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Part 2 - Ground Manners continued
1. Repetition.
It is not widely known that a horse can take around 60 iterations of a lesson to 'get it'. That's right. It may take you repeating the exact same lesson 60 times before your horse understands what you are trying to teach. To put this in perspective, if you see your horse once a week and teach the same lesson once each time, then it may take over a year for your horse to learn it. Of course you may try the lesson more than once a session and you may see your horse more than once a week, but it takes TIME and PATIENCE to train a horse effectively.
The good news is that you can be successful in training your horse to have good behavior in any situation. This applies to all horses, whether they are young, old, previously poorly trained or have been in neglectful and abusive situations. You can teach your horse to lead, tone down aggressive behaviors towards people and other horses, teach a nervous horse to be calm, and get rid of bad habits horses learn such as rearing, biting, and kicking. All of this can be attained. But please remember that horse training takes as long as it takes. 60 repetitions is an average.
2. Be a leader to your horse.
Horses are herd animals and are mentally wired to look up to the
leader of the herd. In a herd, which is the natural situation for a horse, there is a pecking order (order of dominance). The
stallion and lead mare are the leaders. Every other horse below
them in the pecking order will look to these two to find out how to react in a given situation. If the leaders are calm, the others are calm, if the leaders are running for their lives, the rest of the herd is right behind them. It is also the leaders job to keep an eye out for danger. Or in other words, the leaders signal to the rest of the herd what is dangerous and what is safe. The rest of the herd has 100% faith in their leaders. They follow blindly. They do not think rationally or for themselves. This horse behavior makes a horse very easy to train.
To use this horse behavior to your advantage when you're training your horse, the leader of his herd needs to be you. You MUST show, through your tone of voice, your body language, your confidence, that you are a leader. For example, you cannot expect a horse to walk calmly past a barking dog if you are frightened yourself. If there are situations around your horse that scare you, you need to be inventive and work out how to avoid the situation where your horse can see you as weak. If your horse often charges you, avoid the trigger situation until you have established dominance in other situations. Get outside help if you need it. A horse generally weighs as much as 10 times more than a human, so you cannot expect to out muscle your horse when it behaves inappropriately. It is
crucial that you become the leader to your horse so he follows you, rather than dragging you around.
3. Consistency
Being a leader also means having a zero tolerance policy towards
your horse invading your personal space or disobeying your
requests. In the herd, the pecking order is often challenged. Stay vigilant as the pecking order is never set in stone. If you get slack, the horse will start to dominate you. Be firm, consistent and persistent in applying your rules. You're either training or de-training your horse every moment you're with him. Mind the small stuff. It really does matter. Your horse will test you in small ways to see how serious you are. If you don't hold your ground over your space or do accept a tardy response to a request, you're effectively eroding the respect he has for you. 'That's ok, I don't really mean stop when I say so'. This is then a green flag for your horse to try on bigger and bigger misbehaviors. For example, don't let your horse kiss you. Not just for reasons of
hygiene! No, letting any horse nibble or kiss you is sending him
down the slippery slope of developing a biting habit. After all, a
bite is just a firm nibble isn't it? And a biting problem is not
one you want to be dealing with. Painful for you, and difficult to
get rid of. In this case, no kisses, no nibbles, no bites. Ever.
Be firm, consistent and persistent in applying your ground rules.
Absolute CONSISTENCY is the key to fast training.
4. Trust
One of the biggest reasons horses lack good ground manners is the
fact they don't trust as well as respect the people who are
handling them. Trust and respect go hand in hand and once you have
attained that, the rest of your training is so much easier. As
leader (where you earn respect), part of your job is to keep your
horse SAFE (where you earn trust). That's safe from his
perspective, not yours. You might think he's perfectly safe in a
trailer, but if he's never been in one you'll need to show him that
you'll go into one and that other horses agree it's safe too. Your
job is to prove to your horse that no matter what goes on around
him, he will not be harmed. Angry bullying won't work. Losing
your temper won't work. Banging his teeth with the bit, slapping
him unexpectedly on the rump, making loud, sudden noises and
unexpected gestures don't help either. Let your horse know where
you are and what you're up to as much as possible. Be calm, be
considerate, be affectionate, be patient. This path leads to
earning your horse's trust, an essential for a long and happy
relationship.
5. Be fun.
No one, even a horse, enjoys all work and no play. Remember to
make your lessons enjoyable. Your aim is to encourage your horse
to look forward to hanging out with you. What your horse likes
will be individual, but most horses have a place on their body they
like having scratched or rubbed. This can be a reward for
obedience. Many horses enjoy the mental stimulation of a lesson if
it's not repeated endlessly in one go. More than half an hour on
any one lesson at once is too much. 10 or 15 minutes is enough.
And horses like variety in their 'work'. So sometimes go out for a
trail ride, sometimes do some jumping, sometimes work in the ring.
Mix it up and keep it interesting. A bored horse is a cranky
horse, and anyone in a bad mood is likely to misbehave.
6. Comfort
The horse likes a life of comfort. That means, a life free from
irritants as well as pain. You can use his dislike of being
irritated to your training advantage. Basically, you are looking
for non-painful but annoying things you can do to encourage your
horse to do as you ask. The key is to remove the irritant
immediately when the horse does what you are asking. Stopping the
annoying thing you were doing is his reward for doing as you asked.
This is the most effective and yet gentle way to teach your horse
to do what you ask
One example of irritant training is a technique called pressure and
release. An example of pressure and release:
If you wanted your horse to turn its head to the left, you would
put your hand in the halter strap and gently pull to the left just
slightly. As soon as the horse begins to turn his head left, let go
of the halter, releasing the pressure, and praise your horse
quietly. If your horse were to pull to the right instead, you would
continue to apply gentle pressure to the left until your horse
complied, then release and praise again. Through patient,
consistent repetition, your horse will learn what you are asking.
This is the pressure and release training method in a nutshell, and
can be applied throughout your horse's training.
Irritant training is also an excellent way to teach your horse to
pick up his feet and to discourage a horse that does not like to
slow down. Details on those later.
So these are the 6 basics of teaching ground manners. Repetition;
Be a leader; Consistency; Trust; Be fun; and Comfort. Apply these
whenever you are around your horse and you will be well on the way
to many happy times.
Your next instalment will cover a piece of horse psychology that
is useful to keep in mind around horses.
Thanks!
Phil Tragear
Wake Up The Horse Whisperer In You...
Because There's One In ALL Of Us
For more information, go to:
Horse Training Success
Solve Your Horses Bad Habits With These Horse Whisperer Training Techniques.
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