Ponying

Ha ha! Well, I always know I can come here to be set straight.

Oh and Bill, regarding this...

...I'm still in denial about this and I have my hands over my ears going "lalalalalalala". LOL!

Haha thats someone who dosen't understand the concept that any horse can learn how to go any speed at any gate. Its all about training.

I'm curious why you would never under any circumstances not want to dally the rope. If the ponied horse got away from you, couldn't you just let go?

Actually, RedRoan, I agree with iridehorses, but I'm being stubborn and refuse to accept it... for now. ;) My two girls are definitely the difference between night and day.

Way too many things can happen while ponying a horse, and by Murphy's Law, it will happen faster then we can react. You can't compare it to dallying a steer - it isn't anywhere near the same thing.

As for "any horse can be taught any speed at any gait" I totally agree but we need to talk about reality and most riders don't have the skills to do it. It takes too much training for the average rider to accomplish so that they can occasionally pony another horse.

I guess the real trick is learning when to let go. I've gotten my shoulder pulled almost out of place so I get lazy and let the horn do the work.
Hard to tell my brain to LET GO STUPID!!!!

See, I ALWAYS dally with a soft poly rope on my non-leather clad horn. Because of the slip factor in both the rope and my bare horn, by getting just one or two turns around it I'm able to better enforce any anatics without risking either my shoulder being hurt or even worse, being yanked off and it prevents the ponied horse from getting away "easily". I've started training Jynx to pony and once so far I've had to drop my dally completely and it just slips right around the horn like it's greased and falls to the ground.

I'd never tie the rope to my horn, but I do personally find it far safer to have that extra leverage. It gives your room to feed the rope and as someone who's had her shoulder injured many a time by frisky youngsters, just a lot safer on the body. Again, I wouldn't do this on any saddle that had a leather clad horn or a lariet style rope. I just prefer it this way since I can have a good hold on the youngster so they don't learn that "getting away" is an option. Obviously you need to know when to drop it, but being forced to drop it or hurt yourself every time something spooky happens isn't the best method in my opinion.

what is ponying??

Ponying is leading a horse from the back of another.

To dally or not to dally...another one of those horse questions that is constantly debated

There is certainly not one right answer, but always putting your safety and that of your horses first, I am certain that it depends on how experienced the rider is at ponying, how experienced the pony horse is, the horse you are ponying, and where you are riding at.

For someone inexperienced at ponying, I do believe that NOT dallying is a lot safer, and my experience has been that unless you are ponying a very flighty horse, if you need to drop the lead rather can getting pulled off your horse, the ponied horse won't go anywhere anyway. Although with a good pony horse you can indeed 'drag' along another horse, just like walking a horse in hand, I don't believe this is the most effective way to get those legs moving...most horses I know will do their best to resist and dig those heels in.