Me and BootZ

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Bay Area Equestrian
Network

Horse Safety Organizations and Law

Horses are large animals, and just because of their size they are potentially dangerous.  Add to their size, their inherent nature, a flight animal that survives in nature by escaping quickly, and add in a human prey animal and you have a perfect formula for accidents.  This is why safety around and riding horses must be a priority.  Most horses don't try to hurt you, but they often do accidentally hurt you.  Since you, the human are the smarter of the two, you must always be thinking ahead to avoid mishaps and mistakes.  

The best organization that I am aware of regarding horse safety and horse law is www.law.utexas.edu/dawson, the American Association for Horsemanship Safety, Inc.  It is an excellent resource for information.

Another good site is, Certified Horsemanship Association (CHA).  I attended one of their certification clinics in the mid 090's.  It was a 5 day, 40+ hour course.  It was very good and comprehensive.  

The American Riding Instructors Certification program is a comprehensive certification program.  It is not as "hands on" as the CHA, but relies heavily on written testing and video to do assessment.  They maintain a list on their site of their certified instructors. 

http://www.cdc.gov/nasd/docs/d000901-d001000/d000978/4.html Hopefully this link points to the  NASD, national ag  safety database and its document on horses and children