For G, after a day among the smoke and embers
The pair is mounted up ready to practice their Cowboy Mounted Shooting at left, and at right they finish up a dressage test.
Desensitizing G Training a horse to accept the sights and sounds, not unlike dressage, takes time—you crawl, you walk, then you run. To desensitize him to the sound of a gun, G was introduced to the cracking sound of a bullwhip. Over time, Gretchen cracked the bullwhip while she rode the Dutch horse. Soon he was comfortable with the sound as well as the sight of something moving near his eyes, caught in his peripheral vision. The first few times she shot from on top of G she aimed high and back over his hindquarters with a .22 caliber pistol, which is not as loud as the .45 caliber Ruger she uses in competition. These guns are filled with black powder blanks with crimped ends. “Shooting gets progressively louder with more smoke
as we move to half loads, then full loads of black power,” Gretchen says. Initially, she explains, you try not to shoot near the head
or face, staying at three and nine o’clock. “You’ll walk among balloons, and you’ll fire off a round, then walk, then fire. Then you move up to the trot and see how he responds. At some point, you move to shooting from ten and two o’clock and see how he does. After he’s desensitized to that, you can shoot from eleven and one o’clock and cross fire (across the body).” When shooting the gun, the hammer comes down, hits
the primer and ignites the black power which creates bright spark embers. It’s the embers that burn the balloon. The optimal distance from the balloon is 12 to 15 feet. If you shoot too close, the embers will go around it and not break the balloon. If too far away, the embers will die out and not break the balloon.
Warmbloods Today 19
and bright lights of the shooting arena, the whispers and polite applause and occasional exuberant extended canter might seem like a snooze in the stall. Clearly this Warm- blood enjoys the challenges of both sports as each one helps improve the other. Perhaps these two contrasting worlds are not so far apart after all.
Photos courtesy Gretchen Walters
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