Oh man. I tried this once. Dora regularly tries to turn around and go back out on the trail when we start heading for the trailer. One day I said “ok fine, go wherever you want.” We ended up off the trail, in the middle of the field, just standing there for 10 minutes until I said “no really we have to go home.” I have no idea what she was thinking or why she wanted to go stand in the field but I’ll never forget it. 
6 Likes
I am sure we can debate “abuse” all day because following this logic, confining a horse to a stall is abuse.
2 Likes
Exactly and I agree with you that probably many horses are trained thereby you describe it but I know how mine are trained 
1 Like
Tell me about it If mine is allowed his head, he walks up the nearest stranger’s driveway and will stand for ages just gazing at whatever’s happening on that property. Even if he has friends with him out on a hack, he is happy to let them walk away from him while he has a nice long look.
3 Likes
I have a little mule that was forced into compliance by people who had him before me. He’s never forgotten it and it remains the basis of his response to any interaction with him. He’s small and instead of training he was simply pushed into a corner by multiple men and trimmed, or vaccinated, or whatever. He doesn’t have a mean bone in his body - people just didn’t have the patience to work with him.
It took me several months to just put a hand on him and six months before he trusted my farrier enough to have his feet done. With him, and I think most mules, once they understand what you want, they will comply but if he thinks for a moment he’s going to be forced into anything he will get very frightened and defensive.
My farrier and I mention the trend of letting the horse choose from time to time. Some clients of hers have gone to the extreme with this and it causes danger for her. Horses that formerly were good to handle with an occasional command to stand still are now allowed to put a hoof down and move, even walk away or push against her or act aggressively towards her. She is told she’s not allowed to correct the horse, but has to ask the horse to comply. It’s a mess.
3 Likes
As someone who trims my own horse…that is just awful. Anyone like that in my area would get dropped as a client so fast. The good farriers/trimmers in my area do great business and many can’t take new clients on due to the load as it is.
8 Likes
This reminds me: The only two emotions that belong in the saddle are patience, and a sense of humor.
6 Likes
[quote=“treebeard, post:125, topic:803012”]
I have a little mule that was forced into compliance by people who had him before me. He’s never forgotten it and it remains the basis of his response to any interaction with him. He’s small and instead of training he was simply pushed into a corner by multiple men and trimmed, or vaccinated, or whatever. He doesn’t have a mean bone in his body - people just didn’t have the patience to work with him.[/quote]
This is likely similar to how my horse’s dam was treated. Much like people, how a horse reacts to this treatment depends on their personality as well. My mare wasn’t really having any of it and when my friend got her, she found the mare would check out and leave. She also wasn’t as herd bound as the other horses so couldn’t be enticed to come back by many methods used with other horses. At the time I was giving lessons to two neighborhood children on my friend’s pony. Mare initially just stood 100 yards back while all the other horses came up for post lesson treats (because apparently even though the pony was the only one that did work, the other three needed treats for…um…not eating all the hay? I don’t know).
It took MONTHS before mare started coming closer, then close enough to stretch the neck out and get a treat. She was also really bad with the farrier all the way up until the end.
She would pull back and break her halter at shows when tied to the trailer, but only when I was saddling her. So I started untying her, putting the girth on, letting her do a lap or two around me (as was her wont), until she settled. Then we would bridle. It was a while before she started calming down about that.
I think it takes a certain person to work with equines like this and see plenty of “good” trainers that cannot - oh they can go to the Olympics, but on a certain type of horse. Someone I worked for once got an Arab in to start under saddle. This individual had started quite a number of racehorses and was experienced in general. The owner got the arab back and the horse was bad for pleasure rider owner. Trainer came out to owner’s place and was bucked off Arab. Owner asked me later if I ever saw trainer get bucked off but I had not been present during training sessions. I do think Trainer was just used to a certain type of horse and that wasn’t Arab.
Oh yeah! I am a strong believer in listening to your horse - sometimes they aren’t feeling it, sometimes they are hurting. There is nothing wrong with saying “hey, feeling lazy today? Let’s be lazy.”
As long as it doesn’t become a THING. We have to be careful with my friend’s mare that we are starting - she gets a little balky and you get off, next ride she starts with balkly so a discussion must be had. Luckily, if she doesn’t get away with it once, she figures it out quick as well. That being said, we try to listen to her - she’s 9 months or so pregnant right now so we walk around because you know what, she probably doesn’t want to waddle around at the trot with a rider on her. (note: she had been stricly a broodmare before we got her so she doesn’t have “riding muscles”, which effects our decision).
Or my horse - suddenly not being forward, not wanting to jump? Something has to be wrong - others may say she’s just being bad but no, she LOVES jumping so what’s wrong? Let’s not make her jump and figure out her issue.
But yeah, some people go way to far with the “let them do what they want, they know” type thing and that’s dangerous for any handler, especially farriers.
I’m a strong believer in “gently push over their comfort line but don’t throw them” type philosophy. If we always just did what horses wanted, we would likely just being hanging out in a pasture with the majority of them. So they learn things so we can interact with them and enjoy them.
They learn things like wearing the saddle. While every horse is difference, “throwing a horse over the line” earning to wear a saddle would, in my opinion, be putting saddle on and tightening girth right away. Some horses may be ok with this, but many would absolutely NOT be.
So, by “gently pushing”, we start with putting saddlepad on back, then saddle, then girth loosely. Or use um…not cavesson…the girth things for long lining…can’t think of the word now…first. There is more than one way to do any kind of training thing - the point is, introduce more slowly and keep horse relatively chill. Some may need more work at one step than at another.
EDIT: Sorry, my multiple quoting may be messed up, I tried to fix it.
2 Likes
Yeah, he’s one of the ones I blocked and hid his content. I saw one too many of his creative redefinitions of commonly understood terms for the purposes of demonstrating his holier than everyone else opinions on dealing with horses.
I think this does more harm than good because it’s the newbies who are going to get into trouble attempting the rainbow relationship with horses. I find it frustrating, so blocking them is best for me.
3 Likes
I believe she has fired some clients because of this. She does try to educate people but often the client is now following one of the new trendy “gurus” and doesn’t want to listen.
4 Likes
