About Courting the Horse

This online multimedia magazine is devoted to horses, their human companions and the relationship between them.  It is devoted to improving the lives of horses, to exploring ways of giving them a more natural and fulfilling lifestyle and in the process allowing them more opportunities to inspire us and enrich our own lives.

Courting the Horse will be focussing on the many natural and ethical approaches to equine care and training that are available to us.  We will also be interested in topics such as equine assisted therapy and the physical and psychological make up of horses.

What Does the Logo Represent?

Courting the Horse will be an ongoing search to achieve the type of relationship between human and horse that is suggested in the image on the right. The logo for Courting the Horse suggests two strong and vibrant animals who are beginning to engage in a dance. But it is not simply one dance that will last a few minutes, it will be a series of dances that will last a life time.  Like any dance, there may be some one who leads but in order to create a beautiful interaction both individuals must be fully willing to take part. They must be fully willing to put their hearts into the moment, to each respect and be willing to learn from the other. This life long dance is a courthsip between both species. Neither one knows where it will lead or what form it will take, but both are willing to embrace the joys and the challenges that will come as a result of their courtship. These two individuals are joining to create one new and beautiful movement, one which neither could have created on their own.

I saw the outline of this image in a line of ash trees as I stood in the moonlight with our two horses and it perfectly summed up the relationship that I would like to have with our horses. It also struck me that many other people are searching for this ellusive sense of connection and would relate to the image as much as I do. I asked a friend to recreate the image as a drawing. Claire Comiskey, who is a professional illustrator, took my written descriptions about what I had seen and created the logo for Courting the Horse. Claire can be contacted here.

The Aims of Courting the Horse

Our aims are to support and highlight the work of the many wonderful people who are already working to improve the lives of horses and to bring other horse owners the information they have been looking for.  We also hope to help new ideas to emerge and to research many areas that we feel are currently neglected or overlooked.  We would like to facilitate a change that is ready to happen. By sharing resources, contacts and ideas we can grow a better future for horses and their human companions. By combining knowledge and creating a new awareness we can take part in our own dance which will take us somewhere new, somewhere that none of us would get to on our own.

Who we Feature on This Site

This is in a constant state of flux as we learn more about what is out there and what our own standards are.  As much as is possible we only highlight people who have the same ethos when it comes to horses that we do.  While we try to have a wide a range of methods represented we have to stick to our own standards.  The most important one is that we strive to find horsemanship methods that are not based on dominance or agression of any kind.  We prefer instead to stick to people who go with the idea that a horse should be given the opportunity to want to be with you and to do what you may request it to do.  This is an ongoing search so there are people out there who are not yet represented on the site but who are undoubtedly doing wonderful work with horses.

We also believe that most of the work should be done on the human half of the relationship.  This is where most of the work needs to be done, where the responsibility lies.  Horses are subject to our imbalances and suffer as a result of our busy life styles and muddled standards.   Physical and emotional problems in a rider or owner will transfer to a horse and it is our job to use that “mirror” as a valuable feedback system and to take action.  Also many of us have misconceptions about what makes animals tick, whether that be horses or humans.  Many ingrained notions need to be looked at again and in this second year of Courting the Horse we will be putting even more emphasis on finding people who focus on ideas like this.

We also believe that “problem” horses should be checked out for injuries and illnesses, poorly fitting saddles, teeth and hoof issues etc before proceeding with any kind of work.  Because of this there is a strong emphasis on health care on this site.

Inspiration for Courting the Horse

This entire project has been inspired by our own horses and their determination to teach us how to be better people, how to respect them and what the benefits are when we do this. We bought our horse Hazel with a moments notice, with the help of our friends, when a horse simply needed a home. We had never even thought of having a horse before this moment but we have never looked back. Pollyanne was added to the group as a companion to Hazel and came from Cottage Rescue in Tipperary, Ireland. Both have had their share of troubles and we are now doing our best to rectify the harm done to them by other humans. We have never been happy with the established view on how to care for horses and have always searched for better ways. This is part of that search and I hope that one day Hazel and Pollyanne will feel that in their lifetimes they actually benefitted from living in close quarters with man.