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Hone Instructon
The fillies—one a bay Percheron and the other a V* Belgium, % Percheron—were * started in harness last fall. Kate could have taught Stinky and Kit. For hundreds of years, farmers have been hitching older, experienced animals with youngsters for training. “An old horse will teach the young ones everything they ever wanted to know,” Jackie acknowledged.
The 17-year-old mare certainly has the qualifications for an instructor. Bought from Joe Lawson in Orange, she’s been in harness for almost two decades. “Kate’s fun. She’s been a logging horse all her life. You can hook her to anything and she’ll go. We had a 32 foot log that must have been 16 inches at the butt end. She pulled that in and out and around, up and down hills—you just can’t make Kate quit pulling. You hook her to anything you want and it will move even if she has to get down and scrabble,” Jackie said.
But with three novices at driving—herself and the fillies—Jackie decided to be teacher so all three could learn together. Since her budget didn’t include funds for special equipment, she started Stinky and Kit in halters with two lead shanks tied as reins. It wasn’t a cowboy’s hang-on-until-theystop-bucking approach to horse breaking. Purchased as weanlings, the fillies were quiet and gentle, used to having Jackie lead them, groom them, pet them and feed them.
“We worked by trial and error when we began training,” Jackie recalled. There were a few anxious moments until the filies got used to having something banging along the ground behind them but it wasn’t a Rappahannock version of the
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