I admire your training and enjoy hearing about it. 
I’m genuinely interested to see how far it takes you - some of riding is inherently not R+ (well, most of riding isn’t technically R+).
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at the risk of boring people…
My theory about that is that yielding to pressure is indeed nicely trained by R+. And that’s pretty much what riding cues are. i start them bareback. And in a halter and a lead rope…that i kinda fling over from one side to the other and use the same gentle pull but pair it with a bit of calf pressure and an exaggerated upper body turn. To get them to move forward, i use a verbal cue and wait…wait wait. If nothing happens then i do other things up there…move around…scoot back onto their rear and squinch back forward… you know, all the desensitizing things one does on a stationary horse. There is plenty to do aboard until they get the courage to walk. Once they do take a step, there’s a big reward…big party. And mostly, my riding is different because i give a lot of praise and scratches and an occasional peanut in the shell. And i hop off and give a lot of interludes of rest and praise/admiration. When we are done with our dressage lesson my mare has to be coaxed to leave the ring…She plants her feet and doesn’t want it to end. THAT’s what i want. Their enjoyment too.
edit: i’m sure that if i do start riding in dressage shows i’ll get disqualified for praising
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Yeah. So pulling the rope to turn and wiggling on them until they walk is Negative Reinforcement aka pressure and release.
Backing a horse via positive reinforcement (R+) would be teaching the behavior without pressure and then adding pulling on the rope and wiggling as pre cues. In practice this often looks like (short version) creating a pattern with cones (targets) marking at each cone, getting a solid verbal cue established, marking to get a leg over at one cone, giving the verbal cue to “target the cone” and marking when horse proceeds to next cone. A ground person is often used. ETA: Then once the horse is solid walking around the cone pattern you start adding your pre cues of leg pressure and rein aids.
TBH I’ve never seen a horse trained to yield to rope pressure solely using R+. Welcome any examples to prove me wrong.
The short version, if you apply pressure to the horse (touching the rope / bouncing on his back) to get a change in behavior, you are using negative reinforcement NOT positive reinforcement.
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Yes. This. Lots of people use pressure plus treats. That’s not pure R plus. I have not yet seen anyone make a riding horse out of pure R plus or indeed even make a horse that’s reliable on the ground.
I use R plus for lots of things but R minus for riding. R minus is not punishment. Also horses totally understand R minus because they use it on each other constantly. Arguably they understand and accept it more than R plus.
R plus for riding would be waiting until horse chose to take a step and then rewarding them. Waiting until he chose to walk to the mounting block and rewarding. Waiting until he chose to walk down the path to turnout. Etc.
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Right! Just so. The waiting until the subject volunteers a behavior, I have mostly heard that technique called capturing. It’s tricky to put captured behaviors under cue ime.
With r+ OR r- it is possible to put the horse over threshold / create anxiety. Timing and feel are important anyway you go.
I had a good experience backing my horse the R+ way, but the backing bit. Say 10 little baby rides, before the concept was generalized enough to start using more straight R- to teach him things while still sometimes marking and rewarding good efforts. I joke that instead of a one rein emergency stop I could just tongue click and horse would hit the brakes 
Thankfully haven’t had to try that theory yet.
To stay on topic. I try very hard not to call my horses names like jerk / butthead nor describe them as such to other people. I prefer more accurate verbiage like horse was anxious, horse spooked, horse was dull to the aids, horse was overly reactive, horse was distracted etc.
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i do not wiggle on them TO get them to walk, i move around on them when they are not walking because they are stationary and i can do that. Not to make them move. totally different.
I hold a crunchy cookie bag when i’m up there and the horse will back up to get to the cookies. they think (almost all of them do this) that the cookie bag is stationary and all they have to do is back up to get to it. It’s a funny thing really.
and this is not at allll what i do.
nope …this isn’t it.
teaching to yield to pressure is something i do totally R+. I do it on the ground an teach it way before ever even haltering. Only after they have learned this do i get to ask for a turn with a pull.
Bouncing around then a change of behavior then a mark if your initial verbal cue didn’t work is what you described. That’s R-
As I stated. I’ve never seen yielding to rope pressure taught purely with R+. From the ground or otherwise. I’m happy to listen if you wanna type out your process.
TBH you’ve tossed around R+ so much in your posts I was kinda surprised to read your description. I’m not familiar with every R+ technique, but I’m familiar with a lot of them. Based on your posting history, I was expecting to see a more R+ centric technique. And that’s not what you described.
There’s no moral difference between R- and R+, fair training is fair training no matter the method. There is a scientific difference though between the two.
Additionally you are welcome to share with me the name of the trainer / program you’re following. Perhaps it’s one I’m not familiar with and I am open to learning new things. You’re free to PM me if you’d prefer.
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I was thinking about this thread yesterday when I was at the barn.
My barn manager’s girlfriend was yelling at her horses because there was a lot of chaos happening all at once and some of the babies got loose. Anyway, she was trying to wrangle the babies she and her boyfriend breed and the yelling caused all of the horses to become upset. Lots of running and bucking followed. At the time, I was working with my filly to show “grandma” how awesome the two-year old is doing. My filly had her first spook, which really wasn’t a spook at all. It was quite funny because she just looked suspiciously at some ground poles.
Internally, I felt so proud of my kid because through the whole process she listened to me and stayed glued to my cues. She got over her nerves pretty quickly and then I let her watch the commotion for a bit until she completely calmed down.
I felt bad for my barn manager because this is a common routine and I would imagine it’s frustrating. I do know they think I spoil my horse-- they have told me-- but I think my girl has a lot of common sense and is clued into me, too.
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I say please and thank you to my horses because it changes my tone of voice and my body language. I also call my young mare and a mare I board “the mean girls” because that is how they act. I still expect them to behave but when turned out they try and run the field and boss the other horses around. Of course the rest are much older so ignore them for the most part.:
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no, that is NOT what i described. What i said was what i did when my horse wasn’t ready to move forward. I think you either misinterpreted what i said or i was not clear.
What i do i the basic stuff one does when desensitizing a horse. Not bouncing around trying to initiate a step forward. And, in the end, with many of them, i actually end up spending a lot more time just sitting there than i do making movements to spend the time constructively.
The mustangs i suppose have been my best teachers. i do not follow anyone. in fact, my coach is the very first person i’ve lessoned with in decades. i have zero book learning on this subject as well. And frustrating to the nth degree black/white discussions about training methodology and quadrants. All i do, ever, is to work to make everything i do with a horse not compulsory, not stressful and with as little pressure as possible…from the bare beginning with a horse fresh from holding, and with the adopted ones, going back many many steps.
It is Positive Reinforcement that works.
i am ending this conversation with you…and placed you on ignore for a while. I’m just not into fighting about it. It is what i do for my horses and i it is best for me, and for them
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Perhaps I did mis understand your post. I had a longer response typed up, but I get the impression you’re not keen to discuss. If I misinterpreted your keenness, you’re welcome to PM me.
ETA: ah. I see I’ve been put on ignore for believing the science behind the 4 quadrants of behavior modification. As a person that did use a strict R+ protocol to back their horse after investing much money and time into learning the methods. Fascinating.
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[quote=“Scribbler, post:26, topic:771113, full:true”]
Except that horses, like all other animals in dominant positions can just plain be dicks sometimes. It’s totally normal. Animals can absolutely be assholes. Does it change that we love them? Nope. Does it necessarily mean their turnout situation needs to change? Not always.
But, whatever, I don’t really have a problem with most of what you said. It’s the one I replied to originally that irritated the shit out of me. It’s people that DON’T apply SOME “human” emotions to horses that have a whole lot to work out with themselves and their horses. Those are the ones that clearly do not understand how the equine brain works and that is extremely disturbing and can often lead to dangerous situations that could have been handled better by telling the horse not to be an asshole and to use its manners. OTOH, many of those folks fail to “install” any sort of safety net of manner in the first place, so.
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[quote=“sascha, post:53, topic:771113, full:true”]
Well yes, there are two pitfalls. One is to see the horse as a machine and not think about its pyschology or emotions at all and the other is to see the horse as a fur baby and assume human emotions and motivations.
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100% agree.
I’m all for having a sense of humor when things go tits up despite best efforts, but, with a few exceptions, that page is a glorification of incompetence and refusal to take any lessons or seek out ways to do better.
When they were all laughing hilariously at an absolute mayhem of a group lesson were everyone got run away with and 3 terrified kids fell off because all the girths were too loose was the last straw for me. Like, really? Making sure the girth is tight is 100% within the responsible human’s control, and failure to do so isn’t “funny.”
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I have a molasses treat in my hand or a handful of the " off limits for fatties" grain and she KNOWS I have it because I always do. She is extremely food motivated but also has a mind of her own.
Keeps me hopping that is for sure. She did well this morning and I called her good things
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I have a small horse with a streak of pony in him. I often call him “turdledove.” Who is to say I’m not saying “turtledove”? No one. It is a mystery to all but me.
Another viewpoint.
My riding teacher asked me to ride this supremely ugly badly conformed dun QH gelding who had been dumped at her stable in his late 20s, with a very bad attitude towards anybody asking him to do anything at all.
I had the feeling that he had been repeatedly called all the bad names in the book because this gelding was super defiant.
It took me months to turn him around. During those months I did not let a derogatory name pass my lips and my riding teacher cooperated with me about this. This horse was not an agreeable cooperative horse, he balked, he backed up uncontrollably, he gave me constant dirty looks, and he disobeyed me as much as he could. He DID NOT want to cooperate with a human unless he was being fed, and I do not feed treats at all.
So I took every chance to praise him–at first he thought this was a new, odd form of punishment. Gradually he came to enjoy being praised.
If I had gone on calling him all those nasty names everybody else had probably called him I doubt I would have made progress. I do not know if he “understood” the words, but with enough repetition with emphasis I am pretty sure he ended up with a good idea of what was being said to him in a negative way.
He ended up being a reasonably cooperative horse about 75% of the time, and he argued less with me when he was being “bad”. He was “bad” because neither me or my riding teacher saw any evidence that anybody had ever even tried to EXPLAIN to this horse what an aid meant and what his rider’s expectations were.
If I had called him an ugly monster who was always bad, bad, bad, I really doubt he would have come around. I bet he had every negative word memorized because he was the type of horse who had found a “winning” program of running away, balking, backing up fast and every other think he could come up with to defy all humans. It was like all those bad names served as “proof” that he was successful in defying us humans enough so everybody would just give up on riding him.
It took me about a year before he would even consider the desirability of being a Good Boy, before he started believing me that I could like him, before he did not worry that praise was just an introduction to more abuse.
If I had to vent about him I made sure to do it far away from him.
Hey, it worked. It turned out he was really a pretty sweet horse who had some problems with life.
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I had to actually stop and think about whether I do or not! Certainly yesterday I was saying the young one was being a bit of a brat (kept trying to chase the old girl off while I was treating said old girl’s eye ulcer!) but she’s also a giant sweetie most of the time. I’d like to think generally when they’re having a moment, my reaction is usually a “yeah yeah doofus, cmon let’s keep going” but I’d be lying if I said I’ve never let emotion get the better of me (and immediately felt dreadful afterwards!).
Admittedly I have also said recently that both horses can go in the bin…but that’s because one has an eye ulcer that just cost me 1.3k in vet bills and the other has decided she would prefer not to use the brand new trailer…so I say it jokingly while still treating the eye 4x a day and doing daily trailer training because well…what else are you going to do!
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No, he doesn’t understand the words, he understands the tone and the feeling behind them.
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