Arabian horse

[faster horses]

We used to have a Finder's Service where we found horses to fit different people.
Some of those people weren't good horsemen/women. I can tell you, Appaloosa's fit
those people well. They tend to be more gentle, ok, call them slow even...but they gave
people confidence and I know kids that used them in Junior rodeos. They fit a lot of people.
We never owned one, we had QH, but after what we experienced with our Finder's Service,
we neve knocked another Appaloosa.

That being said, I have to tell a story. A young man who lived with us was a genuine
horseman from the time he was young. He was amazing with horses, but he had a lot of young horses he was riding. So when he had a daughter that wanted to barrel race, pole bend, etc he bought her a nice, seasoned horse. A
beautiful gelding from a close friend (who lived in another state). He picked up the horse
and brought him home. He was a good-looking son of a gun. Like WOW. The friend said
"I'll send you the papers in the mail." The day came when he picked up the papers in the mail.
Guess what? He had bought an Appaloosa!!!! That's why the 'friend' mailed him the papers.
He didn't want him to know.

The Appy did make the daughter a very nice horse. He had a mane and a tail and no spots/ big hip, nice head, you sure couldn't tell he was an Appy by his looks.

 

[GoWyo]

There was a guy around Cheyenne years ago raised Appies. Had really nice horses. They had a lot of QH blood infused to pretty them up, but the appaloosa coloring. They were impressive and high dollar horses.

 

[Warren Allison]

Appaloosa breeders bred too much exclusively for color, and conformation and disposition went to hell in a hand basket. Bunch of jog-headed rat tailed, Tarpan-looking manes, etc. Up until the 80's, you copuld use reg TBs, QHs, Arabs, TWHs and Saddlebreds as outcrosses. But now you can only use TBs and QHs, and the Apps are now as good as QHs and paints as far as western disciplines.

 

[Dave]

I traveled with a guy who was a darn handy bronc rider. His parents were big in the early Appy horse association. Him and his brother won a lot in the junior Appy asso showing. I don't know what they rode at the ranch but my guess would be they had spots.
There was an old former NFR calf roper who roped at team ropings I went to. He had an Appy gelding he roped on. We would pitch him crap about riding an Appy. He said it was embarrassing and if the horse ever took a bad step he would sell him. But the horse always did real good and he kept riding him.

 

[Travlr]

There was a guy around Cheyenne years ago raised Appies. Had really nice horses. They had a lot of QH blood infused to pretty them up, but the appaloosa coloring. They were impressive and high dollar horses.

I saw a couple of guys standing together over at the sale barn, and they were laughing about the looks of a horse standing in one of the pens.

The mare was old, a red roan appaloosa with no distinct appy markings, and huge feet, a deep narrow chest with her two front legs coming out of the "same hole", and a spindly neck with a huge ugly head. Thin, bony hind quarters, ribs showing, high withers, no mane worth the mention and a bobbed tail.

I could only shake my head as I overheard their derogatory conversation.

They were experienced cowboys, used to fine horses of a specific breed and look. Meaty, thick quarter horses with fine heads and short front legs, built for short distance speed and quick action working cattle.

The old appy made them laugh.

Most of the appaloosas they were familiar with looked a lot like the quarter horses they preferred. Big, thick mountain ponies with short heads, the only distinction being loud coats from a distant appaloosa ancestor.

But I knew the old mare would have amazed them in her prime had they tried to run with her. She was an old style appy. Built for speed over distance. Those huge feet wouldn't accelerate fast, but once they got going they would increase momentum in a flat out run. The narrow, deep chest held a huge heart and lungs that would better supply oxygen to the thinly muscled legs than to thick, overly muscular limbs. The big ugly head would act much as the feet did, swinging on the end of a long neck to provide momentum. She wouldn't be a speed horse over a quarter mile, but she would get from here to there in half the time a quarter horse could run five miles.

A real Nez Perce war pony…

But yeah, by present standards she was ugly.

 

[TexasJerseyMilker]

A lady gave me this leopard ap because he was too much horse for her daughter. She said he was mean. Well, it turned out he was cryptorchid. I had a friend, an elderly Indian man named Chief who just loved this horse and the horse loved him too. So I gave him the horse. He rode him in parades.

 

[faster horses]

Remember when Paul Tierney rode the Appy mare? He roped on her at some big-time rodeos.
I tried to share the FB post where he is pictured calf roping on her, but I couldn't for some reason. It is on FB Paul Tierney Performance Horses. It's a neat photo. I thought he was paid to ride that horse for someone else, but I guess it was his. He posted above the photo
"Our great appaloosa mare at the 1985 NFR". So she was a big-time rope horse.

 

[cfpinz]

Then you have the ones on the short bus
View attachment 32855

The short bus fella could literally pass for my horse, same star and all.

 

[kenny thomas]

The short bus fella could literally pass for my horse, same star and all.

View attachment 33943

Sure is an ugly guy riding it

 

[Stonewall Joe]

I have had both Quarter horses and Arabs over the years along with a number of Grade horses at one time owning over a dozen horses at the same time. I have never owned an Appaloosa. I always found the Arabs easier to train and more responsive to my requests than any other breed. They just seemed much smarter, so perhaps quicker to learn both good and bad habits. My Arabs seemed to learn new things much faster, but they responded better to encouragement than they did to force. It felt like my Arabs wanted to please me, while the Quarter Horses had to be convinced that they had to do it. Most of my Arabs bonded to me in a way I was never able to accomplish with a Quarter Horse. I never had an Arab horse buck either, and I can't say that about other breeds of horses. Some people claim they are more likely to shy, I never found that to be true either. I remember riding a narrow trail through the woods at a trot behind two Quarter horses one time. Both shied and jumped off the trail into the woods to reveal a confused woodchuck in the middle of the trail scrambling to get across. My Arab extended her trot and went right over the top without missing a beat. The difference probably had little to do with their breeds and more to do with how many wet saddle blankets they had seen. My horses were ridden 6 or 7 days a week and had seen most things before.

Like I said before, I found the Arabs easier to train. As a simple example, I remember working with two 3 year olds at the same time and we were working on crossing a stream. The Quarter horse planted all four feet and I spent a great deal of time convincing her that it was safe to cross. We had to repeat the same process with every crossing for the next week or so. The Arab danced around a bit, but I got her to cross in just a few minutes and from then on she trusted my judgement. Those are just two horses, and of course they all have different personalities, but I trained dozens of horses in my youth and I always found the Arabs easiest. My experience was mostly in the area of distance riding and Arabs are the superior animal in that area, so my opinions are colored by that. Those horses would go wherever you asked at whatever speed you asked. I could ask that they walk quietly into a rest stop or race for first place finish, and they would oblige me either way. The best part was that when I went to get them from the pasture, most would come when called, ready to go for a ride. The few Quarter Horses I owned would need to be tricked into coming for food, so I could catch them. I know it isn't fair to judge from the few Quarter Horses I have owned, so I'm sure that isn't always the case, but I also think people that make derogatory comments about Arab horses have never spent much time around them.

I now own only one horse. Finese turned 41 in February. I watched him come into the world on February 1 1982. It was 10 below zero that night and he was born in a stall in a small barn. He is the last of my endurance horses. In 2019 we had a snowstorm that left us trapped and without power for a week. We lost the last of the others to colic in the first few days. After that, we opened the gate to his pasture and he has been allowed to roam free in the yard ever since. He could take the long road down the driveway and off the ranch, but he seems happy to stay here and hang out with us. I am attaching a photo of him taken in May. He still gets around well, but he is hard to keep weight on since most of his teeth are gone. He gets a mash of Purina SR each morning and night. I was in my late 20's when he was born. I never would have dreamed we would still be together when I was in my 70's. He wasn't the best endurance horse I ever owned, but he was steady and consistent. He usually placed in the top 5 and was ready to race again. He won the high mileage horse in the Midwest in 1990, competing 1270 miles that summer.

I used to shoe horses for a living many years ago and the problem I had with arab horse generally were problems with the owners who spoiled them and were convinced if you just gave them treats and talk nicely to them they would behave. If the owner was truly a performance type horse person that had a use for a horse and did something with them, the horse was usually no problem, if the owner was a person that chose an arab because they read a specific book or watched a specific move and thought arabs were blessed at birth with human intellect and could be trained by itself, there was usually huge problems and they never wanted you to correct their horse or make them stand still

 

[Warren Allison]

I used to shoe horses for a living many years ago and the problem I had with arab horse generally were problems with the owners who spoiled them and were convinced if you just gave them treats and talk nicely to them they would behave. If the owner was truly a performance type horse person that had a use for a horse and did something with them, the horse was usually no problem, if the owner was a person that chose an arab because they read a specific book or watched a specific move and thought arabs were blessed at birth with human intellect and could be trained by itself, there was usually huge problems and they never wanted you to correct their horse or make them stand still

My TWH/SSH that is an absolute demon to shoe! He is going on 30 yrs old now, about 21 yrs old when this pic was made. If they were all this good I would have learned to shoe
myself long ago.

 

[Stonewall Joe]

My TWH/SSH that is an absolute demon to shoe! He is going on 30 yrs old now, about 21 yrs old when this pic was made. If they were all this good I would have learned to shoe
myself long ago. View attachment 34002

the production shoers in New Holland will often shoe like this and my grandmother's brother was a shoer as well when more horses were used to haul freight, he said they did it that way too

 

[alacowman1]

Paul Tierney on meter maid, a app mare

 

[Katpau]

All of our Arabs were easy to shoe. With the conditioning plus the competition on weekends we put on 100 to 150 or more miles in most weeks, and since much of that was on gravel roads, we would wear out a set of shoes often in less than 3 weeks, so my husband learned to shoe. This was especially handy when you lost a shoe in the middle of a competition. Before he started shoeing, we would ride to the farriers place, which was about 6 miles away and if I remember correct it was maybe $10 for a full set. Nowadays it costs more to shoe a horse than what I paid for some of my horses in those days.

 

[cfpinz]

Sure is an ugly guy riding it

That's my stunt double, I'm much uglier.

 

[TexasJerseyMilker]

Horses bad with the shoer come in all breeds and flavors. It's the owner's fault not the horse. I bought a horse so bad the lady had to twitch him for shoeing. Now I just point at the foot I want and say Pick Up.

 

[Travlr]

Horses bad with the shoer come in all breeds and flavors. It's the owner's fault not the horse. I bought a horse so bad the lady had to twitch him for shoeing. Now I just point at the foot I want and say Pick Up.

I've seen good horses abused by farriers that had no patience.

 

[Mountaintown Creek Ranch]

My TWH/SSH that is an absolute demon to shoe! He is going on 30 yrs old now, about 21 yrs old when this pic was made. If they were all this good I would have learned to shoe
myself long ago. View attachment 34002

What is that hanging off the front man's chaps ? Has a wooden handle ???

 

[cfpinz]

What is that hanging off the front man's chaps ? Has a wooden handle ???

Looks like a hammer laying sideways on top of the shoe shaper, unless I'm missing something.

 

[TexasJerseyMilker]

The first and greatest horse of my life, The one that I bought with my babysitting money in 1970, kept taking her foot away from the shoer. This was the first time I ever had a horse shod. He finally hauled off and hit her in the side with his rasp. So hard it made rasp print on her hair. This made me furiously mad but I didn't say anything. She never took a foot away again and she lived 40 years. Thats when I started teaching them to pick up the foot I pointed at and said Pick Up.