Horse trainer Amy Bourk teaching Clementino to stand quietly at the hitching rail.

As I walked into the office recently, a co-worker smiled at me and asked, “How’s the brat?” I knew full well she was talking about my colt, Clementino, whose antics I often describe to friends and colleagues.

Raising a trail horse from birth in my backyard hasn’t been a cakewalk. Clementino — born Easter Day 2005 — inherited a spicy temperament from his Columbian-bred Paso Fino grandsires, Petrolero and Vitral. And I hadn’t raised a foal in 35 years.

A Bucket of Trouble
I bought my first two Paso Finos at a show farm a few years ago, then boarded there. The fulltime Paso Fino trainer at the farm, who’d originally worked in Colombia (famous for its Paso Finos), taught me about the breed, including its gaits and the training methods used.

This trainer was familiar with American horse clinicians, and recommended that I become acquainted with the one he liked best, Clinton Anderson. In the past two years, I’ve attended an Anderson weekend demonstration, acquired several of his training videos, and practiced his methods.

After watching Anderson’s foal-training videos twice and trying to duplicate the results with Clementino, I concluded that either Anderson demonstrated on docile foals unlike Clementino or was such a good trainer that he made the foals appear docile. Whatever it was, I couldn’t replicate Anderson’s results with my colt. 

To help keep Clementino entertained, my husband and I converted our arena into a romper room, adding plastic barrels, orange traffic cones and balls designed for horseplay.

One day, Clementino discovered he could empty the large plastic bucket we keep in the arena to water the horses. Then he scooted it around the arena by running with his nose pressed against the inside. Next, he found he could grab one of the bucket’s rope handles and twirl the bucket in the air.

Then my trail-horse gelding, Alegro, learned how to grab the other bucket handle in his teeth, and the two began having tug-of-war matches. Within a few weeks, the bucket was broken into pieces from the rough play. My husband got another one for Clementino — it lasted a week. Next, my husband bought a cheap bucket, which survived only two days. Since we can’t afford to keep Clementino amused with an endless supply of buckets, the bucket play has come to an end.

Acting Out
The time came to wean Clementino. I gave him his own stall and gradually reduced the number of times per day he could nurse from his mom, whom we’d fondly dubbed the Dairy Queen.

One morning I went out, still half asleep, to feed the horses. I opened the gate to Clementino’s stall so he could go inside the Dairy Queen’s stall and nurse. He ran across the aisle. I raced behind him to open the Dairy Queen’s stall door. But he assumed I was racing him for his momma’s teat, so he kicked out behind at me to make sure he got there first. His hoof whacked me solidly in the chin, spreading pain instantly to my eardrums.

At first I thought my jaw was broken, but it was only jolted, and I had a cut in my chin that wouldn’t stop bleeding. My boss commended me for showing up to work that day, changing ban-dages during breaks to stem the bleeding.

As Clementino reached 400 pounds, he became more disrespectful and aggressive. When he became confused or angry about a correction during groundwork exercises, he’d rear up on his hind legs and try to strike me with his front ones. He also took delight in nipping.

Time for Help
It soon became past time to teach Clementino to trailer load. For months, I’d tried to load him without success; he refused to step inside. The tide turned when the woman who trims my horses’ hooves asked a trainer friend, Amy Bourk, to join her at my house to help me. They loaded my colt in 15 minutes. 

Impressed by Amy’s skills, I asked whether she could give me a couple of handling lessons. Soon, she had me ponying Clementino from Alegro, without the colt trying to jump on me or the horse. Clementino also started respecting me in the round pen and walking obediently beside me on a lead line.

The colt’s best lesson occurred as we were walking him away from the barn. Clementino’s attention wandered, and Amy sharply backed him up as a reprimand; it caused him to back into a four-foot-high cholla cactus. His rump and back legs covered in spines and chunks of stinging cactus, Clementino had a fit.

I thought Amy would ask me to run home for a comb and pliers to remove the offending cactus. Instead, she corrected the colt for panicking and made him keep walking. When we finally got back home, it took a half hour to pluck out the cactus.

Since Amy was also familiar with Anderson’s techniques, she gave me great feedback on how well I was replicating them with my colt. I told her how helpful that was: to watch the videos, then receive hands-on coaching from her.

Amy emphasized that good athletes are always improving themselves: the best sports players have coaches and the best horse trainers occasionally work with others to hone their skills and learn new ones.

Now almost 8 months old, Clementino was recently castrated. Here's hoping that sqeulching testosterone, along with ongoing training, will soon make Clementino a joy to be around and will form a solid foundation for a future trail horse.