Staff Writer

Gabriela Rodriguez has a different approach to handling horses: treat them like a 3-year-old who could bite off a finger.

Rodriguez has handled horses on a daily basis for more than a decade and has tried to educate children and adults about proper care of horses through her organization, Blixx.

 “We never force the horses to do anything, we work to train them to accept us as the leader,” she said.

The Blixx crew was in the Nonantum parking lot last week for the second time this summer to entertain hotel guests and teach them to properly pet the animals.

Rodriguez works with her husband, Dan, and her two horses, Lexxie and Fritz, to show how gentle a horse can be when violence and unsafe teaching methods are avoided.

The parking lot show can challenge the horses, which aren’t used to the noise.

“They are normally not in these conditions with all the people and the noises and all that luscious grass and they can’t have any of it,” Rodriguez said as she led Fritz around in a small circle.

Rodriguez keeps the horses calm by letting them walk around. When they feel comfortable, Rodriguez drops the rope and lets them stand on their own. Both Lexxie and Fritz understand basic verbal commands such as “stay” and “back up,” but every so often Rodriguez must get up close to the horse and stamp her feet to make it move backward.

“I’m not using violence but sometimes we have to show them in a physical manner,” she said after Fritz got nervous and started to move toward the crowd.

Throughout the lesson Rodriguez invited children from the audience to pet the horses, but never on the head.

“The head is a private place. I hug them, I’m all over them, but they know me,” she said. “How would you feel if a stranger came up and patted you on your head? You wouldn’t like it.”

Instead, children come up one at a time and allow the horses to sniff them, never giving them a hand to sniff, but standing close enough to allow the horses to smell their whole bodies.

Rodriguez said horses have four blind spots, including one directly under the chin. When someone puts their hand under the chin to get the horse to smell their hand, the horse can’t see and may think it’s a carrot or a small treat.

Hana DiTullio, 16, was one of the first to pet Lexxie, a small Polish Arabian mare.

“My grandparents’ neighbors have horses, but I’ve always just gone up to pet them, it’s an interesting technique,” DiTullio said. “My brother calls me the ‘horse whisperer’ because the horses like me, but I’ve never ridden one.”

She won’t get a chance with Lexxie, who has never been ridden.

For the last 10 years Rodriguez has kept Lexxie in shape by running her alongside a horse she is riding.

Blixx started more than a decade ago with two horses, Blue and Lexxie. The name Blixx is a combination of the two horses’ names. Two years ago, Blue died and Blixx was given a new horse, Fritz, which is part Hanoverian and part Thoroughbred and helps Lexxie train humans.

Rodriguez said Blue was mistreated before Blixx and, like many horses, was ridden too hard and lacked proper care.  Rodriguez said one of the most important lessons she teaches is to ride a horse without a metal bridle in its mouth.

Rodriguez said horses don’t like the taste of metal and it limits their movement, which can irritate them – especially if they are being bothered by a bug and can’t remedy the problem.

For most of the children who watch Rodriguez’s classes, their favorite part is getting up close and personal with the horse.

“I liked petting the horse. He was big and soft,” said Madeline Gross, 4, as she looked at her mother. “Can we get one?”

Staff Writer Suzanne Hodgson can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 233.