>>> I need to go into the pasture and take some video of our horses going into and out of the grass eating pasture and also the young horses.
That would be great, Robyn! I know folks get tired of seeing videos and pics of my horses moving about, and you certainly have more horses at your farm than I do. >>> I would be very interested to see if anyone has photos of horses in tolt/rack free in the pasture. Of all the pictures I take, I have exactly TWO pictures where I've caught one of my own Icelandic's in a true tolt/rack in the pasture. It was Saga's filly, Tifa, taken when she was just a couple of months old. I don't have it on video though, just a couple of sequential pictures. >>> Karen and Janice you may have seen it?? Honestly, I've never seen many horses rack at liberty in person, but yes, I have seen little videos and still pictures of TWH-racking-type horses racking at liberty - I just can't remember if they were TWH, racking horses, or some crossbreds though. There is a TWH mare down the road from me who racks very nicely and with apparent ease, but I've never seen her do any gait above a walk without a rider up. She's a trail horse, and as far as I know, has never been padded or oddly shod. I could ask her owner, and go watch her, because she's the closest horse to me that I think MIGHT rack in the field. Neither of my TWH rack at liberty...although I suspect Mac may have in his younger days. But, remember, Mac had some lingering muscle memory from his awful early BL training, so I wouldn't count that as fully natural. I have a suspicion that Mac, like many TWH of his generation would have been pacey even young without that early training - he certainly converted (reverted?) to pace as he aged. I'm so sorry now that I don't have any videos and more still pictures of us riding him in his early post-BL days, or of his gaits at liberty. I'm sure I could have learned a lot from him during that time, had I only known what to look for. Holly does a foxtrot, running walk and trot at liberty - and to think, I once naively thought her to be a defectively gaited TWH because she would trot! Live and learn! (To my defense, I simply rode her as a three-gaited horse, posting to her trot for my sanity, until I got a handle on what all she could do, but knowing I was missing out on her gaits. Trotting certainly didn't ruin her gaits though, and her top line looks very nice for a horse her age.) >>> The question then becomes are Rack/ Tolt as defined mostly human influenced gait??? Just a question well worth looking at, IMO. I think it's a very good question, and from what I've heard from the local old-school type trainers, yes, I think that rack/tolt is the most easily influenced/manipulated gait of all, no matter what the breed. Karen Thomas [EMAIL PROTECTED]
