Animal Communicator

[ecileh]

@Bluey

It is also called the gift of gab.
You throw out there a bunch of thoughts and the listener works hard to make them fit what they know or want.
Some do stick and those is what people remember.

I had an aunt that was a fortune teller and card reader.
She made a good living at that, she was good.
When asked if any of that was real, her response was always, some times I surprise myself.

—"Mine told the communicator that something that was happening “every month” … "—

Does anyone really believe horses know what a month is?

That was my interpretation of something that was said to me…gosh, a few years ago now. I honestly don’t recall what word the AC used at the time.

In this particular case, I didn’t gab at the AC and she was not even in the same county as my horse during the process. We spoke on the phone–her having never met or even seen my mare except in a photograph.

I’m not saying that ACs could or should replace vet care and I’ve only used one a handful of times when everyone else (vet, farrier, trainer, etc) has been stumped. In my case, the conversation worked out in such a way that something she identified as problematic was, in fact, problematic for the mare. The conversation cost a LOT less than the imaging diagnostics the vet was getting ready to recommend to chase down something that was “not quite right” but also not easily identifiable. And it worked.

Corollary? Coincidence? I don’t much care.

[Jackie_Cochran]

@Guilherme

If an horse owner doesn’t listen to their animals and hear when they say it’s time to go then they should sell them all and buy a Harley.

G.

But then there is the case where the owner KNOWS that the time is coming soon, but as long as the horse is showing enjoyment in his/her life the owner lets the horse live on.

My riding teacher had an Arabian mare that she had raised from birth. She LOVED this mare above all other horses. Well the mare’s front pasterns got worse and worse, sagging down distressingly. She told me that she had asked the mare to tell her when it was time to go, but no matter how bad the mare’s pasterns got the mare never told Debbie it was time, even though it was getting obvious.

Now I had not had a relationship with this mare when Debbie told me this, so I politely went up to the mare, told her what Debbie had told me, and I got a very brief picture of Debbie collapsing from grief, and that the mare did not want to see this happen. So I told the mare that if she told ME when it was too much for her to go on then I would tell Debbie and bear the initial spate of grief.

So I started going up to the mare every time I was at the stable, and I noticed that her back looked scruffy so I started currying her back. Soon the mare would come up to me and stand athwart me so I could curry the itchiest part of her back, and she showed every sign of enjoying it. This went on for several months.

One day the mare came up to me, and stopped facing me. When I went to curry her back she pivoted so she still faced me. I THOUGHT this might be the signal but I was not sure because the mare did not speak to my mind. I told her if she did this the next week I would be sure about her wanting to exit life because it had just gotten too burdensome.

The next week the same thing happened. She came up to me, faced me directly, and did not let me curry her back.

I told Debbie, she cried, she called the vet and made arrangements for getting the grave dug but was too upset to be there when the vet came. So her husband got the mare and led her to the already dug grave (it had a slope down), and the mare willingly walked into the grave and the vet put her down. This mare did NOT like going into strange looking places, but this time she just went ahead, laid down, and stopped hurting.

So no, not all horses will “tell” their owners that it is time to go even when it is long past time. Some other human has to step in and communicate the truth that the horse wants to stop suffering. Like many humans some horses feel a deep sense of responsibility for the well being of their favorite human and do not want to hurt that human’s mind/emotions grievously, and someone else has to step in and act as a go-between between the horse and its owner.

[Guilherme]

@Tyrus' Mom

You really can’t stop, can you? Give it a rest. This has gone off the deep end.

Perhaps so. But if you are entitled to your response in #116. below, are not others entitled to the same thing?

The last comment was so utterly hateful on such a sensitive subject, I’m still reeling. Why should you hate me this much? I only disagree with you. I don’t threaten you.

Hate, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. I don’t hate you at all. I think you wildly uninformed and have a completely false view of much of the science of equitation, husbandry, and training when applied to horses. Don’t equate that to “hate.” It isn’t.

We live in what history will call “The Era False News Enabled By Social Media.” If folks with knowledge and experience remain silent in face of this barrage of unreality then they are enablers and ought to be ashamed of themselves.

G.

[Pennywell_Bay]

As an animal lover with some unique experiences, I would so love to totally believe in AC in the form that is being portrayed on the board. I read it with interest (though I totally disagree with the poster who says they need an AC to tell them when their dogs need to be PTS. I don’t care how stoic your dog is you don’t need a medium).

As a scientist (like a few others posting) besides what has already been brought up- I know animals experience emotions, as labeled by humans. I do not think that animals, even my brilliant JRT, are able to analyze that emotion and put it in to words- in this world or the next.

I love the anecdotal stories. I have a few (I’m not going to belabor- as I write them I can think of 100 reasons to explain each one) because #scienceskeptic

What I’d like to see is an fMRI study of more than an N=2 because that allows for real-time imaging of the brain of people who claim to have psychic abilities. Because everything comes through your brain.

Until then, I enjoy the stories (as long as medical care and humane practices are not relying on an AC).

And I’m not going to lie- a small part of me takes great comfort in my own personal stories on the chance that #scienceme is incorrect.

[Guilherme]

@Pennywell Bay

As an animal lover with some unique experiences, I would so love to totally believe in AC in the form that is being portrayed on the board. I read it with interest (though I totally disagree with the poster who says they need an AC to tell them when their dogs need to be PTS. I don’t care how stoic your dog is you don’t need a medium).

As a scientist (like a few others posting) besides what has already been brought up- I know animals experience emotions, as labeled by humans. I do not think that animals, even my brilliant JRT, are able to analyze that emotion and put it in to words- in this world or the next.

I love the anecdotal stories. I have a few (I’m not going to belabor- as I write them I can think of 100 reasons to explain each one) because #scienceskeptic

What I’d like to see is an fMRI study of more than an N=2 because that allows for real-time imaging of the brain of people who claim to have psychic abilities. Because everything comes through your brain.

Until then, I enjoy the stories (as long as medical care and humane practices are not relying on an AC).

And I’m not going to lie- a small part of me takes great comfort in my own personal stories on the chance that #scienceme is incorrect.

I noted a book entitled Evidence Based Horsemanship. It’s available on Amazon and there some some reviews of it floating around the 'Net. One of the authors is a PhD Neuroscientist. IIRC they reference some real-time equine MRIs. I haven’t read it in a while and don’t remember the specifics. But it is a worthwhile read.

I’m the guy who likes to watch professional magicians because it’s fascinating even though I know I’m being deceived, both actively and passively. I’ll even pay money to go see it in person. That does not reduce the entertainment value. But I KNOW it’s also an entertainment, not a bending of the laws of the Newtonian Universe. Those who claim otherwise have a burden of proof that, IMO, cannot ever be borne.

G.

[Ghazzu]

@Jackie Cochran

Many years ago I read a book “Island of the Color Blind” by Oliver Stone about totally colorblind people. He went to an island in the South Pacific where there were a number of genetically related people who were color blind. He also worked with Western people who were colorblind. While people who have no ability to see color of course do not see color they see the BRIGHTNESS of a color, and several have apparently made artwork using this ability to notice the brightness of the color versus the colors themselves.

Could horses be doing the same?

As far as the ability to count–another Hat Tricks story. Hat Tricks was a pretty good predictor of winter weather, if it was going to snow at all his winter coat was a full snow coat. If it was not going to snow it was a much lighter coat. He was not infallible, there was one big snow after the Spring Equinox that he did not predict, but he was pretty good at it and I used his winter coat as a signal about how much I had to budget for heat that winter. Some of the snows he predicted were mere dustings, but it did snow.

One fall I was looking at his winter coat (every Nov. 1 I would do this) and it looked like a lighter, non-snow coat. Then Hat Tricks looked at me and I heard in my head “There are going to be three ice storms this winter.” I looked at him, saying “Hat Tricks, I did not know you knew how to count”.

Well, that winter there was no snow, and there were two widespread ice storms all over the area. Then one night there was an extremely small ice storm that seemed to center itself on my county, and Charlotte NC did not get any ice at all. I had to call into work (in Charlotte, NC) and tell them I had to wait until the steps cleared before I could come in (I started work at 5:00 AM). My supervisor did not believe me at first but I told him I was NOT going to risk falling on my icy steps, and that I’d come in as soon as I could get out and work a full day from then.

Hat Tricks only cared about where HE was living, the rest of the area was on its own.

So yes, some horses CAN count to three and know what it means.

Some horses, not all, can learn to understand English. Some horses, not all, can learn to translate their thoughts into understandable English.

Again I have never had an animal communicator do any work with my horses so I spent no money to get these messages from Hat Tricks or Glow, the two horses who definitely “spoke” to my mind in understandable English.

And I really do not care if anyone believes me or not. However it got to the point at work that every Fall my co-workers would ask me what Hat Tricks said about snow that winter, and when it snowed they would all greet me with “Hat Tricks was right again.”

AC aside, I find it difficult to conceive of a horse having voluntary control over haircoat length, nevermind prescience regarding a season’s worth of weather patterns.

[JGHIRETIRE]

@Jackie Cochran

IF animal communicators do achieve a connection with the horse, a good enough connection for complicated concepts, I most certainly do not have it.

But over the past decade I’ve been riding other people’s horses, lesson horses, and sometimes when I wonder how a particular discomfort the horse has came about I sometimes get rather short “video clips” in my mind.

For instance I wondered why the BOT poll caps &/or the Fenwick face mask with ears seems to help these horses, I got the above mentioned short video clip of a horse slamming back when tied with a halter, and with the Fenwick eared face mask I got a brief video clip of the horse being “eared”. I got the impression that these horses had a perpetual “headache” from slamming back when tied, and with the eared horses I got the impression that their ears still hurt some.

One horse had something wrong with his back behind the saddle. When I wondered about it I got a brief video clip of the horse jumping into water and his hind legs slipping off to the side, wrenching his back. (I already knew the horse had been evented.)

So maybe there are people who pick up a whole lot more than I do. I don’t know. I’ve never used an animal communicator, mostly because riding horses takes up the majority of the money I can spend for luxuries, like tack and riding horses at all.

Some AC’s get novellas - others get just a sentence.

[Jackie_Cochran]

@Ghazzu

AC aside, I find it difficult to conceive of a horse having voluntary control over haircoat length, nevermind prescience regarding a season’s worth of weather patterns.

I had a really hard time believing it too, until the decades went past with Hat Tricks either putting on his “snow coat” with long guard hairs, and it snowing, and him putting on his “its not going to snow” with the denser winter hair but without the long, long, long guard hairs and it not snowing that winter.

I have absolutely no idea how my horse predicted winter weather. I have never found another horse that did this. All I know is that he was pretty darn accurate in doing that.

[NoSuchPerson]

@x-halt-salute

Where do you get this hostility from?

Yes, I read the study.

Not everybody believes that the presence of human experimenters invalidates all animal behavior or cognition research.

The detail you’ve added is helpful, but it’s still difficult to evaluate this second-hand argument.

Guess I was wrong when I said @Frostbitten didn’t need to hunker down! Who knew that anyone could get so upset about the mention of a pretty unexceptional equine behavior article in the course of coming to some fairly reasonable conclusions!

What hostility? There was no hostility in my comments. There was some exasperation on my part, I admit, due to the nature of the responses I received, but the only hostility I saw was in Frostbitten’s snippy response to my original post and your snippy response to my subsequent comments.

Some of you seem to be confusing discussion and debate with hostility and aggression. Disagreeing with your opinion does not equate to being hostile. If you’re going to post on a public forum about a topic about which people have strong opinions, then you need to be prepared for some discussion and expect that not everyone is just going to accept what you say at face value.

I view AC like G views magicians (and I also love magicians and a good magic show). If someone was having an AC come to the barn, I’d pay for a reading. But I’d view it as entertainment.

[ecileh]

@NoSuchPerson

I view AC like G views magicians (and I also love magicians and a good magic show). If someone was having an AC come to the barn, I’d pay for a reading. But I’d view it as entertainment.

Genuine question: If you did have a reading done for entertainment and the AC told you that your horse needed a change–say he absolutely hates the kid you have exercising him while you are on vacation–would you make the change?

[RainWeasley]

Sooo…as far as the “animals don’t understand the concept of a week/month/whatever”, there is this book series I read where the guy in it can “talk” to wolves. When you “read” what the wolves say, it is stated in actual words, with distances, times, all of that. But the guy mentions that it’s not literally what the wolves say, but how the human brain interprets it so that it makes sense to him in a way he understands. It’s actually more like images and feelings and sensations of time passing.

Fictional series, but to be totally open-minded, if it is real, that could be why the readings can be more “literal” than what people say horses and other animals actually think. Human mind trying to make sense of a non-verbal communication of pictures and feelings.

On the other side of the discussion…I don’t understand when people complain that they should be allowed to share their proof of something being real, but then get upset that others share THEIR proof of something not being real. Why do you think that their proof isn’t just as real to them as yours is to you? They claim that the proof of it not being real isn’t acceptable because they didn’t speak to a REAL communicator. But apparently can’t comprehend that maybe what they think is real, possibly could be as unreal as what they believe the skeptic’s proof is? I mean, it goes both ways.

If you REALLY want to convince someone, then you pay for a reading for the skeptic, with the communicator of your choosing that you believe is the real deal. Put your money where your mouth is. Don’t expect someone to automatically want to put their own money into something they don’t really believe just because you say it’s real.

[Crashing_Boar]

@Jackie Cochran

But then there is the case where the owner KNOWS that the time is coming soon, but as long as the horse is showing enjoyment in his/her life the owner lets the horse live on.

My riding teacher had an Arabian mare that she had raised from birth. She LOVED this mare above all other horses. Well the mare’s front pasterns got worse and worse, sagging down distressingly. She told me that she had asked the mare to tell her when it was time to go, but no matter how bad the mare’s pasterns got the mare never told Debbie it was time, even though it was getting obvious.

Now I had not had a relationship with this mare when Debbie told me this, so I politely went up to the mare, told her what Debbie had told me, and I got a very brief picture of Debbie collapsing from grief, and that the mare did not want to see this happen. So I told the mare that if she told ME when it was too much for her to go on then I would tell Debbie and bear the initial spate of grief.

So I started going up to the mare every time I was at the stable, and I noticed that her back looked scruffy so I started currying her back. Soon the mare would come up to me and stand athwart me so I could curry the itchiest part of her back, and she showed every sign of enjoying it. This went on for several months.

One day the mare came up to me, and stopped facing me. When I went to curry her back she pivoted so she still faced me. I THOUGHT this might be the signal but I was not sure because the mare did not speak to my mind. I told her if she did this the next week I would be sure about her wanting to exit life because it had just gotten too burdensome.

The next week the same thing happened. She came up to me, faced me directly, and did not let me curry her back.

I told Debbie, she cried, she called the vet and made arrangements for getting the grave dug but was too upset to be there when the vet came. So her husband got the mare and led her to the already dug grave (it had a slope down), and the mare willingly walked into the grave and the vet put her down. This mare did NOT like going into strange looking places, but this time she just went ahead, laid down, and stopped hurting.

So no, not all horses will “tell” their owners that it is time to go even when it is long past time. Some other human has to step in and communicate the truth that the horse wants to stop suffering. Like many humans some horses feel a deep sense of responsibility for the well being of their favorite human and do not want to hurt that human’s mind/emotions grievously, and someone else has to step in and act as a go-between between the horse and its owner.

That’s a beautiful story, but relies on a quite fanciful degree of anthropomorphizing.

It is equally possible, and a lot more probable, that the mare turned toward you because she had rain rot or a sore back or was done shedding, and just plain was not up for a vigorous currying. Lots more believeable!

While horses may have an instinctual sense that their death is approaching, and may exhibit related behaviors such as isolating themselves from the herd, I have never seen even the slightest indication they understand that we are about to do something to effect their death. All the vets I know seem to be under the impression that they pretty much live in the present tense, and they see this stuff every single week.

This is textbook projection of human emotional needs and anticipation of grief onto a helpless animal who is wholly unaware these these issues exist. These are human/personal problems to be resolved by humans/people, and no horse or other animal should EVER be forced to live in pain and misery past its humane time because its caregivers “can’t deal” with the parting.

Please folks, try to meet an animal at the level of it’s ANIMAL senses and DO NOT project your own emotional “stuff” onto them. It’s indulging yourself at the animal’s expense and it’s not horsemanship.

[anon38350891]

This board has a certain pattern of response to topics about which there are skeptics and enthusiasts:

Enthusiast: I really got something useful out of the experience of X, an unusual phenomenon that’s hard to explain.

Skeptic: I will now dedicate my online life to destroying your credence in the validity of X. I will post again and again, and I hope to wear you down so that you flee this thread in shame. HAHAHA! I live for this.

[NoSuchPerson]

@ecileh

Genuine question: If you did have a reading done for entertainment and the AC told you that your horse needed a change–say he absolutely hates the kid you have exercising him while you are on vacation–would you make the change?

No, not in the absence of physical evidence corroborating the statement.

But there’s no denying that the thought would be stuck in my head and I would be paying close attention to my horse’s observable responses to the kid in order to reassure myself that things were going well (or find evidence that it wasn’t).

While I don’t believe that ACs have any magical power to commune with my horse, I do believe that the best of them are very talented at picking up on subtle and non-verbal cues from both the horse and the human, which might provide useful information.

For example, maybe the kid was there and interacted with the horse in view of the AC and she picked up some subtle fear or withdrawal response from the horse that I wasn’t seeing. Or maybe I’m not happy with anyone else riding my horse but accept it as a necessary evil, and my ambivalence showed in my body language when the subject of other riders came up.

[x-halt-salute]

@NoSuchPerson

What hostility? There was no hostility in my comments. There was some exasperation on my part, I admit, due to the nature of the responses I received, but the only hostility I saw was in Frostbitten’s snippy response to my original post and your snippy response to my subsequent comments.

Some of you seem to be confusing discussion and debate with hostility and aggression. Disagreeing with your opinion does not equate to being hostile. If you’re going to post on a public forum about a topic about which people have strong opinions, then you need to be prepared for some discussion and expect that not everyone is just going to accept what you say at face value.

You should be aware that swearing and dismissive insinuations can read as hostility, even if what’s intended is “exasperation”. Just as one person’s dry and long-winded post can be another person’s “snippy”.

Regarding taking things too personally, I hope you are willing to consider your own advice re: not getting upset when people don’t take your contributions at face value.

As for communicators, I’d rather get a root canal than sit through a magic show, so I’d never pay for communication merely for entertainment. Regardless of whether extrasensory communication is possible, or if it’s just a variation on cold reading, I think many people have such basic animal communication deficits – loving their “furbabies” without understanding their real needs, ignoring a host of observable postures and expressions and gestures and such – that the most valuable animal communication service one could provide for many people is simply assistance with interpreting everyday, observable communication. I’m sure most on this board are pretty capable on that front, but working with other people’s animals has introduced me to a lot of folks who’d happily shell out to find out Fluffy’s favorite color or who Dobbin’s pasture pal was in a prior home. But what would most help some of these people to do right by the pets they care for is a little more sensitivity to the kind of communication that doesn’t require a supernatural connection to receive.

[evilc123]

Any data points that could inform a the course of treatment or intervention for an animal’s medical condition should be subject to scientific scrutiny, with the exception of last resort situations where there is clearly nothing to be lost. Otherwise using anecdotal evidence to form the basis of a treatment recommendation is irresponsible, and, in most cases of human medical care, illegal.

To illustrate this point, I leased a mare for a long time who developed a severe UTI that began to make it extremely difficult for her to urinate. I tried countless antibiotics that were susceptible to the pathogens causing her infection with no success. Before putting her down, we decided to try acupuncture (a treatment modality that I, myself, hadn’t given much credit to prior to that). Low and behold…it friggin worked! Every 4-6 months an acupuncture treatment kept her symptoms at bay and she lived a comfortable life until she passed on due to a pasture injury. Now…do I consider that experience to be “proof” that acupuncture is effective? Absolutely not. There is a hierarchy of evidence in which anecdotes (or even a collection of anecdotes) at the 2nd lowest tier, just behind blind faith.

I don’t have a problem with people who choose to spend their time and money seeking information from AC practitioners, but I’d hope that for the sake of their pet’s health they defer to therapies that have been proven through highest levels of evidentiary standards.

[Bluey]

@anon38350891

This board has a certain pattern of response to topics about which there are skeptics and enthusiasts:

Enthusiast: I really got something useful out of the experience of X, an unusual phenomenon that’s hard to explain.

Skeptic: I will now dedicate my online life to destroying your credence in the validity of X. I will post again and again, and I hope to wear you down so that you flee this thread in shame. HAHAHA! I live for this.

Try:

Skeptics: Those are interesting, neat stories, but as those phenomenon being hard to explain, you are right there and this is why we think what is happening in those situations is not likely to be happening as some think.

Enthusiast: You are a meany and stupid and just don’t know what you are talking about, have the temerity of giving reasons why, and need to open your mind to the fantastic and if it is not clear yet, you need to quit posting, you are eeeeevil and your breath smells.

[ecileh]

@NoSuchPerson

No, not in the absence of physical evidence corroborating the statement.

But there’s no denying that the thought would be stuck in my head and I would be paying close attention to my horse’s observable responses to the kid in order to reassure myself that things were going well (or find evidence that it wasn’t).

While I don’t believe that ACs have any magical power to commune with my horse, I do believe that the best of them are very talented at picking up on subtle and non-verbal cues from both the horse and the human, which might provide useful information.

For example, maybe the kid was there and interacted with the horse in view of the AC and she picked up some subtle fear or withdrawal response from the horse that I wasn’t seeing. Or maybe I’m not happy with anyone else riding my horse but accept it as a necessary evil, and my ambivalence showed in my body language when the subject of other riders came up.

Fair enough. Thank you.

[Denali6298]

For the record I enjoy the stories in these threads. My Mom’s ex girlfriend used an animal communicator for one of my horses and well, I wasn’t impressed. We were at the Equine Affair so no where near the horse. She worked off a picture. I don’t remember what the woman said exactly as this was 20 years ago but basically everything she said was vague enough to be believable.

If I had the money to blow on a reading I would. Maybe I would walk away with more information or maybe it would just be fun.

I don’t think anyone was being rude in their skeptical responses. I also think the people who value the ACs they use are way too emotionally invested in the topic. It’s a discussion. Person makes a statement and people agree or disagree. Disagreement isn’t a personal attack.

[anon6003733]

@Tyrus’ Mom The whole AC thing doesn’t really flow with me (yet? … Maybe never?..Open mind and all that ) but you come across as a sound, solid animal owner so I’m happy for you and your crew that you feel you’ve found a new level of understanding.

Yours and couple of others’ posts have definitely elevated my knowledge of what it’s all about and it’s been an intriguing read from that perspective. Thanks for sharing.