Recently while cruising through the forums, I tripped on a few comments about how some of the individual skills traditionally associated with the Bujinkan have died out or are lost to history. My first question is whether any Bujinkan groups or individuals integrate horsemanship in their training. If so, what kind of training is conducted? If not, why is Bajutsu still considered one of the eighteen skills?
http://www.winjutsu.com/source/18skills.html
I asked this question years ago in another forum somewhere on the Internet and received a reply from somesone who questioned Soke about this particular "art". The reply was that it was dead but...
Can horsemanship be reincarnated? Does it have value to the art to train with an animal and master taijutsu with that animal?
Any thoughts or comments on the subject are welcome and appreciated.

Greg McGillen

From a traditional point of view it would be interesting to learn the horsemanship skills.

Since most people don't ride horses around these days maybe the skill has evolved to driving automobiles in combat situations. I know the police and military have such training. I'm not familiar with horsemanship or combat driving but some of the concepts involved may be the same?

I've seen links posted before leading to private driving classes. If I can find one I'll try to hop back here and post it...

Sounds like you're a horseman, Greg, so I won't elucidate on the cost and rewards of equastrian pursuits. I got a feeling you recognize how great it is!
Nobody in the world is a master of the 18 skills. However, as an organization, we may very well have a master of each, cool, huh? Bajutsu is one of the most difficult to study, costs and all. But a Montana man has advantages.

Just ride, you could probably get some info on...shit, I forgot the koryu that still practices horsemanship (do a search on Kutaki, it's here). Just train.
Then make a trip to Japan, and ask some question. You never know!

We had a bajutsu seminar last summer. It was very interesting!
The training was conducted by this years European champion in bajutsu.
It was really interesting, but I doubt it was traditional. Spear throwing, for example?
Yet it was an interesting experiment... and above all, it was fun like hell :)
Although... my Kermit the Frog look at the end of the seminar wasn't as funny as the training... allegy vs. every animal with hair