{"id":27251,"date":"2024-06-09T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-06-09T21:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/to-buck-or-not-to-buck-powder-river-rodeo-finds-the-right-job-for-the-horse\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T23:55:06","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T05:55:06","slug":"to-buck-or-not-to-buck-powder-river-rodeo-finds-the-right-job-for-the-horse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/to-buck-or-not-to-buck-powder-river-rodeo-finds-the-right-job-for-the-horse\/","title":{"rendered":"To buck or not to buck: Powder River Rodeo finds the right job for the horse"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"John
John Franzen with Kemosabe, a bucking stock horse turned ranching, hunting and pickup horse. (Sophia McCrackin\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Powder River Rodeo, LLC has been raising great bucking stock for almost four decades, sending their athletic animals to the National Finals Rodeo every year since 1988.<\/p>\n

But every once in a while, John Franzen, son of owners Hank and Lori Franzen and the General Manager of Powder River<\/a>, gets a horse who just won\u2019t buck.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what happened almost 20 years ago with Kemosabe, who is now a hunting, ranching and pickup horse for Franzen, and it happened again just recently with Tonto.<\/p>\n

Franzen started the process of \u2018breaking\u2019 4-year-old Tonto just a few days before the first night of the Ute Mountain Roundup.<\/p>\n

Most saddle horses are broken long before this age. Most horses take much longer to get comfortable with the saddle. But Tonto stood serenely, fully tacked under the heavy summer sun as Franzen explained his philosophy.<\/p>\n

Bucking horses are the bread and butter of Powder River, and Franzen prefers his horses turn out as great competitors. However, a key piece of horsemanship is respect.<\/p>\n

\u201cA big deal about being a horseman is that they\u2019ll tell you everything you need to know if you\u2019re willing to listen,\u201d Franzen said. \u201cYou just have to take out what you want them to do and realize what they want to do, and then you can kind of get about anything our of a horse you want, as long as you\u2019re willing to work with them rather than against them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kemosabe and Tonto are cousins.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve got some relatives that are really good bucking horses that have been to the NFR,\u201d Franzen said. \u201cBut they\u2019ve got a really calm disposition and a really good demeanor, a kind eye.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bucking stock horses are bred to be tall, stocky, independent and unperturbed in the face of the roaring crowd.<\/p>\n

All these qualities make Kemosabe and Tonto great saddle horses, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cBucking horses, as pickup horses or anything like that, work really well. They are never lame, they\u2019re very sure-footed, they hardly ever stumble,\u201d Franzen said. \u201cThey\u2019re not blessed with speed, but they can do anything. They\u2019d pull a tree out of the ground for you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Kemosabe
Kemosabe as a rodeo judges horse for the Ute Mountian Roundup. (Sam Green\/Special to The Journal)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

One fundamental part of Franzen\u2019s process in breaking a horse is groundwork. Before he ever puts the saddle on, he familiarizes himself with the horse\u2019s personality and introduces the horse to new cues.<\/p>\n

\u201cRiding them is one thing and that will all come, but getting them to where they\u2019re really good to be around people and seeing everything around here (is key),\u201d Franzen said, gesturing at the bustle of people and livestock preparing for the rodeo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

putting the saddle on, John Franzen familiarizes himself with the horse\u2019s personality<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27252,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,60,937,346,2295],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-27251","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-rodeo","tag-sports","tag-ute-mountain-roundup-rodeo"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27251","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27251"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27251\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80002,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27251\/revisions\/80002"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27252"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27251"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=27251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}