Roundpenning, Liberty Work and "free Longeing"
In the field of natural horsemanship, it is a common practice to work a horse loose in a round pen 40 to 70 feet in diameter. (50 to 60 feet is considered standard). This is sometimes called free longeing or work at liberty, because the horse is asked to travel in a circle and obey human commands, only without a longe line attached. The handler uses voice, body language and a lariat or a longe whip to give commands to the horse, eventually teaching it to speed up, slow down, stop and change direction on command.
A variation of these techniques are also used by circus trainers to train horses and other animals, such as elephants to work in a ring for exhibition purposes. Both single animals and groups of animals can be trained to perform at liberty.
These types of liberty work are considered schooling disciplines and to simply turn a horse loose in a small pen and make it run around to get exercise is not free longeing.
Read more about this topic: Longeing
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