Medicine Horse Visits Art Farm

Campers at Carlsbad Art Farm this week were delighted by a surprise visit from Boy Scout, a paint "Medicine Horse". Scout (click on image to enlarge) is 16-hands and about seven-years old. His owner, Tim Barlow, at far right, owns the Barlow Ranch just down the road from Art Farm. Scout LOVES apples slices and had a great time eating them as they were offered by students.

Boy Scout, and his little sister, Girl Scout, come from a 180-year-old horse ranch in Plano, Texas, that specializes in Medicine horses that are a cross between an American Quarter Horse and an Appaloosa.

So what is a "Medicine Horse?"

In an article titled "The Spirit or Medicine Horse", by Nancy Falley of Lockhart, Texas, originally published in the Spring 2003 issue of Caution: Horses, Falley writes:

"Many Native American tribes and families held certain horses in high regard as Spirit or Medicine horses. The designation was made for horses with unusual markings. These horses could range from appaloosas with a 'bearpaw' or ‘handprint' marking in its spotting to paints or pintos with an unusually shaped spot or spots (Medicine Hat or War Bonnet markings were highly prized) to the solid colored animal with an unusual facial marking. Many so-called Spirit or Medicine horses also had blue eyes which were often called Sky-eyes or Heaven-eyes and added to the mystique which surrounded them.

The term Spirit or Medicine horse could also be placed on a more 'normally' marked horse who had shown its owner some unusual talent or power, such as alerting its rider to danger that the rider/owner hadn't discerned or being able to find game.

Warriors and Shamans as well as other members of the tribe or family valued these Spirit or Medicine horses very highly and believed that the good fortune of their people depended in some part on keeping these animals in their possession. Since horse stealing was considered an honored profession among early Native Americans, it was these particular horses that an enemy warrior or tribe might go after. If they could get away undetected with the valued horse, they were considered to have good medicine' and the theft earned the respect of both their tribes and the enemy from whom the animal had been stolen. Of course, it was then the former owner's turn to try and regain his stolen property.

Today Spirit or Medicine marked horses still appear in the various color breeds, as well as the solid colored breeds. The American Indian Horse Registry (AIHR) welcomes these unusually colored horses without discrimination. They may be a combination of appaloosa and paint or pinto or an outcrop from a solid colored breed. Some Indian Horse breeders work very hard to breed these features into their lines, but nature is still the boss and most deliberate breeding programs fail due to the very nature of the elusive coloration."