Horsemanship Merit Badge

Requirement 11 is one ride, not seven tests

On level ground, continuously do the following movements after safely mounting the horse. Do them correctly, at ease, and in harmony with the horse.

Then seven lettered items. The word that matters is continuously. They are one sequence, ridden in order, without dismounting between them:

The two half-circles are nearly double one another and sit two lines apart. And correctly, at ease, and in harmony with the horse is three separate judgements, none of which is about whether the horse eventually went where you wanted.

This is the only requirement on the badge you can turn up for and not pass. Everything else can be learned in the moment; this one is practice.

Five requirements need an actual horse

For most Scouts that means a stable, a riding school or a summer camp, and it means the badge moves at the speed of the diary rather than the reading. Book the horse time first and fit requirements 1 to 6 and 8 around it.

Requirement 7 cannot be finished on a day you do not ride

Demonstrate how to groom a horse, including picking hooves and caring for a horse after a ride.

The last part needs a ride to have happened. Group it with a riding day rather than treating it as stable work you can do on a quiet afternoon.

The badge numbers 9 and 10 in the order you cannot do them

Requirement 9(b) saddles and bridles the horse. Requirement 10 approaches it, leads it safely from a stall, corral or field, and ties it securely.

You cannot saddle a horse you have not caught, led and tied. In practice requirement 10 happens first, every time, and it is numbered second. This plan draws that arrow the way round it actually runs.

Requirement 1(b) is about the building

Every other requirement on this badge is about the animal. 1(b) is fire safety in a barn: bedding, hay, wiring, smoking, extinguishers and how you get a horse out of a burning building, which is not the same problem as getting a person out.

What this page is

The Horsemanship merit badge, drawn so the one performance requirement is visible as a performance and the horse time is visible as the thing to book first. It is not a copy of the requirements: each step is a short label with a link to the official requirements, which are what actually governs and which change from year to year.