Campaign Saddle Training

Well, four of our six students have survived the first phase of the Cavalry Riding School and are eager to get on with the next phase.  Today, we worked on how to build a campaign saddle and put it on a horse.  To give them hands-on training I disassembled my own saddle and then asked the students to put it back together.  I also went over how to clean each individual item on the saddle.  



After the students successfully reassembled the saddle, we found a couple of volunteers out in the pasture so we could practice putting the campaign tack on a horse.  I went through the process of putting the halter and bridle on and showed how all the tack fits together and is correctly configured.

After that we went over horse illnesses and how to treat minor injuries and who to notify in the case of more serious injuries. We even went over how to put a pressure bandage on a horse's leg so that they could do that when necessary.  Since they are being assigned their own horse for the rest of training, they were excited about all this information.

Finally, to wrap up the day, we issued uniforms to the new recruits and showed them how to put everything on.

Looking forward to the next phase of training.