Top 5 ways to train your horse when you don't have time to train your horse!

#1 Come to you in the paddock:
Most clicker trained horses will come running as soon as they see you at the gate. If yours don't already do that and you have to walk out to them, just wander on over until they raise their head and look at you. Stop there. Call them in a friendly, relaxed sort of way. Acknowledge them and any calming signals they might give you by turning your energy down (breathe out, turn sideways, wait). When they take a step towards you, click, and either wait for them to wander over, or just start meandering slowly back to the gate. Feed them when they catch up with you. If they won't approach or they walk away, then a) they need more time to learn to trust you, b) you need to ensure they are truly enjoying the time they spend with you, and c) try high value treats to change their associated emotional response (you = wonderful things) and speed the process along!

​ #2 Self halter:
Haltering is usually the first things we do with our horse each time we interact with them, and it sets the mood. Invite your horse to be part of the process. In other words, don't get all business-like and just walk up and shove it on. If you are in a rush, you can at least pause with the halter around nostril-level and give the horse a chance to put her own nose the rest of the way into it. Ask permission and listen to her answer. Many horses, if invited tactfully, will put their own nose in the halter. This is the point where you might like to reward. (If your horse turns her head away, she is giving you a calming signal. Take a calm slow breath. Acknowledge her and just wait. She’ll come back to you. If she raises her head or otherwise tries to evade the halter, then I'd suggest you need to dedicate a couple of short sessions to training this. Click and reward when your horse brings her nose to touch the halter, and build up to self-haltering (putting her own nose into it when you hold it out). Also, similar to the catching example, examine your relationship and how she might be feeling about the time she spends with you. 

​#4 Good manners for the trimmer/farrier:
If you hold your horses for the trimmer and you are not actively training the entire time, then you're wasting a massive amount of time and opportunity. I had 4 young horses trimmed this morning, and as each horse was having its feet done, I was constantly training. I marked the moments they lifted their foot on the first gentle ask, and when they stretched their foot forward to rest on the hoof stand (and when they kept it there). I was building duration while she was rasping, and I was simultaneously reinforcing park and self-control around the food. If you have young horses (or older horses that are not impeccably behaved for the trimmer), you need to actively train your horse. Don't expect your trimmer to train AND do their feet.
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#5 Mounting block safety:
Acknowledge and reward your horse for lining up and standing still at the mounting block. Take a breath and thank her. (What she is doing here is much more than just a convenience for you; she is allowing you to sit astride her body, so be thankful). Pause for a few breaths on top of the mounting block and reward her for staying parked.
If your horse doesn't stand stock still when you put your foot in the stirrup and remain still until asked to move, please dedicate training time to this. It's VERY dangerous. So don’t take it for granted, and don’t just correct her when she moves - actively reward her for standing calmly.
You can click again when your foot is in the stirrup and you're swinging up, so that by the time your butt lands in the saddle she will be looking for her treat, not going to walk off. Once on board, don't pick up the reins and immediately get going. Take a moment, check your girth, make yourself comfortable, take some deep breaths and connect with her. If your horse tends to take the initiative and start the ride without being asked, make a point of fiddling about before you cue the walk and reward her for waiting patiently during this process.
(​Please don't mount from the ground unless you have to - think of your horse's poor spine).

​So there you go - five ways you can fit more training into your days. Little short sessions are way more effective than long ones anyway.  The horse learns faster that way and it ensures some brain soak time.  And don't worry, when you use positive reinforcement they retain their learning for an exceptionally long time, so even if it's weeks or months before you re-visit that behaviour they'll still be further along than they were before.  I hope that helps - just remember, something is always better than nothing.  

Most of you reading this have handled and/or ridden horses for years, or decades, and thus have spent an equal amount of time TRAINING those same horses. That training is not always deliberate, or conscious.  Whether on the ground or in the saddle, we may well be getting good results, and yet often we still don’t truly know WHY it is working (or not working, as the case may be).   I say “we” because this was me, from when I got my first pony as a child and on right through the next 10 years or so, despite plenty of coaching and relative success in both dressage and show jumping.   I was working on gut feel and instinct, combined with some basic “recipes” given to me by instructors. ​

It doesn't matter at all that I didn't know the proper terms for what it was I was doing, what matters is that it worked.  However, I lacked clarity about why it worked and how I might apply the same principles to different scenarios or different horses or different training problems.  Looking back, it feels like I was operating in a bit of a fog, riding and training quite effectively, but without a conscious understanding of how I was doing it.  After teaching many hundreds of humans to train their horses and dogs, I believe this is the way many (or perhaps most) people are, to some extent.  ​

The thing is, if we don’t have the ability to observe and analyse behaviour, and a clear understanding of how to gain the animal's cooperation to influence that behaviour, then we’re missing out on the real magic. There’s plenty of instructors that can teach you HOW to achieve a certain outcome, just as I can buy a recipe book and bake quite a good cake by following the instructions exactly. But I don't understand the science behind baking. I can't invent a recipe, or substitute important ingredients. I don't know why one recipe calls for 1 tsp bicarb soda and another one calls for 2 tsp of baking powder, and if my scones end up hard as a rock I don't always know what to do differently next time to fix it.

​We can learn specific techniques to fairly reliably get our horse to back up, or go in a “frame” before a dressage test or get him over a jump etc, but it is understanding the WHY of learning that enables our efforts to be more efficient, repeatable, and transferable to other horses and other behaviours. And importantly, this is also what enables us to train ethically and consistently,  with clear communication in both directions, and ultimately giving our horse the best chance of succeeding each step of the way.  And that right there is the foundation of true partnership and trust.

​I want to pass on some tips at this point, in case you feel like you're experiencing a bit of fog yourself, or if you have students or friends who could do with some blue skies and clarity.

1. LEARN. Read books (not "how to" guides, not "horse training books", just books about the science of learning. Don't worry, they're not text books and they make remarkably entertaining reading). If you haven't read Karen Pryor's Don't Shoot the Dog (not actually about dogs, by the way) and Reaching the Animal Mind then start there. There's also lots of information online, including Facebook groups and blogs (there is also, of course, lots of false and inaccurate information online, so always think critically). If you're a New Zealander, join us in our Facebook group for NZ Equine Clicker Trainers. ​
2. PRACTICE. Get out there and experiment. With your own dogs, cats, horses etc, and with other people's. I have been known to visit friends and teach their puppy to play dead or their cat to high five as we drink our coffee. The more individual animals and different species you train, the more fluent your shaping skills will become, the better you will become at applying the principles of good training to different scenarios/personalities/behaviours, and therefore the better trainer you will be. Teaching your dog to fetch you a tissue when you sneeze will make you a better horse trainer. Honestly. For more on the process of how to get started training something new, I've got a blog about that!
3. TEACH. Even if you are a novice trainer, if you have begun to educate yourself I can guarantee that you know more about training than many people you know. Teach a friend how to train their cat to sit on cue. Show your daughter how she can get her pony to smile or follow a cone target. By explaining the concepts to another, you will absorb and integrate and come to understand them better.

What experiences have you had that have caused those "pennies to drop from the heavens"?  Have you got any tips to share on how to help lift the fog and start having more clarity and consciousness around the training that is happening every time we interact with our horses?  Leave a comment below!

'til next time,
xxBex

​We must remember, that as the trainer we are standing in front of the metaphorical mountain, looking up at our goal.  It's a bright sunny day, and we can see the various roads winding their way up.  It is clear to us where we're headed, and we're anticipating our arrival.  The horse, on the other hand, is standing at the bottom in the dark, with  a spotlight shining only a metre or so in front of his hooves.  He can only see far enough to take one step at a time, and has no idea what the end goal is.   It's crucial that we retain our empathy for just how difficult the learner's job actually is, and if we ever find ourselves beginning to think "oh come on! Why don't you just do it! It's obvious what I want you to do!", we should go away and smack our heads against the wall, then come back, apologise to our horse, and train better. 
(If you haven't played the Training Game before, you must try it! It's great fun and it gives you a real insight into what it actually feels like to be an animal being trained).

One more thing ​I’ll just put upfront right now: there are no fixed formulas.  Many people seem to want a recipe - simply complete step 1, then step 2, and you will have x result. But it doesn’t really work like that. Sorry.  Behaviour and training is a study of one (Dr Susan Friedman said that!). Each animal has different skill sets, talents and temperament, as do us trainers, and all these factors (and more) influence the outcome of each session. Bottom line is, there's many roads up the mountain. Treat your barn/arena/paddock as your laboratory - get out there and experiment. But! Do your horse and yourself a favour, and do some thinking and some PLANNING first, before unleashing your fanciful ideas and hopes and wishes upon your unsuspecting equine.

So, having just said above that a "step 1, step 2" approach is not appropriate, I am now going to set out some numbered steps for you to follow.  Ha!  

So you have an idea of something you want to train.  That being the case, here's some questions and prompts you can now ask yourself, so that you are clear and confident on how to get to your end goal.  If you're not clear on how to get there, then how is your poor horse ever going to be successful?  Don't leave him floundering in the dark while you wander around aimlessly.
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1.  What’s the end goal? Be specific!  
You’re not married to every detail, things may change as you go but you should be clear on how you want the behaviour to look when you’re finished.  This clarity is what enables you to make decisions as the shaping session progresses, rewarding one attempt but not another, gently steering the horse in the right direction as you build the picture you want to see. 

Specifics are important!  So don't just say "teach him to bow".  Instead say "bow with left cannon-bone resting on the ground, head lowered, with nose at knee level".  It's a really good idea to google images or video so you can see the different variations and visualise your end result.  To some extent your horse will decide how he wants to do it, and you can be guided by him, but it's best to start out with an idea at least.

​By way of example, below I have put a collection of bow photos (I googled 'horse trick "take a bow"').  This is just a few of the possible variations.  I have sorted them according to my personal preferences.  Look at the top row versus the bottom row - does one look more elegant and the other more effortful or extreme?  It does to me.  This is not a criticism of the trainers in question but simply a matter of style.  In many cases the photographs are a "moment in time" and the horse has probably moved through a variety of different angles and positions on its way into and out of the bow.  I have to admit though, some of these look downright dangerous to me (e.g. the ones where the front plane of the head is lying flat along the ground).   Regardless, you can see how this exercise helps you to build a picture of where you want to end up (and therefore, how you will get there).

​4a. What are his existing skill sets that can contribute?
Depending on the behaviour you're training, useful existing skill sets may include targeting, mats, liberty leading, picking up/holding objects, following a feel on a rope or mirroring your body movements etc. How can we use these to our advantage, to make it easier for our horse to be successful (and therefore make our training more efficient)? 

For example, if I want my horse to retrieve a letter from a letterbox, and he already knows how to pick up and hold an object, we are halfway there before we've even started.   If I want to hold a target near my horses hip and have him perform "carrot stretches" by keeping his nose on the target, I need to find a way to explain that he should keep his feet still and bend his neck around rather than disengage the hindquarters to follow the target as he naturally would want to do.  So I put a mat down and have him stand on that, before presenting the target where I want his nose to be for the stretch.

It is the trainer's responsibility to alter the environment, the props, the surroundings, the training space to ensure success for the horse.  Think creatively and constantly about this.

5. What objects or props do we need?  How shall we set them up?
In this context I am talking about objects ​we might be using as part of the behaviour.  So the letterbox or basketball hoop or pedestal etc.  Before you start training, and throughout the training process, examine how you can set these up to best help the horse.  For example, when I first taught Hokey to fetch a bottle from the chilly bin, I propped the lid up with a towel so he could more easily nudge it open.  I then quickly discovered I needed a way to hold the bottle upright inside the chilly bin, because he can only pick it up from the neck when it's sitting vertically and he often knocked it with his nose before getting a hold on it.  So I sat it in a small bucket wedged between two bricks.  Once we had the set-up working well, the training progress accelerated markedly.