February 3, 2011 Cover

She was 12, and her folks were among parents gathered to watch their daughters as they revealed what they had learned during a week-long trick riding camp at the Riata Ranch in Exeter. The routines were simple, slow and very safe – but still quite challenging for a girl who had ridden for the first time that week.

Royan Herman
Shadow Hills, CA
The smart horse owner will make his/her spouse No. 1 on Valentine’s Day, if only for the sake of harmony! Just think of the number of times one can get a free pass to the barn by being thoughtful when it counts.

Claudia Sneed
Fallbrook, CA
I plan to show my horse LOVE this Valentines Day by making her a special bran mash with grated carrots and molasses and maybe I will add a drop or two of red food coloring!

A SCRCHA championship line-up includes (top row, from left) Roy Rich, John Farris, Tony Mendoza, Mark DeForest, Garrell Reilly (second row, from left) Christine Farrar, Glen Aspinall, John Black, Lauren Lynch, Cheryl Harmon, Becky Holman, Sandy Miller, Tia Harari.

The Southern California Reined Cow Horse Association honored its best performers Jan. 22 with an awards banquet that sent home many year-end champions with trophy buckles. The fast-growing group has a full line-up of 2011 events that operate under an innovative system that encourages long-term participation. Learn more on http://www.scrcha.com

HEY RAY: When do you start an Arabian driving or riding?
Teresa Holden
Marysville, CA

HEY TERESA: Your question is very interesting to me because there can be so many answers depending on what your goal or motivation is in getting him started.

Next in a series

After focus on influencing the horse’s head and neck through lateral and vertical flexion in recent issues, we are going to move back a zone and learn to control the shoulders.

Once you can control the shoulders, it opens the door for many of the maneuvers that you’ll be working on in the future.

LOS ANGELES – Representatives of the homegrown Los Angeles Horse Council met with Los Angeles Equine Committee members Jan. 24, reviewing the LAHC’s effort for a “Equestrian Bill of Rights.”

The Bill of Rights is the LAHC’s set of equine specific precepts for use by city and county officials that, if adopted, will set in clearer course for equestrian lifestyle in the future.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has rejected Madeleine Pickens’ plan to create a Wild Horse sanctuary in Nevada according to a written statement from BLM Director Bob Abbey.

The wife of Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens first offered to establish the sanctuary for horses in BLM long-term holding facilities in 2008. Under the plan, 10,000 animals currently residing in BLM long-term holding pastures would be relocated to the sanctuary. The plan requests a $500 per horse per year BLM stipend to fund the nonprofit Save America’s Mustangs Foundation (SAMF) to oversee the horses’ care. In Oct. 2010, Pickens acquired the property necessary to create the 500,000-acre sanctuary in Nevada.

After a year of hearing your great feedback and another seemingly endless time spent building those changes, the new Horsetrader.com search site is unveiled with this issue – so please take a look.

It’s far from finished – in fact, websites aren’t ever finished – they “evolve.” We launched the first version of Horsetrader.com back in 1998, and this is really the third major facelift.

Last time, we introduced a new, easier to used part of the site to help you place your orders – both in print and online. This year, we’ve updated the search part of the site…and we’d love to hear your feedback. The good things you tell us now you’ll see in the months ahead.