Tying Up Young Horses

Sometimes people will contact me and ask about the Functional Tie Rings, sometimes just to make sure they are still available or they are skeptical about ordering on line. Having been scammed before, I get it, and I always enjoy those conversations anyway. I always follow up a phone call with a email to lessen the chance of our conversation being taken out context, especially when it comes to using a Tie Ring or addressing other issues with horses. So in that vein I am including most of an e-mail response I sent to a lady named Colleen who was asking "when is it appropriate agewise to use a Tie Ring on a horse?" Apparently she was told that it is generally okay to start tying up young horses so they can get used to stand being tied. And although she has a Clinton Anderson tie ring, she has not used it yet nor does she know anybody in her circle who uses tie rings. The horse in the photo at right is tied using a Functional Tie Ring, but for the first 6 months or so of saddling him, I did not tie him at all, instead I would lay the lead rope over my arm or simply lay it on the ground as in ground tying. I highy valye a horsee that is comfortable at ground tying so I work at this. So bottom line is that I would highly suggest never saddling a green horse when he is tied.

Unfortunately it's pretty routine to see tying mistakes. Some of the common one's are: hard tying to non-anchored points like temporary panel fencing; hard typing without a quick release; and, hard tying horse's who have never been tied much nor stand tied well - and this can be a tragic mistake when a young horse's seeming calmness belies his lack of experience. I have seen or know about several young horse's that were hard tied and pulled back flipping over or falling and injuring themselves badly.

And I can't talk about tying horses without this story. I was doing a demonstration and clinic a few years ago at an indoor arena. I entered the arena and hard tied my horse (with a quick release) to the permanent rail fencing. He was the only horse in the arena. Shortly, a rider attending the clinic entered and tied her mare up just feet away next to my gelding despite having plenty of room to tie elsewhere. Her mare started turning her butt towards and trying to kick my horse. The rider returned to move her horse but ended up tying the mare to a long hinged gate on wheels. Her horse started pulling back and pulling the gate towards herself. The rider got in between the gate and her horse and every time she reached for her horse, the horse would pull back and slam her with the gate knocking her down. This happened a couple times until she was able to get to the side of her horse's head. Anyway, could have ended up with more than just embarrassment.

It's not the age of a horse that dictates when they are ready to be tied, either hard tied or using a tie ring, but their ability to understand coming off of pressure. When a horse pulls back, or even when we pull on a horse from the front, the biggest part of that pressure they feel is from the halter (rope or web halter) on their poll - on the neck behind the ears. Again your horse needs to come off of pressure from the halter before you tie him up, so at a minimum this would be if you pull the lead rope taunt and the horse changes his body weight forward or takes a step forward towards you, to relieve the pressure. I'd like them even much better than this, so when they feel that pressure it's always a step forward to obtain their own release. And even then I like to use a Functional Tie Ring for weeks or months before I start hard tying.

If you are beginning to lead your horse and you have to bump on the lead rope until he starts moving forward, he is not giving to pressure very well and you need to do more work on getting him to follow the feel of the lead rope willingly and in a timely manner. Sure, in the beginning of ground work on a green horse you will likely have to bump him some to follow the feel, but you don't start right off bumping him. Instead, you would draw a loose lead rope taunt slowly and allow a chance for the horse to understand before you start bumping him.

The Clinton Anderson Tie Ring, previously known as the Blocker Tie Ring will work just fine. Just remember the hinged center bar falls away from you. If you insert the lead rope with the hinged bar rotating towards you then push the bar up to the magnetic lock, a small amount of pressure on the lead rope by the horse will pull the hinged bar down and the horse is loose. Should not be a problem to remember to use it correctly and with any tie ring you have to be concerned of where your fingers are if the horse pulls back when you are securing the lead rope! I know two people who have lost the tip of a finger tying a horse and having the horse pull back. One of them owned up to not paying attention, the other guy blamed a pretty girl diverting his attention. The results were the same, loss of a tip of a finger and it could have been the good finger that you use to clean your ears out with.

The sequence of photos above (click on the photo to enlarge) show: Figure 1 - Normal hookup of the lead rope using the Functional Tie Ring. This allows for the rope to feed through the tie ting if or when the horse pulls back. The lead rope I am using in the photo is a Double Diamond standard lead rope and it will start moving through the tie ring around 15-18 pounds of pressure. Figure 2 - the arrows depict pulling the bite of the lead rope that is through the tie ring around the bottom of the tie ring which creates a girth hitch and a hard tie. This is wrong if your intention is to tie a young horse or any horse who has pull back issues. Figure 3 - using a girth hitch on the lead rope with a tie ring, again, creates a hard tie. Make sure if you use it this way that your horse is good about being hard tied.

Trailering Horses Using the Functional Tie Ring

I have had several people purchase my Functional Tie Rings then write me to ask if they can use the Functional Tie Ring to tie horses in a trailer. It dawned on me that I did not do a good enough job in early videos or articles on using the Functional Tie Rings so I made this video on how I use the Functional Tie Ring in a safe manner to trailer my horses.

There are any people who may think tying horses in a trailer in a solution to a non existent problem and there was a time I did not tie horses in a trailer. I'm sure you can certainly be safe not tying horses in a trailer and I have loaded horses side by side in stock trailers without tying, but these days I'm all about reducing potential problems so no longer will I trailer horses who are not tied, and by tied I mean using the Functional Tie Ring.

The problems with hard tying horses in trailers, especially horses that are not good about riding in trailers, is that they can pull back and break snaps or halters then their head flings up into the trailer roof which can prove fatal to the horse. I have had a horse or two do that, but thankfully not hit their head very hard. But I also know people whose horses have died from an accident of this type.

My trailering steps, as shown in the video below are: 1 - load the horse with is lead rope through the Functional Tie Ring as normal and snapping the Functional Tie Ring into an inside trailer D ring. At this time I do not do anything with the excess lead rope except get it out of the way and where I can reach it from outside the trailer. If the horse pulls back before I can shut the slant load partition or can shut the trailer door, he'll get his controlled release from the Functional Tie Ring. 2 - I close the slant load partition (if necessary) and door. 3 - I move around to the side of the trailer then I normally daisy chain the excess portion of the lead rope to keep it out of the way of the horse. 4 - When I get where I'm going, I reverse the steps, first untying the daisy chain, then opening the trailer door, unhooking the horse then backing him out of the trailer.

I hope this helps someone be a little safer about using the Functional Tie Rings and/or trailering horses using any tie ring. Drive safe and give your horses a safe trailer ride.

Functional Tie Rings for the Horseshoeing Stand

I have received several e-mails on using my Functional Tie Rings in cross ties after introducing my Functional Tie Rings in a previous video where I briefly mentioned that I use them in my cross ties on the horseshoeing stand. The video below shows my shoeing stand and cross ties which are approximately 2 1/4 inch poles sunk 4 feet into the ground and the concrete shoeing stand pored around the cross ties.

I drilled eyes bolts into the cross ties about six feet off the ground,..I know in the video I say 5 feet,...but's it's actually about 6 feet high. I just might be a midget, but only in the mental sense.

I attached the Functional Tie Rings to the eye bolts and use about an 8 foot section of white 9/16ths inch diameter yacht braid rope with a brass bolt snap as my tie lines. These tie lines are similar to the lead ropes I make, but without the leather poppers. I put a brass bolt snap into the end of the rope and melt the rope together. Then I use two separate lengths of cotton line to tie the loop together for added security, then shrink two layers of heat shrink tube over the cotton line. This is the same way I make lunge lines as well.

The yacht braid rope feeds easily through the tie ring for adjusting your horse's position on the shoeing stand and if your horse pulls back he gets a slowed release caused by the friction of the rope feeding through the tie ring giving him time to think and stop pulling.

When a horse pulls back it's the not fact that he's hard tied when he breaks a lead line, the halter or a metal snap. I's the pressure on the poll from the halter and sometimes the halter under the jaw and over the nose which panics him. The Functional Tie Rings greatly reduce the chance of a horse's feet going out from underneath him or breaking the halter, lead or snap by giving that controlled release.

Some people have panic snaps on their cross tie ropes, but if you have ever seen a horse panic and pull back on cross ties, flip over or have his feet go out from underneath himself, you know how quick it happens and the manual release of the panic snap is only useful for unhooking the horse and getting him to his feet, not for reducing the chances of the wreck itself.