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lets folk about HORSES The Acton Free Press Wed August Many of you have no doubt wondered about the treat meat of the bona you we to Western movie being yanked down In spectacular fill and Mrtbtfining dreadful stunt The following excerpts from Riding magazine may put your minds at rest Some of the moat highly valued members of the cast In any film in which they appear are the specially trained stunt horses The tot of the stunt horse has happily changed radically for the better during the last few decades Before that the horses used for stunts were often cruelly mistreated and their most spectacular contribution to a film the head over heels tumble before the cameras was often achieved by galloping them full tilt Into tripwires Nowadays however such barbarous practices are a thing of the past and the stunt horse is humanely trained to fall when his rider pulls a rein in a certain way at the same time as he twists In the saddle A welltrained stunt horse la now a valuable Item and this economic reality alone Is enough to ensure that his wellbeing Is a matter of real concern other considerations apart It takes many weeks of silent skilful training afore a horse will perform a good fall safely ana and fundamental to such good performance are the basic qualities of the animal Itself Once the animal has been conditioned so that It is good and fit it Is gradually taught to fall on quite deep sand the sand bed used so that there is no possibility of the horse being A strap Is attached to the pastern of each forefoot and a long rope Is affixed to each strap Then the ropes are crossed over from one side to the other hat behind the withers by means of a special special surcingle this allows a man standing on the left of the animal to raise its right forefoot by pulling on the end of the rope on that side the left forefoot can be lifted by a man on the offside The next stage Is to bring the horse to its knees by pulling In the rope attached to to the strap on the other forefoot the animal knees are protected with pads and after an Initial struggle or two It becomes used to dropping to its knees on the soft sand The final lesson at this point in the training Is to teach the horse to roll over on to its side This is done by the man holding the reins he reins the horse head around to the right as far as It will go and up and eases the animal over with much quiet en talk and caressing until it is lying with Its neck and Its side on the sand As it lies stretched full length the trainer holds It down by means of the reins and makes much of it The trainer sits astride Its bare back and accustoms the horse to going down with a rider on top Then the rope to the off pastern is removed and the horse learns to drop to its knees then lie down in obedience to the combined aids of the rider reining its head around to the right and tilting it up and the rope lifting its nearside The next step Is to saddle the horse take off the long rope and attach a shorter one instead This shorter cord goes from the nearside pastern strap direct to the rider left hand To get the animal to fall on cue the trainer lifts the nearside foot with the snort rope at the same time as he reins Its head around to the right and twists his body to the right ft take long for most horses to learn and then their education can be taken further by teaching them to fall in this way at walk trot and canter From then on It is just a matter of conscientious skilled practice until the horse becomes completely accustomed to racing towards the sand bed at full speed and falling on cue HS HOLDEN MCsrkSt Cast Phone 822 POLLOCK AND CAMPBELL Tt taster GAIT North OPEN 9 am to 9 pm Monday to Friday Saturday am to 6 pm 316