May 2006

Ruling The Roundpen

Pressure is the operative word here, and the trick is knowing when to apply how much of it.

In the old West a roundpen was a place where cowboys took young horses that had never been handled to be bridled, saddled and broke to ride—often all in the same session. Ranch hands didn’t have a lot of time to spare for subtleties. They needed to get a horse broke fast and into the remuda ready for a long day’s work. Roundpens were usually just a flat area enclosed with a circle of sawed-off saplings to keep a horse from escaping and running off. …