KBR Horse Training Information Exercising Body AND Mind

"Open Training" and setting up "Learn-Learn" Situations
Part two

(Dahlia was deathly afraid of headstalls. She would run in a panic if she saw someone approach the round corral simply holding one. This was not a desirable behavior and she needed help, not punishment, to get beyond it. The first step would be to enable her to stand quietly next to the headstall.)

We properly prepare the animal first. If she hasn't learned to longe, we're not going to teach her to stand still if we then have to break into a "how to longe" lesson when she fails her "standing still" test. The alternate choice is too confusing for the association between undesired behavior leading to the alternative task (being sent out to longe) to "stick." Thus the horse needs some very basic, but solid preparation before addressing its behavior problems. With this preparation, most behavior problems can be solved relatively quickly.

We don't get emotional ourselves. We let the horse make a "free" choice. It's not a problem since the horse can probably use the alternate work (we don't call it "punishment") anyway. The horse's "less desirable" choice involves more work than our primary teaching objective. If the handler executes the cue in proper relationship to the horse deciding to "leave" the primary lesson, it will take no time at all for the horse to figure things out.

The reason we set up these sessions in a way that allows the horse to choose is so that the horse will, after some repetition, start trying to make the right choice. The horse learns that it has some responsibility for the outcome of the encounter and most horses will "invest" in the training process if the trainer isn't too aggressive and the horses are allowed to make some decisions.

Does this methodology work? Dahlia, (the example in this feature) was a severely abused horse (e.g., broken neck, broken nose, deep spur scars) who came in with significant emotional problems. In addition to her bridling problem and other bad habits, she would buck riders off. After just a few "Learn-Learn" sessions in the round corral, we saddled her up. I went to mount the horse without any head restraint (prepared to get off if need be) and she started to walk off. I swung back down and before I could gesture for her to go off on a longe, she side passed right back to me as if to apologize and not only did she stand dead calm for me to mount and dismount several times from both sides, we exited the round corral and had a wonderful half hour ride. This behavior modification was achieved without our ever striking the horse.

Leaving Dahlia choices, albeit structured ones, empowered her to take control of her emotions. For a while she still didn't like having a headstall put on and she would swish her tail when first being saddled, but she is no longer dangerous and she progressively became less "negatively reactive" to those things which bothered her.

(Dahlia has since been "adopted" by a retired lady with moderate horse experience who rides her regularly, often bareback.)

These examples are typical of horses who have learned that they can make decisions and have been guided as to how to make the correct decisions. More specific examples as to what we do are listed in the "Training Page" index.