Generally, a horse is said to have a “hard” mouth when he has developed callouses in the corners of his mouth or dead spots on the bars of his mouth where nerve endings have been damaged. The more callouses or dead spots, the more pain he can take and the harder you will have to… Read More Horse Problems: Hard Mouth – Another Approach
Let’s start at the end of our quest instead of the beginning: A round bale with a hay net requires less time to feed daily, uses less hay per horse, keeps horses happier because it provides more natural forage, and will reduce your own stress level as horses calm down and stop worrying themselves and… Read More The Case for Round Bales: A Kristull Chronicle
A horse shoe can serve many purposes. It can bring luck to the household over whose door it is nailed. It can be used as decoration or as a wall hook. It can be nailed to the bottom of a horse’s foot to protect the hoof or add traction to the movement. (It can be… Read More Horse Shoe
A recent trip to Prague, Budapest and Vienna provided these beautiful examples of horses of old and equine treasures today in what was the Austro-Hungarian Empire during the reigns of Emperor Charles VI, Empress Maria Theresea and the Emperor Franz Joseph I (and before). Horses were the war machinery of the day, the agricultural beasts… Read More The Horses of Middle Europe – A Kristull Chronicle
By now your foal is getting pretty big and strong. He has also experienced a lot more of life: He has had daily sessions of Loop control and halter control. If your baby hasn’t experienced any of these routines, make it a point to introduce them right away. He still isn’t standing still to be… Read More Training Exercises – Foal 3 Weeks Old
In the past, most of our mares were pasture-bred to one of our in-house stallions. It was natural and easy. We had several premium stallions to choose from, we knew the mares were clean and there were no outside breedings to bring VD’s into the herd, and the breedings took place with little interference from… Read More Horse Health: Breeding on Foaling Heat
Equine PTSD. Horse abuse pulls on anyone’s heart strings. It usually comes in the form of neglect and malnutrition or is practiced as unpredictable or traumatic physical punishment. Horses with true PTSD need special care. Their reaction to stress is usually exaggerated, frantic, not proportional to the stress a normal horse exhibits. Some researchers posit… Read More Horse Problems: Training The Abused Horse
At the Kristull, we’ll saddle and ride anything! There’s a lot of work to do and not much time get it done, so it’s all hands on deck. These saddles must be cleaned and moved. It’s a dirty job but somebody has to do it. This Gator is not as comfortable as a good horse,… Read More Saddling a Gator- A Kristull Chronicle
The purpose of this exercise is to catch, restrain, gently control, and release the baby every day so that he gets used to giving to pressure from the very beginning. This lesson will also reinforce his earlier contact-imprinting as you enlarge your rubbing, stroking, and manipulating of his body, legs and feet. All of this… Read More Training Exercises – Foal 3 Days Old
It has been raining for a week solid, and the mud is ankle deep all over the ranch. But we have an appointment with the Horse Tooth Fairy, Loren Hardie, to float the teeth on several horses today. “Floating” involves a series of rasps (called floats) of different sizes, angles and depths that are inserted… Read More The Horse Tooth Fairy – A Kristull Chronicle