Icelandic Horses

In 2007, a German magazine, Cavallo, published an article about the Icelandic Horse competitions, which focused on the riding style and the tack.

Yesterday, a blog was published on the same subject:

Icelandic Horse Shame in the Show Ring

Tennessee Walking Horses are known for the running walk as a breed; however, as individuals with different conformation, musculature, and neural wiring, they may do other gaits such as fox trot, saddle rack, stepping pace, trot, or pace.

As with Tennessee Walkers, this is the same with Icelandic Horses (aka cheval islandais, islandhast, islandskehest, islandpferde, ijslands paard, islanninhevonen, islenskihesturinn, islandisches pferd, hestur, islandpony, icelandic pony).

Not all Icelandic Horses will tolt. Some do not have the conformation, musculature, or neural wiring to tolt. Some will strictly be three-gaited trotting horses. Some will have the natural inclination to fox trot. And some will do the running walk as naturally as can be.

Natural gaits require no additional tack, no force, no weights, no manipulation.

As owners and custodians of the breed, we need to realize this and not force horses who are not naturally inclined, to tolt.

FEIF is trying to focus attention on the welfare of the breed. This is a good thing to do. Forced gaits are not pretty. They are hard on the horse. And, of course, they are not inherited.

We need to ride in a humane way and meet the goals of the humanitarian efforts on behalf of the Icelandic Horse.

How can we do this?

Here are some suggestions:

[] No forced frames for riding the horse, which includes ALL gaits. Yes, walk, trot, and canter included. We do not want to see the horses crammed unnaturally to perform natural gaits.

[] No nosebands. Let's not hide the horse's lack of bit acceptance, and the rider's hard hands with a noseband. No more! If the horse doesn't accept the bit and the rider can't ride without pulling on the horse's mouth, let him stay on the ground, and not ride at all.

[] No weights on the legs. Let's breed some good straight legs so that "protective" boots are not required because of bad conformation, and, of course, no boots for manipulating gait!

[] No whips. No intimidation for the horse. It's a straight track, people. There's no finesse going on as in other riding disciplines. Let's toss out the whip and see if the riders can ride and the horses can move without it.

[] Burn the icelandic saddles! or turn them into lamp shades. These are brida saddles, tight in the gullet, putting the rider's weight on the weaker part of the horse's back. Why would anyone purposely do this? Gaits obtained by sitting on the cantle and digging the back of the saddle into the loins are not inherited... and basically, it's not nice to do to the horse; not humane.

Let's go natural and not leave anything to be deemed questionable!

See Slide Show of the Icelandic Horse Birth

Many of us, around the world, as Icelandic Horse owners, are geographically so far away from each other, that it's not easy to get together to exchange information about training and riding.

To meet the need, and to help fill in the gap, Judy Ryder has organized an on-line video "show" to enable Icelandic Horse owners to share information about training and riding. Judy is a long-time gaited horse and Icelandic Horse owner. She is an educator and a facilitator, located in California,
and also an advocate of natural horsemanship and natural gaits for gaited horses. Judy currently has two personal Icelandic Horses, both mares, named
Cookie and Charm, and a handful of rescue / rehab Icelandic Horses.

The on-line virtual show is an innovative concept that will enable Icelandic Horse owners to share natural training methods, along with training gaits naturally. The location of the "show" will be on YouTube.

YouTube is a free on-line video hosting service. The URL is: http://youtube.com. Hundreds of videos about any topic in which you may be interested, can be found on youtube, including Icelandic Horses.

Anyone can create at account at YouTube, for free, and upload videos at no charge. There is no limit to the number of videos that can be uploaded, altho there is a limit to the size of each video (100 MB / less than 10 minutes). YouTube gives you your own page and all of your videos are linked to your personal YouTube page.

The focus of the Icelandic Horse virtual show will be the increasingly popular natural horsemanship, and natural gaits (gaits without gimmicks, without mechanical aids). Natural Horsemanship is growing in leaps and bounds all over the world, and many of our Icelandic Horse owners have started their journey on the natural horsemanship road, and are doing quite
well.

The on-line show will enable us to share what we are working on with our Icelandic Horses, and the progress from one point to another. All Icelandic
Horses worldwide are invited to participate, and we hope to have all countries around the world represented. There are no costs involved, and no
fees to enter the virtual show.

Any type of natural horsemanship can be used. Some owners use Parelli, some use John Lyons, or Clinton Anderson, or a mix thereof; some add clicker
training. The method doesn't matter, it's the two-way communication between horse and rider that is the focus.

Some of the entrants might be: foal getting used to a halter; an older non-rideable horse being lead thru obstacle course; riding bareback;
lead-line riding for kids, tricks, neckline riding, platform and / or mat work, driving, trailer loading.

Here's an example of the steps that might be taken in the process of obtaining a video and uploading it for the on-line show:

[] Register for a free YouTube account.
[] Grab your digital camera and set it on video mode
[] Set the camera on a fence or barrel, or have a friend video for you
[] Get your horse and try to stay within the area of the camera's
viewfinder.
[] If you're alone with the horse, turn on the camera, move to the right
spot, and start action
[] Focus on the relationship with your horse, and let 'er roll!
[] Don't worry about your hair, or weight, or background noises, etc.
[] When you're done, turn the camera off, put the horse away
[] Connect camera to the computer, upload the video to your YouTube account
[] Send the link to iceryder@gmail.com

This is fun to do, and you can practice video-ing and uploading as much as
you'd like. You can submit one video to the show or many videos. There are
no limits.

All of the videos submitted for the Natural Icelandic Horse Virtual Show
will be linked to one webpage so that everyone can view all of the videos.
This will be a very educational endeavor for all involved!

All entries should be uploaded by June 14, 2008 (but if you happen to miss
the date, upload anyway and let us know :-)).

If you need any help, please feel free to email me at iceryder@gmail.com

Thanks!

See the video: http://youtube.com/watch?v=-ApPJCMjZVg

http://thoof.com/stream/highlightedStoryId/146887/tr/true/.p12

This is a quick, fun trivia game about Icelandic Horses; try it:

http://iceryder.livejournal.com/8530.html

Von and Sam, a mare and a gelding Icelandic Horses are currently in a rescue which is closing down. They need to find new homes.

September 09, 2007

Facilitated by Nancy Allen

Introduction The Seven Games (7 games) of PNH (Parelli Natural Horsemanship) are a great way to start training or re-training of your Icelandic Horse / Pony. They help to develop a relationship, a bond, and a common basis / method of communication between you and your Icelandic Horse.

These exercises can be used with any breed of horse such as Missouri Fox Trotters, Tennessee Walkers, Paso Finos, Peruvian Pasos, Icelandic Horses, Quarter Horses, Thoroughbreds, Mules, and Donkeys.

Natural Horsemanship is not an invention of Pat Parelli's, but Natural Horse-Man-Ship is. It is an organization of techniques learned from many great horsemen and put together in a comprehensive form. Pat Parelli developed the program as a progression of tasks that develop horsemanship skills and takes us through a Levels program as we increase our abilities.

For centuries men and women have gotten together to discuss ways to make things better for the horse. Through Natural Horsemanship we are asking the horse to do alot of un-natural things though. Be around people. Be saddled, bridled and ridden.

Natural, to me, means working within a horses natural way of understanding (this is through feel) and within his own boundaries. Icelandic Horses seem to understand this natural communication very easily.

I'm hoping to get alot of input here from everyone. Yvonne, Lisel, Paul, Judy and others-I'm counting on you to share your knowledge with the rest of us! I've learned alot from the Seven Games, but my application may be different to what some people use. We can sure discuss the differences! It would be fun and interesting.

Since the clicker will be added to the Seven Games, my purpose is a little different from the ones Parelli lists in his notes for the Level 1 Partnership Program. In his Level 1 notes the purpose of the Seven Games is stated: "PURPOSE: Game #1 proves to your horse that you are friendly. The other 6 games prove to your horse that you are alpha in the herd."

With all of the games I am looking towards building a partnership. I'm thinking alot about feel and developing that from the very beginning. To me, this is the most important and understandable way to communicate to our horse.

I'm never going to use or think about the word dominance.

Continued:
http://iceryder.net.

Date: Sept 2, 2007

Icelandic Horses can do several different gaits. For more information about gaits:

http://gaited-horse.blogspot.com

From the Icelandic Horse Connection:

Anita of the GaitedHorse list said:

"My experience has been that many TWH & SSH that I've worked with seem to have a nice curvature to their spine that most saddles will bridge. Every caution should be made to avoid this problem fit, particularly in the gaited horses. Couple that with the fact that my stud has a very short back, which he is passing on to his offspring. Saddle after saddle has been too long for these short backed horses. I sold my Wintec after realizing that every shortbacked horse I put it on went hollow and couldn't release their topline. I've since ran across several other people who have had this same experience, and all seem to be riding shortbacked horses.

The needs of the gaited horse are so particular when you think about it... needing to move each corner independently requires a lot of freedom of movement."

Helen said:

"When it comes to saddles, design and materials only play a small part in the saddle's ability to distribute weight. People think, rightly or wrongly, that the larger the bearing surface, the better the weight distribution but this is not necessarily the case, especially with treeless saddles because flexibility does not distribute weight in the same way as rigidity. The important factor and what should be focused on first and foremost is that the saddle offers little or no restriction to the horse and this is one of the major benefits of treeless over treed, no matter the make or style.

If for instance, a treed saddle that had large wide weight bearing panels that covered a larger area of the horse's back did not follow the contours of the back and was not wide enough through the front of the tree to allow full movement and unrestricted rotation of the shoulders, the weight distribution ratio would not be even and a large percentage would be carried on the trapezius either side of the withers and not much more. As it is with even the best fitting saddles, there is more weight carried forward than to the rear and this is a combination of design features of ours and the horse's body, the way we have to ride them, the design of the saddle and how the stirrups and girthing are rigged. Just having a tree does not automatically mean our weight is better distributed and more often than not, the weight distribution can be worse.

(continued next section)

What really needs to be addressed is not that the weight is constantly being distributed evenly throughout that saddle's panels, but that the pressures from weight can fluctuate and be constantly on the move so that no area of the horse's back is under continual pressure. This is where treeless has the benefit over treed due to the flexibility but then relies a little more on the rider's ability to be aware of their position and how they distribute their own weight. The weight of the rider may be a factor but it isn't necessarily the most important. I've seen heavy weight riders who can ride lightly and more balanced than some of their much lighterweight counterparts.

Maybe not all but certainly most horses are happy to be ridden bareback and certainly some prefer this to being ridden in a treed saddle. When we ride bareback, the only area we have to distribute our weight is our bum cheeks and upper-inner thigh so this is one time when those of us with "20% extra free" can be of benefit! If you think about it, mankind and horses managed very well this way for a few thousand years until someone decided they needed to put a forked wooden block on their horses backs. Now when riding bareback, there is no rigid interface between horse and rider leaving two soft and flexible entities working togther . This means your body is constantly making small adjustments to move "with" the horse and therefore keeping the pressures from weight constantly moving and to some degree this is how it works with treeless. What really makes things difficult is our need for stirrups and this is where materials and design play a part but the biggest part needs to be played by the rider in ensuring that the stirrups are used as a balancing aid to rest ones feet in rather than a strut to support them.

When it comes down to it, do your research but above all ask your horse's opinion because the most up-to-date technical designs and the most expensive materials will mean diddly squat to the horse because they will know when they're comfortable."

Icelandic Horse Connection Community.


You'll love this community to share videos, photos, blogs, audio, and more!

The Pajama Project is a way for Icelandic Horse owners to give back to the community. We provide pajamas for children who are in special circumstances. The pajamas are distributed by the Pajama Project of New York.

More information here:

Icelandic Horse Connection Pajama Project.

You can find videos of riding Icelandic Horses bareback and bitless (or bridleless) at the Icelandic Horse Connection website and / or the blog.

To keep our horses, especially those that are very expensive, very loved, safe and sound for a lifetime, say "No" to the use of horses on ice.

Performing on a hard surface such as ice can be detrimental to the horse's legs. If wearing shoes with caulks, or shoes with ice nails, the foot is prevented from performing it's normal action of sliding into place. The caulks or nails grab the surface and stop the hoof, sending a torque up the leg. This can't be good for the horses' long-term soundness.

Charm is learning to say "No" through clicker training. At first, her ear is tickled with a finger, and she shakes her head. That gets a click and a treat.

She catches on easily, and the finger is faded away, to just a slight point, and she will say "No" to a question.

Video here: Charm Says No

For the sake of the horses... forget the human ego... Please consider the horse and do not use force and mechanical aids to get gait. Please let the horse gait naturally.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." -- Edmund Burke 1729-1797