Luckily horses are very clear once we have learned to look and listen. I’ve altered the quote below (from Maya Angelou)
“I have learned that horses will forget what you said, horses will forget what you do, but horses will never forget how you made them feel”
So how do we know that our work is good? In a world where so much teaching is against the horse rather than for the good of the horse, how do we tell the difference?
How do we know whether the work made his body feel better?
Which after all is the whole point of Dressage- from the French verb ‘dresser’ which actually means to prepare or to straighten, to sculpt our horse into a thing of beauty that is empowered rather than diminished by our interventions. Did it make the horse feel good? What signs do we look for to know it made them feel good?
My favourite sign is helicopter ears- they go soft and floppy and assume all sorts of funny angles. Rocky has huge ears, as do all his family, so this one is pretty obvious, as well as being visible from on top!
Another sign is soft liquid eyes, with relaxed ‘eyebrows” and slow blinking. When the work is good, the horse is calm, because horses are kinaesthetic and they find it frightening to be out of balance. When their balance is aided to improve, they relax and chill out. They almost look stoned after good work. Stoned, not exhausted.
Breathing slows and calms: soft hurrumphs or gentle chuntering are signs of a relaxed mouth , tongue and larynx as well as relaxed brain. Harsh sharp breathing, breath holding, or sharp snorting, teeth grinding or calling out are all sure signs of a horse either stressed or on full alert.
More on the mouth from James Dunlop: “In the French Tradition, it is the state of the mouth that governs everything. There are three mouths possible. A dry mouth, a soaking wet one with gobs of foam on the chest and legs, and a moist one in which the lips are just moist and the lower jaw relaxed. The third mouth is described as being ‘fraiche’ and offers a gentle murmur (L’Hotte) as if to be ‘smiling’ ( Beudant) . It is to this third mouth that we should aspire.”
I always get off the horse after a work session and look critically at the muscles. Is the neck soft and inflated, are the under neck muscles soft, does the neck come nicely out of the shoulder girdle. Does it look wider at the base than the middle of the top? A good neck should be an even triangle from withers to poll, and from shoulder girdle to poll.
The horses ridden in hyper flexion, also called Low Deep and Round by those trying to make it sound better, have this weird tube of muscle that runs up from the middle of their necks, with no splenius or trapezius; in layman’s terms they have a hollow missing triangle just in front of the withers and also under the pommel. This photo below is an example of a horse showing aberrant muscle development from excessive flexion.
A lovely reminder of the missing neck muscles, also showing why forward down and out is the healthiest position for the neck
Is the lumbar back full? Does the hors’s skin shine and glisten and move smoothly over his frame or does it look dry and tight and stuck to the bones? Is the tail carried, not clamped, does it swing softly as he moves? If the tail swings, the back can’t be braced.
And finally, does he look proud after work? Does he go strutting back to the field to tell his mates how cool he was? Does he look better and stronger and bigger each time? Does he offer the improved posture next ride without having to do the prep work? If he offers the new posture or the new body usage next time, you know it felt good and he’s choosing to seek that posture. If you have to do all the work all over again, every time, it didn’t feel better. And that means it probably wasn’t right. So don’t repeat it…because if you aren’t improving your horse you are breaking him down (Charles de Kunffy).
Learning our alphabet is the first step of learning any language. And dressage is no different. Except that learning our alphabet isn’t quite the right phrase, really we need to be learning our horses’ alphabet.
Elizabeth Ball
As horses are movement itself, and the best way to access a horse’s brain is through his body, learning our horses’ alphabet actually means learning the alphabet of our horses’ movement.
First, the gaits. The step pattern, the footfalls, the sequence of pure gaits. How will we know if we have a pure walk or a good quality canter if we don’t know what the pure gaits consist of?
Humans are born with the ability to make every common sound heard in every language, from the Welsh ttthhh to the Xhosi nk. Babies learn, by imitation, to repeat the sounds they hear the most around them; they perfect those, the voicebox adapts and they may lose the ability to create other language sounds.
I learned to speak French in the Ecrins mountains when I was 10. I have a regional accent that most native French can pinpoint to that area, and I always get a very warm welcome when I go back to that region.
Glacier des Violettes- the best mountain HVS in the world runs up to the left of the glacier- Ailefroide
But there is one telling detail that a true linguist would spot, one omission- my rrrrrr is weak. I can just about roll my rrrr, but not quite like a native.
Coming down from the Violettes
In the same way, horses are born with every variation of every gait at their disposal. Some will come easier than others, some are bred selectively, such as the tolt or the pacing gait, but all foals can do all gaits at the beginning. They learn first by copying their mothers, and their peer group, which gaits are the easiest for day to day life. And then in training, we reward them for the four pure dressage gaits, and every variation thereof. But we can only do that if we know how the four pure gaits are meant to look , feel and sound.
A young Milton with Caroline Powell- brought on slowly and correctly to become the world’s most successful show jumper
The reason these specifically defined pure gaits have been selected as the most desirable over the centuries is because time has shown that these gaits are the most efficient for the horse to carry a rider in a healthy biomechanical posture.
And we have to understand that aberrations of these gaits are not healthy, and should not be ignored, let alone rewarded. How many lateral walks do we see in FEI dressage tests, not only ignored but scored highly, against the directives?
Then we need to remember that horses are born crooked. Just as humans are born right handed or left handed, the symmetrical, perfectly balanced horse has not yet been born.
Training is therefore first rehabilitation, followed by therapy, and finally it can become gymnastic.
To complete the training of the dressage horse we need to be able to speak to his body in sentences, in combinations of aids that combine targeted exercises and accurate patterns to enable the horse to develop strength and suppleness.
CDK talks about the daily vocabulary of training; like a virtuoso musician practising their scales every day, a trainer must help the horse to run through his full physical repertoire every session- all bends, all gaits, every length of neck, every length of stride, all directions of travel.
Paul Belasik
Run through, not drill.
Simple repetition does not bring about improvement- targeted focus does. When doing scales we did them fast, slow, staccato, slurred, syncopated da deee and deee da, forwards and backwards. Every variation, to avoid strain and boredom.
The quality of each movement will vary according to the horse’s level of training, but a fragment of each exercise will be possible in every horse from the very beginning.
This can be achieved from the ground, in hand, or from the saddle.
The brilliance in the virtuoso comes from a solid foundation, from the long hours spent perfecting the details of the basics.
Perfect practise makes perfect.
So know your horse’s alphabet, and help him to write three dimensional poetry in motion.
We must make sure that we do not inadvertently teach ourselves to fail regularly in our training. It is important that we learn to make the mental transition to” I can”.
I heard a story this weekend about a very high achieving golfer. Every time he takes a lesson to improve one aspect of his game he goes out, applies the lesson and plays much better. Instead of being pleased that he has played better, he then looks for the gaps in his recent good game, focusses on those, practises those aspects which he has not improved and then goes out and so has a horrible time again. Essentially he has trained himself to fail, repetitively.
We must train ourselves to bank the good stuff first, especially in riding where there are two sentient beings involved in the encounter. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t learn from our mistakes; reflection, adjustment and testing is a key part of experiential learning of a practical skill. But we must learn just as much if not more from our successes.
I have started videoing myself riding more regularly. A friend once made the comment that high definition video is the most brutal feedback anyone needs. I don’t have hi-def capability but a mobile phone propped up on the arena fence is effective enough.
The first time I watch the video I am always appalled. I look like cooked spaghetti, what are my legs doing there, what on earth makes me think I can ride….
Then I look at it again and watch the horse…and generally there are some nice moments. And I have to remind myself that if the horse is improving then I can’t be that bad…
If the horse wasn’t improving, I would possibly have appalled myself so much that I would have given up. I am my own worst critic.
Do as I say, not as I do!!
But luckily for me the grey horse loves the nitty gritty of training, and loves the way good work makes his body feel. Which means he loves me.
If we want to improve a movement or an exercise then we have to pick one aspect to work on. We can’t just “try it again” and hope something will improve globally by accident. Practise doesn’t make perfect, perfect practise makes perfect. So you have to be consciously competent enough to choose one aspect that you can change to improve the overall performance of the task. A bit like teaching surgery….
Which means we have to choose other aspects to leave alone, or even better, aspects to keep because they are already good.
So for example; I’m doing trot halt, rein back, trot, transitions in step sequences of four. Four because even numbers make it predictable for the horse so the transitions should occur with less resistance. (That bit is magic, don’t question it, it just is, even number of steps for predictability, odd number of steps when you want change).
I ask myself what I can do….generally I can count to four, the transitions occur when asked, the rein back is diagonal, the line of travel is straight, the trot out has lovely oomph.
What do I want to improve? Lets just say one thing- the softness of the topline, for now.
Do I throw all the good qualities away just to focus on the topline? Do I say topline first and foremost, at whatever cost, no matter how many steps, no matter if it’s straight, …
Or do I try and add another quality to the good stuff I have already?
I have written before about how essential positive feedback is to the horse if you want to keep him on side. The horse is never allowed to think he made a mistake.
Imagine how dispiriting it would be for a horse if, every time he does a movement or an exercise, to the best of his ability, exactly as you have aided it (because again that is the truth) and you say “No, no, that was terrible, it was all wrong, we have to do it again, we are just so rubbish!”
He wouldn’t keep trying for very long would he?
Imagine if, instead of saying “we just can’t do that”,
you made the transition to thinking I can,
if we thought “We can do that even better! We can do that more like an advanced horse. What’s the most we can do?’….in the example, “What is the best most elevated and elongated topline we can do that rein back in? How would Granat feel doing that reinback?”
What is the maximum we can ask for?
Not demand…that’s different. If we ask for the absolute maximum possible that we can imagine, the horse will give is the maximum he is capable of, in that moment, and he might just surprise himself and you!
Our limited expectations can limit our horse’s potential. I know I am often guilty of trying to make every step the best step, when sometime it just needs to be the next step. Sometime we just need to make progress, in the work and across the arena.
Dinner needs to get cooked!
Never mind if the balance goes awry, what is the biggest length of stride the horse can offer?
What is the longest neck he can keep that balance on without going splat? He has to go splat at least once for you to find out the answer to that question. If he doesn’t go splat how do you know you have asked enough? Obviously you ask for a touch less next time.
And then the next time you pick another aspect.
So in my example; yesterday I worked on quality of topline. And the response to the aids also improved. Today I worked on responsiveness to the aids (and topline came for free with a few repetitions). Tomorrow I will need to find a different sequence or a different usage of that lesson (pretend piaffe/passage transitions with rein back legs maybe, or what does reinback leg do to the canter walk transition) otherwise I am drilling my horse, and sucking all of the joy out of his psyche.
So to get the best out of out horses, we need to learn to make the transition to “I can”.
To I can do the most magnificent trot, halt, rein back, trot that I can imagine, with this fabulous horse I am lucky enough to be riding in this moment. The horse doesn’t know this is a difficult exercise, he just hears your thoughts, well before your aids.
So make those thoughts worth listening to. Make him feel magnificent.
The magic is in the transition- when every possibility is available, everything is possible.
And teach yourself and your horse to succeed, a little more every day.
Trust is a two way street. For trust to exist in a relationship it has to be felt both ways. ‘How does this relate to horses’ I hear you cry?
Simple really. We expect our horses to trust us, but do we trust them?
Those of you who have had the delightful pleasure of sharing a lesson with me and the Rockstar will know I have racked up quite a few air miles this summer. Highlights were winning the “most spectacular dismount” rosette at camp (there were 3 episodes that could have qualified), and a splat at the end of one of Neil’s bouncy grids- Rocky was getting more and more extravagant in an upward direction, and just minutes after me saying those immortal words ‘at least I’m still on’ his back end flicked up even higher as we turned and I wasn’t.
He had just dumped me again before this photo was. taken-
I’ve been resetting the counter on the 1st day of the month. It’s the only way to stay sane. And I’ve said out loud on several occasions that I’m not sure if I’ll ever ride him without a back protector.
Then something very peculiar happened. Over the last few weeks I’ve been hopping on Cal bareback to take the two of them down to the field. And after a few days I started getting this really strong urge to hop on Rocky instead of Cal.
Which I initially dismissed as madness and stupidity.
After all, I can barely steer this young horse in a bridle. I can’t remember May’s total of involuntary dismounts but there was a score, June was a 4 point month and July a 2 pointer.
But the urge kept occurring.
If we believe in the whoo whoo stuff, maybe it was Rocky himself putting the idea in my head.
August has not been a month of perfect behaviour. I’m still on 0 points but that’s more about luck than skill- I’ve had a couple of hilariously spicey in hand sessions.
So I have no idea why I got on the big baby warmblood, him in a head collar, me in Crocs with no hat (don’t judge me) and no body armour, to take him and Cal down to the field.
It took me about 3 goes to line them up to the mounting block and actually get on. Then there was some milling about in all 4 dimensions while I got them both pointing the same way in the yard. I’ve ridden Cal quite a bit in a head collar and done some neck reining stuff like Garrocha work- (note to self- too much even- that inadvertent indirect rein aid needs sorting) Rocky however had no idea as yet what a neck rein aid might be.
Once we were lined up it was a relatively straightforward exercise. They know the way, obviously.
There is something very special about riding your horse bareback. You are connected to the horse, muscle to muscle, back to back, in a way that you just can’t feel in a saddle. I giggled, and I praised him, and I found my inner child to jolly him along.
We got there, I slid off carefully because of the Irish safety boots and I thanked him properly, scratching his chin and looking him straight in the eye. And I felt something shift between us.
Me trusting him enough to get on in that playful kid like way has changed our relationship. And if it was him asking me to trust him and just get on, then that is the first loud and clear request that I have had from him, and I listened. And every creature loves a good listening to!!
I really hope that was his thought I heard because if so, it was delightfully clear- we always say ‘if only they could talk…’
Now don’t get me wrong: I’m sure the points tally will continue to rise. And I’m sure he will test me in ways Cal hasn’t even dreamed of. But he has taught me a very important lesson: that trust is a two way street. And if I want him to trust me; then in a partnership of equals, I have to offer him the same courtesy.
Cal has long known my every thought- however inconvenient a truth that may be.
You might not think of riding and training as a partnership of equals. That’s fine. In my humble opinion horses are the best mirror out there- what you receive is what you asked for. And what you offer will come back amplified a hundred times.
I’ve shared this picture before but it is my mantra for this year
Charlie Mackesey
and the wonderful Charlie Mackesey has got his book sorted – it is now available for pre Order on Amazon.
I’ll tack the link below when I am on my laptop rather than phone.
Another phrase that should have made me a millionaire;
“my horse could never live out, he loves his stable. He’s always begging to come in at night.”
Apart from the fact that this begging is a learned behaviour, because horses live for routine, we also need to understand the difference between providing ‘turn out’ versus providing adequate facilities for them to live out full time in a suitable environment.
Now don’t get me wrong: I would much rather horses spent a measly hour turned out than no time out at all. But we have to acknowledge that horses are movement, and the more they can move the happier and healthier they are. And that all our husbandry practises are a compromise chosen by humans between cost, practicality and ease of use of the animal. Turn out versus living out is a good example of a human chosen compromise.
I tolerate thick mud on my horses from November through to March, and many other days in between.
Other than competition days, I only groom to ride. I only wash a tail or pull a mane to compete. And I am comfortable with those choices. You won’t shame me into bathing my horse in winter- he needs his greasy coat for waterproofing. Likewise his feathers stay full all winter. And I very rarely brush his legs- layers of super dry mud wellies are the best protection against mud fever.
Mud wellies and ice baubles in fetlocks- natural insulation
Many people mistakenly believe that how a horse behaves in a turn out situation will determine how prepared that horse is to live out full time.
But there is a huge difference between turn out versus living out.
To understand why, we need to know more about the behaviour of the wild horse.
Horses much prefer to be too cold than too hot. They can warm themselves up, by increasing their activity, or by eating plenty of forage that then gets fermented in the caecum a.k.a. hindgut, producing heat. Effectively horses have their very own central heating system, and as long as they have adequate access to forage, will keep fermenting that forage and keep warm.
Horses left in their natural state will grow a fabulous winter coat. This has at least two layers, an underneath fluffy insulating layer and a longer coarser protective layer on top. If you have ever turned your horse out naked in the rain you may have noticed the herringbone pattern that the dried in rain has left?
Gorgeous herringbone courtesy of Sarah Oliver
This is no accident. The herringbone acts like a guttering system, allowing the water to run off the top of the coat while keeping the fluff underneath dry.
Sarah Oliver’s trackie in Cumbria
Mud herringbones for a cold night- Rocky's mum Willow in Weymouth
As long as the fluff has enough air in between the hairs it acts as an amazing insulation layer.
It used to amaze me, coming home after work to ride and pulling a naked horse in from the field, how dry the horses’ backs actually were most of the time.
Mud herringbones- dry underneath- Willow again
And all horses can grow a good coat if left to adapt. Paddy is 7/8 thoroughbred, thin skinned with a very fine coat, so I thought. The first year, we moved to Delamere from livery in March so all the horses were rugged. The second year we just didn’t rug.
I trace clipped Cal to allow me to work him, but with a shallow trace clip, he still didn’t need a rug. He’s half Irish Draught so grows the most beautiful fluffy winter coat, and thrives on fresh air.
Cal’s working and living out clip
Incidentally I also never dried him off after riding- I had to walk him back to the field from the house so he cooled off a bit; then the first thing he would do when turned out was roll in the cool sandy mud, good for his coat and his body temperature.
Rocky’s mum Willow in her mud rug
When it did snow, the horses loved rolling in the snow- it was like a spa day.
Insulation properties of snow- Sarah OliverMoustache definition – Sarah Oliver
Snow is also strangely insulating- the horses all wore snow rugs when they could, and their backs were toasty warm underneath!
Snow rugged pony in North Wales- Jo Ellis’ Rockstar
Snow pony in the Cumbrian fells- Sarah Oliver
Rolling is also a bonding activity I discovered. I took a book down to the field one summer day to sunbathe. I was flat on my back reading and enjoying the damp grass on my sweaty back when all 3 horses came over to join me for a rolling session. That was a pretty cool moment.
Rolling is a bonding activity – my 3 in Delamere
Paddy grew a good enough coat year 2, although he still looked a bit poorer than I would have liked coming into spring. Year 3, a really cold, wet year , he grew the most amazing triple layered pelt and wintered really well.
Environment is key though. Our horses had a field shelter, which they rarely used, but also had really good hawthorn hedges all around the field perimeter, good tree cover in the bottom corner, and most importantly the field had dips and hollows that offered varying natural windbreaks.
Their favourite spot was down in the dip in the bottom corner of the field. Eddisbury Hill formed a high level wind break, the hollow has quite deep sides and is south facing. I used to think they had all escaped as you literally couldn’t see them until you were on top of them, sun bathing down out of the wind.
Sun bathing in the dip in Delamere
Each part of the field served a different purpose. The sandy area near the field shelter was the sand rolling area. The steeper side of the slope below the field shelter was the mud rolling area.
Snoozing in the sand pit
The horses were very particular in their personal grooming routine. They would do a very thorough sand roll every morning after breakfast. The mud roll occurred in the afternoon generally, coating themselves up with extra insulation for the night.
Fluff and mud- super high tech thermal protection – Lyddy Putt’s ponies in North Wales
The Pzrewalski horses in Mongolia coated themselves in mud in the morning to keep the midges away but our field didn’t have good mud in summer. I could always tell when a cold night was due though- they would be coated in mud from eyelash to fetlock.
And the undisputed winner is- Lyddy’s Tawela
They never got rain scald- the twice daily self grooming regime works much better than the human version.
When it rained, they might occasionally hide in the field shelter for a half an hour break if it was really relentless. More often, they would be found grazing down in the dip, or browsing huddled under the hedge. Once there was a lull in the weather, they would charge around a bit to warm themselves up, then get back to the serious business of grazing.
They would graze for a couple of hours, then nap, then have some haylage, roll or groom, then go for a wander around the perimeter and stop for a drink. I used to love to spend the hours watching them just being horses.
So if your horse is “begging” to come in at night, ask yourself
1) have you trained that behaviour (yes obviously) and
2) what is missing from that turnout environment that would make your horse less keen to come in?
Does he have #friendsforagefreedom
Tearing themselves away from the hedgerow for a fuss
Is there enough forage? Enough stimulation?
A place to hide from the sun? A place to shelter? A place to roll? Room to get up some speed and play?
A place to look out over the surrounding area?
Now we are back at livery my 3 wait by the gate at 3pm, expecting to come in.
Before we moved back to livery, they used to wait by the gate of the big field at 6pm for evening feeds. But they weren’t asking to come in. They would eat their dinner, say thank you and then wander off down the field to the water trough and the haylage feeders.
Dinner al fresco
Now they know their new routine – they are coming into a stable for dinner, and the turnout, although lovely, isn’t an environment good enough to support happily living out. They have adapted back to overnight confinement, for now.
But when we find our next dream Nelipot, I’m determined that I’m going to need a school dinner bell to call them down off the big wooded hill 😎😎
Because even happy healthy filthy horses should work occasionally 😜
buy the book- “Bare Hooves and Open Hearts”
If you have enjoyed this blog then please consider buying an author signed paperback copy of my recent book. It contains more of my philosophy on husbandry and training, based on my experience, research and learning. Price includes 2nd class postage to anywhere in Europe. Other regions may cost more- email me and we can always arrange.
With the New Year come resolutions, statements of intent, affirmations, SMART goals, whatever your preference. I’m sure we all share a feeling, around about this turning of the year that it is a time of change and that we can try to focus this for the better.
My statement of positive intent is that this New Year brings in a new energy.
First things first. Rocky went to the physio for assessment on the 2nd and got a very good report. The muscles in his back are no longer in spasm, and appear to have developed a bulk more in keeping with the size of his vertebrae. This is despite him essentially being left to rest, recuperate and just grow for the last three months.
My friends will know that my life has been somewhat changed over the last few months. I decided to give us all a break and go old school with Rocky’s mild kissing spine injury and try a bit of Dr Green and a whole lot of love.
I’ve probably managed to work him in hand one or twice a week since we moved back to livery in mid-November, he’s been out in the field every day and in at night, and we did a course of treatment with the Arc equine. Rocky, me and all the other animals are also learning about energy healing, after what in retrospect has been a tough time emotionally and psychologically.
Rocky looks really good. So the plan now is to do a couple of months in hand, building a back that one could sit on, and then aim to get back on and hopefully get going.
And hopefully we will find that the new year brings in a new energy, and a new positive start.
It’s a funny old thing, life. It is completely possible to keep trudging on from day to day, keep oneself busy, particularly with a demanding job and horses at home, and completely fail to check in with ourselves.
I liken my recent experience to working in the office at dusk; it gradually gets darker and darker, but as long as we can see the screen and keep typing, we don’t realise how much we are actually struggling until a colleague walks in and turns on the light.
Once the fluorescent striplight is on, it throws everything into sharp focus, the seemingly familiar is briefly and strangely illuminated. If we happen to glance up at that moment of unguarded change, we may get a surprising flash of clarity. The pile of boxes in the corner may seem more intrusive than usual, or the mess more disturbing.
And in that moment of stark illumination, we get to choose. We either blink and carry on, ignoring the familiar mess, or we decide that the situation must change. And from that point, if a decision is made to change, then nothing can ever look quite the same again.
And the New Year brings in a new energy.
I have always said that to learn about horses is to learn about life. Horses are first sentient; however their language isn’t one of words but of energy. The power of positive expectation cannot be over estimated
Or busting the myth of the alpha! I’m learning energy work at the moment. The first few sessions with a new teacher, even one infused to the hilt with energetic information, are always about seeking a common language. No matter how connected or enlightened we are, as humans we still need a framework of communication, and that communication can occasionally be clumsy. Sometimes one might drop a complete clanger.
It may occur as an attempt at shorthand, to convey a feeling, or it may reflect confusion stemming from a different understanding of words. My teacher’s clanger today was “the horse trusts you….you are the alpha in the herd.” There we have it, the myth of the alpha!
Now first, let me just clarify; I’m not bitching here. I spoke up at the time and between us, we found a different set of words that conveyed the feeling required in the moment. But it did get me to thinking…..
The myth of the alpha or herd leader is all pervasive. Depending on who you read, it may be the alpha male, the stallion or herd defender, who fights off all comers to protect his harem of mares and pass on his genes. Or it may be the alpha mare, the real herd leader, who makes all the important decisions in the herd, including when to move, when to drink, eat and sleep.
So much training methodology, in equine and canine training, is based on this flawed concept. We are told we have to be the pack leader, to dominate, to demand respect, if we expect to earn obedience or cooperation. The whole Natural Horsemanship movement is based on repackaging this belief in various shiny guru-based guises- “control the feet and you control the horse”, the use of “pressure release”, the “round pen” work and “join up”.
None of this methodology really stands up to scrutiny if your primary aim is a willing partner, either equine or canine. When an animal shows aggressive behaviour, the others will quietly choose to remove themselves from the aggressor’s proximity. When humans use coercive or alpha based training methods, the animal is never given the chance to remove himself from the unpleasant stimulus. Instead, he is subjected to ongoing dominance behaviour with no release or reprieve. What’s natural about that? The round pen work particularly, if you watch carefully, shows stressed horses, running around, demonstrating displacement behaviour not submission. And who wants submission anyway?
Modern cross country training ethos seems to rely on the fact that the horse will be more scared of the consequences of not jumping the fence than he is of jumping the scary fence. How many sales adverts say “never stops”? Personally, if I completely miss at a fence, I would rather my horse save us both rather than turning himself inside out to take off and hopefully get to the other side. I want him to trust me so when things get scary he asks me, are we ok, are we going, what do we need to do, not just to launch himself in desperation.
Training classical dressage, especially, can not be done by force. We are incrementally teaching the horse to experiment with new and different ways of using his body; the reward is that the new muscle usage feels better and so the horse will spontaneously offer it again. This relaxed experimenting on the horse’s part simply cannot occur in a coercive relationship. Classical training, similar to dance, is the very antithesis of the myth of the alpha.
I have spent many hours observing my horses in the field, while doing pooh picking and fencing and other jobs. They are three geldings, a bachelor gang, that have been together now for 5 years, mixed up with various short term visitors. Paddy, the eldest, is 23, Rocky is the youngest at 6. There really is no clear leader among them. They definitely all have different jobs. Paddy is the sentinel- I cannot get within half a mile of them in any situation without him fixing his eyes on me and saying Hi! I have owned him the longest, and the bond is close, but not as close as the bond I have with Cal. Still, it is always Paddy that announces my presence to the herd.
Cal is very controlling about food. He really flexes his muscles and his teeth at meal times; I have always fed him first for ease and safety. This doesn’t necessarily make the others want to hang out with him, and often when he is snoozing, or if I take him out to ride, the other two will spend the Cal free time stuffing themselves at the Haylage feeders. Cal is Irish born and bred, so I guess food has been scarce at some point. That’s resource guarding, it’s not leadership.
Rocky still loves to play, mostly on two hind legs. Cal and Paddy take it in turns to entertain him, and to chastise him when he gets too annoying. No one in particular decides when to move, or when to drink, or when to go for a mosey to the vantage point; those decisions seem to occur organically and any one of the 3 horses can take the lead. When we had a little mare in with the boys, she did move them around a lot, I guess because she liked to prove that she could!
All these observations however are based on horses in captivity. No matter how much we had enriched our field environment, it still had fenced boundaries, Haylage feeders and limited grass when they were allowed on the middle; i.e. rationed resources.
Lucy Rees has studied horses extensively in the wild.
“There’s a lot of fiction written about wild horses” says ethologist Lucy Rees. By that, she means that many books and even scientific studies describe horse behaviour in terms of “dominance hierarchies” – something which has never been observed in horses living under truly natural conditions, but which nevertheless form the basis of many schools of horsemanship… even ones purporting to be “natural”.
Her fascinating series of videos can be accessed for free. They should be required watching for all horse owners and horse lovers.
“In this video series, we meet the Pottoka ponies of the Gredos mountains in Northern Extremadura in Spain. The ponies lead a natural life in over 1000 hectares. The purpose of the project is to study natural horse behaviour and also to keep the mountains clear of shrubs which can start forest fires.
Briefly, where there are adequate resources, and adequate space, there is no dominance behaviour demonstrated. The wild horses live in peaceful, co-operative family groups, and show cooperative bonding behaviour and virtually no aggression. There might be some posturing at breeding time, but there is no true conflict. Humans could learn a lot from horses.
Likewise the seminal study that led to the myth of the alpha wolf, was based on an observational study in the 1940s, performed on wolves in captivity. Mech then published a book on the theory in the 1970s, which he has recently been trying to get withdrawn! A wolf pack in captivity, a bit like our domestic horses, is a group of disparate individuals who have been forcibly grouped together by their human owners, with no family relationship or accounting for personalities, and who are then made to compete for resources which are controlled and rationed by the humans. Funnily enough, the captive wolves fought a lot. The study has been compared to learning about the behaviour of human families by observing people living in refugee camps!
Imagine how much less stressful and more fun life at the office could be if we all worked together for the greater good rather than allowing behaviour that would not be out of place in a small shark tank!
So if we are not to be their alpha animal, what role can we assume? How about being their most trusted human? How about an equal relationship between two different species of animal based on mutual trust and affection? Believe me, these animals know you have two legs. Of course large animals need to understand physical boundaries, for everyone’s safety, but we can set those parameters with energy and intent as well as very simple training- rewarding the behaviours we like and either not rewarding or discouraging the behaviours we don’t like.
Positive reinforcement does not have to involve treats; dogs and horses are first sentient: your approval and love is reward enough. (Although treats do help in the early days when puppies are super distractable.) I’ve never yet had a horse for whom I needed to use treats for simple training tasks. I’ve used food as a distraction e.g. when clipping and trimming, but not as a specific positive reinforcement training aid. I’m not saying I will never need to, but in my current skill set, with my current equines, my timing and marking is best done with verbal praise and a pat or a stroke. Horses are so good at understanding intent, they know when they have done well.
So please do your animals a favour. Look your horse or dog in the eye and try communicating with the smallest possible whispers or signals. Imagine you are in a war zone, or out hunting, and need to communicate with silent gestures and just a thought. Once you start to whisper, they will start to listen more closely. And once you observe them carefully, and try to only praise rather than constantly saying “NO don’t do that”, you will be amazed at how they blossom.
So please, join me in going out and help us all bust the myth of the alpha. The world will be much better for it.
Another useful article with a load of references to boot
Sarah Oliver’s trackie in Cumbria
