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I'm Karl Hoopes with Utah State University Equine Extension.
And we're going to be talking about putting
halters on and different kinds of halters today.
This is Olaf.
He's one of Norwegian Fjords here at the university,
and he's consented to be our help today.
But we'll talk about a few different kinds of halters.
We have buckle halters.
and we have rope halters as well.
This buckle halter is leather.
It's got several buckles, and it actually has a snap.
So we're going to be demonstrating
how to put these halters on.
Let's talk about the halter that's
on Olaf right here to begin with and the proper placing
of the halter.
We want to make sure that the noseband of the halter
goes over about the middle way between their eyes
and their nostril.
We want to make sure that there's
plenty of room in the halter so that Olaf
is able to open and close his mouth as he needs to.
We want to make sure that it's fit up around his cheekbone
here.
So that it's not hanging down.
And we want to make sure that it's a good fit.
This is the buckles that we refer to.
This is a nylon halter.
And so we want to be careful with them
and make sure that we always put the ends back
through the keeper.
So as we talk about approaching a horse
and being able to halter this horse
or put the halter on to begin with,
we want to be able to take the lead rope.
And you should always do this when you first
approach the horse, as well as if you're exchanging a halter
like we're going to be here.
You put the rope over their neck and make sure
that you of keep a hold of them.
Most horses are trained that if the halter
rope goes over their neck, they can stand.
So as you're catching a horse out in a pasture,
you're able to get up to them and put this around their neck
and they generally will stand.
As you go to approach this horse,
be careful that you're not coming too fast
or that you're going right to their face,
but you're coming from behind.
You run your hand up their neck so that they
know what you're doing.
And you can unbuckle this halter and place your other hand
on the other side of their head so that you can drop that.
You don't want to just drop the halter
and let it hit the ground because then that
can scare them, can spook them.
You want to be very careful about their eyes,
that you're not allowing the straps
to hit their eyes or the buckles to hit their eyes.
It can cause quite a bit of damage.
When we go to put this halter on a horse to begin with,
I like to make sure the halter rope is around the neck.
And then bring it up under their chin.
So we have not approached their face yet.
You're able to reach over with your right hand
to the other side.
And you're able to hold the halter up
as you can see both ways here.
And you work it on their nose.
As you get it up in place around their nose,
slowly bring it across their foretop
and you can buckle the halter at this point.
And then make sure you put it through the keeper
there in place.
You want to be able to adjust it.
Make sure it's the proper fit.
You're then able to bring the halter rope over,
and you're able to go and do what you need to do.
We're going to try and put this leather halter on and see
how it looks.
It has a little different way of buckling.
So first off, we're going to put the halter rope around his neck
again.
And we're going to undo this halter.
Let it drop off his head.
Now this halter has a permanent buckle
that can be adjusted here, but when
you approach with this halter, you come up the front.
And similar to a bridle, you put it over his ears.
And then you bring this buckle and snap it in place.
Let me get the halter rope on him now.
Thank you.
Bring the halter rope back over.
Let's now look at the fitting of this halter.
As you can see, this halter is bigger on Olaf.
It's actually bigger than what I would like.
And so I would say this halter is too big for him.
See how the noseband is sitting down here
on the sensitive bones of his nose.
We want that noseband to be sitting up here.
You can oftentimes adjust the length through right here,
but this halter is already in its top hole,
and so you can't shorten it up enough
to where you would like this to be with Olaf.
So if this was my horse, I would be
looking for a different halter because this one is
a little bit too big for Olaf.
Now I'm going to show you how to put this rope halter on.
So we put the halter rope over his neck.
And we undo the buckle right here, then
as we take this halter off.
It's like a bridle that we're going to bring it over his ears
and slowly bring it down his face.
Now this rope halter, as I'm putting this rope halter on,
I want to be very careful.
Make sure that it's undone before you approach the horse.
Again, you want to come up under the horse's neck
and grab the tail.
Be very careful that is this is swinging around that you're not
hitting him in the eye over there
because that can be very painful.
So again, you bring this up very slowly, fit it over his nose,
then you're able to bring that tail over this way.
And I'm going to show you how to tie this knot.
We have a loop of rope right here
and you want to bring this end towards you through that loop.
And then you bring it up.
This halter is easily adjusted on how far you
want to bring that up to the rope,
but I always tie my halters.
I start on the backside.
I go around that loop, bring it to the forward,
and bring it back through itself.
And I'm going to show you some of the common mistakes
with tying a halter like this.
One of the common mistakes is tying the knot
up above and just an overhand knot up above that loop.
One of the problems with this is if he pulls back and pulls
that knot tight, it's extremely difficult
to get that knot undone.
If we tie it in the correct way, this
forms a knot that can always get undone no matter what happens,
no matter how tight he pulls.
And it's easy because you can move that up,
and it loosens the knot.
It's a lot safer.
And it's the proper way to tie that.
Another problem that we see is if you
bring this around the front and leave
the tail end sticking out.
It's right in his eye.
And it can hit him in the eye and cause some problems.
It can also spook the horse.
So you always want to make sure that tail,
after it's tied properly, is facing away
from the eye towards the back.
There, again, we need to check this halter out
for proper fitting.
Now this is pretty tight right here around his muzzle.
And I would consider this halter is too small for Olaf.
And so we want to make sure there's plenty of room
for him to be able to open and close his mouth comfortably.
You want to be very careful that we're not
applying too much pressure over the nose.
With that being said, let's put the proper halter back on Olaf
so that we have the right one on him that fits properly for him.
And we'll talk about some of the advantages and disadvantages
of these halters.
So we talk about some of the advantages and disadvantages
of these halters.
With this nylon halter, that's a buckle halter,
one of the advantages that I like with this
is the ease of getting it on and off.
The buckles are pretty clean.
They're easy to use.
I also like the side buckle rings
as well that if you're needing to cross
tie them or other things, you can use the side buckles.
Some of the disadvantages of these halters
is that if it's nylon and it gets too worn in the holes
or on the ends, they can fray.
Nylon buckle halters are pretty strong.
They can be washed and they can be dried.
And they're pretty nice in that manner.
Let me look at the rope halter here for just a moment.
The rope halters are becoming very popular.
They are actually extremely strong.
They're lightweight.
And if tied properly, they are safe for the horse
and they're easy to use.
Hey, as we're looking at some of the advantages of a rope
halter, they're very strong.
They will not break.
They're very lightweight.
Some of the things that can happen here
is you can actually put different knots
along the noseband for pressure.
They can be used for training.
Horses tend to really enjoy these.
They're not very invasive.
As we look at this leather halter.
And this style of buckle is popular with your draft
breeds and also some of your English style variety.
The leather halters are pretty neat.
They look really nice.
They feel nice.
They're very good in that manner,
but some of the things that happened there is they do
tend to be a little bit more expensive.
They can get worn too.
The leather, if it's not properly cared for, will crack.
And actually the leather is not as
strong of a halter as your rope halter or your nylon halter.
So the other things that are neat with this halter
is it can be adjustable on the noseband and those other items
there.
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