I’ve spent all afternoon watching Clint Eastwood westerns, and I suddenly wondered:
It’s pretty standard in western movies for someone to ride through the dusty little town, up to the bar, dismount, hitch his horse to the railing, and saunter into the bar. How long would a horse, wearing bridle and saddle and such, really stand quietly at a hitching post? It’s not like there is anything for it to graze on nearby. And all of the traffic has to be going down the road, behind the horse. Are they really that patient?
My minimal experience: depends on the horse. Some are content to stand and dooze or entertain themselves by watching the traffic or chewing on the hitching post. Others will get fussy.
He wouldn’t be a particularly good owner if he left the horse there in the sun or all sweaty under the sadle. Considering how importate a tool a horse was to coyboys, they’d have to reasonale owners if they wanted to stay in business. I imagine, if he was planning on staying for any length of time, he’d move the horse somewhere it would be more comfortable.
Remember that the horse has been working, and is likely tired. A tired horse is much more likely to stand patiently than a fresh one. Say the cowboy has ridden into town from the ranch, 10 - 15 miles away, and has been using that horse all or most of the week, for most of the horse’s working life. That’s a horse unlikely to cause trouble. A horse that gets fussy, or doesn’t play nice with others, wouldn’t last very long, and wouldn’t be very useful as a working animal. If the rider was planning on staying a while, they would take their horse to the livery stable (think parking garage for horses). That wouldn’t be very entertaining, though. It’s the equivalent of a modern movie, where the hero drives up, parks right in front of the courthouse or whatever, and goes inside. Bottom line is that a horse was both transportation and livelihood, so they were reasonably well-cared for. That means that if your horse is a troublemaker, you’ll either leave it at the ranch, or make arrangements other than the hitching post.
You need to train them to do it, but luckily, horses are rather trainable. Standing tied is a pretty basic training for any kind of horse even today – you can’t always be holding onto them you know. A horse that doesn’t tie is a real drag.
Horses don’t really get bored too easily… and as Jandra points out, would probably be tired after the ride in from the ranch. Horses can sleep standing up, so, most likely, you’d find them having a bit of a nap when you emerge out of the bar.
Some horses are that patient and some are not. All my horses knew that if they dropped the reins, they stayed put. But I didn’t leave them very long. I also used to routinely tie one horse I had to a certain chain-link fence–but again, I didn’t leave her there long, and in that case there was grass.
In the case of the cowboys riding up to the hitching post, the hitching post is realistic, but most people who were going to be long enough to have a drink and maybe a quick round of poker would probably have at least loosened the cinch (I would have). That would be pretty boring to watch in a film, though.
Go to a roping (like a one-event rodeo) today, and the place will be full of horses tied like that. Some to a fence, some to trailers, some with the reins looped over the roper’s arms, and some mostly being used as stadium seating. Those horses get a lot of that, as would have the horses in the old west. It’s pretty basic, and a horse that won’t stand tied won’t be that way for long; either they’re trained out of it or sold.
And we loosen the cinches, like Hilarity does, and if it’s hot and going to be all day long, we’ll take them to water now and then, keep them in the shade when possible, and warm them up before your turn is up. But they’ll commonly stand there all day with no problems.
Westerns are in large part pretty un-realistic when it comes to cowboy life at times. Virtually all of the early ones, everyone always dashes off at a mad gallop, regardless of an emergency or not, roasting meat over 3 foot campfire flames, campsites located in the blazing sun in the desert, etc. A horse represented considerable expense in those days, theft alone a hangable offense. While no expert, (I did go on a weeklong horsepack trip oncet with a wrangler), it’s obvious that after a ride of any distance, a cowboy worth his bacon is going to spend at least a few minutes taking care of his steed prior to anything else, but this isn’t going to work in the movies or television.
I am not a horse expert, so take this with a large grain of whatever.
I live near Amish country, and many stores in the towns nearby us have hitching posts. There are regularly horses hitched up, still attached to the buggies, and I’ve never seen any of them doing anything but standing quietly.
I guess Mr. Stuff was once standing on a street corner near a horse and hitching post, and had just finished eating an apple. He was still holding the core. After a few seconds, the horse bumped him in the shoulder and nudged the hand holding the apple. Much amused, he handed over the core. Happy horse. That’s the most fiesty I’ve ever heard of a horse being while at a hitching post, though.
To answer the OP: yes, many horses (not all) are really that patient. But then again, it’s from a movie, and is entertainment, not realism. Just like in modern crime shows: the hero always finds an empty parking spot right in front of the building, and never seems to have to lock their vehicle.
Horses can certainly be taught to ground tie, and will stay there patiently. It helps if they are tired, and if they are on a dusty street with nothing worth grazing in sight. But it should not be done for more than a couple hours, really. If it’s more than that, a good horseowner would find a more suitable place for his horse. (That’s why those towns had livery stables there, to take care of horses, and rent stalls for the day or overnight.)
And of course, a good horseowner would loosen the cinch, even take the saddle off and put it on that hitching bar. (But maybe not, depending on how many thieves there are in that town.) And they would have watered the horse at the watering trough first, too. A cowboy, whose horse is probably his most valuable asset and required for his job, would certainly take care of these things.
But all those basic care tasks are boring, and not relevant to the story. So they aren’t generally shown in the movies or TV shows.