South Wind Equestrian Center

09/08/2026

Understand your horse better, fostering a deeper, more meaningful friendship.

09/05/2026

Wear a helmet every time. Have your child wear a helmet every time. Every single time you get on your horse put on your helmet.

Folks, your kids' lives matter.

If your a parent or grandparent looking to get a child a horse,

Listen to me,

This is Absolutely NOT the time to be cheap or skip steps.

First,

Enroll your child into an established lesson program that is respected and priorities horse care, ground work and riding.

Unless you're a professional horse person, don't skip this.

Start building a good support system within the horse community.

When you first start to look into a horse for your child, listen to advice from professionals. Bring your trainer with you when you visit potential horses. Listen to them, not the kid. If cost is a concern, horse ownership may not be the right choice. Consider leasing.

If you buy, then partner that horse with your child under lesson / training guidance awhile.

Horses can kill your child because you were too cheap to do the proper steps to help make the Equine adventure safer.

Your kid matters too much for you to cut corners on training or the right horse.

https://horsesonly.com/horse-riding-accidents/

09/05/2026

This really hits Home. For 22 years I owned a private boarding barn Northwest of Austin, Texas. I would board between 25 and 28 Horses at a time. I was never off of work. Most of my weeks were 70 to 80 hours.

I met some wonderful people and I met some really awful people. I learned so much about horses and humans. I taught horseback riding lessons to adults and children for 18 years. When I retired from doing it, I realized how much I enjoyed it but didn’t really feel like the amount of time I sacrificed with my own family was appreciated by those I taught.

Running a horse barn is expensive. People think it’s just buying hay, but it’s also time, insurance, utilities, equipment, repairs, and maintenance. And oh, the manure!

I offered full care service with supplements, a boutique approach, with each horse handpicked to reside in its own small herd. I kept track of and schedules all parasite and manure management, feeding, clean water, farrier appointments, holding Horses for the Vet and the farrier. Blanketing 20+ horses in terrible weather at midnight. Walking horses that were showing signs of colic, standing with horses as they were euthanized because their owners could not handle it. Taking care of 30+ year old horses, making sure their quality of life was great. Lying in the cold mud as they were sewn up.

My clients didn’t have to worry about anything other than leaving a check.I wanted it that way. I wanted my clients to enjoy their time with their horse. For it to be an escape for them. I wanted them to know that their horse was taken care of so that they wouldn’t have to worry when they were not there. And I was good at it. I had very loyal clients and horses I loved as if they were my own.

I love taking care of Horses. I enjoy watching them learn, recover from injury and neglect, I love watching partnerships grow and evolve. I loved seeing how my barn grew into equine therapy and learning facility and how much the horses benefited from it. I so loved the friendships, girls nights, sunset happy hour rides, drum circles and trail rides

But I got burned out. Mean gossip, high maintenance people, increasing costs, low profit margins, betrayal by business partners. On top of the worries about water, oak wilt, COVID repercussions…I baled.

Five years later I have people asking me to come back. To open another boarding barn. To teach again and offer equine therapy. And who knows, maybe God will open up doors to do that?

But one thing I do know, South Wind shaped so much of who I am. Hard work, true friends, wonderful horses and nature. My heart is full with the good memories. And I pray for those barn owners out there, that they hold their boundaries, keep gossip at bay and remember how much we can impact the lives of owners and especially their horses.

08/31/2026

08/30/2026

So true. Horses are autonomous beings that were not created to be ridden. They allow us to do so for the most part, but it is not their divine purpose. Give your horse a pasture, herd mates, good food and safety. That is what they need.

Recently I saw a post about a horse for sale- their owner was selling the horse because it loved being ridden, and unfortunately they didn't have time; they felt their horse deserved a home where riding could be a priority.

This could be controversial, but as a behaviourist who has spent years studying equine behaviour, who horses really are and what they really need and want to be happy- I don't think there is a horse who NEEDS to be ridden or loves being ridden so much that they need to be rehomed. Do I think horses can enjoy being ridden? Yes, if done so in line with how horses learn, and if their bodies and minds are healthy. Do I think this is something that comes as a priority to them, and that they'd miss if it wasn't present within their lives? Absolutely not.

What do horses want from us humans? Friends, forage and the freedom to be horses. The primary things in their lives are forage and friends- they're highly social animals who need to eat for many hours a day to keep their bodies and minds functioning in a healthy way. They want to be turned out as they've evolved to be, with the freedom to act out the natural repertoire of behaviours which make them a horse, and to socialise with their friends as they please. They value shelter and health care that helps them be as free from pain as possible. Sure, they enjoy a good groom, a scratch and some kind, rewarding training with us humans, and we can build strong and mutually rewarding relationships with them, which riding can be a part of. But as far as behavioural science goes, the study of who a horse really is, no horse is standing in a field wishing they were being ridden. They are quite happy to just be horses instead.

It makes me sad when I see horses being rehomed because their owners believe they love being ridden so much- many of the behaviours we mistake for enthusiasm are actually stress and discomfort if we look deeper and seek to understand the horses in front of us better. There are horses being taken from homes where they are settled and bonded to other equines, where things feel safe and familiar, because of something us humans believe to be true that sadly isn't.