witheford equine ltd
Witheford Equine - Home He is often referred to as a horse whisperer, others
call him ‘the magic man’, but Gary Witheford, the man who breaks horses in less
than half an hour, prefers to call himself a ‘horseman’. As the first man to
break in zebras, Gary and his son, Craig, have worked with horses who present
all sorts of problems. These range from refusing to load onto horseboxes, ridden
issues such as bolting, bucking, rearing or napping, fear of traffic, farrier or
vet phobias and many other challenges faced by horse owners from all
disciplines, be it happy hackers or competition horses. Gary’s expertise in
dealing with horses spans over 35 years and January 2018 brought about a slight
re-structuring in the business. The decision was made to focus purely on working
in the racing industry for racehorses who have a range of issues, most notably
those with issues when being loaded into starting stalls but the team also break
in hundreds of horses each year – although he prefers the term ‘start’.
‘Breaking-in’ is a very negative term. The most notable of his racing successes
to date is Sea The Stars for Irish trainer John Oxx and the mighty Kingman for
John Gosden. As Gary explains, horses don’t really want to get into a fight and
by working them using pressure and release, they quickly learn to look at you as
a leader. “The less pressure there is the more the horse will follow you. It’s
the herd instinct. Horses are flight animals, whether they are thoroughbreds,
ponies or shire horses so you’ve got to go through their thoughts and go back to
basics.’’ As the ‘magic man’ says “I like to think I let my horses do the
talking and let the results speak for themselves. It’s all about trust and
getting them to think ‘You’re my leader and I will follow you’. It just proves
to me that the way I handle horses has to work. I have great respect for the
owners, riders and trainers that I work with and totally appreciate the trust
they place in me. With the increased focus on welfare for horses I hope that by
working as a team we can all make things better for the horses, handlers and
riders".
