Documentary Filmmaking
Doing it the vaquero way in Santa Margarita
By Diane D. Urbani
The Tribune 
Posted on Fri, Oct. 21, 2005

"Soft hands."Not something you'd expect those riding horseback and running cattle all day to want.

But soft hands -- gentle on reins and the rope -- are a sign of both skill and art with animals. They're the essence of what's known as the vaquero method of horsemanship and the subject of "Tapadero," an 80-minute documentary film premiering Saturday at the Santa Margarita Ranch's original stone structure.

The film features local cowboys, including Templeton's Ernie Morris, who will be on hand at the screening.

Paul Singer and Susan Jensen, filmmakers from Santa Barbara, became interested in Santa Margarita and other California ranches when they made "Vaquero," a documentary that was televised locally in 2003. As they learned more about cowboy culture, they discovered that today's horsemen are taking a keen interest in the centuries-old training practice known as the vaquero way.

It starts with the hackamore, a bitless bridle worn in a horse's first phase of training. During this period the rider and mount learn to communicate with each other without the use of force, and without the metal bit that is rough on a young horse's ultrasensitive mouth. Subtle body cues are exchanged as horse and human progress together.

"The hackamore is a training device for the people," said Gwynn Turnbull Weaver, a horsewoman in "Tapadero."

The original vaqueros developed their ways during the 1800s, as California was becoming an expanse of cattle ranches that supported the missions. The Californios, as those cowboys were called, had two things that enabled them to cultivate techniques that would serve them well: space and time. California was so isolated that nobody was going to stop by and push for the old way of doing things. And the vaqueros were in no hurry.
Rushing never worked with animals, as Dave Weaver, another "Tapadero" cowboy, has found. "Horses and cows don't wear watches. We work for them," he says.

Out on the "sagebrush sea," as it's called in the film, a man and his horse can roam across unbounded time. Both benefit from the "soft hands" way, since neither gets worn out by rough rein- and bit-pulling. Even amid the elements -- sandpaper wind, blazing sun -- the vaquero technique can keep a horse feeling fluid as silk.

With cattle, vaqueros use long rawhide reata ropes and a lassoing technique called the figure 8. It encircles the animal's neck as well as the front legs and does the work of two men. "The reata enables the cowboy to handle the cattle more gently, and it requires a lot more skill," said Singer.

Today the art of vaquero-style roping and riding attracts a new breed of Westerners, said Jensen. "There's been a whole group of young people from Cal Poly who are using the vaquero method," she said. "People of all ages are getting into horses and looking for a healthy, safe relationship with them."