Presenting A Young Horse At A Fence Correctly

We now approach dangerous ground, for Mr. Jorrocks said, "That there was no young man wot would not rather have a himputation on his morality than on his 'ossmanship." In fact, he is sometimes rather flattered by the former.

Pace

Presenting a young horse at a fence for his very first lesson should be done at a walk, then at a trot, over the smallest possible obstacles. When he shows absolute confidence, he can go at a collected canter, but to get confidence in himself he must always learn to jump slowly at first. He can easily be taught to go faster later, and if given a nice free head at a canter a young horse will soon learn to extend himself well over ditches, etc.

Slow jumping will teach him to jump off his hocks and arch his back over a fence as a hunter should do.

Sticky Fencers

In approaching the fence young horses may have one of two faults; either they are inclined to be sticky or to rush. If anything the former is preferable and is the easier for the rider to deal with. It generally means that the youngster is careful and will look after himself. When coming to the fence he must be driven well up to his bit by the rider's legs, but on no account must his mouth be interfered with when actually jumping, otherwise he will be afraid to jump out when required.

The pressure, or more extreme use of the rider's legs besides driving on the horse, will tend to keep his hocks under him. Thus a sticky horse will generally be found to jump well off his hocks, propelling himself upwards as well as forwards over the fence. Such horses can easily be sharpened up, especially in company with others, provided the rider is fairly strong.

Fig. 8 - Two chasers-one jumping kindly and the other with his mouth being interfered with and consequently his balance. Chasers are trained to take a strong hold racing over their fences, but this is not the case with hunters. The picture is from a photograph taken at Punches-town. If this effect is produced on a chaser, it is obvious that a violent jerk like this would be very disastrous when schooling a young horse with a light mouth.