figbat
Slippery scientist
- Location
- South Oxfordshire, UK
Last year I was doing a bit of uncharacteristic offroading when I met a man riding a big horse coming the other way down a bridleway. I pulled into the bushes to let him pass and he stopped for a (rather long) chat, and introduced me to the horse (I forget the horse's name).
Anyway, he told me he'd just been to take the horse "to see the pigs". I thought I'd found myself in some kind of kids' story ("hello Mr Pig said the horse"), but he explained that the horse was nervous about pigs so he was training it to be habituated to them. He'd take him to where the pigs were, and explain to him that they would end up as sausages soon enough. This, it seemed was to make the horse feel braver about pigs.
Anyway Mr Horse was very nice and placid. Maybe the rider realised that I needed habituating to horses, because I managed to relax a bit, having backed away into the nettles and brambles at first.
I had a horse that was terrified of a specific place on a track, every time we ride past it. I discovered that pigs used to be kept there, but hadn’t been for a while.
Another horse I rose was a classic docile riding school hack - you’d put anybody on her in the school. If she saw a tractor though…