Some mules can sit in the pasture with extensive amounts of time off.  You can saddle up and ride off like there was no time off at all.  Some mules cannot sit.  I have one of each.  My Molly mule can have time off, but my John mule cannot have time off.  Here is what I do to ensure my John mule and I are both safe. 

With owning a trail facility and with having rental equine in the past, I compare having time off for the equine to finding the combination of trainer to rental trail guest ratios.  Some equines have to be ridden by the trainer one time for every time a guest rides them.  Others might be one ride by the trainer for every ten rides by a guest.  Once a mule knows the difference between a novice rider and a more advanced rider, some use those opportunities for activities such as trying to come back to the barn, eating on the trail whenever they want, being way too close to the mule in front of them, or choosing their speed.  I once had an instructor that explained this best with a joke:

An old woman was sitting beside her old man.  She rolled up a newspaper and swatted him and said, “That’s for not being a good lover.”  The old man sat there for a few minutes and then rolled up a newspaper and swatted the old woman and said, “That’s for knowing the difference”. 

Some mules can handle the burden of a novice rider, and some get a streak of ornery in them because they know the difference between a novice and an advanced rider. 

Even though having an animal sit in a pasture is different than finding the ratio to ensure rider safety, they are still the same concept.  With letting a mule sit with time off you have to consider two things:  desired behavior and physical health for desired use.  In a future article, I will break behavior down into the mule’s perspective and the rider’s perspective.

Take note of how much time it is between rides.  If two weeks pass and your mule was the same as the last time, then you know two weeks doesn’t phase your mule.  If you see a dip in behavior when the mule has three months off, then this tells you that when there are nice days during the winter, you should consider saddling up. 

The physical health of the mule is the greater concern at times.  We see people that haven’t ridden their mule in four or five months, jump on and expect that mule to go on a weekend trail ride doing over twenty miles a day.  This can be dangerous and is just not fair to a mule that can show up for you and not have behavior issues.  I would highly recommend more frequent shorter rides to “leg up” that mule.  This will ensure that they will be physically ready for those longer rides. 

My John mule loses his confidence when we take too much time off.  This is a behavior issue because a loss of confidence means that he is not accepting my decisions as a leader, and he is trying to make decisions for himself.  He can handle about a month off before he turns back into a scaredy cat. With having six equine, keeping them behaviorally and physically sound is a labor of love that I happily keep signing up for on the days that end in y.

By Brandy Von Holten