Julie doing lead line work with a horse at her Florida clinic

The Magic and Mystique of Horsemanship Clinics

…clinics can vary a lot, depending on the riding activities and the clinician.

They may be discipline-specific (dressage, jumping, cutting, barrel racing, trick training) or more general in nature (groundwork, riding, colt-starting). Most of my clinics are general horsemanship, which means we address everything from groundwork, to leadership skills,…

horses next to each other looking agitated

Did You Teach Your Horse to Kick?

…riders—to stay calm and focused on the positive outcome, to show confidence and leadership even when you don’t feel that way, and to ride the horse more forward even when your greatest wish is to stop and get off. These are not riding skills; they are mental skills. This is…

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Another Day, Another Dollar!

…matter what people seemingly varied and individual issues are, it always boils down to the same few subjects leadership and authority confidence, effective communication, better riding skills and finding the right amount of pressure that motivates the horse to change. If these things do not ring a bell, you might…

Barn Rules, Cleanliness & Respect At Feeding Time

…acknowledgement of their efforts, followed by another nice rubdown. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it?

Since our horses are happy to be with us and comfortable with our leadership, they walk quietly beside and behind us, matching us step-for-step. They ground-tie whenever and wherever asked and they do not act…

Julie Cantering

Resistance to Canter

…horse—first ruling out pain then making sure the horse follows her leadership.

QUESTION: I have a four-year-old gelding. He has a wonderful jog and walk. When he is asked to canter or do anything faster than the jog he displays a bad attitude—complete with pinned ears and curled nose….

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Burn Out In Therapy Horses

…your horse and he respects your leadership; otherwise, when you step back or loosen up, he just does whatever he wants. I have written a lot about this subject—it’s all over my Training Library—and I spent a lot of time in my NARHA presentation just teaching simple ground manners to…

Reflections On Riding Bikes And Riding Horses

…to show him that you trust him. No more enabling or co-dependence. Expect your horse to be as obedient as your bicycle and he may surprise you!

Horses thrive off of good leadership. A good leader sets the tone, enforces the rules and trusts her first mate to do…

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Home From The Oregon Horse Master Shoot

…human stepping up to the plate and showing some leadership—either you are the boss of them, or they are the boss of you—that’s the way it works in a horse herd. Horses are much happier when there is a competent leader in charge, so that they can relax and not…

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My Horse Spooks At Traffic

…article called “Advance and Retreat” that talks about a process for desensitizing a horse to a frightening stimulus. Most of all, she needs your confidence and leadership. For a wealth of information on this and many other topics and to purchase educational videos and training equipment, visit my website, http://www.juliegoodnight.com.

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Fix A Grass Grabber

…to get into a nagging relationship such as this. A firm correction will motivate your gelding to change. This is much kinder than pulling on his mouth over and over for years. Make one correction, and be done with it.

Establish your leadership role in your herd of two….

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Dominated Horse

Leadership that shows a series of exercises you can do from the ground with any horse to gain respect, focus and obedience from your horse. Secondly, I would begin to reinforce the “nose” rule when I am riding. Any horse I ride, I don’t care the age or training, is…

Horse Master with Julie Goodnight

Episode 503 – Got Your Number

Got Your Number: On Horse Master: teaching a mustang owner that he doesn’t have to play games and can expect more from his horse

Slower is Faster with Horses

Let’s face it, we’ve become a society of instant gratification. From fast food, to fake nails, we like immediate results. This quest for instant results carries over to horsemanship, too—from flying lead changes, to side-passing, to collection.

Building A Better Relationship: Does My Horse Respect Me?

Question Category: Building a Better Relationship

Question: Dear Julie,

I have a 5 year old Tennessee Walker that I have had for almost a year. I am not sure if some of the things that he is doing are disrespectful, or if it is his personality. He

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Conquering The Canter

In every clinic that I teach, there are riders eager to canter; all they want to do is canter-canter-canter and maybe work on lead changes. Then there are those that want to canter but dread it, especially with 15 horses in the pen and