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I have committed to words a few things about
training a horse to be Larp-proof. These are not rules, just guidelines..
the three trials
I have made three trials
that can be used to judge
whether a horse is suitable
for LARPing. click on image
But first, the training:
For those of you interested in training a horse to become a
LARP horse I recommend reading up on Natural Horsemanship ( NHS) or Horse whispering. There are several methods of NHS
(e.a. Pat Parelli, Monty Roberts) and I do not prefer one over the other. The basics are the same, a bit of common sense and
trying to see things from a horse's perspective. This will help you create a bond of trust with your horse that is vital for
going Horse-Larping
A horse's natural instinct is to flee for anything that look threatening
(even if it doesn't seems threatening to us) The only way you can teach a horse not to turn and run away is to let him get
aquinted with a lot of potentially scary stuff in a safe environment.
When you have a good relationship with your animal, he will trust you and
when you say it is safe, he will believe you. Never, ever betray that trust by putting him in an unsafe situation and don't
forget that a situation might be safe in our human perspective, but feel unsafe for the horse!
Start by putting strange objects in the paddock and guiding him along with
a leadrope. An umbrella, football, piece of plastic, a flag, anything that you think might trigger a reaction. Be careful
not to reward him when he startles, just ingore his reaction and stay calm and he will not be scared.
I can't write a detailed trainingprogram here... I need a whole book to
do that and those are on the market already, so why bother..
So if you have a horse that seems pretty cool around these sort of things
it is time for the fun stuff!
I got myself donned up in cloak and banner and simply
started riding around the paddock. I waved the banner around a bit more and soon I was galloping around...
Before you try this: make sure your horse has a good
whoa! and braking system and is steerable on one hand if you want to ride holding a banner.
After riding my horse with banner and flapping cloaks
I asked some LARP friends of mine to visit. We spend an afternoon in the paddock with swords and cloak and yelling and shouting
and running. And although my horse did jolt a couple of times and found it all very unnerving, he stayed manageable. He jumped
aside only a few steps and only when someone charged at him. When he did the charging he was fine!
So this is a good exercise for the horse, but also a
good way to find out where his limits lie. This was his daily surroundings, but on unfamiliar grounds the horse
might react a little more unnerved to these kind of situations.
I keep on suprising my horse by for example throwing
things at him. Not hard and not with the intention of hitting him...just to get him used to sudden movement. His reaction
is a slight tension in his body and then curiosity takes over. So the character and disposition of your horse is also important.
A short note on wearing mail....
First of all my deadcalm horse freaked out when he spotted my shiny jingely
ringmail. By the time I had it on and was on his back he didn't mind it so muc anymore.
Some usefullt ips:
The ringmail will scuff your saddle so covering the saddle with a seatsaver
of a fleece is a good idea! It also make a noise when your riding and you should be aware that the extra weight can shift
your sence of balance!
Here is a link to Horseguild, an american website, where you can read their qualifications on
being a good Kinght's Horse.
Please e-mail me any other links to websites you might find regarding
this subject.
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