Lynch Horsemanship Obstacle/Trail Training Center

02/13/2025

02/13/2025

4 bags of shaving and 5 hay bags and they were still out in that stuff.

02/04/2025

Developing Empathy

Frustrated by your horse? Try this---

Go for a run. Yes, you, human rider. Intersperse your run with sets of push-ups. See how long it takes before you lose athletic buoyancy, before you “just can’t.”

Fatigue in a horse, which is pretty much the same thing that you just felt, creates leaning, tripping, stumbling, slow reactions, poor coordination, lugging on the hand, all sorts of what you may be mistaking for “bad behavior.”

The tired horse will feel just like a “disobedient” horse. And then what will happen to that horse if the rider doesn’t tune into the horse’s fatigue? You know exactly what will happen to the horse. It will get drilled on. Drilled on just when the exact opposite should happen.

Trainers who lack the ability to sense what the horse is going through are among the worst drillers, and they create tense, scared, resistant horses, and they then do something even worse, they blame the horse.

Change your mind set. Think how YOU would feel if you had gotten beyond your limits and then got ground on and punished to fix your bad behavior.

You think I’m kidding? You think this isn’t going to happen today, all across the world where people ride and drive horses? That unfit for the task horses won’t be cranked and pressured? Dream on.

The best thing that you can do if your goal is to become a competent trainer is to constantly be aware of your own frustration meter. And stop before you create damage, physical and emotional injury and distress. Get a little and end on that. If even a little seems elusive, DO NOT GRIND. Go walk, try again tomorrow. Don’t add fear and anxiety to the training process.

I will say this one more time---“Don’t add fear and anxiety to the training process.”

Why am I saying this so often? Because if I had learned this decades sooner, I would have been a far better trainer and horse person---That’s why. Learn, if you are capable of doing so, from the mistakes that others have made. Do not drill your horse.

02/04/2025

We have gift Certificates for Valentines $25 off.

Bring your valentine on a 2 hour guided ride for just $240!

01/29/2025

From hard to catch, to hard to resist.

01/29/2025

01/27/2025

Oftentimes, we put a lot of onus on the balance of the front feet whilst disregarding that the horse is a quadruped with hind feet that require attention too.

The fallacy here is that if your horse's hind hoof balance is poor, i.e. they have low heels or negative plantar angles, they're going to be more inclined to overload their forehand to reduce the loading through the hinds.

It is very, very rare that I see a horse with good hind hoof morphology.

It is incredibly common that I see horses with indicators of negative plantar angle combined with at least two (but usually a handful) of the following:

- Chronic lumbar discomfort

- Chronic sacroiliac discomfort

- Atrophied gluteal muscles

- Atrophied quadriceps muscles

- Effusion around the stifles

- Diagnosis of hock arthritis

- Diagnosis of hind suspensory ligament desmitis (+/- recommendation for fasciotomy & neurectomy)

- Reactivity to palpation over proximal suspensory branches

- Reactivity to palpation over deep digital flexor tendon as it inserts into the hoof capsule

- Difficulty lifting hind legs.

What is even more farcical is that we bodywork, we medicate, we operate, we bash over the head with movement intervention...
.. And we are still SO slow to intervene with the feet??

And yet I have found that if you intervene with the hoof balance, you:

- Support greater muscular equilibrium: I find horses literally walk symmetrical muscle mass on without the need for an exercise plan!

- Restore joint range of motion, which improves joint comfort and longevity

- Perhaps (or in my experience often) reduce the discomfort in the suspensories, support their healing and can avoid surgery(!)

- Find the elusive sensation of "push" from behind when riding your horse.

So with all this in mind... why are we still so slow to catch on and do it?

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📸 the superficial dorsal myofascial chain which connects to the solar surface of the hind hoof.

You can see how if we lower the plantar angle, we traction all along the horse's topline, collecting discomfort as we go.

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For this month's webinar, I am delighted to be joined by the wonderful Beccy Smith of Holistic Equine, where she will be discussing what healthy hoof morphology really is, the factors that influence it and what you can do to help your horse.

Beccy is an Integrative Equine Podiatrist who truly considers the whole horse with respect to hoof health. Her keen eye and attention to detail is second to none in the hoofcare sphere and I cannot wait for this webinar!

NEW DATE: 28.01.2025 19:00 GMT

Recording available if you can't make the live ❤️✨️

01/27/2025

Nice horses, new friends.