January 2008 • VOLUME 29 • © HORSES For LIFE™ Magazine

[Anja]: Yes, that’s another problem because they know their riders very well. They know the people very well who are around them. If I get a Friesian here with a problem with its rider, I train him. And when he gets better and better, his rider comes [back] and wants to ride the Friesian. He looks to his rider and he remembers. And they really make problems for the rider after.

[N]: Too long of a memory. Do you find that because these horses are intelligent and don’t want to do a lot of the same thing all the time, sometimes people can become too strong with them because they do stop listening?

[Anja]: Yes, of course.

[N]: And what do you find happens with the Friesians? What do you find their reaction is?

[Anja]: With a normal horse, he gets away and run crazy or something. A Friesian, no, he doesn’t work any more. I have Friesians here that people have problems with, but they don’t put riders on the ground or things like that. They go in the hall, they stop in the middle, and they don’t move.

[N]: I recognize that one so well.

[Anja]: The riders can put on spurs and whips and the Friesian will just turn his head a little and smile and stay in the middle and that’s their system. I get many, many like that every year. People [come] crying “my Friesian doesn’t go, doesn’t trot, doesn’t gallop. I’m always tired when I ride and I sweat and the Friesian doesn’t go.” For [Friesians], if you don’t wake them up and keep them sensitive, you’re lost. They don’t move.

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