Naughty, Naughty, Human...

Naughty, Naughty Horses…






There seems to be a few schools of thought when it comes to working with horses.

Here is mine :

We are the human, we are not the horse… Why the heck I would want the horse to think

“Hey look, here comes that human, oh I mean horse “

and why I would want that horse, to react around me like I was another horse baffles me..

Why do I want the horse challenging me, kicking me, or just plain ignoring me..

Heck thats what horses do to each other EVERYDAY!.. WATCH THEM!


Humans are supposed to be more intelligent then horses..

Cough

So why would I not try to help the horse. A horse is a smart animal. It can work out the difference.. It can learn.

So lets take a example…

I watch someone working with their horse and for whatever reason the horse reaches around and bites them..

So they, hit the horse, and maybe yell at it, and sometimes just for good measure they give the horse a kick…

From their perspective, the horse was being naughty and they needed to correct it. Needed to teach it a lesson, needed to show that horse who is boss.. Boss mare!

That’s what they see…


Here is what I see…

I see a horse that has a human problem…

I see a horse that before whatever happened, happened, that horse had given indication to the human that something was not right…

They flinched, the turned back an ear, they moved… Whatever..

The human never picked up on it…

So then the horse did what nature informed it to..

It reacted to the pain and it felt it needed to defend itself…

Lets say the horse bites when the human tries to cinch it up. (Most cases!) that’s because the human cinches to quickly and gakes the horse.. duh..

And maybe the human does not pick up on the fact that as you were cinching it, it put its ears back, maybe it flicked its tail, maybe its eyes got hard..

You never saw it.. You just keep doing what you were doing..

Then one day.. that darn horse has had enough, and it reaches around as your turning him into him into Mr. Peanut and it goes for a bite.. And you stop cinching, to smack it..

You just taught the horse your fair game..


Horse 1 - Human 0…

So now the horse is thinking, I need to bite faster..

Or maybe it turns into I need to move my feet while you are trying to saddle me..

Now you got bigger problems. Your chasing the horse around trying to smack it, and you know.. you never addressed the problem…

Respect the horse, and it will respect you.

Or they let it start by doing the wrong thing... Like oh letting a horse or colt nibble your pockets looking for a treat.. Why even let it start?

Now I am not talking about mouthy colts… Which my friends you have an option other then HITTING IT…

Why the hell do you want to be a bully?

All you have to do is position your elbow in nibble range and the darn horse will hit itself… and it will think, hey that did not work… and maybe it will try something else.. and guess what, it will hit itself again and it will say damn this human has lots of hard bits.. and it will stop… You don’t need to hit it…

You are smarter!

You don’t need to be a bully! You need to be an educator… you need to help the horse find the way… a way to softness and a place of peace and prosperity..


How do I know this works… How do I know I am right…

NONE OF MY HORSES BITE!

HiHo
LW