Paladin was rescued near the start of September 2016 after being locked in a stall for years unhandled. He was not halter trained to lead when he went in, and he came out the same. He was isolated and never outside. He was ten years old and still a stallion.
Keep in mind, at the time of these videos, Paladin had 6 weeks since rescue to move freely in a turn out paddock 24/7. He learned to associate people with grooming (though we still hadn’t been able to get his dreadlock tail washed), learning to wear a halter and so forth. He still didn’t know how to really lead, and he certainly had no training of any sort.
While obviously, starting a horse undersaddle takes a much longer time than was possible for this day demo, this shows what a savvy trainer and smart horse can accomplish.
This one day demo served as an introduction to what will be, beginning in 2017, A yearly Competition where horse trainers in West Virginia, Ohio, KY, VA, PA and MD train a rescue horse for 100 days to compete in a one day event.
Stay tuned, spread the word and help us grow the Appalachian Trainer Face Off into something amazing that serves to adopt well trained rescues into great homes, give a spotlight to great local trainers and educate the public on proven training practices!
We know any training efforts usually garner comments from those with opinions on how it should and shouldn’t be done, so while you’re welcome to have your thoughts, any negative comments will be deleted. This was a day for a great trainer and horse to shine, and if you have different methods or would have done things in another way that would be effective, you are welcome to either work within a rescue you operate as you wish or to email us with your offers of free amazing, proven training services, and we are always happy to consider volunteers giving their time to train horses in need.
I wish I would’ve had someone like this man to help me and my mare. She and I have had to figured it out as we went . This was so wonderful! Palladin is absolutely gorgeous. I am a sucker for a red horse. Love the trainer’s horse too! Thanks for posting!