Many farms these days are equipped with Gators, Rangers, or Mules – the modern day “work horse” that feeds on fuel and runs on rubber. These 4×4’s no doubt serve their purpose on a busy farm.

However, there are still farms where horses are used daily. Those farms are few and far between, but one such farm is located just a few miles west of Edgerton.

Levi and Mara (Van Essen) Mouw operate a commercial cow calf operation with Mara’s parents, Del and Lori Van Essen. Mara grew up on a working ranch where horses were integral to the operation. Gathering cows on horseback and trailing them home was a daily chore and trail-riding with her family a favorite pastime.

Levi is a sixth generation horseman. He is the son of Steve and Peggy Mouw of Sioux Center, Iowa. His dad and grandpa had a standard-bred breeding, training, and racing operation. They trained saddle horses and Steve was a team roper as well. Life revolved around horses. Family vacations were at horse races around the country. Levi still thinks of a trip to a horse sale as a vacation!

In addition to operating their farm, Levi and Mara own Levi Mouw Performance Horses. They train horses on behalf of clients who need their horse trained from the ground up, or perhaps they want their horse to learn a specific skill.

He also does “tune-ups.” “Say someone has a horse they enjoy during the summer, but it has sat all winter and they just want someone else to put the first few rides on in the spring because they’re maybe a little more seasoned in life and don’t have the confidence they once had,” explains Mara.

Levi utilizes horses daily – whether it’s checking cows and calves for sickness or a fence for damage, he is generally doing it on horseback.

Every fall they gather all their pastured cattle to precondition that year’s calf crop before they make the drive home to be weaned. (Submitted photos)

“Horses are a great, low-stress way to interact with cattle,” Mara said. She added that it is good to be able to treat a sick calf in the pasture without the laborious process of driving them to a corral, loading them on a trailer, unloading them, putting them in a chute, treating them, and reloading them to go back to pasture.

“It’s much less time consuming to rope them where they stand, see what ails them, treat them, and then release them directly back to mama,” she explained. “It’s a quick and easy process.”

Using horses to take care of the ranch gives their clients’ horses experience that they wouldn’t otherwise get by just riding down the road and training in an arena. The Mouws have their own ranch horses that they use to help start colts and for more dangerous big jobs (like treating a large herd bull for a sore foot).

“We don’t risk someone else’s horse getting hurt. We usually keep two or three ranch horses for that reason. We also keep a couple of brood mares to raise our own babies,” Mara said. “It’s a good way to get horses bred how we like and it’s fun to see babies running in the pasture during the spring and summer.”

The Mouws also buy other horses when they are weaned off the mare and raise them to riding age. Once they have them trained for riding, they use them around the ranch, teach them a job,  and then sell them after they are a few years old.

“When they have a few years of solid experience, potential buyers can be confident that what they are purchasing from us has gone through our program, was raised here, trained here, and we can confidently convey the horses ability and temperament,” Levi said.

They usually have anywhere from 10-20 horses, depending on the time of year and how many client horses they have scheduled.

Levi’s real specialty is starting colts and rope horses, however, he’ll tell you his passion is the cow horse.

Levi took his first horse in his early teens for a friend’s sister who was having trouble with an older horse and it has snowballed from there. He has learned to train horses from a variety of places and people.

You don’t necessarily need a specific education to be a horse trainer, but you do need to be educated about horses and willing to learn. Levi continually studies horses and horsemen. He periodically goes to clinics offered by other trainers, gleaning things from them that he thinks will work for him and make sense to the horse.

Levi often says there is something to be learned from everyone – even if that something is what not to do.