How do YOU teach a horse to work on a long line??

Question

I have seen,heard and read about so many different ways to teach a horse how to work on a long line. I'm just curious as to how many ways all of you do it. and why do you chose to do it the way that you do? is it the easiest? fastest? ect ect

Answer 1

I have never been shown an official way to teach a horse to longe that I've liked.  So before teaching my mare, I longed my geldings for a while, watching my cues and kind of "asking" them how to help.  I also let her watch while I did it, which I think helped immensely.

I started by longing her outside of a pen.  I put the line on her, then worked on just the walk verbal cues.  I took her in hand, told her to walk, went a bit then told her to halt until she had it down.  I then used my longe whip to tap her (varying the spot from just above her hocks to almost level with her tail base) and tell her to walk.  I kept doing this, letting her circle around me.  I gave her tons of praise and kept on with it, making wider and wider circles until she had it down.  This took about half an hour for me, but then again she is a very smart horse.  My other gelding, Maverick, who had never done this before either, took forever it seemed with just the walk command.  But he has a long attention span unlike Harper (the mare in question), which helped a great deal.

I decided to take a chance and she how she did free longing.  A couple hours later, I longed my babysitter gelding in the pen while she watched and then let her in.  With just the walk cue, she started on it and did everything I asked.  She's not up to a flat or running walk yet, she's a former performance mare who was sored and her muscles are still stretching out so I'm taking it slow.  Her only issue has been staying at the end of the line or on the fence, which I am still working on.

I have tried this technique on two horses so far, Harper and Maverick, and I'll be trying it on two 20 year old mares quite soon.  Harper has done wonderfully but I always have to judge her attention span.  He has done alright, he's just coming along slow.  The thing I think has helped them both was to see other horses doing it.  I'm not entirely sure exactly how this works, but after they saw them it just "clicked" and they got it, especially the verbal cues.

Best of luck to you!

Answer 2

We stand behind them with rope looped up and tap their heels with a buggy whip or stock whip.  They move away and you can cluck etc to get them to move on or snap whip etc.  Best to start in a corral rather than the big ring.   Just keep gently giving them a swat if they wander in too close.  

Answer 3

clip on the lunge line to the horse's halter. Have one person stand in the center, and have another hold the horse's halter and walk around with them in a circle, alongside them. Repeat this, and in about a week, the horse will understand and probably won't require a walker for much longer.

Why? Because it's kindest to the horse, since there's no confusion involved.