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Course 100: Equine Science & Care

Course 100: Equine Science & Care

The first course of the Level 1 Foundational Horsemanship Certification, and the place every rider at Ocean View Stables begins. Course 100 opens with the Leyden Way itself: Feel, Timing, and Balance, how horses actually learn, and the two standards that govern your progress, the Zero Assistance Standard and the Rule of Three. From there it moves to the horse: anatomy, colors and markings, feed and water, hooves, vital signs, and the daily routine.

Then the hands-on core: grooming as a daily physical exam, the parts of the western saddle, the California knot, saddle fit, and the after-care that finishes every ride. Pass the certification at the end to show your ground knowledge is solid, then carry it into Course 101.

Soft is strong. Clarity is kindness.

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Responsible Zachary Leyden
Last Update 10/20/2026
Completion Time 7 hours 36 minutes
Members 115
Level 1

Course trailer ·

Course 100: Equine Science & Care, in one minute

The first course of the Level 1 Foundational Horsemanship Certification, and the place every rider at Ocean View Stables begins.

With Zachary Leyden. Look for the Watch with Zachary videos inside the course.

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  • The Foundation (empty)
    9Lessons · 1 hr 5 min
    Section 1 of 6. Before you touch a horse you need the method that everything else hangs on. This section gives you the map of Level 1, the three ideas behind the Leyden Way, a working definition of feel, timing, and balance, and the learning mechanism every later exercise depends on. Read it slowly. Everything after this assumes it.
    • Watch with Zachary: Soft Is Strong

      Welcome to the Rider's Journey. Press play for the one idea under every exercise in all four courses, and the half second that decides what your horse actually learns.

      Preview New
    • Welcome to the Rider's Journey
      The map before the territory. What Level 1 actually certifies, the 23 skills an instructor signs, and how long it takes at the pace you really ride.
      Preview 10 xp
    • Soft Is Strong: The Leyden Way
      Back to nature, the scientific method, and first principles. Where the Leyden Way came from, and why softness is a form of strength rather than the absence of it.
      Preview 10 xp
    • Feel, Timing, and Balance
      Three words every horseman uses and almost nobody defines. Defined here, including the half second that separates a release from a reward.
      Preview 10 xp
    • How Horses Learn: Pressure and Release
      Horses do not learn from pressure. They learn from its removal. This is the single mechanism underneath every exercise in all four courses.
      Preview 10 xp
    • The Two Standards: Zero Assistance and the Rule of Three
      The Zero Assistance Standard and the Rule of Three. The two published rules that decide when a skill is yours and when you are still borrowing your instructor's eyes.
      Preview 10 xp
    • Watch: Tom Dorrance - Exposure to New Ideas
      Vintage footage of Tom Dorrance, the source this whole method flows from, guiding Bryan Neubert through two colts. Watch his hands, not the horses.
      Preview
    • Watch: Tom Dorrance - Feel, Timing and Balance
      You read about the three pillars in Feel, Timing, and Balance. Now hear Tom Dorrance himself, the man who named them, explain what feel, timing, and balance actually mean. Everything else in these four courses builds on this six minutes.
      Preview
    • Watch: Buck Brannaman on the Release
      Buck Brannaman explains what a release really is: no pressure at all, not just a little less. Listen for his point that easing from 50 pounds of pull to 40 is not a release, and that at first you exaggerate the release so the horse knows for certain he did something right. He is talking about riding and young horses, but the same rule holds every time you hold a lead rope or a rein.
      Preview
  • Knowing the Horse (empty)
    10Lessons · 52 min
    Section 2 of 6. A horse you cannot describe is a horse you cannot report on. Here you learn the language: the points of the body, the colors and markings that tell one animal from another, and the three numbers, age, height, and condition, that decide what a horse can fairly be asked to do.
    • Watch with Zachary: A Checklist in Disguise

      You cannot report what you cannot name. Learn the points of the horse, near and off side, the three numbers, and colors and markings, so your next report sends the vet to the right leg.

      Free account New
    • The Points of the Horse
      Forty words that let you say exactly where a problem is. Without them, the best report you can give a vet is that he is sore somewhere behind.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Age, Height, and Body Condition
      Read age from the teeth, height in hands, condition on the Henneke scale. Three numbers that decide what a horse can fairly be asked to do today.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Coat Colors and How to Name Them
      Bay, chestnut, sorrel, dun, roan, gray. The naming system, and why two horses that look like the same color often are not.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Face Markings and How to Name Them
      Star, stripe, snip, blaze, bald. Precise names for the white on a horse's face, which is how horses are identified on paper.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Leg Markings and How to Name Them
      Coronet, pastern, sock, stocking. The vocabulary that turns the bay in the third stall into one specific animal.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Watch: Naming the Coat Colors
      A working tour of fourteen coat colors on real horses. Watch once, then try to name every horse in the barn tomorrow.
      Free account
    • Watch: The Five Common Face Markings
      A short, clear guide to the five face markings you will meet most often. Two minutes, and the names stick.
      Free account
    • Watch: Reading Leg Markings
      How to tell a sock from a stocking, and why the boundary matters when you are writing a horse down.
      Free account
    • Watch: Learn the Parts of the Horse
      A clear walkthrough of the points of the horse. Learn these names now, because your instructor uses them in every single lesson.
      Free account
  • Daily Care and Feeding (empty)
    9Lessons · 1 hr 24 min
    Section 3 of 6. The gut, the hoof, and the vital signs are where horses actually get hurt, and they get hurt quietly. This section teaches you the normal so well that the abnormal announces itself, and it draws the hard line between what a student reports and what a student never treats.
    • Watch with Zachary: Know Normal

      An empty stomach is an acid bath. Learn forage and water, picking out a foot, the normal vital signs, and the one rule when something looks wrong, before you need it at six in the morning.

      Free account New
    • Feed, Forage, and Water
      Two gallons of stomach, twenty-five gallons of hindgut, and acid that never stops. The anatomy behind every feeding rule here, including the ones that look fussy.
      Free account 10 xp
    • The Hoof: Picking, Cycles, and What to Watch
      A quarter inch a month, a whole new hoof in a year. How to pick out four feet properly, and the four findings that mean the horse is not ridden today.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Vital Signs and When to Call
      Temperature, pulse, respiration. Learn the normal ranges cold, because their whole value is that the abnormal jumps out at you at six in the morning when you are half awake.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Turnout, Stall, and the Daily Routine
      Why every horse here is deliberately looked at three times a day, how a horse is released into a field without anyone getting kicked, and why routine is a welfare measure and not just tidiness.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Watch: How the Horse's Gut Works
      University of Georgia equine science on why the horse is built for constant forage. The reasoning behind our feed rules, from the people who measured it.
      Free account
    • Watch: How to Check a Horse's Vital Signs
      Dr. Molly McCue and the University of Minnesota Equine Extension team walk through a full set of vital signs: breathing, gums and capillary refill, pulse and heart rate, hydration, gut sounds and temperature. Watch why they count breaths from outside the stall before the horse is disturbed, and how they count for 15 seconds and multiply by 4. Their normal ranges differ a little from our lesson (even within the video heart rate is given two ways) because normal varies by source and by horse, so use the numbers in our lesson and learn your own horse's normal.
      Free account
    • Watch: Body Condition Scoring, Hands On
      Dr. Krishona Martinson and Devan Catalano of the University of Minnesota Equine Extension score four real horses on the Henneke 1 to 9 scale. Watch how they look first (can you see ribs or not?) and then feel six places: neck, withers, behind the shoulder, ribs, back and tail head. Pay attention to the last mare, who carries fat unevenly, and how they score each area and average them to get a fair number.
      Free account
    • Watch: Picking Out a Hoof, Step by Step
      Gwen Elliot of the Salem County 4-H Blue Ribbon Hoofbeats club, in a video shared by Rutgers New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station, picks out her quarter horse Chester's feet in about two minutes. Watch where she stands (at his side, facing his tail), how she runs her hand down the leg and leans in slightly to shift his weight before he lifts, and how she sets each foot down gently instead of dropping it. The hoof dressing at the end is optional; follow what staff tell you for each horse.
      Free account
  • Grooming (empty)
    4Lessons · 33 min
    Section 4 of 6. Grooming is not cleaning. It is the daily physical exam you run with your hands on an animal that cannot tell you where it hurts. Learn the order, learn the tools, and learn what your palm is really looking for.
    • Watch with Zachary: The Daily Exam

      Grooming is the daily exam, and you are the one doing it. Learn the tools, the order, and what your bare hand is feeling for, so you find the problem before the saddle goes on.

      Free account New
    • The Grooming Kit and What Each Tool Does
      Feet, curry, hard brush, soft brush, mane and tail. What each tool is for, where it must never go, and why the metal curry never touches the horse.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Grooming as Diagnosis
      Twenty minutes a day with your hands on every inch of an animal that cannot speak. Heat, swelling, flinching, and the head nod that tells you which foot hurts.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Watch: How to Groom a Horse, Step by Step
      A full grooming routine start to finish. Watch how she keeps one hand on the horse the whole time and reads it while she works.
      Free account
  • Saddling (empty)
    7Lessons · 1 hr
    Section 5 of 6. More horses are spoiled by a saddle that does not fit than by any rider's hands. The tree, the pad, the placement, the cinch, and the California knot, tied the same way every time, because the one time it is tied badly is the time the saddle turns.
    • Watch with Zachary: Tail Down, Every Time

      Learn what really carries your weight in a western saddle, how to cinch without making a cinchy horse, and the knot that holds it all on. Watch before you saddle up again.

      Free account New
    • Parts of the Western Saddle and the Pad
      The tree, the bars, the pad, the rigging. Learn what actually carries the rider's weight, then learn the ten second test that condemns a saddle for good.
      Free account 10 xp
    • The California Knot
      The knot that holds your saddle on. Tied flat, tail pointing down, fifty times on a rail and fifty more with your eyes shut. Tail up is how saddles turn.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Does the Saddle Fit?
      Two to three fingers at the wither, a flat hand down the bars, and a sweat pattern that tells the truth. Fit is checked on the bare back and never fixed with a thicker pad.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Watch: The Basics of Saddling
      Pat Puckett, from the vaquero tradition, on placement, cinching order, and fit. Compare every step against what you just read.
      Free account
    • Watch: Saddling Properly With the AQHA
      Brent Graef, in AQHA's Fundamentals of Horsemanship series, shows saddling as a set of good habits: lower the cinches on the off side instead of dropping them, stand beside the front legs facing the hindquarters when you reach under, and let the back of your hand rub the belly so the horse knows your arm is there. Notice that he snugs the cinch only enough to keep the saddle from rolling ('don't make the horse into a peanut') and tightens it again after moving the horse, the same staged cinching you just learned. When he rests the lead rope over his arm, that means draped only; never wrap or loop a rope around any part of you.
      Free account
    • Watch: Checking Western Saddle Fit
      Dara and Derrick of Circle Y Saddles, a Texas western saddle maker, put the same saddle on two different horses to show that fit is about matching the saddle's tree to the horse's back, not about a good or bad saddle. Watch the front of the saddle near the withers and shoulders: on Red, a wide, round-backed horse, the regular tree pinches, while on Gator it sits right. This is a saddle maker's video, so skip past the product talk; at the stable staff fit the saddles, and your job is to notice and speak up if something looks tight or uneven.
      Free account
  • After-Care (empty)
    6Lessons · 46 min
    Section 6 of 6. The ride is not over when you dismount. Cooling out, tack care, and closing the barn are graded skills here, signed off like any other, because how a person finishes tells you more about their horsemanship than how they start.
    • Watch with Zachary: Better Than You Found It

      The ride is not over when you dismount. Learn cooling out, the water rules, the five-minute check, tack care and closing the barn, because how you finish is what your horse remembers.

      Free account New
    • Cooling Out and Putting the Horse Away
      Ten to twenty minutes, legs first, scrape immediately, short drinks only. The last part of the ride is the part most people skip and most horses pay for.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Caring for Your Tack
      Leather fails at the fold and at the hole. Clean, dry, then condition sparingly, and give every piece forty seconds before you use it, even when someone else prepared it.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Closing the Loop: Leaving the Barn Better Than You Found It
      Sweep the aisle, turn the tines down, walk the latches, and say one thing you noticed out loud. A graded skill here, signed off like any other.
      Free account 10 xp
    • Watch: Is Your Horse Cooled Out?
      SmartPak's staff veterinarian, Dr. Lydia Gray, on how to tell a horse is cooled out after hard work in cold weather: the coat is dry, and the breathing and heart rate are back down. She also busts an old myth: a hot horse can drink. At our barn you offer that water little and often while you walk him out.
      Free account
    • Watch: Saddle Soap or Oil, and When
      Dennis Moreland, a maker of western and vaquero tack, cleans a bridle and saddle while checking each piece for wear. Watch where he looks for weak spots: the reins, the latigo where it folds over the D ring, the billet holes, and the hobble straps on the stirrups. His answer to the title question is to wipe tack with saddle soap regularly, oil only leather that is truly dry and then soap it again, and use rawhide cream instead of oil on rawhide.
      Free account
  • The Certification (empty)
    1Lesson · 30 min
    Everything Course 100 taught you, tested. Ten questions, eighty percent to pass, unlimited attempts, and no trick items. Pass this and your ground knowledge is solid enough to be useful in the barn tomorrow.
    • Course 100 Certification
      Ten questions, eighty percent to pass, unlimited attempts. Everything Course 100 taught you, tested the way the barn will test you.
      Free account
  • Go Deeper (empty)
    8Lessons · 1 hr 27 min
    The encore. Your certification is behind you. This is where the Leyden Way points past itself: the library it was built from, and the archive footage of the men who built it, starting with Tom Dorrance in Depression era Oregon.
    • The Library of the Leyden Way
      True Unity, Think Harmony With Horses, The Faraway Horses, and the films worth an evening. Where to go next, in the order that will make the most sense.
      Free account
    • Watch: The Original - Tom Dorrance
      Where it all starts: a short documentary on Tom Dorrance, from Depression-era Oregon to the man every teacher in this program traces back to. Watch this first; the next four videos follow the line forward.
      Free account
    • Watch: Bill Dorrance at Ninety - Lessons from a Legend
      Tom's older brother Bill, still teaching in his nineties. Bill's book True Horsemanship Through Feel sits on the shelf you read about in the Library lesson. This is the only public footage of him at work; watch his hands.
      Free account
    • Watch: Buck on Ray - What He Meant
      The Dorrances taught Ray Hunt; Ray taught Buck Brannaman. Here Buck tells you what Ray meant to him, over archival footage of Ray. Three minutes that explain why this lineage matters.
      Free account
    • Watch: A Tribute to Ray Hunt
      From the memorial gathering in Fort Worth, 2010. The horse world saying goodbye to the man who carried Tom's message to the public. You will meet Ray at work throughout Courses 102 and 103.
      Free account
    • Watch: A Legacy of Legends
      The foundation Buck Brannaman and the Hunt family built to keep Tom's and Ray's teaching alive, which is exactly what this program is for.
      Free account
    • Watch: Buck - The Film That Told the World
      The official trailer for Buck, the Sundance-winning 2011 documentary from the Library lesson's watch list. Two minutes that show why this lineage reached far beyond the horse world.
      Free account
    • Watch: Monty Roberts - A Real Horse Whisperer
      A parallel road: while the Dorrances taught from the ranch, Monty Roberts reached the same conclusion, that force fails, from the racetrack world. His full life story. Watch it as a comparison: same destination, different trail.
      Free account