The bonds are strong between people and their horses in the high mountain ranching country of Colordo’s Grand County. These are friendships that run deep.

When she was in graduate school studying to become a physical therapist,  a close friend of hers was murdered. “I just couldn’t get okay with all that emotional stuff going on,” she recalled.

So she took a 40-hour-a-week job working horses while still going to school full time. “It saved me,” she said. “It’s what got me past a rough time. I thought, “Working with horses is the only thing I want to get up and do every day.”

Without horses, it’s hard to envision how the West could have been tamed.

Bob Temple, a founding father of the John Work Rodeo Arena in Fraser, grew up on a Colorado cattle ranch. He noted that the horses were in North America thousands of years ago, but died out during the Ice Age.

In more recent times, they were the backbone of the cattle operations.

“You couldn’t outrun a horse,” said Temple, who has a doctorate degree in animal genetics.
 
Stories of the special relationship between man and horse are abundant wherever the two coexist. From bucking broncos to pricey cutting horses to gripping accounts at the Therapeutic Riding Center, what follows are personal accounts that are bound to raise your spirits.
 
 
Now a staff member at the Sheep Mountain Ranch Therapeutic Riding Center, he’s helping students progress often beyond their wildest imaginations. “I’m making a difference in people’s lives,” he  said. “I’m living the dream.”

Alpenglow: Does a horse act differently with different riders?

Southward: There’s such a unique relationship between the horse and rider. A horse knows automatically if it’s a child, or if it’s somebody that hasn’t ridden for awhile. I can ride a horse and he’ll be a certain way with me. We could put a student on that doesn’t have good balance and good posture — or say a student with cerebral palsy who is very tight in the hips and the legs. The horse will be very gentle. He will throw a hip to accentuate the barrel roll to help that person’s legs relax.  He can feel where their legs are on his back. With a lot of cerebral palsy students we’ll use a  close contact English saddle or a bareback pad because they don’t have the flexibility in their legs to straddle a Western saddle.
 
One student in particular comes to mind. She would start off almost with her knees on the withers of the horse and after about 15 or 20 minutes her legs had relaxed almost to a natural riding position. That was amazing the first time I saw her legs drop that far because her mobility is limited and she has an electric wheelchair.  And she’s non-verbal. But as she rides more and more she has been able to vocalize a little bit more. She’s got a synthesizer and a keyboard that she uses to talk when she’s in her chair.  She can speak but and you have to really listen closely to understand what she’s saying.

Alpenglow: Does the horse hear her?

Southward: The horse feels it when she says “Walk!” because she leans forward. And most horses are trained that if a rider is forward, it means forward motion. You sit back and it means slow down or stop. So the horse senses that. 
 
It really is something innate in nature that the transfer of information between our students and the horses is almost natural between both. Somebody that’s timid — a horse will sense that timidity,  that apprehension.  And a horse will also sense fear and know when he can get something over on you.
 
But just seeing such a sense of achievement on the student’s face, the smiles, when they get a horse to make a turn all by themselves is pretty remarkable. Horses just seem to have a sense about it.

Alpenglow:  Is there something surreal or spiritual going on here?

Southward: Sure there is! The breakthrough that happens isn’t just physical.  It also helps mend spirits and low self-esteem. It’s easier to see the physical, because it’s a little more immediate. But we’ve got one young lady that started riding this year and the first couple times she came out she didn’t smile — she just looked angry.  The first time she smiled was huge. It had nothing to do with controlling the horse or anything else. But she just smiled. I made a comment to her: “You’ve got beautiful teeth.”  So, it heals both mind and spirit as well as the physical body.
 
And I think the horses feel that too, because sometimes I think they hold their head a little higher.  They walk a little prouder.

Alpenglow: Do horses communicate with their riders?

Southward: The horse isn’t any different than the child that you’re trying to get to behave or teach something new to. But the communication is a two-way street between humans. It can also be verbal from rider to horse or from trainer to horse, but you have to be a little more attuned to pick up the cues that the horse gives back. But they talk to you. They communicate in the way they hold their head, their ears, their posture. It’s a unique inner working, but you have to be just as patient with that horse as you do a child.

Alpenglow: In almost every walk of life, there always seems to be a bad element. What about people who mistreat their horses?

Southward: I’ve seen many so-called “horse people” slap and smack and kick and treat a horse the way they’ve seen in the old Westerns. It just doesn’t work because you have to work hand-in-hand with that horse, and when you’re mounted — whether you’re working cattle or doing therapeutic riding like we do here — horse and rider need to become one, not one overpowering the other. It has to be a team because if it’s not, both of you are going to become frustrated. You know, a horse can’t cuss you but he can throw you off. (laughing).
 
There has to be mutual respect.  Because if horse and rider aren’t in  sync, neither one is going to perform very well. If you’re out in the pasture working cows and your horse bobs when you’re expecting it to weave — there you go!

Alpenglow:  Horses obviously have a therapeutic effect on the kids here at the Therapeutic Riding Center. Do they have the same efffect on you?

Southward: Yes.  It’s also therapeutic for me.  Just the majesty of the size of a horse — and the things they can actually do. You wouldn’t think that a 1,200-pound animal could jump over a five-foot fence — but it can.  You just wouldn’t think something that big and tall and long could  spin a circle around a barrel and only leave a few inches in between — but they can.
 
It’s uplifting for me to work with the horses, let alone the emotional satisfaction that I get in my heart in working with my students.

When Skip Jacques was just a year-old growing up on the family’s Chimney Rock Ranch outside of Granby, Colorado his parents strapped him to the top of a horse and took him on rides. Now a top neurophysiologist in Los Angeles, California, he’s never lost his love of horses.
 
“We did everything on them,” he recalls. “And as I got older, my job was to go out and round up the cows.”
 
But when he saw his first cutting horse competition at the National Western Stock Show in Denver, he thought it was just about the neatest thing he’d ever seen.
 
 “I thought if I could ever afford it, I’d try to get into it,” he explained.
 
Now it’s his passion.  At the Flying Heels Rodeo Arena  — with the old family ranch off in the distance — Jacques is host at the First Annual Cutting in the Rockies event. The arena is surrounded by pricey horse trailers, while inside the riders and horse, are doing their thing — trying to separate individual cows from their herd. It is a graceful, dance-like exercise as these quarter horses bob and weave and move lightly on their feet as the top athletes that they are. These animals can sell for $350,000.
 
Jacques’ equine passion extends to all horses.

Alpenglow: Looks like there must be an incredible amount of teamwork between rider and animal in the cutting horse competition?

Jacques: No, not really. I mean, it’s there during the training and you can nudge them a little with your feet. But in essence they’re trained.
 
Whatever cow you get, once you have the cow out there, you put your hand down on the horn and you’re not allowed to lift your hand again. It’s all up to the horse.

Alpenglow: What do they need you for?

Jacques: They don’t. I’ve seen people fall off their horses.  A lot of times you’ll take the bridle off and just hold on.  The horse does fine. They don’t need you. They’re probably better off without you because they’re not packing an extra 150-200 pounds.

Alpenglow:  What makes cutting horses so valuable?

Jacques: They’re like athletes. Some of them are Michael Jordon and some of them are not. You try and breed them like race horses — the good ones with the good ones. But it’s still sort of a crap shoot. I mean, just because your mother and father had a 160 IQ doesn’t mean you will. But if you put good horses together, you obviously have a much better chance.

Alpenglow: In general, just how smart are horses?

Jacques:  Really smart!  Did you ever see that chimp study at UCLA where they give a treat when they recognize a certain shape?  A horse can do that, too, just like a monkey. Here’s the difference: When you bring the monkeys back six or eight years later the memory retention is around 70 percent.  With a horse, it’s almost 90 percent.
 
Don’t ever get in a wreck with a horse. If you have a trailer with a horse in it and there’s an accident, they never forget.
 
That’s why you have to be very careful — they pick up bad habits as well as good habits. They’re really intelligent. It’s just amazing. I mean they’re almost human-like in their intelligence.

Alpenglow: Do your horses get attached to you like, say, a dog would?
Jacques: Yeah, the horse gets attached to you, there’s no question about it.  I’ve got two of them that literally follow me around the whole ranch in California just like they were a damn dog. They follow me everywhere.

Alpenglow:  Do you relate to your horse as a partner or a person or is that going too far?
Jacques: You know, I do, but I’m a little different.  I have two cats and a dog and they’re all members of the family. Horses are like that too. Obviously, you don’t bring them inside, though.

Alpenglow: So, they’re really part of your family?

Jacques: Well, I talk to them like a person half the time. I mean, I know when  they are happy or if they’re mad at me or whatever.  They’re very loving animals. I love them. I just couldn’t be without them.


Behind the chutes at the far side of the arena a young cowboy with short cropped red hair looks intense as he settles down on his adversary —  a big bronc named Hot Sauce who had only been ridden once — successfully — all year long. Suddenly, the gate swings open and in a blur some 1,200 pounds of horse is rushing out the chute, kicking its heels high in the air. A moment later, the cowboy cuts lose and falls to the ground, far short of qualifying, as a loud, humiliating buzzer blares across the arena.
 
Bucking horses — as well as those who attempt to ride them — are a breed apart.

After the day’s excitement, Dave Sammons, a local rancher and competitor who serves as the rodeo superintendent here, and Ty Lang, the stock contractor who fills in as everything from rodeo clown to announcer, discussed their favorite subject. Horses.

Alpenglow: How does a horse become a bucking horse?

Lang: A lot of horses in the old days came from the ranchers such as Dave Sammons, here. He’d bring a horse in and say,  “Hey, nobody can get this horse rode.  You ride him all day and he rears his head and bucks you off that afternoon.”
 
Nowadays we have the Born to Buck Program.  Stock contractors have found out that there’s certain pedigrees that truly like to buck. They really enjoy it.  And so they capitalize on that and they go out and get sires from a bucking mare and a bucking stud and hope they’ll get a colt that will buck.

Alpenglow:  At what age do they start out as a bucking horse?

Lang: We try to leave the colts alone so they can grow up on their  own and became as wild and independent as they can. And maybe you can settle them down enough to buck when they’re four years.

Alpenglow:  Are the cowboys happy about this? You’d think that tougher bucking horses would make it harder for them to stay on?

Sammons: As far as the cowboy goes, he wants to have the absolute best chance to win. And if he enters a rodeo and that horse won’t buck and will not give him all that he has, then he doesn’t have that opportunity. So, a good cowboy wants a good, strong buck because 50 percent of the points come from the performance of the horse.

Alpenglow: Do the various bucking horses all have different personalities?

Lang: Oh, yeah. If you’re around ‘em everyday you can figure their personality. They’re just like people.  Everybody’s a little different. There’s some broncs that are the wildest mares you can imagine out in the arena that just walk up to you and sniff you when they’re not doing the rodeo. So as far as a set personality, there is no such thing. They’re all a little different, just like people.

Alpenglow: Do you consider them athletes?

Lang: I absolutely do. We’ve taken these animals and we’re creating rodeo athletes.  And they do the same things with bulls.

Sammons: A lot times it would be 20 percent. If you buy 20 of them, you’d only have four of them that would buck. And be honest about their bucking. I mean they would buck every single time. So, this breeding program for these animals — these athletes — that they’ve created has catapulted the rodeo business to the next level.
Alpenglow: Do you have any favorite individual horses?

Lang: There’s a horse that’s known throughout the industry, Justin Boots, and he’s from the northern program out of South Dakota. He was a world champ for about five years and that’s actually the sire to the stud horse that we use on our ranch in Montrose.
 He’s one of my favorites. In fact, I feed him and look at him every day and  go check him every day so they’re all kind of like my kids.  They’re just like family.

Sammons: You do see them as individuals because  they all have their  individual little quirks. Some of them like to be hauled. Some off them don’t.  The one I ride right now, he loved my little girls to mess with him. She’s always messing, combing his hair and doing this or that. You can just see that he truly enjoys it. Where, years ago I hauled around a mare that I rode and he didn’t like to be messed with at all. The only thing she wanted me to do is put the bridle on, do the job, put her away, and be done with it.

Alpenglow: Do you think that they think this is a job?

Lang: The bucking horses, especially; they know this is what they’re doing and they wouldn’t do it if they didn’t like doing it. If they didn’t like to be a bucking horse, they wouldn’t do it. Another way I can tell, which is kind of neat,  is to watch as you load the truck and they take off and run up and get in there. They’re not fighting to stay off it. They know it’s time to go somewhere on Thursday. If they didn’t like it, they’d stay off that truck.

Alpenglow: Can you compare this to humans in the sense that they feel more fullfilled when they’ve accomplished something meaningful in their jobs?

Sammons: Yes. Most all domestic animals were beasts of burden at some time, including dogs, cows, and horses. And when you take that need to be useful away from them, it changes the animal. When you give an animal a job they’re absolutely the happiest animals in the world.

Alpenglow: Do bucking horses know they are supposed to be bucking somebody off?

Lang:  Oh yeah. When a bucking horse bucks somebody off they always feel good. They know they’ve done good. They go to the return chute a little happier about life. I think they know competition just like anybody else. 

Alpenglow:  Do you train them on techniques?
Lang: Oh no, there’s bucking horses that have all sorts of different techniques.  They figure out their own ways.  They figure out what they have to do to buck the cowboy off.
 
They create a pattern they feel comfortable with and they’ll do that 85 percent of the time. Now, there’s a time when they’ll have a bad day — maybe they’re not feeling as good, just like anybody else. Just like a batter going zero and four, when usually he’s a 300 or 400 hitter.
 
But they build that deal to where they’ll buck almost the same every time to where these cowboys keep books on them:  “This one bucks and kicks straight away, this one will circle a little to the left. This one will circle to the right.  This one will turn its belly.”  They figure their own patterns. They’ll do what they’re comfortable with and they’ll do it 85 percent of the time.