Red Dead Redemption 2 Horse Guide | How To Saddle, Whistle To Call, Tips To Increase Bonding Levels

A horse is one of the most important aspects and element in Red Dead Redemption 2, it is not just a medium to travel around the world in the game. The way you treat and care for your horse in the game will directly impact the bonding levels. In this Red Dead Redemption 2 Horse guide, what are the different bonding levels, what benefits you get at each bonding levels, tips and tricks to take care of your horse, and many other things. So let’s get started without wasting any time.

Horse Bonding Levels And How To Increase Them

You can train or “break” wild horses to gain their trust so that you can saddle and ride them. As you spend time with your horse, you will develop a bond of trust and understanding with it.

4 Important Benefits of Bonding With Horse

There are four levels of bonding. Here are a few benefits you get when you increase your bonding with your horse.

1. Your Horse’s Health and Stamina will increase.
2. You’ll be able to call your Horse from a greater distance and during combat.
3. Your Horse will cross deeper water and navigate more challenging ground.
4. Your Horse will become more difficult to steal.

How To Increase Bonding With Horse

1. Calming your horse when it’s agitated.
2. Feeding your horse when it’s hungry.
3. Grooming your horse when it’s dirty.
4. Riding, leading, and swimming with your horse, as long as it isn’t tired out.

This is not all at certain bonding levels you will be able to pull out some special move with your horse just by pressing a couple of buttons on the controller. These special might come in handy at a tricky situation during a combat.

• At Bonding Levels 2, HOLD R1 and Tab “SQUARE” when stationary to Rear.
• At Bonding Level 3, HOLD R1 and “X” while moving to SKID TURN or SKID STOP.
• At Bonding Level 4, HOLD “SQUARE” to perform a Piaffe. While doing this, push the “L” right or left while moving to Drift.

Tips To Take Care of Your Horse

To keep your horse happy and healthy, and retain a strong bond, you will need to keep it fed and clean. A horse’s health and stamina cores are affected when it gets hungry or dirty – meaning it’ll tire faster and withstand less damage.

You will see a warning when your horse starts to become hungry or dirty. Hold L1 and navigate to the horse item menu to select and use food items or the horse brush.

What Items You Need To Feed To Your Horse

Nutritious foods like oat, cakes, apples, and hay will satisfy your horse’s hunger for longer than treats. Giving these foods to your horse also increases bonding significantly. Certain plants and herbs picked in the wild can also be fed to your horse.

Treats, such as Sugar Cubes, Peppermints, Common BLurush, and English Mace will increase bonding a medium amount but will give almost no nutritional value.

You should be careful about feeding your horse. Overfeeding it when it is already full can cause it to become overweight. Underfeeding it will cause the horse to become thin.

How To Hitch Your Horse

You have to HOLD “TRIANGLE” to hitch your horse safely at a hitching post. This means it can’t be stolen.

How To Whistle To Call Your Horse From Far Distance

You can press “DPAD UP” to call your horse to you. As you bond with your horse, the range at which you can call it will increase.

Your horse will not respond to your whistle if it’s too far away, stabled, or dead. It cannot come to you if you are inside a building or a cave.

Where To Find Stables In Red Dead Redemption 2

There are stables in all major towns shown by a blip on y our map and radar. At a stable you can do the following things:

• Buy and sell horses.
• Buy horse care items such as food, snacks, and tonics.
• Buy or upgrade equipment such as saddles, saddlebags, stirrups, and blankets.
• Keep up to three horses safely in stables.
• Customize your horse’s looks and accessories.

How To Saddle A Horse In Red Dead Redemption 2

You can buy and sell horses at stables throughout the world. You can break wild horses or steam owned horses. You can ride a horse temporarily, but to make it yours, you’ll need to put your saddle on it.

To saddle a horse, approach it with a saddle in hand and hold “DPAD UP” to put it on. You can only have one saddle, and therefore one main horse, at a time. To remove a saddle you must approach the horse and hold “L2” to lock on and hold “DPAD UP” to remove.

Arthur Morgan cannot saddle, bond with, or own horses belonging to the other members of Dutch’s gang.

To remove your saddle from the dead horse, you will have to approach it and hold “DPAD UP” to remove it.

That’s all we have on the Red Dead Redemption 2 Horse guide. Stay tuned for more interesting guides like this. For more updates on the game do check our Red Dead Redemption 2 Wiki guide.