Question for readers:

After all the bitching about forums and how stupid some of them are I've decided to ask the readers here if I should add a forum to this blog that would pretty much be no holds barred and open season on the blissfully ignorant.
A simple yes or no post to answer will let me know what you think.

Online learning: Updated Again

Online forums are a curse and a blessing. First they spread a lot of information quickly to a wide range of horse people. Second they spread a lot of information quickly to a wide range of horse people. I have seen some brilliant tips on horse forums, but I've also seen some of the most blatant stupidity imaginable. Since horse show people are found on just about every equine related forum out there it stands to reason that some of the information passed around an cause problems.

I’ve gotten a lot of feedback and got to visit some forums that made my eyebrows leap off my head with the rampant ignorance. It’s a wonder that some of these people’s horses survive a day, much less a lifetime of incompetent care.

I’ll list the top five good forums first. These forums actually provide good solid information and don’t cater to the hearts, flowers and unicorns crowd. They are for the horse, not for the ego.

1) Chronicle of the Horse

Geared mainly toward English but does have some western conversations. Good information on feeding, foot care, veterinary treatments and riding. Has a good reputation for getting “endangered horses” rescued.

2)Dr. Deb Bennett’s Equine Studies Forum

Absolutely the best place to learn about the mechanic’s of the horse. You will rarely see Western or English Pleasure or halter people posting here, because they can’t justify working their horses so young to Dr. Bennett. Also has great sections on bitting, handling and arena exercises.

3)Allbreed pedigree Forum

This is a great place to expand pedigree knowledge for all breeds. There are several prominent equine historians that participate and offer their knowledge for free. Being able to fill in the holes in a horse’s pedigree can help prevent genetic defects from being spread.

4) The Appaloosa Project

There is no equal to the equine color genetics knowledge that this forum provides. They have gone beyond looking at base colors and take you into learning about patterns, modifiers, genetic links to defects and other great stuff that anyone planning to breed horses needs to know.

5) Just Horsin

Normally I avoid anything to do with the pleasure horse industry. But I started reading this forum and was impressed that they were willing to crack down on BNT abuse and people that breed for horses that aren’t sound. Definitely more about riding and showing than the other forums and does have a lot of snark factor, but over all the equine advice is sound.


I got several emails about the collective dipshit equine forums and if I included them all here I would have a list the size of War and Peace. I’ve never seen such a morass of stupidity in my life!

In order to cut down the list to a reasonable size I had to set some criteria:
How harmful was the information being passed around?
How stupid were the majority of members?
How high was the whining level?
How pathetic were the justifications for doing shit wrong?
How fricking psycho I perceive the moderators to be?
How useless the existence of the forum is?
Even with this stringent culling method I still had to pick through quite a list, so I went for the ones that just pissed me off personally.

1)Horse Topia

Who the fuck are these people and what planet did they come from? Seriously do they have real horses or just Breyer Models and a crack pipe to make it all seem real? Why is anyone asking what to feed a baby mini after they already have the horse? Find that shit out before you get a baby. What is with asking if you should breed your grade pintawalkaloosian? Are you fucking kidding? Oh and let’s not forget that the stallion must be either grade too, or a registered horse with a proven genetic defect. My eyes almost bled from the color genetics thread. If these stupid fucks actually succeed in crossing those horses they are going to get something lime green and plaid. Unless you’re into pre-death penance or just a masochist avoid this place. Rating 5 Horse Apples

2)Baywind Farm Horse Forum

Let’s just say I could blog for a year and a day just on the crappy photos I saw posted here. The yellow lines of dooms would look like that big monkey drawing on the plateau in Peru. I could start my own version of the Nazca Lines all over their ass.

I added this photo because the forum evidently didn't understand what lining a photo means. Yellow is bad, blue is correct.
Can these people not ride? Is it something in the water? It’s obvious the moderator has her panties in a twist because she’s never going to be anything but some backyard local show fixture, but seriously, when did hosting a forum mean that zero common sense was required? This forum alone would make me avoid buying anything from Baywind Farm. It's like if Exxon used pictures of the Exxon Valdez spewing oil in order to sell gas shares.
One thing I saw here that pissed me off was the mention of this blog, but given under another person’s name. Hey you stupid fucks, this is my blog, my name is all over it and I don’t appreciate you giving my hard work to someone else just because you’re too stupid or lazy to read the big words posted here. I think most of us here appreciate humor and sarcasm, but people trying to be funny and snarky, while just coming off lame and ignorant, give me a pain in my ass. Rating 4 ¾ Horse Apples


3)Lil Beginnings Miniature Horse Forum

There literally are no words to describe this bunch, although complete stupid fucks would work in a pinch. Breeding and getting dwarves is just part of the business, right? Dwarf Threads, You can't post replies on the dwarfism threads. They don't want discussion, they want their "experts" to have the last words. Dwarves are to be accepted and expected. Promoting smaller horses over quality horses is okay. And let's not forget that breeding for color as the most important trait is just sooooo the right thing to do. Having photos of some tiny mini hauling around a fricking moose in a flowered dress is just wrong. Get a bigger horse or carry the mini. He is not supposed to be hauling around twice his weight. And the feeding misinformation! How there is a single mini out there that isn’t foundered I’ll never know. This is another group that sets the whine level to ten and feels that others “owe” them respect instead of them earning it. They also can’t read for shit. They assigned my blog to another author because my fucking name on the front page is just a joke, right? I type my fingers to the bone so these no-reading asswipes can give someone else credit? I don’t think so! It’s obvious that this bunch sits around all day with nothing better to do but post about their whines, grips and frustrations, while denouncing anyone that offers a differing opinion. Their attack on a newbie for telling them something they did was fucked up was priceless. Driving people out of the horse industry is just what we need to be doing. Rating 4 ½ Horses Apples


4)Free Speech Horse Forum

I hate to add this one, because I really enjoy the parent blog. However, the desire to be associated with a straight talking, controversial blog has attracted a myriad of dumbasses, dweebs and dorks. I've traveled over there in the past and a few of the uppity bad asses tried to get tough until they found themselves featured here and at that point they whined, pulled their hair and threatened me. Big whoop! A forum member sent me nasty emails. Like I’ve never dealt with that before. They also seem inclined to bite the hand that feeds them and criticize the creator of the forum, although never to her face on her blog. I hate chickenshits. I really hate ignorant chickenshits. Despite the attachment to a blog that denounces irresponsible breeding there seems to be a plethora of morons on here asking if they should breed their grade mare to Joe Bob’s grade stallion. I don’t get it. Rating 4 Horse Apples.

5)Horse Dopia

The name says it all. This place is populated by the people too dumb to make it on the Horse Topia or Free Speech forums. Scary thought huh? Believe me, that isn’t teen spirit you’re smelling. This place should almost be mandatory as a test in order to own a horse. If you get accepted to post here then you don’t get to have one! Only when you’re regarded as too smart to be on this forum can you again apply to get a horse, and only then if you’re not a member of any of the other top five piece of shit forums. Rating 3 Horse Apples.


Ironically, when you read the above bad forums you will almost always find a thread bitching about the Fugly Horse forum, or this one, or any other forum where the bullshit gets called out and the "pretty princess pony" people get told to get their heads out of their asses and back into reality. I don't know about Fugs, but I consider it an honor when the dipshits hate this blog, it means I'm doing something right. And I also love it when I google search their sites and this blog pops up as the first listing under their name. That way people can get the information on the stupid aspects of these sites first, before wading into the cesspools of stupidity they share.

I also like this blog Horse Common Sense by Sue, that features some of the dumbest damn forum posts I’ve ever read. If horses really had access to computers, and could read the stupid shit their owners think, they would all gather together and run off the edge of the Grand Canyon, with the gaited horses leading the way.

From the stat tacker it's easy to see the Baywind and Miniature Horse Forum have found my blog and are having a fit. Too fricking bad. If they'd shown any sense in the first place and not posted bullshit about who owns this blog, as well as the stupid posts that endanger horses then they wouldn't be here.

Leaving threads up that people can find when they search the name of this blog just leads me right to the places where the stupidity festers in the horse world. It's easy to see why I got so many emails about these forums as being bad places.



T Jean Maus, blog owner

You can't out run stupid

Just when I think it might be safe to venture onto Youtube again I find these links. Barrel racing is one event I truly have a love hate relationship with. I love doing it myself. We grew up doing high school and Little Britches Rodeos and had a blast. A good barrel horse is a tremendous athlete and a poorly trained one is a catastrophic wreck waiting to happen. I hate seeing what the sport has become. It's less and less about riding and more and more about ruining good horses.

My first question about modern barrel racers is: When did knowing how to ride quit being a requirement of the sport? I’m not asking for stellar equitation, but I would like to see your ass in the saddle more than it is out of it. I’d like to see someone riding with their seat and quit hanging onto the reins like they’re a ski rope. HINT: If you keep pulling the reins it slows your horse down.

I’d also like to see horses rate without wearing bits that could be used to torture secrets out of a hardened spy. Whatever happened to running in snaffles? Or mild hackamores? Why these hack-a-gag-a-piece-of-shit bits?



Flog, flog, jerk, drag, flail, kick, jerk, bounce, bounce, flog some more, jerk and spur, turn too late, horse is a maniac in the aisle.

Yep, looks professional to me…not.



More of the same. The slow motion only accentuates the crappy hands and flogging feet. Does no one know how to sit quietly? I remember watching Wendy Newman set the world record in pole bending and she barely moved the entire ride. I don’t think her ass ever left the saddle and her horse, Cyclone, simply melted through the poles. She barrel raced much the same way.
What happened to quiet hands= quiet horse?

Here’s another hint for the can chasers: When your horse keeps plowing barrels because he’s dropping his shoulder in and pointing his nose out he’s telling you a few things: your hands suck, your seat sucks and you’ve over schooled the shit out of him.

Here’s another tip: If your boot toes are pointing at the ground then your ass is usually out of the saddle. Can no one run a horse and keep their heels down? I see ten year old pony club riders jumping courses and doing hunt paces and they never lift their heels. Yet mature “cowgirls” can’t make it to the first barrel without slamming their foot through the stirrup, dropping their toe and choking that horn like a 17 year old boy that has just discovered masturbation and online porn at the same time. It makes no sense at all.



And this kind of shit just pisses me off. If your horse is so burnt out that he does not want to go in the area then get him another job and be done with it. You haven’t handled him right or he wouldn’t be so fucked up. A good horse with a solid foundation can do speed events for years, provided you don’t beat the hell out of him at every run, or jerk his head off or hurt his back by bouncing around like a fat ass sack of meal. Your horse is refusing because you cause him pain every time you take him in the arena.



WTF is with all the bucking? Don’t you train your horse before actually running it in an event?
Most of these people deserve to be bucked off because they ride like shit and they’re stupid.

How can this sport gain respect when you have a section of participation that rides worse than Barbie on a Breyer and creates horses that become mentally unstable?

Let's talk terminology...

So let’s discuss some screwed up stuff:

I apologize for the delay in posting, the real world has intruded into my online life in an annoying way and I had to boot reality out the door in order to get back to wasting time on the internet.

I received some suggestions via email that led to research, which made my hair stand on end. I’ve developed a rather jaded view of the horse industry, after 30 years the sparkle is off the sequins and the leather is starting to crack, but even I’m shocked at some of the new fangled ways to torture a horse that people are coming up with. There were also a few that made me whack my forehead and feel shame that I hadn’t covered them already. I’m going to start with some of those and then develop the others for later blogs.

Let’s look at how the show ring makes us think and talk. I don’t think horse people realize how odd we sound until a non-horse person points it out to us. My life is compartmentalized into horse and non-horse people. The non-horse people are more prone to giving me odd looks and asking “What do you mean?” And I don’t think we realize that some times terminology gets misused to a huge degree and propagates the misuse of equipment and training methods.

I’ll start with a simple one that has endured massive misuse, both as an equine term, and a training method.

I’m talking about the dread SPUR STOP. A Spur Stop is just that, it’s stopping your horse by applying your heel or spur to his side. It’s a cue used to avoid touching the horse’s face. Now generally I’m all in favor of a cue that means there is less pressure on the mouth. The problem is that this little cue creates all kinds of other problems when you try to use a horse in other disciplines. Touch a Spur Stop trained horse with your heel going over a fence and you’ll find yourself flying through the air like Peter Pan. Hit a barrel horse with a Spur Stop and you’ll lose time, and money. Outside of western/english pleasure it serves no purpose and most good judges will mark you down for it.



This leads to another problem. People use, or rather misuse, the term Spur Stop and don’t know what it means. It’s a simple concept, made harder by ignorance. I once argued for several posts about Spur Stops with a woman that was describing a regular stop. She engaged her seat, then her upper leg and finally lightly touched the reins. Well fucking duh, that’s how you stop a horse. That’s not a Spur Stop, that’s a regular stop. She was arguing in favor of a term, yet she didn’t know what the term actually meant. Most good WP horses I’ve seen are not trained to actually Spur Stop. Instead they work mainly off a shift of the seat and upper leg. Well hello people, classical riding as been doing that for centuries. A true Spur Stop means you poke the horse with your foot and he stops. End of story! No seat, no upper leg, no bit. Even the illustrious Pleasure Horse Forum argues the merit of this ultimately stupid cue, and half the people arguing in favor of it don’t know that what they’re describing isn’t a Spur Stop. If you’re going to fight about something then at least know what you’re arguing about.

Let’s look at another term: Headset
I fricking hate this word. I hate what it implies and I hate how people abuse the hell out of horses to get it. Headset seems to mean that your horse sets his head in one spot and never moves it again. I’ve seen people with draw reins, rubber reins, martingales, and every other gadget on the planet, struggling to create a headset. If you want to know what your horse’s headset is then wait until he’s in a relaxed trot, on loose rein and see where his head goes. That’s his natural headset and one you should not be struggling to alter.

Back when horsemen actually trained horses for longer than 90 days and made sure a horse was solid on each gait and maneuver before moving on to the next one, it was accepted for a horse to reposition his head at different levels when changing gaits or maneuvers. Anyone that has ever ridden a big jumper or good cowhorse knows that an athletic animal is going to re-adjust his body for the optimum range of motion and the most efficient way to get the job done. This will involve moving his fricking head, up and down, side to side. I am so sick of seeing pleasure horses whose heads never move even as they change speeds, stop and turn. I say “never move” in the context of they don’t go up at the shoulder to actually collect, since they can’t collect because the rider is constantly plucking and twanging on the reins in order to maintain the “headset”.




This brings us to our next word of the day: Collection
I don’t hate collection; I hate the fact that even big name trainers don’t know what the fuck it is. In simplistic terms collection is when the rear end of the horse is engaged, the neck lifts from the shoulder and the horse is rounded. A flat top-lined horse is not collected. A drop headed, behind the vertical horse is not collected. A horse may be heeding your every cue. He may be slow, cadenced and quiet but he is not collected if his back is convex and his rear isn’t engaged. And you cannot engage the rear and shoulders if the head is dragging in the dirt. It is physically impossible. Simply yielding to the bit is not collection, it’s giving to pressure. And knowing some of the mouthpieces the BNTs use I’d yield too, rather than get my palate torn to shreds. So all of the little show monkeys sitting on their head dragging horses at the Reichert have no clue what collection is. This term has been so abused by the pleasure horse industry that the government should fine them a dime for each misuse of the term and they could build sanctuary to care for used up old pleasure horses.




After collection comes another term that just sets my teeth to grinding: Frame

I’m sure the first trainer to use the term frame had a clear vision of a flexible, freely striding horse that stayed in a nice rounded, collected form, moving lightly and well within its physical abilities. Then some other less talented, and more gimmick driven, trainer got a hold of the term and used it to mean a stiff, robotic moving horse, over-flexed and frustrated by heavy hands and a leaden seat.

The term frame now implies a rigid, square, heavy, over-gilded form, much like the average pleasure horse with his flat back, stiff movement and silver encrusted saddle. Let’s banish that term to a softer, and more visually pleasing one.


Here’s another term that just makes me want to force my head to meet my desk: Lope with a forward motion.




The AQHA came up with this little ditty because they were too chickenshit to tell their judges to only place horses to could actually canter with the proper number of beats. How the hell else do you canter? Is there a canter with backward motion? Canter with upside down motion? Come on people! When an organization as big as the AQHA makes this kind of statement, showing the equine world that their judges and exhibiters have to be told how to properly canter a horse, it tells you have far down the slippery slope of stupidity we’ve gone. Lope with a forward motion? Pleeeaaassseeee! And to add to the morass of stupidity the ApHC and APHA both adopted the term for their own rulebooks. Hmmm lets tell the whole world the entire stock horse industry can’t figure out how to canter their horses.



Okay share the terms that piss you off. I know I can’t be the only one frustrated with this crap.

Pick a topic

I've covered a lot of topics in the past year and most of them have been controversal.
Now I'm going to let the readers pick the next topic:

email me at tjamouse@yahoo.com and let me know what you'd like to read about on this blog.