse too.  Transitions are real good I have to be kind of careful because he could take a trot step – he really makes a big transition from fast to slow in the circles.  Anyhow he doesn’t feel stress as part of our training program – he’s not stressed and he’s a happy camper. 

We ride him out in the mountains and do things he likes to do too.  I don’t feel any problems with him.  People say “Oh my God he’s going to win, I’m going to come and watch you win”, well I welcome you all to come and watch, keep in mind my goal is to create a really nice horse.  For me, I need a really nice open horse, and in the bridle, I would like to have one that I can go rope on in the arena, and go show the next day or maybe the same day and win in both.  And Turbo is the deal – if he stays sound, which he will I think – I do believe that he will be that horse.  And it’s not a matter of him winning at the Futurity.  My goal at the Futurity is to show him for as best as he can be shown, and the biggest thing is to have fun doing it.  So if it’s not fun of course, I don’t want to do it!  But if it’s fun, I think Turbo will be fun to show, he’s a laid back horse.  Anyway I don’t think he’s going to be afraid of things, I think he’s going to look at things with curiosity. Yesterday during the television shoot, they had a hand held mic on like a broomstick and it looked like it was the size of a football, and it had a lot of hair or fuzz on it, that stops the wind noise I guess.  Most horses, if you were to hold it over their head so that they could hear me talk, would have some kind of fit, he thought it was his mother I think he wanted to nibble the damn thing!   Anyways he’s a character.  I totally adore him and I’m very fortunate to have him.  Life is good, thanks for listening!

Summer Update – Highlights from Down Under

A while back I was very very pleasantly surprised to have a surprise encounter that was planned by my banker Jim Glines; it was a surprise meeting with my old friend Max and his wife Marlene.  Max Rouff was instrumental in getting the financing for me to buy King Fritz back in the early 70’s and Jim Glines was the banker who lent me the money to buy King Fritz.  So that was quite exciting – to meet up with Max and his wonderful wife Marlene was a wonderful experience.  After that I went to Australia with my really good friend James Dixon and did a series of clinics that was sponsored by Andrew McArthur.  Andrew is a cattleman or a stockman as they call them in Australia. He owns a company in the United States called Plasvacc.  Plasvacc supplies blood plasma for veterinarians for horses.  The flight to Australia was a little delayed here and there so it took us 29 hours, and it shouldn’t have taken over 15 or 20 hours at the most, so it was quite a long trip.  But we got there and it was all worth it.

Now that first ranch that we went to, owned by the Acton’s, was a 6.5 million acres and it had 300,000 cows, however out near the billabongs and the lagoons, it was called Paradise Lagoon Ranch.  But out in that area where you wouldn’t think there would be anything, it looked like it jumped out from the middle of Kentucky.  White fences, beautiful arenas and spectator areas that looked nicer than Spruce Meadows in Canada.  This was a high dollar beautiful horse show and camp drafting facility.  Camp drafting is their major event in Australia.  The herd is the camp and drafting is a matter of taking single animals out of the herd cutting horse style sort of, then they run beside them at full speed and guide the cow (they call them the beast) through a barrel racing pattern shoulder to shoulder and eye to eye. It’s exciting it takes really good horses and really good stockmen.  With 300,000 cows, we had no shortage of cattle to work and wonderful people – quite an experience and a lot of open country.  There were Aborigines, one of the Aborigines asked me, he said “what do you call a boomerang that doesn’t come back?”, and I thought I would get some intelligent answer, and I said I don’t know, and he said a stick!  Well they’re characters.

Then the next place we went to was Tamworth which is their country music capital like Nashville is to us and their biggest country music star ever was a guy named Slim Dusty, he recently passed.  Slim Dusty, he sings ballads and most of them are cattle camp ballads, very very good – I mean really good stuff and very interesting.  I like Slim Dusty a lot and was interesting to see their country music hall of fame.  James was our photographer during this whole time, he stayed pretty excited.

We stayed in really nice places too!  We stayed at the, I think it was called the Australian Sheep Dog Inn. Everything is pretty darn western.  At that particular town, Tamworth’s, we gave the clinic in a coliseum that was far nicer than any coliseum I have ever seen in the United States.  It was so well designed and so modern and it was brand new, unbelievably beautiful set up for thousands of horses and big horse shows.

Then we went on to the third place called Toowoomba.  The first two were in Queensland the third one was in New South Wales.  Quite a difference you know, when you are out in Queensland you get a lot of what they call bushies.  Bushies are your real deal cowboys, I mean they are the salt of the earth and they’re wonderful.  You get some of the bushies over there from the New South Wales too – some of those guys actually drove 40 hours to come to the clinic!  They drive long, long distances and don’t think about it like we do, but 40 hours each way!  There was nobody there that said that was something very different; it was pretty common I guess.  In Toowoomba we had a really nice clinic there too.  We worked cattle in all the clinics some of the people were pretty westernized, and some of them weren’t. But what was amazing was how some of the very traditional camp drafters got into the leverage bits and wanted to know about the spade bits and actually bought leverage bits and applied them on their horses and liked the results.

The whole trip was really really exciting, and really fun and I loved the Aussie slang. They called their wild horses of course “brumbies” and they never ever said the word spectator, but they would say “that’s a fence sitter” another slang for them – one was called a “stock yard rail mugley” and that’s a spectator also.  People there just love people and I saw old friends from Collin McTaggert to Wallace and Gunthrup and his brother Max.  We had ropers there too and there were some very good ropers that we got to enjoy a lot and had the honor roping with them out there.

I’ll tell you a few of the people we met and the things they said.

A.C. Graham and Evan Acton owned the biggest ranch that was the 300,000 cow ranch.  There was a wonderful guy named is Bill Willoughby, and he’s a movie stunt fellow, and his son is a team roper here.  Now their  trees, they call them “she oaks” and “bull oaks”, there are a lot of oak trees and I never did figure how they told which one was a she or bull, but that’s what they call them.  When they say they’re tired, they say they are “buggered “and they learned about a “digery-do”, it’s a musical instrument the Aboles play – they actually can breathe in through their nose and out through their mouth at the same time, therefore continuing on a long note without any hesitation for breathing, and that was pretty unique – they developed that skill somehow, guess they haven’t got much else to do.  The weather forecasters, I always got kind of a laugh out of them, they would say “the weather here is going to rain” this that and then they would always finish their forecast by saying “fine weather elsewhere”. Well gosh, that’s pretty general.

There was a race track and it was called Ups N Downs, well that’s interesting, so they say lets “sus it out”, that means let’s check it out, when they say “the penny dropped”, that means the light bulb came on, I got it, I got it mate!  And when they say things are ok, it’s right, that’s ok that’s good, “Ridgy-didge” or “fair dinkhum or dinky-di”.  Then when they have to go somewhere they say “they are going to do a walk about”.  They call their cattle catchers the ones who work out in the ranches “bull busters” sometimes and the wild cow is a “scrubber”.  The herd is a “mob”. The two Gunthrup’s I really enjoyed, that was Wallace and Max, they were old friends from 15-20 years ago.  I saw a lot of my old friends, I saw Lori and Gayle Lauer they were the first Americans to go over there with their family, Greg Lauer and that would have been in the 60’s taking the first Quarter Horses to Australia. Then they say going to a fast food place, they say let’s “gobble and go” or if someone is a dumb person, they call them a “dipso”.  If a horse bucks and he kind of has his head down and he hops along, they call it “pig rooting”.  I really enjoyed meeting Cameron McIntyre, a great horseman.

There was places that I went and they had cute names like Zilzie, I liked that one.  Another name was Yipoon that was a beach.  I saw emus, I saw black swans and of course kangaroos.  When you have a horse wreck, instead of saying a horse wreck they say “he had a buster”.  If you go to Colonel Sanders they say “we’re going to Kentucky Chuckies”.  If you have to go to the restroom, you might ask, “where can I spend a penny?”  that means restroom.  If I’m stuffed, say “I’m stuffed mate”, or “buggar”  that means I ‘m tired and if they say “dickey” that means it’s not right or I’m not right, or if I’m really beat up or tired they say “I’m plucked and played mate”.

Then they turn donkeys in with their stallions and the bulls, the donkeys actually break up fights so -the donkeys don’t let the other animals fight – after they’ve been with the donkeys for a while you can throw the stallions in a pen by themselves and they’ll all behave – It’s pretty amazing!

They have good food there, our breakfast was something like omelets, they had mushrooms, bacon and sausage and ham and poached eggs and fried tomatoes.

Bill Willoughby was a fellow that I met there that I really enjoyed – he organized the stunts for Snowy River.  The whole trip was quite interesting.

So from Australia I was only home for a couple of days, went on the Rancheros Vistadores ride over here in Santa Barbara ,Solvang ,Santa Ynez area, that was a weeklong thing, really enjoyed that.  Then right after that my friend Greg Norris, had a clinic in Big Stone Gap, VA.  That’s where the real hillbillies live. I worked last year with Greg and his hillbilly friends and we had a very good clinic there.  Greg’s horses looked good, and Greg’s doing a good job and you know it’s sure interesting how many of those little houses and farms still fly the confederate flag. They call the civil war, not a civil war; there was nothing civil about it. It was the war of northern oppression and trust me, they are still unhappy about it.  Even though much of that doesn’t get out here to us, there’s a lot of really hard feelings about how the north treated the south even after the war.  I stayed out with Greg for four days with his group and I totally enjoyed them and had a wonderful time.

And then I went to Yakima last weekend and that was the weekend of the 30^th and 31^st of May.  Yakima is home to my dear friends Roger & Sue Hart and of course their kids.  They’re just the sweetest nicest people in the world.  And Sue Hart I don’t know how she does it – this was her 42^nd clinic I’ve put on for her!  She’s put on two clinics a year for over 20 years and she’s filled every single one of them.  She pulls people from Montana, Idaho – I have no idea how she does it.  She is a dynamo that one!  She’s alive and over the top on everything she does – she’s a mover!

Now I’m headed today, which is Thursday, the 4^th of June, and I’m headed to Arlington WA, to my friend Gretchen Salstrom.  And Gretchen is a show horse lady and has rescue horses too, she has a business with rescue horses, and it’s pretty interesting how that works.  I’ll go there for 3 days then head off to Watford City, ND hoping for the best. Then guess what, I get a weekend off so I’m going to have some fun, I think I’m going to the Bob Feist roping, and watch it, I have never been.

Well I hope you enjoyed my little update here.  I can’t really make it sound as exciting as it been!  I’m blessed!  I’m having the best year I have ever had!  I have never had this many clinics I have never had every clinic over filled. We had one clinic cancel and that would be in Ohio and I understand that the auto industry had a lot of impact on that. So other than that everything has just been great.  I’m getting to rope a lot, but I pulled some muscles inside of my thigh, so my favorite horse trainer in the world is Kate Neubert is putting some extra time on my colt Turbo, while I do clinics and recover.  And Kate also helped us do our television shoot yesterday, with two colleges Quincy Feather River College and Cal Poly from San Luis Obispo, they each brought their top three riders and their top three horses and they have a contest, and we film it and critiqued it. So watch for it on RFDTV.  Kate was our judge and Kate is the babysitter/trainer or trainer/babysitter for Turbo if I have to leave, and so being as I hurt my leg, my doctor said to stay off of it for a couple weeks, and the timing is perfect, I’ll send Turbo back to Kate.

Kate Neubert, she’s a goddess.  Kate Neubert is perfect; there must be something that I don’t know about her, because I don’t think anybody can be that perfect.  She’s a wonderful person and such a skilled talented individual.  Her timing is fantastic; she knows how to put a cow on front of a horse and keep it there; and she takes really good care of my horse and does a wonderful job with him, and I couldn’t ask for more, plus she’s pleasant to be around for sure!  So I totally enjoy Kate.  If anybody ever wants to send a horse to somebody, I sure would send mine to Kate which I did!

Want some words of wisdom based a lifetime of Horse Trading – Here’s what Les has to say about Buying a Horse

Get Professional Advice
First and foremost, if you’re not a professional, get professional advice. Most non-pros are somewhat inexperienced when it comes to the “dos and don’ts” and traditions of horse trading, so choose a professional you trust and who has a good reputation in the industry.

First off, when you begin your adventure with your professional, make a payment agreement. You’re hiring this person to represent and protect your interests, and that’s a good thing. Sometimes pros work for a flat rate – maybe $500 – and sometimes they work on a commission. You’re better off to work on a flat rate because if you pay commission, the more you pay for the horse, the more the professional who is working for you makes, which is to your disadvantage!

Choosing a Professional
Should you recruit your trainer to help you buy a horse? You bet, but it has to be your trainer as far as protocol goes. If you don’t have a trainer, then you just want to find someone that you respect and who has a good reputation.

What to request from the owner/seller
Before you even spend the time to go look at a horse,

A note on the go!

Well I’m on a big airplane in Los Angeles and its getting ready take off in about five minutes so I have just enough time to give you a quick rundown of what’s been going on.

The seasons been good. Went to Quincy, California and worked with Chuck Mills there at Feather River College, and those kids are sensational!

And I got to go to Lubbock, Texas too! It’s great. I see why they talk about it in the rearview mirror though. It was wonderful to be there, the horses good and it’s a big ol’ place and it’s made for Texans.

Then on to Mitchell, Nebraska. Dottie was a great hostess and good horses. Really super nice people everywhere this year. Alpine, Wyoming had lots of snow. It’s cold. And they had lots of nice horses. Tanya does a wonderful job there. Is a beautiful place, looks like Jackson Hole, but its not.

Salinas, California…the sweetest lady in the world…Darelyn, puts on the clinic there and we had a lot of ropers and I really enjoyed working with ‘em. We had all kinds, but a few ropers.

And then I went to see my buddy James Dixon who’s on this airplane with me and in about five minutes we’ll be off the ground. We are headed toward the bottom of the world…to Australia… where we’re gonna have a little fun. Now, we’re going down there and Andrew McArthur is the sponsor and he’s taking us to three different clinics in Australia and it’s gonna be HUGE FUN. I think. He’s made a big deal out of it. We don’t know whether to be excited or scared…ya know…we kinda feel like rock stars but we don’t know how to act like ‘em…and so, we’re gonna fake it! Just before this, James put on his clinic on in Moab, Utah and I’m gonna tell you what, it might have been the best clinic I’ve ever, ever, ever went to or felt like I went to …The reason was that red carpet was so deep I damn near couldn’t breathe. But then I found out it wasn’t a carpet, it was SNOW. I though it was the red carpet! It was so soft and fluffy….but it was white. I’m color blind ya know… But ya know it snowed on us one day!

When we were in Hawaii not long back at a clinic there and my gosh I’ll tell ya, I had a huge time there. Ya know it rained six inches on us in one day in an outdoor pen. You couldn’t see any dirt! I’m not sure they had any there. But the footing was good, whatever was underneath that water. My boots filled up with water. We enjoyed workin’ there… and those people from Hawaii they work right through it. Everywhere I’ve been this year they’ve made me feel like a king. I love my job. I love the people. I love helpin ’em. I’ve had a lot of good horses.

Speakin of good horses, I’m ridin’ the best horse I’ve ever rode in my life….Turbo. Turbo’s my Nic-It-In-The-Bud. He’s the three year old and he’s a futurity horse right now and Turbo is very advanced. And God, now this colt does everything! He programs like a robot and I’ve just had a fine time. He’s feeds my ego everyday, anytime I need to feel like I’m doing something right I go up and ride Turbo. And after that I rope, so I go up on Turbo and down on my ropin’…but some days I rope pretty good. I went out and roped just cuz’ I thought I better do it before I come here, jump on this airplane and leave for two weeks to Australia, now I’m wishin’ I hadn’t it was not a good day. But my horses are kinda soft.

I’m gonna come back from Australia here and go to the Rancheros Vistadores Ride and then take off and go up there with Greg Norris at Big Flat Rock, Virginia. And that’s where the hillbillies’ live and that where the what’s her name and the McCoy’s had their big fight for years and the Blue Ridge Smoky Mountains and they live in hollers … and they’re really neat people…little different in some ways…but dog-gone sure nice. And Greg is top of the line; a good horseman, got good horses and he’s very enthusiastic…gonna go help him and a group of friends of his.

This colt I’m ridin’ is very, very unusual. Turbo does everything perfect and Turbo’s wonderful and Turbo’s beautiful…Turbo loves me. It’s a pleasure to ride him and I’ve got a lot of confidence in him…win, lose or draw…I know he’s gonna end up being a fancy horse down the road.He’ll be a horse that people know about. He’s kind of a speed lookin horse. He’s kinda leggy. Pretty limber kinda horse…real pretty. I leave him at the babysitters while I’m gone and that’s Kate Neubert. Kate works for Morgan Cromer. Morgan Cromer’s an up and comin super star of California at this point. She won the the Pacific Coast Cutting Horse Futurity this past year and Kate just won a major event on a five and six year old mare that she’s trained herself. And Kate’s shown some Snaffle Bitters.

Kate is the daughter of Brian Neubert a well known clinician throughout the world and very, very much respected by myself. So anyway, Kate’s my babysitter and she’s kept my horse on cattle. Went over and checked her out this morning and she’s probably ridin that ol’ trail horse as good as he could be ridin.’ She’s a super star in my eyes and I’m really impressed with her. So, I’m anxious to see what kind of results we get. She knows exactly what I want and by God she’s programmed and he’s programmed. Can’t do any better then that, so that’s about all I know for today folks! Thanks! Talk to you when I get back!

Buffalo vs. Cattle

I’ve been asked what the difference is between working horses on buffalo and working them on cattle. If you use buffalo, you’ll be getting economic as well as training advantages.

Economic Advantages

Buffalo keep:  A buffalo will last as long as two years, however, most people trade them in every year.

Buffalo can be cheaper: A well-reputed buffalo dealer is generally raising them for the meat, so they’re usually very happy to do business with you. They don’t breed buffalo cows (females) until they are three year old. That means the buffalo breeder has to maintain them for three years before he can benefit from reproduction, unless he has some people that have cow horses that want to use them.

So, for the first buffalo you get, he’ll charge you between $300 and $600. But after that, he’s usually happy to trade straight across—you give him and older buffalo and he’ll kick you back another yearling. Which means a one-time investment and a huge economic savings

Training Advantages

Buffalo are and stay wild: Buffalo have more instinct and are more reactive then cattle. If you had three cows and you work them with one horse on a daily basis, I’d say at the end of a week (ten days max), the cows burn out. Cattle will not recycle. In other words, once they lose their instinctive feel and eye contact with a horse, they never get it back. You could turn those critters you’ve been working out for six months even or a year, bring them back in to work and they’ll be sour again instantly. They don’t forget. Once they lose the instinct of reacting to a horse, it never seems to come back. Buffalo never lose what we call feel—the reaction to the position of the horse. They also react more accurately to a horse’s position than cattle do.

Buffalo instinct engages your horse: The “look” or eye contact that a horse gets from the animal it’s working mesmerizes the horse, drawing him to what we call expression—where the ears come up or “flash”, and the horse shows extreme interest in the object (buffalo or cow) that it’s working, if their eyes meet. With sour cattle, horses lose their instinct and expression til they become placid and dull because they don’t have that eye contact anymore. They lose that bright flashy quick instinct.

If this is the case, you’re better off to go out and work the flag (the mechanical cow) or do nothing. Sour cattle are just an evil thing.

Buffalo have more energy: In addition to that strong instinct, buffalo have a huge energy supply, much more than cattle. They can be worked all day long. You could probably work a number of horses on a buffalo every single day, and he would last you a year. I can easily work three horses on one buffalo for 45 minutes. If you work a cow, you’ll get about 10 minutes and then it’s over.

Everyone in the cow horse industry is the same – if someone comes to visit someone with their horse, very seldom, if ever, would we run our bunch of fresh cattle in to share with our neighbor. That’s what makes us or breaks us. So if we have some mediocre cattle we might use them for some younger horses pr to share with the neighbors, and we’d expect the neighbors to be same with us. However, if there are buffalo they can have at them. You can’t wear them out – they’ll wear you out.

Tip for buyers: Get yearling buffalo cows (females) because the bulls get a little hookie (the horns can hook you) toward the end of the year.

Just a Horse

I saw this in Performance Horse the other day and it really struck a chord with me, so I wanted to share it, if you didn’t see it yourself.

Just a Horse
Author Unknown

From time to time, people tell me, “lighten up, it’s just a horse,” or, that’s a lot of money for “just a horse.” They don’t understand the distance traveled, the time spent, or the costs involved for “just a horse.”

Some of my proudest moments have come about with “just a horse,” but I did not feel slighted. Some of my saddest moments have been brought about by “just a horse,” and in those days of darkness, the gentle touch of “just a horse” gave me comfort and reason to overcome the day.

If you, too, think it’s “just a horse,” then you will probably understand phrases like, “just a friend,” “just a sunrise” or “just a promise.” “Just a horse” brings into my life the very essence of friendship, trust and pure, unbridled joy. “Just a horse” brings out the compassion and patience that makes me a better person.

Because of “just a horse,” I will ride early, take long walks and look longingly to the future. So for me and folks like me, it’s not “just a horse,” but an embodiment of all the hopes and dreams of the future, the fond memories of the past and the pure joy of the moment. “Just a horse” brings out what’s good in me and diverts my thoughts away from myself and the worries of the day.

I hope that someday they can understand that it’s not “just a horse,” but a thing that gives me humanity and keeps me from being “just a woman.”

So, the next time you hear the phrase, “just a horse,” just smile, because they just don’t understand.

Friends at the Snaffle Bit Futurity

Hey folks!  I was able to chat with a few of my old friends at the Snaffle Bit Futurity last fall and I thought I’d share those conversations with you.  One is with my good friend Jake Gorrell, and up and coming trainer in the reined cowhorse industry, and the other is with my good friend Skip Brown, one of the NRCHA’s top judges.  Hope you enjoy them!

Here’s Jake:

And here’s Skip:

Happy New Year!

Why hello folks. Here we go with a new blog for the year 2009. I’ll finish up with some of the things we did last year in 2008 that were interesting. The first one was; I gave a clinic in Bismarck, North Dakota in November. Now who in the world wants to go to Bismarck in November? But you that clinic filled up. People wore their snow suits – at least everybody did except me – I should’ve had my long johns on. They had good horses and good people and my good friend Monte Beard put it on. We had some ropers, we had some reiners, we had some cowhorse people and we had some kids. And we worked with all of them in the indoor area there, while the wind blew outside and it snowed a little. But you know, it didn’t bother us at all. Its interesting how people would come out of the woodwork in a late fall month to take a clinic. I was extremely flattered.

The next thing I’ll tell you that I’ve been doing, that a lot of you don’t know that I do this time of year, is expert witness jobs. That means where an attorney somewhere, actually anywhere, has a horse case – where a movie star falls off and breaks her finger nail, or sometimes her neck. And they always want to blame somebody, and of course the attorneys don’t know a thing about horses. They don’t speak horse, they don’t know horse terminologies and they certainly don’t know what good and poor horse safety practices are. They have no idea! So they have to call on an expert, and that’s where I come in. I very much enjoy, being an expert for the attorneys. I find a case that I believe in, I get to design theory as far as why or why not things should or shouldn’t have happened. I come up with conclusions that are what attorney wants to hear. And like I said if I believe in the case, I’ll take it. And in the end most case are settled out of court, but sometimes we do get to go to court and I enjoy that. It’s a fun time for me to get on the witness stand and talk. And you get a lot of attention from those people sittin’ and starin’ at you from the jury box. So I’ve had some fun doing some expert witness work, here for the past few months. The best part of the whole thing is God knows that we’ve spent our share of money on attorneys in our lives, and this time the attorney pay me. So that’s very sweet.

Next thing I will talk about was the national finals rodeo. The NFR. I’d personally come to grips with the fact that I was not going to go to Las Vegas to the NFR this year. Then my buddy Cody Mora calls up and said “Hey, we got a cheap airplane flight, come on let’s go! Its two days out of your life! Come on let’s go!” So I went, I had a nice time and saw lots of people – saw a few old friends. What I really saw was how many, many thousands and thousands of people were there, and they all looked like cowboys and cowgirls that I didn’t know. Usually I go places…like horse shows or roping, or something like that, and it seems like I know a high percentage of them. But at the National Finals Rodeo it was like I was lonesome in a crowd, believe it or not. Not that I care, it was kind of fun being the fly on the wall. The people watching were great, and the rodeo was sensational. My favorites at the rodeo didn’t win as much as I wanted them to, but I really, really enjoyed the whole process.

The year 2008 was a really good year. As we grow older and hopefully develop more wisdom, we also seem to have more understanding of the reasons that we should be grateful for what we have and for being here. I think part of that is because so many of my friends anyway, have gone from motorcycle accidents, horse accidents or they just died. They just went away. The older you get – I think everyone will say, it’s the same everywhere – the more people you know that have passed on. Well, we’re still here, healthy and kickin’. I think I actually feel healthier right now, physically and mentally, than I have since I was probably 35 or 40 years old. But that’s probably for all the right reasons. I played pretty hard for quite a few years and I don’t regret it, I just wish I could remember a little more of it. But anyway, the play days are over and I am thankful to be here; thankful to have gained the wisdom from my past.

I am also very thankful for being as fortunate as I am to have had a job that is also my passion. I very much enjoy the teaching, sharing my knowledge, my wisdom that I’ve learned, by mistakes more than education! Also I really enjoy my bit and spur business. I totally love silver and polishing silver, touching it, looking at it, designing it, and making bits and spurs that are better then other people’s because I’ve learned to understand how a bit works, and what it takes to make a bit better then the next bit. Not that a bit is a bit. It’s not throwing dart at a map and saying I hope it hits something important. It’s designing a bit for special purposes and that is really fun – to come up with functional products!

Our website, thanks to Linda Boggs, has turned into a first class shopping center! By first class shopping center I mean that they are all products I would use. I think “picky” is an understatement for me when it comes to tack. The reason is I guess, that I’ve had access to just about whatever I wanted as far as horse tools go, and what I didn’t have, if I could dream of it, I drew it on a piece of paper and made it! So I’ve really learned what works – what’s good and what’s bad. From leather strap goods, to hardware as in bits, spurs and so on. Everything that’s on our website is what I call “niche-y” that means it has something about it that you can’t just walk into a tack store and buy. In fact, I don’t think there is hardly anything on that website that you just walk into your farm supply or cowboy supply store and pick up off the wall. Everything there has a little twist or trick, a niche or special option that makes it work the way I want it to work. So this is what we’ve created and this is what we are going to stick by, so it’s real, real interesting and really fun to be able to bring folks things that I know will do the job for them! Or for you folks to be able to buy something without going through ten trial pieces that end up in the back wall of your tack room in a dark corner somewhere because they didn’t work out. So you can buy things from our website that I know will work because I’ve tried them and used them.

Speaking of new bits and spurs, its Denver Trade Show time…Denver Trade Show is the largest, western, English wholesale trade show in the world. I’ve designed about 70 new bits and spurs for it! It’s really, really fun to design new pieces, take them to Denver and display them. And hopefully somebody goes “Ooooh, aaahhh, that’s wonderful! Gotta have it!” and buys it. The economics this year I know are tough in a lot of places, but it hasn’t really affected our bits and spurs as much as it has affected some other people in the businesses according to what I hear.

The Denver Trade Show is pretty interesting. That building it’s in might cover five or ten acres…probably closer to ten acres, and parts of it are four stories high! Every booth is set up as a ten foot square, however, some companies have more than one booth, or some have permanent show rooms, or permanent exhibit rooms upstairs. So it’s beyond description in as far as how huge, how many displays, how many new things we see there.

Like some of the new stuff we saw here last year for instance I would have bet dollars to doughnuts that nobody’d ever buy one thing, and that was the browband headstalls with six or eight or ten inches of Angora hair in the horses eyes and a breast collar to match with Angora hair hangin’ off of it. I saw that and I thought, nobody’s ever gonna buy those! Or ostrich leg boots, and saddles with ostrich seats to match the leg boots! I thought “This is fun to look at but nobodies gonna buy it!” Low and behold, I saw that stuff all over the country! They sold it, a lot of it! But that was the same as the “Bling Stones.” I thought nobody would ever buy them and gosh, look what’s happened, everybody’s got a stone set in something these days! But the Denver Trade Show is so big, that if you were to walk without stopping for two days I don’t think you could possibly see all the different booths. It like a maze! And it’s quite a good place for people watching, and to make connections. We have people from all over the world show up to buy and some to sell. It’s bizarre, exciting, and this year I think it gonna be cold! But we’ll see!

Anyway, we’re off to Denver very soon and then come back and we’re gonna do another television shoot. Cody and I are already out there and my colt that was a two year old last year, just turned three. But I’ll tell you a little bit more about him in just a second.

The first part of February I’m lookin’ forward to going to Feather River College in Quincy California for a two day clinic with Chuck Mills and his wonderful group of students. These kids have been just ace players. Chuck does such a wonderful job of teaching these kids and they use Cowhorse U. I never dreamed that Les Vogt would have college educational books out! You know when I was going to college I think I could have made a lot of bets about that, and people would have certainly bet that I never would’ve, but I do. And Cal Poly and San Louis Obispo and Feather River College in Quincy both have adapted Cowhorse U as their textbooks in their equine programs! Anyway, so Chuck does a great job and those kids are really, really good. And I’m gonna have the fun of going up and working with them and that’s in the first part for February and then I think I’ll slip off on the way home and go ski for a day or two. That should be fun!

Then I go right into the next clinic which will be Temecula, and my new friend Tracy Sullivan is putting a clinic on there and we’re all excited about it. Then we actually do the next one the next week in Lovett, Texas. I’m kinda spreading myself around aren’t I? And get this one! I get to go to Hawaii for the last weekend in February! I’ll be gone for five or six days. I have two clinics there on the Big Island. However, my excitement there in Hawaii is this – I’m a first time grandfather! My son, Brooks and wife Jeannie have a new son and his name is Tyler! So I get to go meet Tyler! Tyler is about 3 months old right now and I’m very excited. I’ve always wanted to be a grandpa, and now that that’s accomplished I’ve got to figure out how to get Brooks and Jeannie to move back to the “main land” so I can have some fun with this youngster!

Well then let’s see here, the next thing I’ll talk about is probably the most exciting thing or two. I’m leading really, really a fun life! This time of year is almost like a fantasy life to me because you see there’s not much going on in the form of clinics until, like the first of February. So that leaves me the months of November, December and January, where there’s not a lot of pressure. So I can work in my office until noon, then I go to the Rancho El Rio Grande and ride with my friend Cody Mora, who I help everyday with his cowhorse aspirations. and Cody helps me every day, as some of folks know, with my roping.

Well my roping is really getting better and better! One of my rope horses is Milly Mag, and Milly is a snaffle bitter I showed a few years back and she’s bridled pretty good now. She’s seven or so. I could go ahead and show her down the fence as a cowhorse. Well she’s turned into a heel horse deluxe…so I go rope on Milly. But the first thing we do is Cody and I, everyday and I get there about 1:30, and we saddle up our colts. Our colts: I still have the two year old stallion that came from Montana that I picked up last year at the Snaffle Bit Futurity. The colt is a product of Travis Young. Travis rode that horse most of the year as a two year old - up until October – and he did a wonderful job! However, I liked him so well, I did what I said I’d never do! I thought I was through with the Snaffle Bit and now I’m back in the game!

This colt could bring the enthusiasm out of a statue! I’m telling ya, this colt…I hate telling horse stories because I hate listening to them but this ones different…how about that!. Anyway this colt, I would say 80% of his days when I ride him, are literally perfect training days! I’ve learned so much riding this colt, because I can plan what I want to use for a focus point each and everyday with this horse. Now then, I plan on how I am gonna warm him up first. I ride him outside more than I have some other horses in the past because it’s beautiful and hilly foot hill pastures up there and I can take him out and he’s the kind of horse that’s easy to ride and he goes nice and slow. He’s a no-hassle horse. So I enjoy riding him out, but I always make my plans as to what my focus points are gonna be, with the horse each and every day. I don’t try and shotgun it at all, and change subjects with him a lot. I don’t just get on and ride. If this colt produces I’ll be so tickled. He is the most uncomplicated horse I’ve ever ridden, at this point.

Snaffle Bit 08

Reno Snaffle Bit Futurity for 2008 was very exciting. I would say the crowds were average. The attendance was average at best and what that was probably attributed to, we don’t know, probably to some of the economics. The reports from the sales were horses of high, high value – horses that had a lot of credentials as far as their dams had won a lot of money or produced horses, and that were by some of the most visible and dominant stallions – definitely brought a lot of money. However, anything less than that, didn’t have much value. In the yearling sales, for $1,000 or $1,500 you could buy a pretty nice yearling. Actually, for $2,500 you could buy a pretty nice yearling, with really good bloodlines and nice color and good looking – but not really proven bloodlines, as far as the dam goes. Between $5,000 and $10,000 you could sure buy a really pretty, fancy yearling; then of course the top end ones went for whatever people would bid for them, which is more money than sometimes they are worth, as far as real value goes.

So the horse sale in general, the actual sale of anything less then the cream of the crop was on an ultra wholesale level. In other words, “get’em out of my yard I can’t afford to feed them” and I think that’s kind of the way a lot of people feel these days – even though they are nice horses – sad but true!

The Reno Snaffle Bit Futurity again was an interesting one. The quality of horses that showed at Reno was better than I’ve ever seen in the finals. The finals were extreme! Super horsemanship, super performance, super training – the guys rode really good! It was a good show.

During the finals we filmed a for our RFD television show (part of Wide World of Horses) called Equine Insights with Les Vogt, and we had some real fun interviews! One of my favorite and best friends is Jake Gorrell, and I interviewed Jake and he was in the finals. He was my pick to win the futurity, however I think he ended up third or forth. But I watched Jake preparing for the futurity and so I thought it was pretty interesting how he kind of changed some things in the way he prepared. So we interviewed Jake and got his insight as far as how he looked at futurity this year, what his plans were as far as showing goes, and what his strategy was for trying to win. I admire Jake an awful lot and I like to think Jake will win the futurity soon, he hasn’t quite gotten the job done yet, but he can make the finals every year in the top end. He’s just knocking at the door.

We also interviewed Cody Mora. Cody is a young man that is just cracking into the reined cowhorse world, and Cody’s my ropin’ buddy. Cody’s one of the best headers as far as team ropers go, in the nation. He doesn’t go to as many rodeos as the super, super stars go to but Cody can sure get the job done. However, Cody wants to move into the cowhorse world, so I rope everyday with Cody and he tries to make me a roper, and I try to make him a reined cowhorse guy. I told Cody not long back, I said “Cody, ya know, you’re only going to ride reined cowhorses as good as I rope…no better.” So he has been teaching me how to rope more seriously lately and I am not sure it’s really having the effect I want, but he’s sure trying. Cody is very interested in this reined cowhorse business, in fact he’s obsessed with it!

Where Cody works is on Rancho Arroyo Grande… and these people that own the ranch are going to purchase the horses that Cody needs to go on and become a reined cowhorse showman. I’m helping as a consultant. It’s really, really a fun project. We’ve done a business plan and so on. We went over that on the television program as to the right approach to put together a reined cowhorse program as a business and hold your money together and hopefully even make a dollar.

The third interview was fun, we had Skip Brown. Skip Brown is the AAA judge…he’s the judge of judges. He judges more shows per year than any other reined cow horse judge and has for a long time. So Skip knows a lot about it and he is recognized as being very knowledgeable. So we asked Skip a lot of loaded questions and of course one of them, that has been my pet peeve is people buy silver bits and have silver corner plates on their saddles and silver spurs, and so on. And the never seem to clean them as much as I’d like to see them cleaned in the show pen. And my biggest discussion with Skip was, “Is it an insult to a judge for someone to show up with dirty equipment or is it a compliment to a judge?” You’ll have to tune in to find out the answer to that! This is a real interesting one. How much influence on judging or your score does the way you present your “package” have?

I am in the process today, preparing to go to Reno, Nevada again for the ACTRA (American Cowboy Team Roping Association) National Finals Roping, and this is a numbers roping so it’s like handicapped as far as your ability goes, and I’m coming in pretty low on the ladder because I’m not a high number roper. I’m a very low number. I also have a booth there, so I’m loading up everything from tables and chairs to horses and saddles and I’m off for a week there to go have some fun!

I use my Five Easy Pieces a lot on my rope horses. So much of what we do with a rope is not just a pattern. Each steer that we rope, as a heeler or even a header, has variables. He may run straight for a while or even make a curve to one way or the other or he may change speeds. A rope horse has to be able to maneuver and put you, as the roper, in a particular position, so it gives you roping advantage under high speed. Well without the controls you can obtain through the Five Easy Pieces, you are at a disadvantage. I use the Five Easy Pieces daily to create these controls and maintain these controls, and when things go a little bit wrong – which they do go wrong occasionally as far as the high speed controls go – I fall right back into the Five Easy Pieces. I can’t tell you how easy it is. I don’t know how people can get along without the Five Easy Pieces. Shoulders are so critical. Shoulders control, neck control, even ribs cage and hips are important with a rope horse. So if you’re a roper and haven’t gotten exposed to the Five Easy Pieces you need to take a look at it.

Well I didn’t know I was going to be anxious to show, but after going to the Snaffle Bit Futurity this year I brought a two-year-old home. A friend of mine, Travis Young from up in Montana, had a really, really, really nice Nic it in the Bud colt. They’ve been looking awful good in the shows this year and I’m kind of interested in them. I’d ridden this colt three or four times this summer, at different clinics Travis has come to and really liked him a lot, so Travis sent the horse home with me and we’re partnering up on him. And I’m going to ride him, and if he continues to be a lot of fun, which he is at this point, then I’m going to show him! Have some fun and if he shows, great! That’s the only way I’ll go, if it’s easy, fun and looks like I can win! Those are three pretty tough prerequisites, but if this colt stands up for it then I will show him. If he doesn’t, I simply won’t. At this point he’s just a two-year-old of course and does some really cute things and I’m really having fun with him, and that’s the big deal, am I really having fun? And really I am… and I’ll keep riding until I decide I’m not having fun! So stay tuned!

Summer’s Activities

I’m going to tell you a little about what I’ve been doing here and why you haven’t heard from me. Well in the month of June, I made contact with a really neat guy named Greg Norris, who lives in Virginia in the Blue Ridge Smokey Mountains, and he hired me for a private clinic.

 

Well, this was my first trip to the Appalachian mountains, and it’s pretty darn interesting; in fact it was one heck of a fun experience. Greg has some really nice horses. We worked with him for four days and got a lot done. Greg’s a good hand, and he seemed to learn an awful lot. He’s also a fine guy–he treated us well, plus he introduced us to a lot of his local friends. They live in “hollers”. I didn’t really understand what a holler was for sure, so we went and looked.

 

Well, hollers are just little gullies with lots of trees and pretty mountains. The Blue Ridge Mountains are blue. They’re just as blue as it gets. I asked them why it kind of looks like there has been a fire because it’s blue, smoky looking blue. They said no, that’s just the way it is there. They have a very unique lifestyle with very grass roots and traditional values, and boy they stick to them.

 

We went to the Saturday night hoedown at the hardware store. They clear out the middle of the store and played the type of music they’ve played since the beginning I guess, whenever the beginning was. This is the same area where the Hatfield’s and McCoy’s were–lots of coal miners.

 

Anyhow they did the flat-foot dance–flopped their elbows, and clickety clacked with taps on their toes and heels. They do some pretty western dances. I didn’t see anybody there drinking if they were. They certainly don’t go there to get drunk but boy they do have fun. They’ve got the little kids and the old folks and everybody out there dancing at the same time. It is so nice to see that there are real traditional family values out there.

 

After we worked with Greg, we jumped in the car and went to the racetrack, Keeneland. We had quite an experience. We went back stage into the stables, looked at the horses, and met some of the grooms. We saw some of the trainers and lots of pretty horses.

 

Near Keeneland, we went on a thoroughbred ranch tour and saw the Kentucky Horse Park, which is very, very interesting. The tour of the farms was breathtaking. The horses that I saw were the greatest thoroughbreds in the world, and they did not look like thoroughbreds to me. They looked like the prettiest quarter horses I’ve ever seen in my life. They didn’t look real lean and long and lanky like I expected. These horses were really balanced and really beautiful.

 

Then we went on to Churchill Downs where the Kentucky Derby is held. They have a big virtual-reality room; it’s like a barrel. It might be 70 or 80 feet across, and there’s 360 degrees of screen projected around you. It’s like a surround screen. It takes you to a day at the Kentucky Derby, starting early in the morning when the grooms get up and start getting the horses ready for the Kentucky Derby. Boy! I will tell you; you can feel the tension, electricity, excitement, the color and the glamour of the day.  It’s just amazing. I can tell you, it had to be as good as or better than going to the Kentucky Derby. They also have a museum there where you can see the hats that some of the famous ladies have worn (They’ve got some bizarre ones). We watched the horses train there at the track and went on a riverboat ride. So the whole thing was pretty darn interesting.

 

Then I drove on to Nashville. I have never seen Nashville. I got to see the Grand Ole Opry, and the old building where it’s been. I can remember when I was a little kid watching television, when TV first came out I guess, and I saw the Grand Ole Opry stage, and by God it’s just like it looked then! That was a lot of fun!

 

We went on to Edmonton and did a clinic up there. I met a bunch of really neat guys that rope a lot. So I got to spend some time roping after the clinics. It was really a good clinic with good horses. We had a lot of fun.

 

Then about the next week or two, I went over to Calgary, in Alberta, Canada, and did a clinic there for Kent Williamson. Kent’s an old friend with some good horses. He’s doing really well with his horses. He’s got a Boonlight Dancer stallion that I think is really a nice horse.

 

We also went to the Calgary rodeo and that’s pretty bizarre! Now I’ve seen Calgary and Salinas. Those are the rodeos on the west you’re supposed to see. Salinas is wonderful, beautiful, and traditional. Calgary is like a stage play. The horses buck better than I’ve ever seen them buck anywhere in the world including the National Finals for sure!  Every rider there is by invitation only, so those guys ride better than you’ll see almost anywhere. It is like a stage play set up for family. It’s a big deal well worth seeing if you’ve got (choke, choke) $80 for a seat. Can you imagine that for a rodeo seat? And it’s a sell-out!

 

Actually that kind of caps it. I’m in the airport right now headed off to Roger and Sue Hart’s place in Yakama, Washington. I’m going to say I have done easily 25 clinics at their place, maybe 30! They’ve hosted two clinics a year for 10-15 years. That Sue Hart can hustle!  She’s filled up every one of them.

 

So here I am, it’s going to be 102 degrees tomorrow! We’ll see how it goes. Then I’m off to Alpine, Wyoming, and then back to San Luis Obispo, California where it’s nice and cool. Then back to Arlington, Washington. Then off to Cheyenne, Wyoming at the end of September, before I drop in at the Snaffle Bit Futurity for the final days. So I’ve got some fun times to look forward to!