Foal Training

by Allen Pogue and Suzanne De Laurentis, all rights reserved, 2005

Arabian Proverb

Lessons learned in youth are as if carved in stone, while those learned at maturity fly like leafs on the wind.

We are all so lucky to be living during the beginning of a new millennium. If ever that was a good reason to reappraise traditions and formulate enlightened plans for the future, now is that time. Do not wait until your foal arrives because in the confusion of the moment you need to have a reasoned and logical plan of action.

You have been keeping a watchful eye like many breeders and thoughtful owners, spending fitful near sleepless nights checking in on the pregnant mare in your barn and yet she has managed to slip the baby out. And so sometimes when you least expect it you find the foal standing there, with sort of a bedazzled look of wonderment which quite naturally causes you to instantly bond with the new face of Gods most perfect servant of man.

The desire to meld with the spirit of the horse abides within in breast of nearly all mankind. Perhaps the Eskimo imagines his kinship with the polar bear while the aborigines in their "dream time" live in harmony with the kangaroo, but most everywhere in between mankind (if given the chance) harbors an inborn love of horses.

This rose-tinted, romantically inspired concept is NOT however part of a horses way of looking at things, especially a newborn foal. And so a strategy is needed that will help mold their instincts towards the mutually rewarding relationship that culturally we so desire.