In the photo above, Bridget can FEEL that Boots is relaxed enough for her to carry on with foot care.
Feel is an aspect of horsemanship that sometimes seems elusive, but it doesn’t have to be. It is closely linked with the idea of empathy. Empathy itself is the ability to ‘feel’ what another being is probably feeling.
When dealing with horses, empathy and feel are involved with everything we do. The more we understand about the nature of horses as a prey species that depends on rapid moving away from danger and group life for security, the more empathetic we can be when our horse shows us that he is uncomfortable about something we are asking him to do.
The more we understand that the horse’s digestive system is geared toward a steady flow of low nutrient forage, the better job we can do at providing such forage. We know that to keep the horse comfortable, we must feed the bacteria in the gut in a way that keeps them happy.
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Horse have evolved to reqire a constant supply of low-energy forage to keep their microbiome in good working condition.
Horses have small stomachs and a large caecum where bacteria break down the food so it can be absorbed by the horse. These bacteria need a constant flow of food and do not like sudden changes of diet.
The more we understand how the horse’s circulation system depends on slow, regular walking movement over 24 hours, the less inclined we will be to confine horses in boxes. After all, they are not chocolates.
The horse’s feet compress and expand with each step the horse takes. Foot movements work like four extra pumps to help send blood the very long way up the legs back to the heart.
Horses step along as they graze. The only time they are still is for the few hours that they sleep, which are spread over 24 hours. Consistent movement is an integral part of horse circulation health.
Horses are naturally active on a 24-hour rhythm, not a day/night rhythm like we are. By ‘putting them in at night’ and by ‘feeding them meals’ in one place, we are seriously mucking about with their movement, their blood circulation and their natural biorhythms.
Many horse ‘problems’ stem from unnatural housing and unnatural feeding regimes as well as the damage caused by nailing inflexible steel shoes to a dynamic live foot mechanism.
As we develop empathy and ‘feel’ about what a horse is experiencing in the strange human-based world in which he finds himself, it becomes easier to know what we should do to ensure the horse is as comfortable as possible.
A horse high on adrenalin will find comfort in being allowed to trot or run the adrenalin out of his system. When he becomes high-headed and agitated, a handler with feel gives him the opportunity to move until he can switch from reactive mode to responsive mode.
A strong-spirited, low-energy horse can be extremely frustrating. A handler with feel for this sort of horse will use click&treat motivation as much as possible. Then it is easier to appreciate the reliable nature of this type of horse once he is on-side with the handler rather than trying to outwit him or her.
As soon as we can see our horse, he can see us. As soon as he can see us, he is gauging our energy level. He is ‘feeling’ us. A person with ‘feel’ will be doing the same with the horse – gauging his mood, the way he is moving or grazing, checking for anything out of the ordinary.
As soon as a horse sees us, he is feeling our mood, our energy level and our intent.
When a handler develops ‘feel’ of this sort, s/he is not frustrated by undesirable horse behaviors. S/he seeks the cause(s) and adjusts the horse’s lifestyle plus his Individual Education Program (IEP) to accommodate the horse. This is the essence of a handler’s emotional neutrality.
Horses don’t do things just to annoy us. At any moment in time the horse is doing what he believes is the best thing do.
With careful education, we can enlarge the horse’s comfort zone and areas of expertise. We can expand his repertoire of things he can do with confidence.
It takes considerable time and effort, but done at the horse’s pace, he will gain skills to help him through his whole life.
‘Feel’ comes in many guises. Here are some of them.
Feeling the difference between reaction and response
Realizing that every horse will feel different, and that to the horse, each handler feels different
Knowing the precise moment to release signal pressure (click&treat)
Acknowledging the difference between teaching and forcing
Knowing when we are pushing too much, resulting in a loss of willingness
Knowing when we are pausing too much, resulting in a loss of interest
Recognizing physical well-being, so that lack of wellness stands out
Finding the ‘balance’ between the two extremes of ‘unbalanced’
Able to cause a subtle shift in the horse so he regains balance
Staying grounded when the horse loses his physical, mental and/or emotional balance
Able to pause for lesson absorption or for a shift in balance
Able to ignore unwanted behavior and quietly ‘re-set’ a task
Understanding a specific horse’s underlying character type
Recognizing when the horse is ready to move on to the next slice of the new learning
Recognizing when the horse-human connection is present and when it is absent
Not taking the horse’s trust for granted
Understanding the lives of horses in the wild; their natural 24 hour and seasonal rhythms
Understanding physical, mental and emotional thresholds of a specific horse
Understanding how habituation works
Understanding how desensitization works
Understanding how sensitization works
Physical feel through the rope
Physical feel through the reins
Physical and emotional feel through the whole body when riding
Feel for two-way communication playing at liberty. If the horse decides to leave, knowing how to motivate him to join up again or deciding to call it a day
Knowing when to stop a session, or a part within the session
Understanding that the way the handler feels is instantly picked up by the horse, good feelings and bad feelings equally.
Clicker training teaches both the handler and the horse important things.
The horse learns that the click means ‘Yes’ that’s right. That’s what I’m asking you to do.
Here I used click&treat to show Boots that what I want is for her to halt with her back feet in the square of squashed bottles.
2. The handler learns to look for and click&treat the slightest try in the direction of the desired behavior.
When first teaching about mats, we click&treat the slightest interest in the mat, even looking at it or approaching it or sniffing the edge of it.
Clicker training allows us to shape* behavior by ensuring that the horse can be continually successful. We do this by putting the following points into place.
[Terms with an asterisk (*) are further explained in the GLOSSARY section. The link to this is at the tip of the page.]
We start with an end goal clear in our mind.
We note what the horse is able to offer already.
We work toward our goal through a series of ‘successive approximations’* which in plain English means gradual tiny changes toward our end goal.
Each tiny change becomes the horse’s decision. He then ‘owns’ that change because he understands that he made a good choice because it earned him a click&treat.
Unwanted behavior is ignored or re-directed. If we feel unsafe, we return to having a barrier between us and the horse.
If the horse’s behavior makes us feel unsafe or frustrated, it is essential to go back to the place in our training where both horse and handler feel confident and comfortable. Then work forward again from there. If we feel unsafe or annoyed, the horse will pick up our feeling and also feel unsafe and want to leave (if he is in anxious mode) or take over (if he is in confident mode).
It is important to thin-slice* end goals into the tiniest clickable moves that we can think of. It helps a great deal to create a written ‘Individual Education Program’ (IEP)* for each horse. We make revisions as we go along and learn via the feedback from each interaction with the horse. A written plan allows us to look back and review how well (or not) a particular horse responded to each slice of our Program. Being able to look back gives us more feedback so we can adjust the Individual Education Program (IEP).
As a thin-slicing example, let’s look at Pool Noodle Task we did for Horse Agility
The various ‘slices’ of this task build the horse’s confidence to walk through an overlapping horizontal pool noodle arrangement, so the horse is comfortable pushing through them with his chest. Each slice* could take a minute or a day, week, month of short, fun sessions. How long each ‘slice’ takes depends on many factors.
We know we can move on when the horse tells us, through his body language, that he is OK with each slice. Boots is already familiar with this sort of work because she was taught to pull a cart using positive reinforcement. A horse new to these concepts will probably need multiple short sessions for each slice*.
SLICES:The video that follows illustrates the slices* for this task.
1. Investigate the pool noodle (PN) in her own time with nose and feet.
2. Comfortable with PN rubbed all over her body, both sides.
3. Confidently pushes her chest into the PN, held by the handler, as they walk along together.
4. Confidently walks over the PN on the ground.
5. Confidently walks over the PN between the gap created by the uprights for the eventual task set-up of the pool noodles.
6. Confidently walks through the gap with one PN in place at chest height — in both directions.
7. Confidently walks through two PNs in place (slightly overlapping).
8. Waits when asked, while handler walks through the PN, then follows on request.
9. As 8, at liberty.
10. Add more pairs of PN, one at a time, until we have 5 pairs.
11. Trot through.
Every change we make is relevant to the horse. If we change something, we have changed a parameter*, and need to be aware of how the horse might perceive the change. A parameter is something we keep constant during our interactions with the horse. It becomes a condition or action that the horse can depend on because it stays the same. When we change a parameter, we have to carefully teach the horse what the change means.
Number 8 in the Blog Contents List goes into more detail about parameters.
The parameter here is that when I stand doing nothing, looking nowhere and with my hands crossed across my belly, the horse is required to stand quietly, and hopefully relaxed, waiting for the click – this is DURATION at the halt..
That parameter can be changed/extended to include when I’m in a sitting position.
It’s hard for us to understand how much better horses hear than we do. Our sounds or words easily become signals if we use them consistently. Sounds can also become environmental signals the horse adopts according to the routines of his captivity.
house door opening if the horse lives near the handler’s house
person’s car arriving at the paddock (with special feed, treats or anticipated adventures)
rattle of food buckets or pellets in a tin
whistle to recall for a treat or a feed
When we use Clicker Training, we refine this response to sound when we use a click or other unique sound to mark the precise response we want.
Horse ears have ten muscles each, which means they can move their ears almost 180 degrees. The shape of the ear allows horses to capture more sound, and from further away, than our ears. On top of that, horses can pick up sounds at higher and lower frequencies than we can.
The shape and mobility of the two ears allows accurate gauging of the direction of a sound. Sound and vision are obviously linked, but sound serves better when vision is restricted. Due to the horse’s ecosystem role as a prey animal, he is wired to notice any sound, especially sneaky, sudden, or unusual sounds.
Horses have strong emotional responses to sounds. Anxious type horses will find the sounds and tense atmosphere of shows and events over-stimulating and problematic. It helps to gradually habituate them to this sort of environment rather than depend on flooding (overstimulation until the horse ‘shuts down’) to get a horse more able to cope with noisy, unfamiliar surroundings.
Ears, it seems, can give us a large range of signals, ranging from curiosity, acceptance, concentration, irritation, fear, dominance and submission. All we have to do is work out which is which – and when – for each horse in our life!
It seems that horses also pick up vibrations from the ground through their feet or through their whiskers and teeth while grazing. No doubt this relates to the ‘early warning’ horses and other animals can give us about earthquakes and other catastrophes. It might also be why they are waiting at the gate before they can see our car. But that could also be a function of their hearing.
Ear postions might be categorized as:
Alert — forward, scanning in observant or anxious mode.
Alert ears. Probably she is watching for someone to appear with treats to entertain her.
Curious/Interested — forward with head movement up or down to focus the eyes.
Because the lens in the horse’s eye does not adjust like ours, horses have to lower and raise their head to get a good focus on an object – like a person wearing bifocal or trifocal glasses.
Attentive — total focus on what she is doing.
She is extremely focussed on the task. It has her full attention.
Back/Sideways – Tension or Anxious — only the context of the situation and the rest of the horse’s body language can tell us if the ears are back due to anxiety (very stiff), or back/to the side because the horse is strongly focusing on a task, causing natural tension (not as stiff). See also, ‘Working Ears’ below.
Ears are sideways and lower lip is a little bit tight, so Boots is putting a lot of concentration into this task which she is just learning. There is some tension, but the rest of her body language does not, which suggests that she is in focus mode, rather than anxious.
Back/Sideways – Floppy — a chilled out, resting, or casually moseying along horse often has the ears half back in a relaxed state.
Smoky is dozing beside a favorite person. His eyes are partly closed and his lower lip is floppy. His ears would be soft for the ear-bending testdescribed below.
Pinned — truly pinned ears are a very strong signal that all is not well, and other action will follow if things don’t change immediately. Some horses lay their ears almost flat when they are strongly focusing on a complex task.This can be more like a ‘frown’ of concentration and we must be careful not to presume the ears are pinned and take evasive/inhibitory action that will confuse the horse who was just busy thinking his way through a problem.
Truly pinned ears. Boots is giving Smoky a clear message that his presence near the treats is not wanted. Her next move, if there wasn’t a fence between them, would be to lunge at him.
We should always give the horse the benefit of any doubt and read the overall situation and body language rather than just the ears. Truly pinned ears are unmistakable, once seen. They are usually accompanied by a very angry face overall and are often followed by snaky-neck movement toward the cause of annoyance, lunging at the intruder, or wheeling around ready to a kick.
Working Ears: Back or Sideways, – Focused/Thinking — horses often put their ears to the back or side when they are in ‘thinking mode’.
We often see these sorts of ear positions in horses doing their ‘job’ of the moment; e.g., cutting horses, calf-roping horses, dressage horses, horses doing an agility course or a gymnastic routine.
Because they are carrying out a learned pattern in a known environment, their mind is focused on the task at hand and the precise signals coming from their handler. Their ears often resemble the ears of a dog working sheep. Back and full of concentration on the job.
Such ears may resemble that of an irritated or disgruntled horse, but if the horse is doing his ‘job’ and his overall tension and body expression suggest that he is focused, we are probably seeing his personal ‘working’ expression.
Often, as soon as the horse has finished a part of his ‘job’, the ears pop forward before the next obstacle or cow or whatever.
It’s helpful to watch video clips focusing just on the horse’s ears. Usually they are constantly in motion and give us an insight into what may be going on in the horse’s mind. Obviously, we can never be sure, but we can get an idea.
The Ear Test:
The Ear Test: how easily we can bend the tip of the ear is a good indicator of the horse’s overall tension or relaxation.
If we can easily bend the tip of the ear, the horse is generally relaxed. If the ear is too stiff to bend easily, it tells us that the horse has tension in his whole body and lacks confidence or is anxious at the moment.
Each horse’s ear expressions will follow the same general pattern, but at the same time be unique, so we should be careful about generalizing too much between horses.
Ear Expression Summary Chart
More about ears
A. Ear differences between mares and geldings/stallions.
It’s interesting to study the ear differences between mares and geldings or stallions.
I watched YouTube clips of the Pignon brothers Frederic and Jean-Francois. Frederic and his wife, Magali Delgado, were the original stars of Cavalia (2003-2009).
Below is the link if you would like to watch Frederic playing with three of his young stallions. It is interesting to note the way they respond to Frederic’s energy levels. He uses a body extension to help communicate with the horses.
I didn’t know they were mares when I first watched, but their behavior was so different from that of Frederic’s stallions, I presumed they were mares. The message was in the ears.
The mares were constantly using their ears to maintain their individual bubbles while performing their routines which often had them very close together.
Mares in a natural herd situation determine much of the social structure of their group. Social order within a group needs a ready language with all sorts of nuances. Mare’s ears have these nuances.
Mares’ job of giving birth and caring for their foals means that they need to cultivate detailed knowledge of their environment when they live in the wild.
Best grazing spots
Safe water
The nature and habits of the local predators
Health of the herd stallion
Bachelor groups in the vicinity
Intrinsic awareness of their present rank in the group of mares
Horses give way to horses above them in rank, and they expect horses lower in rank to give way to them, just like people do in many situations. Mares need to keep track of many things.
Mares have a full complement of hormones and hormonal cycles. In wild herds, their position in the herd is closely linked with survival of themselves and their offspring during the annual hard times of summer drought and winter cold and snow.
We often like to romanticize wild horses, but there is not much romantic about a life lived in the environmental margins of the deserts, plains and mountains where they manage to survive.
Having had mares and geldings, I have found a distinct difference. All other things being equal (which they never are) mares tend to be more independent-minded, geldings more easy-going. That’s a generalization, but it’s not a coincidence that Cavalia uses only geldings and stallions for their shows.
The detail about how a specific horse uses his ears will also relate to the innate character type of the horse.
We can never put horses into labelled pigeonholes, but often it is helpful to describe what we see and create categories so we can communicate our descriptions to each other more easily.
One way of categorizing horse character types is to look at their tendency to move their feet. A strong need to move suggests an extroverted character type. Less tendency to move suggest a more introverted character.
Another way of looking at horse character types is to note whether the horse is innately bold and curious or if he tends to stay out of the limelight and easily becomes anxious.
Quite likely, an extroverted bold horse will want to know where the party is and get going with it. He’ll often show forward, inquisitive ears. If the handler is not providing fun, he is inclined to create fun for himself.
An extroverted but anxious type of horse, who tends to weigh up the cost/benefit of every situation, may have ears moving through many expressions.
An introverted bold, imaginative horse is usually most interested in the next blade of available grass. He sees little reason to move if his life is not in danger. He is strongly committed to his own ideas. He will learn things readily enough if we make it worth his while.
Such a horse tends to love food reward reinforcement and easily becomes a Clicker Training star. Once he learns something, he likes to make it his idea. He then tries hard to ‘get it right’. His focus during training may often include ears lying back or sideways as he thinks his way through a puzzle we’ve given him.
An introverted anxious type of horse may have active ears regularly checking out all points of the compass. He may appear externally ‘quiet’ but is heaving with emotions inside. Horses like this are more suddenly ‘explode’ with an inexperienced handler, so it is important to identify them and keep a close eye on where they are in relation to the edge of their comfort zone in a specific context.
These are generalizations but generalizations can help give us an overview. Ears are obviously highly personalized for each horse. In new situations horses behave differently than they do at home, just as we do.
What I want to highlight is that it is easy to simplify how ears should look on a ‘happy horse’ when we really have little idea of what is going on in the horse’s mind and being expressed in his ears.
We should always read ears in the context of the rest of the horse’s body and the specific context of the moment.
A horse in an enclosed space with little stimulation will have different ear expressions than the same horse out and about with a wide view of things going on all around him.
The main tool we have, to communicate with our horse, is our body language. We instinctively respond to the body language of other people because, like horses, we live in groups. But because people talk so much, we have become less aware of the effect of body language.
Our awareness is still there, but it’s mostly subconscious. We may reflect on how an interaction with a specific person left us feeling good or not so good. Or we may get a ‘gut feeling’ about a person on first meeting. In these situations, we are tuning in to our instinctive understanding of human body language.
All species that live in groups need to be able to ‘read’ each other’s body language because the resources of the environment are finite and need to be used by all members of the group.
To prevent energy wastage by constant bickering or fighting within the group, animals that live together have invariably developed sophisticated body language communication.
With time and consistency, horses can get highly skilled at interpreting our body language.
In human terms, think of posture and intent:
Shoulders back versus slouched/slumped.
Head high and eyes focused versus head bowed/downcast.
Meeting someone’s eye rather than avoiding it.
Standing firm rather than moving away.
Striding purposefully rather than reluctantly.
Chest expanded rather than shrunken/subdued.
Handshake firm rather than limp or aggressive.
Offer handshake rather than wait for the offer.
Approach assertively rather than timidly.
Unsmiling to passer-by versus smiling at passer-by.
Ignore group member versus acknowledging him/her.
Determined versus dubious.
Confidently neutral versus jittery or nervous.
When a teacher and a class of students meet for the first time, the students have the teacher sized up in the first few seconds of visual contact. Horses are the same. As well as visual signs, people (and horses) give off an aura of energy that spells confidence, timidity, or anxiety.
Interestingly, with a few adjustments, the body language we already instinctively know and acknowledge in other people can be transferred to our interactions with other group animals such as dogs and horses. On the other hand, it doesn’t transfer nearly as much to solitary-living animals such as cats and bears.
This is a ‘relaxation’ or ‘no intent’ body language posture. Energy drained out of body, hands crossed over treat pouch, looking nowhere. Boots has learned that this posture means we are having a ‘rest’ and nothing is expected of her at this moment.
Body language postures are similar whether we consider people, dogs or horses. A horse willing to touch our outstretched hand with his nose is willingly ‘shaking hands’. A dog who rolls over and exposes his belly is volunteering a very timid handshake.
This foal is learning to greet a person. We hold our hand near the horse and must be sure to let the horse close the last inch of space to initiate the contact.
Here is a small horse experiment that could be illuminating. It may be interesting to use with your horses or a horse you are thinking of buying.
Stand in a roomy area or paddock where the horse can see you. Stand very quietly with a slumped and despondent posture. Wait. Observe what your horse does (casually, don’t stare at him).
While the horse is minding his own business in a roomy area, make your body language large and assertive (not aggressive), focus on him strongly and walk briskly toward his shoulder in a straight line. What happens?
Some people may, without realizing it at first, slip from assertive to aggressive. As with horses and dogs, human aggression often arises from fear and is a defense mechanism. This is important to remember when we are around horses.
What looks to us like aggressive, intimidating horse behavior is often grounded in fear if the horse is contained with ropes or in a small pen. A horse’s only way of regaining a feeling of safety is to move himself away as far as he needs to go. When we restrict his ability to move away, his remaining options are limited.
Some people (and some horses) are naturally on the timid end of a ‘timid-bold continuum’. A person may want to learn to be confident with their horse, but quickly slips from confidence to nervousness. This creates a problem for the horse when he is relying on the person’s clear communication, and it is suddenly fuzzy and incomprehensible to him.
The strength of the relationship we build with a horse depends on how clearly we can present ourselves to the horse as another being who is confident, trustworthy and fair.
Our body language is intimately linked with our emotions. The more we can lay aside emotional responses, especially stress-related and negative emotional responses, the more we can be ‘in the moment’ with our horse. The more we are ‘in the moment’, the more open we are to noticing the signals the horse is sending us.
The more we can be open to his signals, the better we can ‘stay with the horse’ and give him time to work out how he can earn his next click&treat.
If we are totally focused on our own agenda, it is hard to also be mindful of the horse’s signals and take them on board so that we can quickly act in the most appropriate way.
The more negative emotion a horse feels from the handler, the harder it is for the horse to focus on what we are asking. He will either withdraw into himself or seek to escape by looking away and moving his feet away as far as a rope or fence allows.
Emotional neutrality relates to the ‘aura of energy’ mentioned earlier. A horse can pick up our pleasure and joy when he does something well. He equally picks up every hint of frustration or annoyance. By the time we recognize we are annoyed or angry, the horse will have withdrawn from accepting our communication at that moment.
It takes a long time to build the trust of a prey animal wired for flight. A moment of aggression can erase a lot of trust. If the horse is contained with rope, reins or small enclosed spaces, he perceives human aggression as a threat to his life.
Horses don’t have a concept of ‘punishment’. In the wild, a horse always has the option to move away from assertive or aggressive behavior by herd mates. We must never forget that they are prey animals and their key defense is flight. We must accept that nothing a horse does is ever a personal affront to us. What a horse does at any one moment is what he feels he needs to do because he is a horse.
Body orientation, Gestures, Touch, Voice, Intent are all things we an refine to make it easier for the horse to understand our requests.
The lens of a horse eye is not able to change shape as easily as the lens of a human eye. Horse vision more resembles looking through a trifocal lens. A trifocal lens supports distance focus in one part of the lens, mid-distance focus in another part and close-up focus in a third part.
This explains why horses need to do so much positioning of their heads to see clearly. They need to raise their head high for clearer distance vision and drop it down low to get a better view of something closer.
Horses need to lower their head to see things up close clearly. Long hair obstructing the eyes does’t help.
Forcing a horse to keep his nose vertical with the ground restricts his visual field a great deal. It is easy to try this yourself. Stand with your head up and note your field of vision. Then drop your head so your nose points to the ground. Note your field of vision now.
For a prey animal who depends on early detection of danger and a flight response for survival, restricting the field of vision by requiring (or forcing) vertical flexion can cause a lot of mental anxiety and related damaging muscle tension all over the body.
Being set either side of a large head, horse eyes work more independently than human eyes. The positioning of the eyes limits the horse’s binocular vision (being able to focus on something in front with both eyes) to a triangular area in front.
The shape of his nose causes a blind spot that extends about three feet directly in front when his head is straight, so his field of binocular vision is beyond that. So if we are standing directly in front of the horse within three feet, he is not able to see us or any signals we may give. But he can smell us and be aware of our energy level.
As well as his zone of binocular vision straight ahead, the horse can see almost 180 degrees beside and behind with each eye, similar to a person using rear-view mirrors on a car or bike.
Eyes set well into the side of the head allow rear view vision at almost 180 degrees. This peripheral vision is highly tuned to movement. A startle response due to a sudden movement from behind is an adaptation to get a head start on any predator emerging suddenly.In this view, Boots is able to see me on the right side of her body with her left eye.
This side or peripheral vision is not as exact as binocular vision, but it is excellent at picking up motion. That is why horses often jump away sideways first if something moving to the side or behind startles them, then they rapidly sprint away before turning to assess the situation. How far the horse moves depends on the intensity of the adrenalin rush.
When the horse is strongly focused forward using his binocular vision, his mind is busy with that and not linked to his peripheral vision. This helps explain why we need to be careful approaching a horse from the side or the back, as he can be genuinely startled by movement behind, if his full attention was on something in front of him.
It also seems that horses can doze with their eyes open. If you come across a horse looking very relaxed, with low head, floppy bottom lip, relaxed ears and a cocked hip, he may be too asleep to notice a quiet approach even though his eyes are open. It always pays to give a warning ‘nicker’ or say something while approaching the horse.
With their extremely large eyes, horses have excellent night vision as long as there is some environmental light. I can vouch for this, having once been caught on the far side of a hydro river, when water was unexpectedly released into the river from the dam upstream during a sunset ride. We had to ride in serious darkness on an unknown track to reach the dam and cross over to our home side.
Horse eyes take longer than our eyes to adjust from light to dark or dark to light. It’s important to remember this when we move a horse from a dark building into bright sunlight or from sunlight into a dark arena, stall, truck or trailer. We should allow him to stand with his head in the entrance while his vision adjusts.
As mentioned, horses have a triangular blind spot that reaches about a meter in front of their nose. That is why they need to lower their head as they approach an object closely to inspect it. You can simulate what it is like, to have a long nose like a horse, by putting your hands in place as in the photo below. Note how it affects your ability to see right in front of your nose.
Colette demonstrates how to place your hands to imitate a horse’s long nose to let you see why horses have a blind spot when they are looking straight ahead. If you spread your fingers wider in this position, the blind spot gets bigger.
They also have a blind spot right behind their tail if their head is straight as well as under their belly when walking across things.
Horses have a blind spot directly behind if their neck is straight.
If we are experimenting to find the best position to give our horses a visual signal, it pays to be aware of their blind spots as well as how their vision differs from ours.
A horse’s small range of close-up binocular vision makes depth perception for stepping into or onto unusual surfaces tricky. They again need to raise and lower their head to compare the object of interest with things they have seen before.
This comparison of the look of ‘new things’ with things already in the horse’s memory, helps explain why horses are so sensitive to anything which has been changed – anything added or subtracted to what was there the last time they passed by.
Their limited depth perception explains why horses are often reluctant to step into a puddle. The reflected light and the ‘unknown’ surface’ under the water are both problematic. Dangerous footing compromises a horse’s ability to flee if the need arises.
Horses need to lower their head to investigate unsure surfaces visually.Often they also paw to check the stability of what lies underneath.
The horse eye has a ‘visual streak’ in the retina (sensory screen at the back of the eye) which is the area of most accurate vision. As mentioned earlier, horses must move their heads in order to bring the item of interest into the range of this ‘visual streak’ to improve the depth perception and detail of the image.
If the horse’s head is restricted by tight ropes or reins, his ability to see clearly is compromised. Not surprisingly, such restrictions cause tension that affects the whole body.
Horse eyes appear to magnify objects more than our eyes (maybe up to 50%). The acuity (sharpness) of what they see is less than 20/20 human vision but seems to be better than that of dog and cat vision.
The way horse vision works helps explain why it is so important to teach everything we do on both sides of the horse. A horse that is only handled from the left side will suffer from ‘right eye neglect’. Handling procedures will be ‘strange’ to his mind on the right side because the neglect means no nerve pathways have formed to build his confidence with handling on the right side.
This links to all aspects of training and handling. Like us, horses are naturally either left or right-handed. In other words, like us, their bodies are asymmetrical.
Unless both sides of the horse’s body are coached gymnastically, it is hard for the horse to be straight in his body. Which means a saddle will always be misaligned to some extent. A symmetrical saddle on an asymmetrical horse is a perennial problem for riders and painful for horses.
When teaching a new movement, the less agile side of the body needs at least two or three times more attention than the agile side of the body. Think about how hard it is to brush your teeth with your non-dominant hand.
Horses living within sight of their owner’s house use the lights coming on during a winter morning as a signal that their morning feed is not far away. Part of the year I provided hay in the late evening. The headlamp I wore was a visual signal the horses used to meet me at the shelter.
During groundwork our body language and gestures are visual signals. If we are approaching from behind, the horse is usually able to see us by turning his head.
When my horse’s companion, a large white gelding, went to live elsewhere, her attention was often riveted on a white Charolaise cow in a distant paddock as she tried to figure out whether that was her old paddock mate.
My thoroughbred mare, Gypsy, was super conscious of anything on the distant horizon. A rabbit hunter toting a rifle, so far away that I could barely see him, caught her immediate attention.
Horses are genetically wired to pay close attention to anything which looks different to how it looked before, or if something appears that wasn’t there before.
Because their eyes are not the same as ours, it is important to be aware of the following situations.
Depending on the shape of the horse’s belly, there is also a blind spot under his hind legs and under his belly. If we ask a horse to back over a rail, he can’t actually see the rail at the time, but is working from memory or feel. Just because we can see it doesn’t mean the horse can see it.
When we approach the horse from the front, it is best to be a little bit off-centre, so we are not in his front blind spot.
If the horse is focused on something ahead in his area of binocular vision, his mind is not engaged with his peripheral vision. This means that something suddenly moving behind him can result in a startle response, often called ‘spooking’. As mentioned earlier, peripheral vision picks up movement rather than detail, so the horse will move first, then turn and inspect the cause of the spook. How far he moves before turning depends on the amount of adenalin shock he experienced.
If the horse is strongly focussed on distance vision, with a raised head and a concentrated look, his peripheral vision is ‘off’, so sudden movement from behind will cause him to spook. Spooking is a highly effective method for escaping from predators.
If we are doing groundwork behind the horse, we need to move between his right and left peripheral vision and teach him to adjust his head so he learns to confidently keep us in view as we move left and right into and out of his blind spot.
Playing the peek-a-boo game from behind. In this photo Boots can see me standing behind with her left eye.
In this photo I have moved to her right, so she is watching me out of her right eye.
I’ve moved back to the left and she tracks me with her left eye. It’s fun to play this peek-a-boo game when the horse has front feet on a pedestal.
When we begin long-reining, it’s a good idea to play a peek-a-boo game from behind, while the horse is stationed on a mat or pedestal, and make sure he is comfortable turning his head to track your movement.
When horses negotiate a jump, the jump disappears from their vision as they approach it, so they are jumping from their memory of where the jump was. If the horse was paying attention to something else on the approach to the jump, he will run right into it without realizing it is there. You see this sometimes at jumping competitions.
When jumping or stepping over rails, the obstalce disappears from the horse’s vision and they work from memory of where it was.
Riding – Visual Signals Mosty Disappear
When we move from groundwork to riding, the visual signals the horse has learned suddenly disappear. We need to teach the relevant replacement touch and verbal signals we will use during riding from the ground first. In this way, we make it easier for the horse to navigate the change to riding.
Once mounted, we need to carefully re-teach the replacement touch signals by at first pairing them with the voice and visual signals the horse already understands from his groundwork.
If touch and voice signals are clearly taught with groundwork, the switch to riding can simply be part of a systematic progression rather than a major change.
When we mount up, the visual cues and signals we use on the ground suddenly disappear. We have to carefully transfer these to voice and touch signals to make the transition smoother.
In the photo above, one horse is within his comfort zone checking out the tarp. The new horse standing behind is unsure about what is going on. In this situation, the confident horse is helping to build the new horse’s confidence, which is a great way to proceed.
Beginnings are Hard
When we begin doing new things, it takes time and effort to get the feel of what we are doing. Getting this ‘feel’ for a new activity doesn’t happen in ten minutes. Same for horses.
Doing something new takes us out of our comfort zone. We know when we are out of our comfort zone because our heart rate and breathing speed up. We may sweat more and have feelings of un-ease, often beginning in our gut or stomach. Same for horses.
It’s important to recognise how we feel when we are out of our comfort zone, as well as how we feel when we are back in our comfort zone. And we need to recognize when our horse is out of his/her comfort zone.
Only desire, effort and application can make a comfort zone larger. Learning and education are all about expanding comfort zones.
Obviously, both the handler and the horse have comfort zones. If both parties are out of their comfort zones, it may not be a good horse day. So it’s important that when the handler is out of his or her comfort zone, the horse is in his comfort zone.
When we take the horse out of his comfort zone, we ideally want to remain in our own comfort zone so we can maintain our emotional neutrality. By understanding our own and our horse’s comfort zones, we’ll have more good horse days, until every day is a good horse day. (The bold items are in the Glossary page.)
For a horse at a particular time, ‘comfort’ can mean the freedom to move and run, using up adrenalin and enlarging his personal space.
At another time, the same horse may find ‘comfort’ in a quiet, restful state.
As the handler gets to understand the edges of a horse’s comfort zone, it becomes easier and easier to thin-slice tasks to suit that particular horse.
The diagram below has six arrows that illustrate the six situations that a person or horse will come across.
The inner circle with the smooth boundary is the existing comfort zone. We can call the boundary of this circle ‘Edge One’ because it is a threshold that determines our behavior, or the horse’s behavior.
To expand our comfort zone, we have to move out toward the wiggly, broken line. Out there is the world with all kinds of thresholds that challenge us. We can call the broken line ‘Edge Two’.
The numbered arrows following the diagram refer to the six situations that will arise whenever a person or a horse is faced with expanding their comfort zone.
Comfort Zones: All of us, horse or human, have a ‘comfort zone’ within which our heart rate is normal and we can allow ourselves to relax. Expanding a comfort zone takes active intent. The six numbers are explained below.
Lacking confidence to leave the comfort zone.
Can leave the comfort zone for a bit, but then has to hurry back.
Able to leave the comfort zone for longer before going back.
No longer needs to retreat to the former comfort zone. The comfort zone has expanded.
Starting to feel comfortable well beyond the old ‘Edge One’ threshold.
I can do this now. What is the next challenge? I’m ready to set a new ‘Edge Two’. ‘Edge One’ has moved out to encompass the original ‘Edge Two’. The comfort zone has expanded.
If we push ourselves, or our horse, toward ‘Edge Two’ too quickly or too soon, we, or the horse, will feel worried, anxious or fearful.
We will ‘run away’ in our mind and make up reasons to avoid going ‘out there’ again. The horse will indicate that he’d like to leave the situation or he will ‘shut down’. Either one means he has given up trying to understand what we’d like him to do.
This avoidance response is the brain’s way of keeping us safe. It’s a useful instinct in some situations, but in today’s human world, and with horses forced to live in captivity, we have to both find ways of successfully expanding our comfort zones.
As we learn to recognize where we and the horse are in relation to our comfort zones for any given situation, we will be able to take more control of where we are, in relation to where we want to be.
Safety is always the first priority. The horse has to learn how to respond appropriately to a variety of human pressures. The handler has to know how to influence the horse to keep everyone safe when a stressful situation occurs.
A stressful situation can arise in a split second. It helps a great deal if the horse has faith in us and if we know how the horse will probably respond when his adrenalin is up, so we can take pro-active measures.
With careful positive reinforcement training, stressful situations will become less common.
Boots is temporarily distracted out of her comfort zone as Smoky gallops around the paddock next door. Bridget waited quietly until the excitement was over, then carried on with trailer-loading skills.
Horses are incredibly sensitive to body language because it is the language they use with each other. They are also highly aware of the body language of predators so they know if predators are in hunting mode or not. When our horse gets to know us well, and we are reliably clear and consistent, small changes in our body language can become a significant part of messaging with our horse.
Moving from A to B, the horse follows along or moves with us.
When riding, the rhythm of our body in tune with the gait we are in, and our rhythm changes when we ask for a change of gait.
Facing the horse in front, we can draw him toward us by stepping backwards.
Facing the horse in front, we can ask him to back up by stepping toward him.
Facing the horse’s ribs, allows us to ask him to move past us or in a circle around us.
My body orientation is a large part of the signal that lets Boots know that I’d like her to move over the rails and continue in a circle while I pivot on the spot.
Specific Orientation – the alignment of our body axis in relation to the horse is a major part of the signal when we ask for:
Turning right or left
Weave pattern
Figure 8 pattern
S-bends, L-bends, U-bends, zigzag-bends
Hindquarter yields
Forequarter yields
Backing up with counter-turns (as in backing a square)
Standing on a mounting block as a signal for the horse to line itself up for mounting.
By shifting my body axis away from the horse, she knows we are turning right and no pressure on the halter is needed.
‘Walk on’ with finger tap behind withers or on butt.
We use body orientation and touch signals for foot care. Also often a voice signal.
Body Extension Touch: This involves all the things we have in our hand, or things we put on the horse. It might include:
grooming
cleaning and trimming feet
head gear put on/off
ropes all over body
saddles or harness on/off
guiding touch with a body extension, as for long-reining.
When we start using gear on our horses, we must remember how sensitive they are to touch.
Riding Touch:
Since horses are extremely touch-sensitive they feel every shift of weight and position. As long as we don’t desensitize the horse to touch signals by nagging, inconsistency, or rudeness, the horse learns to respond to the smallest of touch and weight placement variations.
poll pressure to walk forward when leading, although this can be replaced easily by using clear body language (breathe in, gesture with arm and step off with outside leg – easier for horse to see).
light nose pressure to halt, back-up (refined with voice signals)
light nose pressure for change of direction
light nose pressure for downward transitions, halt, back up
light nosepressure to ask for bend.
halter vibration to back-up.
A very light jiggle on the rope is one of our signals for backing up.By using props such as this, it makes sense for the horse to back up, making it easy to teach. The rope touch signal can then easily be morphed into gesture, body orientation and voice signals.
When I want to park the horse with ground-tying, I have first taught verbal ‘whoa’ and ‘wait’ voice signals to a high standard.
Before we deliver the treat, we have used a click (tongue click or mechanical clicker) or a special sound/word to let the horse know what he did at that moment, is what will earn a treat.
breath in = raising body energy to prepare to ask for more movement
breath out = dropping body energy to prepare for slowing down
large sigh to encourage relaxation
relaxed posture during dwell or relaxation time between requests
This relaxed posture during ‘dwell time’ I learned from Alex Kurland. Shoulders relaxed, looking nowhere, facing away from the horse, hands quiet on belly. I’m also slowing my breathing and therefore my heart rate. Horses are incredibly tuned in to the body language of people they know well and who act consistently. They are also instantly aware of emotions. Body language is the key language between horses.
This links very closely with our breathing and body energy. Again, horses are incredibly perceptive. The more consistent our behaviour and emotional state, the more relaxed and willing the horse can be.
how we align the core of our body and our eyes
how strongly we are focused on what we want to happen
how we bring our breath and energy up in preparation for giving a signal
how firmly our inner belief backs up what our signal is requesting
In this photo I’m aligning my body axis to weave the obstacle in front of us. My energy and breathing are up. I’m strongly focussed on what I want to happen. As we round one obstacle I change my body axis alignment and my focus to weave the next obstacle. Because I’m consistent, the horse learns to read my intent and readily complies.
I hope you have fun seeing how small you can make your body language and touch requests and still be clear for your horse. They depend on us for so much.
By always starting at the withers when we want to ask for a foot to be picked up, the horse has time to shift his weight so he CAN pick up the foot we want. Here Bridget is about to ask for the left hind foot and Boots will shift her weight to make it possible – in fact, she will be lifting her foot as Bridget moves to her hindquarters, in anticipation. Just as we do, horses like to know what is going to happen next, before it happens.
In the photo above, we are working on building duration staying on the mat while I move around. Note her ear and eye on where I am and what I’m doing.
Creating resources to help people learn more about training horses is tricky for several reasons.
When we start out with horses we learn from the people nearest us. We tend to absorb their ideas and their way of doing things.
This morning my granddaughter, almost five, excitedly brought two library books about horses for us to read together.
They were about children learning to ride and going to shows, featuring standard British riding paraphernalia and methodology.
She has been riding Boots for over a year and shows great interest in how we clean her feet and she makes a good effort at brushing her.
It was an interesting challenge for me to explain that we don’t put things in Boots’ mouth (other than food). I explained that it is easy to teach a horse to change directions with a halter or bitless bridle using clicker training, body language and words.
She is familiar with clicker training because that is all she has seen. We play games where we pretend to be either the horse or the handler.
Her question, of course, was, “Why do these people do it this way?”
All I could say was, “This is the way they were shown how to do it, but there are other ways too.”
When it came to explaining the picture with the horse who had his mouth tied shut with a cross-over noseband, I found myself lost for words. Yet in the distant past I used one of these – what was my rationale at the time? To keep the bit in place?
Thankfully, the other book she brought outlined gymkhana games that I can adapt for her and her sister to play on their next visit.
For many horse owners, especially those involved in horse sports (sport for the rider) the concept of training with positive reinforcement is still something to be discovered.
It is common for people moving toward positive reinforcement at a traditional horse facility to be mocked, told off, ridiculed, and told not to spoil their horse.
My hope is that my work helps open the door to being with horses in a way that respects their intelligence and willingness to take part in the weird things that humans expect of them.
Writing a detailed plan and keeping track of where we are in the plan, tweaking the plan as we get feedback each session from the horse and ourself, is the way forward. Below is one way of keeping a record with a 5-point outline. It can be used with anything we want the horse to master.
At the end of this blog is a video clip on the importance of setting up the learning environment for the horse.
Spiral Learning with Linear Resources
Another difficulty with teaching and learning is that usually materials must be presented in a linear manner, such as in a book, video, or online course.
However, we don’t learn in a linear way. Learning is more a spiral process. We begin and get side-tracked. As we learn more about one aspect of training horses, other things suddenly begin to make sense.
We leave a difficult task or challenge and come back to it later. As we get better and better at reading our horse, what was once a mystery becomes obvious.
We become more aware of our body language and what it might be saying to the horse, so our signals become clearer.
Realization dawns that what we thought was a simple task for the horse actually has a whole series of mini-behaviors the horse must be comfortable with before he can confidently achieve the task we want.
We move forward with our training but learn to recognize when slowing down and consolidating are more important so we can maintain the horse’s confidence and interest.
A book forces the author to present ideas one after the other. But improving handler skills and good training come about by frequent returns to revise key concepts. We learn continuously as we gain feedback from the horse and our own actions.
Each training experience gives the text of a book, or the ideas in a video, enhanced flavor because we return with different insights.
Becoming adept with this new way of communicating is an exciting business, but it takes commitment to learning new information and letting go of information and habits that no longer fit with what we’re now striving to do. It can require a significant rearrangement of a person’s belief system.
Change is always a challenge. It is especially hard if we are trying to change against the stream of what the people around us do with their horses. It takes a fair amount of belief and stick-ability to persevere to the point of proficiency when we hear unpleasant comments from colleagues.
But we can also find kindred spirits. There are equine clicker training tribes on the Internet. Facebook groups allow us to share ideas and give support to people new to clicker training.
The science behind clicker training is straightforward. All people and other animals are motivated to do more of whatever makes them feel good or gains them a reward.
However, gaining skill with the mechanics of clicker training and understanding its layers of possibilities are not simple processes.
Once the handler is proficient and the horse is clicker-savvy*, we can use clicker training to build complex chains* of behavior*. Terms with asterisks (*) are explained in the glossary you can access at the top of this blog page.
When it is truly adopted, the click&treat dynamic infiltrates every corner of the relationship and becomes the backbone of the horse’s Individual Education Programs (IEPs)*.
In other words, clicker training becomes the mainstay of a holistic approach to educating a horse to live in captivity.
Ideally, we consider the following points before we start.
We have thin-sliced the task into its smallest teachable parts and have an idea of where the early click points will be.
We have organized a training environment where the horse is able to relax. Ideally, he can see his herd mates, but they are not able to interfere.
We have thought about which part of the horse’s body we need to influence, and we’ve planned possible signal(s) to use (energy levels, body posture, body position, gesture, touch, words, strong intent). My book, Conversations with Horses, An In-Depth Look at Signs and Signals between Horses and their Handlers, looks at this topic in great detail.
The environment is set up to make it as easy as possible for the horse to understand what we want (use of a ‘lane’ or a corner; where we place the mat target or a nose target; use of barriers on the far side of the horse; where we position our body).
We want to make the desired behavior as east as possible for the horse to do. Setting up the training environment to achieve this means we are already halfway there.
For example, if water is challenging for the horse, we can start with walking through a box of rails on the ground, then put unusual surfaces down, like a tarp or these plastic bottles, before moving on to water.
If, instead, the horse learns evasive moves during our first fumbling with a new task, our education program has suddenly become more complex and longer. A bit of thoughtful planning can make things much easier for us and for the horse.
Ideally, we first try out our ideas with another person standing in as the horse. Or we can trial our process on a more experienced, forgiving horse. That allows us to eliminate some of the early trial and error in relation to our positioning and body language.
By practicing with a person standing in for the horse, our horse does not have to put up our first fumbling as we learn new motor skills.
It allows us to be clearer for the horse when we first introduce something new, rather than confuse him because we have not yet worked out a smooth way to proceed.
The first step is always to make sure the horse is relaxed and in a learning frame of mind. If something has brought up his adrenalin, we do calming procedures or something active until he’s used up the adrenalin and can return to relaxation. If he is uninterested, we need to make ourselves and our treats more interesting. Or stop and just hang out. Maybe the horse is tired due to the weather or other activities.
Or we wait to start the new thing in a later session. If the horse gets tense during a training session, we must first look closely at our own emotional state and the energy we are communicating to the horse, often unconsciously. Both handler and horse need to return to relaxation before continuing.
We start teaching each slice of the whole task with click points determined by what the horse is able to offer already. As both horse and handler get smooth with each tiny additional slice leading toward the whole task, we gradually chain the slices together and shift the click point until the whole task can be achieved with one click point at the end.
When we begin teaching something new, we start by finding a beginning click point. For some things, this may be a very rough approximation of the final goal behavior, e.g. just a tiny drop of the head when we begin to teach head lowering right to the ground.
This is illustrated in the first of two Head Lowering video clips in my Free-ShapingExamples playlist. Click here.
We gradually shift the click point toward closer and closer approximations of what we want until we achieve the goal behavior.
Good timing of the click allows the horse to become more and more accurate. Once the horse understands a task that we are free-shaping, like the head-lowering example, we add a signal (cue) so we can ask for the task and also put in ON CUE so that the horse learns that a click&treat will only follow if we have asked for the task to be done.
When teaching something new, the focus of click&treat is on the new learning, but we can still click&treat good execution of things the horse already knows.
Short clip about introducing water as an unusual surface.
Consolidation of New Learning & Developing Fluidity
The Consolidation Phase begins when the horse generally understands our intent, our signals and usually responds willingly with the move we want.
At this point, we can keep up interest and enthusiasm by providing an extra click&treat whenever any part of the task is done really well.
To put a new task into long-term memory (for horses and for people) it needs to be practiced at least 9 or 10 sessions in a row; ideally over 9 or 10 days in a row. Some tasks will take longer, depending on their complexity. If we can’t have a session every day, we need to accept that it will take longer to build a new behavior solidly. Keeping a written record becomes essential.
How many ‘repeats’ we should do during one session is hard to pin down because it depends so much on:
What we are teaching.
The character type, age and history of the horse.
The skill of the handler.
The nature of the handler-horse relationship.
For some tasks, a rule of thumb might be three practice repeats in a row, unless the first one is perfect and calls for a major celebration. Clicker-savvy horses are usually keen to work until you decide to stop, but even a keen horse can use a short break after 10 repeats of learning something new.
If the horse is in the initial learning stage, a tiny improvement over last time is a valid click point, followed by celebration and doing something relaxing. During the whole training session, we could return to the ‘new learning’ task three times, in-between doing other things.
People are often confused with the scientific/mathematical terms: Positive Reinforcement and Negative Reinforcement used in the study of behavior.
‘Negative’ means ‘bad’ in much of everyday language, but used in the mathematical sense, as it is here, it simply means removing (subtracting) something from a situation.
We touch the horse’s chest to ask him to step back and when he does, we remove our hand from his chest and drop our energy (-R).
‘Positive’ in everyday language means something ‘good’. But used in the mathematical sense, as it is here, it simply means adding something to a situation.
The horse comes to us and we give him a strip of carrot. We have added the carrot to the situation (+R).
Horses (as do we) behave in ways that stop/lessen the pressure of directional touch, gesture, voice, or energy sent toward them. This is negative reinforcement (-R): we remove the pressure of the signal when the horse complies.
Of course, horses may also seek touch if they love to be groomed, scratched or massaged, so some forms of touch may be positive reinforcement (+R). Young foals often find scratching very reinforcing. They quickly learn to repeat behaviors that result in a good scratch.
Horses (as do we) behave in ways that ensure they get more of something they like. When we train horses, we usually use a small food treat to reward a behavior that we want. This is positive reinforcement (+R): i.e., we add the treat to the situation.
We build up complex behaviors by marking each tiny step of the learning process with the marker sound we’ve chosen (click or word) and delivering a treat. Eventually the horse will be able do the whole task smoothly with one click&treat at the end.
How often we click&treat (rate of reinforcement) depends on the complexity of the behavior we are working with. We have to click&treat often enough to keep the horse being continually successful with working out what will earn his next click&treat.
Combined Reinforcement
We can use a touch on the chest, remove our touch as the horse steps back (-R), plus mark the stepping back behavior with our special sound, then deliver a treat (+R). This is ‘combined reinforcement’ because we have used -R and +R together to help the horse understand just what he needs to do to earn another click&treat.
It could be that if -R is reinforcing and +R is reinforcing, using both together in the name of clarity is more than twice as reinforcing for the horse.
Because we are essentially asking the horse to learn a foreign language, striving for clarity is essential. If a horse can only perceive a vague mumble, he will be inclined to zone out, either with his feet, or mentally if he is held by ropes or fences.
When we are riding, we use the energy and inclination of our body as signals for the horse. We use reins or a neck rope to give touch signals. When we train with touch, gesture, voice, body language and our body’s energy, we are using negative reinforcement. When the horse responds, we remove the signal. If we add click&treat to develop the response we want, we are using combined reinforcement.
Combined Reinforcement: Boots learned to ‘smile’ when she reached up to my hand held aloft and I tickled her Upper lip. When she moved her lips, I clicked and gave her a treat. Soon she was offering the smile, and now uses it as one of her ‘consent signals’*
Video Clip: Target & Tickle
Capturing
Some equine clicker trainers try hard to teach everything using only what they see as being +R (positive reinforcement). This has led to a burst of creativity to work out how we can teach horses by giving them a choice about taking part in what we want to do.
Capturing a complete behavior with a click&treat is possible for some behaviors. Things that horses do naturally can be captured. For example:
Touching the nose to a target.
Downward dog stretching.
Lying down.
Staying in the ‘sit’ position which is part of a horse getting up from lying down.
Backing up – if we are patient enough to wait until it happens naturally.
There are probably others, but for more most things we want to teach we use free-shaping* and guided shaping*. Items with an asterisk (*) are defined in the Glossary section.
Capturing a behavior: A horse’s natural curiosity will cause him to investigate something new with his nose. We can capture this moment with a click&treat. Once targeting is established with a strong history of positive reinforcement, we can use the willingness to touch or follow a target to train a variety of more complex behaviors. In other words, we can use the target for ‘guided shaping’*.
Capturing a behavior: Boots has learned that this stretch always earns a click&treat. I noticed she usually stretched like this after a nap and managed to ‘capture’ it three days in a row with click&treat. Then she began offering it often.
Capturing a behavior: If the horse will walk one step beside us, we click&treat after one step. Gradually we build up the ‘walking together’ by click&treat for two steps, then three steps, and so on, staying within the horse’s comfort zone and understanding. If we lose the behavior, we’ve gone too fast.
Free-Shaping
For free-shaping we click successive approximations of what we eventually want. For example: look at tarp, walk toward tarp, sniff tarp, put one foot on tarp, walk onto tarp, trot across tarp. We stay with each approximation until the horse is ho-hum with it, then move our click point along the continuum.
Free-shaping allows us more of an agenda than capturing a finished behavior.
Here are a few examples of free-shaping:
Approaching a mat or a tarp. We click&treat each tiny step toward the horse confidently standing on these. Click here.
Putting on a halter. We start with a horse willingly targeting a halter, then proceed from there. Click here.
Picking something up. Ideally we don’t want the horse tied up as in this clip, but in some situations we don’t have a choice. Click here.
Free-shaping: We are playing with picking up a cone and bringing it to me.
Luring
Luring can be useful in some situations. If the horse is anxious about approaching a tarp, we can put a treat near the tarp and eventually on the tarp, then let the horse make up his mind about stepping on the tarp in his own time.
We can teach a horse to self-load into a trailer using luring by feeding first near the trailer, then on the ramp, then progressively more in the trailer until the horse is right in and the bucket of feed and hay are at the front of the trailer.
Using this system means the horse has time to overcome his anxiety about entering and exiting a small space. It takes careful planning, but the result can be a horse totally calm about entering and backing out of a trailer.
When I used this method, the horses managed their daily trailer loading sessions independently while I did the chores. By allowing horses the time to make up their own minds about a situation, we give them back some of the control we take from them by having them in captivity.
Luring: We can add a treat to a new situation and let the horse build his confidence in his own time.
Modelling
Horses are experts at reading the body language of their herd members. After all, a foal raised with his mother and other herd members learns what to do and what not to do by observation and modelling their behaviors.
A handler that the horse knows and trusts can tap into this by modelling the behavior she’d like the horse to copy. When a click&treat follows the horse’s first attempt to model a behavior, he often picks up the new move with enthusiasm.
Examples include:
Putting the feet on an obstacle.
Standing quietly with no intent.
Walk/jog when we walk/jog.
Halt when we halt.
Turn when we turn.
Beginnings of jambette.
Modelling: Boots was keen to follow my suggestion when I put my foot up on the object.
Modelling: If we click&treat the first effort at matching leg-lifts, the horse often becomes keen to do it again to earn another click&treat.
Guided Shaping
For guided shaping, we use a target, gesture, hand touch, touch on a halter via a lead rope, and energy changes in our body to give the horse information about what will earn him his next click&treat.
We click&treat each small step toward the finished behavior. Then we gradually link the small steps together until the horse can carry out the whole behavior with one click&treat at the end.
These cues we start with, once refined and once the horse understands and accepts them, become signals for requesting the specific behavior. We must be careful to put each behavior ‘on cue’ so the horse understands that a click&treat only happen if the task has been requested.
Guided Shaping with Targets
Using targets is a great way to motivate horses. This is +R where we add two things. The target to gain the horse’s interest, then the click&treat when the horse meets our objective. In a way, using targets is a specific type of luring.
We can use hand-held targets, stationary targets set at nose height, and foot targets.
Here are some examples:
Follow a hand-held target.
Walk/trot between stationary targets.
Follow target onto a trailer, wash-bay or stall.
Introduce movement around a reverse pen. Click here.
Voluntary stretches to reach a target. Click here.
We ask the horse to target gear we want to use before we use it, e.g., halters, ropes, covers, saddle blankets, saddles, harness parts, balls, wheelbarrows, vets, worming syringes. When I put gear on my horse, I always ask her to target each piece of it (click&treat) before we use it.
Come to a mounting block.
Once the horse has a strong history of positive reinforcement for touching his nose to a target, we can use it to encourage him to explore new situations.
Using a target for stationary flexion of parts of the body. Note that we are using a mat target to build the idea of keeping the feet still to do the stretching.
Our Hand as a Target
Although targets are super useful to teach the horse a variety of movements, they are an intermediate stage of training. We don’t want to have to carry a target with us forever.
We can begin to teach the horse to walk with us by presenting a target, click after a pre-decided number of steps, remove the target out of play behind us and deliver a treat.
As we present the target, we also use body language, breathing, voice, energy level changes. Once these are well established using the target, the target is easily replaced by an arm gesture to accompany the body language, breathing and energy change (energy up for ‘walk on’ and energy down for ‘halt’).
We can use our extended hand as a recall target. And we can use our hand to teach the horse to target various of his body parts to our hand. These include chin to hand, ear to hand, cheek to hand, knee to hand, shoulder to hand, hip to hand. Click here.
Hand as Target: Boots has moved her head to target her ear to my hand. I click, then feed the treat in a position that has her straighten her head again.
Guided Shaping with Touch and Gesture
When we use touch and gesture to explain to the horse what will result in a click&treat, we use ‘combined reinforcement’. We add the touch or gesture energy, remove it as the horse complies and simultaneously click&treat.
At first the horse often gives us just an approximation of what we want as the finished behavior. We click&treat all of these approximations. This is often called ‘rewarding the smallest try’. The horse is then usually keen to repeat the behavior and over time the click&treat point moves closer and closer to the ‘finished’ behavior.
When the touch and/or gesture signals (-R) are intricately linked with marking & rewarding (+R), the touch and gesture are information for the horse about how to earn his next click&treat.
Used thoughtfully in this way, negative reinforcement gives clarity to our teaching. The energy of our touch/gesture signals is minimal.
We can often teach a task or behavior using Capturing, Free-Shaping, Luring, Modelling, and Shaping with a Target. Once the horse understands the task, we add distinct, consistent voice, touch, and gesture signals.
Gesture Signal: I’m using my focus, arm gesture and energy to ask Boots to move her hind end across. This was one of the steps in the process of teaching her to sidestep along a rail.
Touch signal: Asking the horse to back up using touch on the halter via a lead rope. She is about to step back with her left front and right hind legs. We should teach our horse a variety of signals for backing up, both at liberty and with rope or reins.
Summary
It is an interesting learning experience to work out how we can use just positive reinforcement (+R) to teach our horse many of the things he needs to know. Once he understands the task, we add consistent voice, touch, gesture, breathing, body language signals so that we can put the task ‘on cue’ or ‘on signal only’ or under ‘stimulus control’.
When we begin using positive reinforcement, many horses become very keen and begin to throw behaviors at their handler in the hope of scoring a click&treat. This has to be handled carefully by only clicking&treating when an action has been requested. If we randomly hand feed at other times, the horse will of course be confused.
Some horses find this process of ‘putting a task on cue’ very frustrating so we have to plan our training carefully. We need to work in small bursts, develop ‘end of this session’ signals and ensure that the horse is never hungry before we begin a clicker training session. Click here.
Once the horse knows several tasks, we can switch between tasks to avoid this sort of frustration.
Equine clicker training is fun and built on a simple scientific principle, but it is never easy. Horses are complex beings and each horse brings his own twist to the table, as does each handler.
On top of all this, we have to be realistic about the situations most horses face sooner or later. We have to carefully prepare them to understand how to respond to various forms of negative reinforcement. We need to do this at home so when a tricky situation arises away from home, we have a full toolbox to deal with it.
We first played with this task at liberty andBoots scared herself when her leg touched the pipe on her left as she backed into the space.She jumped forward.She jumped forward a step or two and then stopped. I was standing well back (you can just see the toe of my shoe) in case this happened.We quietly reset the task with the help of halter and lead, with click&treat for each step back and she quickly regained her confidence. I’m standing to the side in case she feels the need to suddenly come forward.
The task above is a good one to prepare a horse for being restricted behind, as in a horse trailer. It is also a task for preparing a horse to back between cart shafts.
Rather than correct something that did not go well, we learn to reset* a task without placing a negative value judgement on what the horse just did. This makes a huge difference to how horses perceive their training.
Clicker-savvy* horses often don’t want their sessions to end. The positive vibrations that go with good clicker training make it fun rather than a chore.
Clicker training gives us a way to let the horse know instantly, by the sound of the marker signal* (click), when he is right. It takes away much of the guessing horses must do as they strive to read our intent* (which is often fuzzy to them).
A horse’s perceptions and world view are quite different from human perception and world view. While we are with our horse, the more closely we can align our world view with that of the horse, the easier it is for him to understand us and comply with our requests.
There is much more about this in my book: Conversations with Horses: An In-depth look at the Signals & Cues between Horses and their Handlers available as an e-book or a paperback.
Clicker training is not a quick fix for problems. It is a carefully crafted language between horse and handler used during every interaction. People often have to let go of what they have always done in order to make room for a new way of interacting with their horse(s).
If frustration becomes part of the equation, for the horse or the handler or both, it is usually a sign of going too fast and expecting too much too soon.
The solution is usually to slow down, think things through, decide on the exact behavior required and write a careful shaping plan to achieve that behavior.
Keeping emotions (horse and person) on the calm/relaxed/joyful side of the emotional continuum is a major part of effective clicker training.
Acquisition, Fluidity, Generalization and Maintenance
Acquisition
Acquisition includes getting our head around how we will ask for a unique behavior and then explaining what we want to the horse.
The way we first present new material to the horse is crucial. As much as possible, we want the horse to be continuously successful.
It’s helpful to practice our ideas and techniques first on a person standing in for the horse. If you are lucky enough to have an experienced horse, it also helps to work out techniques with him before moving on to a novice horse.
Even a well-educated, experienced horse appreciates learning new things in small slices. This allows him to build confidence and expertise with each step toward being able to carry out the whole task smoothly with one click&treat at the end.
We always begin with low-key experimentation to see what the horse can already offer. We may find that some of the basic elements in our Individual Education Program are missing or not quite good enough. We might find some major training holes that need to be addressed.
For example, before we can teach our horse to weave a series of objects, have we taught him to confidently walk with us on a loose lead rope? Does he easily stay beside us, stepping off when we step off, halting when we halt and turning when we turn?
Gentle experimentation may also lead us to discover that the horse already has a solid foundation on which we can easily build a new task.
How we first present the halter to a horse and the way we handle the rope will have a huge influence on how confident the horse will be about joining in with activities that include the halter and lead.
Fluency
Once we have created an Individual Education Program and carefully taken the horse through it, we have acquired the ability to carry out a specific behavior together.
If the task is part of daily general care and recreation, such as safety around gates, the horse will have ample opportunity to use the new behavior often and receive reinforcement for it. His response to the signal will become more fluent as long as the handler’s signals are consistent.
If, on the other hand, the new behavior is for a specific purpose, such as loading onto a trailer or trotting through a tunnel for Horse Agility, we have to set up special training opportunities to allow the horse to become fluent.
Thin-slicing the many skills required for trailer-loading leads to fluency. Here we are using a trailer simulation to build duration while standing in a closed-off spot.
In my experience, if we train a new behavior to the point of fluency, the horse tends to remember it forever.
If a behavior is unreliable, it was not originally taught to the point of fluency and was not adequately generalized or maintained.
GENERALIZATION
Once the horse understands a new task or a new skill, it is important to take it out into the world. Through generalization, the horse gains further fluency with a task.
Generalization includes:
Asking for the behavior in different places but still at home.
Using different props.
Working at different times of the day.
Asking for the behavior away from home.
Working with unusual distractions.
Working at a different gait.
Handler using a different body orientation.
Fading out a signal and replacing it with a new one.
Requesting more repeats or duration before the click&treat.
Working with a different handler (who uses the same signals).
Generalization helps the horse put the new learning into his long-term memory. Each time we quietly repeat the task, we help build the horse’s confidence. If the horse is unable to do the task in a specific situation or context, it gives us vital information about where we are in our Education Program* with this horse for this task.
Once the horse confidently jumps simple obstacles, we generalize the skill to different-looking obstacles and obstacles in different venues.
MAINTENANCE
As already mentioned under Fluency, some behaviors become and remain fluent because we use them a lot, for example, putting on and taking off a halter or cleaning out the feet every day.
Other behaviors are specialized, and we have to create a plan to refresh and use them occasionally so that they stay in our repertoire. Vet procedures usually come into this category.
If we teach our horse to flex toward the prick of a toothpick, so his muscles are loose rather than taut, we need to do such needle simulations on a regular basis. Likewise, if we want the horse to be confident with a worming tube, we can practice with applesauce as frequently as we like.
Hoof trimming, whether we do it ourselves or hire someone, can cause anxiety for a horse if it suddenly happens out of the blue. It’s much easier for us and the horse if we pick up feet regularly and move the feet into trimming positions to make it a normal request. We can also introduce the horse to a variety of different people who are allowed to touch him and handle his legs and feet.
My friend Bridget helping Boots get used to other people handling her feet.
Photo: Using targets as ‘destinations’ makes it much easier to give meaning to our request in a way that the horse easily understands. Reaching the target, whether it is putting the front feet on a mat or touching the nose on a stationary object, earns the horse a click&treat. We can then move between targets to encourage the horse to come with us willingly because there is always something for him to look forward to – the next click&treat when we reach the next destination.
Training with a Marker Signal and Positive Reinforcement
Training with the click&treat dynamic is a skill worth learning well, but it is not the only thing we have to learn well.
Some people handle/condition a horse’s behavior in a way that encourages the horse to always look to the handler – a form of ‘learned helplessness’. The horse is asked to subjugate his own observations, feelings and natural responses in favor of what the handler requires him to do.
Other people set themselves the interesting challenge of doing everything with their horses using only positive reinforcement training (often called ‘clicker training’). They pair each desired response with a marker signal (click) followed immediately by a food treat. They feel that this is the only way to keep a horse’s ‘sparkle’ alive.
Somewhere between these two extremes, fall the people who teach many things with the click&treat dynamic, but they also understand, respect, learn and use universal horse language. In their view, any horse education system that fails to acknowledge group social order, different horse character types and how horses succinctly communicate with body language, will have limited success.
From our human standpoint, we could define ‘success‘ as having a horse that is safe and fun to be with and that we can take places for exercise to maintain blood circulation health, overall fitness and mental stimulation.
Success could mean that the horse:
greets us willingly
enters our space politely
offers feet confidently for foot care
accepts gear on and off comfortably
leads safely and willingly in a variety of positions
responds equally well to upward and downward transition requests
confidently accepts touch and grooming all over its body
confidently accepts ropes draped all over its body and legs
willingly, at request, moves away from a food dish, pile of hay or grazing spot
not unduly spooked by dragging ropes, wheelbarrows, flapping things, balls, bicycles, vehicles
able to stay ‘parked’ quietly or stand and ‘wait’ for a further signal
confident moving through gates/narrow spaces/lanes and over water/unusual surfaces at our request
approaches new/spooky things as long as we give him the approach & retreat time to convince himself it is harmless
at ease with any body extensions the handler might use to clarify or accentuate signals
Once we have all that, we can endlessly refine the basics and teach new patterns and tricks.
Teaching with the click&treat dynamic is hugely helpful to horse handlers for two main reasons:
Encourages accurate observation of what the horse is doing in order to pick the ‘clickable moments‘, which are also the moments that signal/cue pressure is released. Therefore becoming a good clicker trainer also hones the skill of becoming an excellent trainer with simple ‘release reinforcement’.
It teaches ‘thin-slicing’ — the cutting of a large task into its smallest ‘clickable’ components so that we can get the horse confident with each tiny ‘slice’. Then we can chain the slices together until the whole task is achieved. This way of teaching/learning, often called ‘mastery learning‘ keeps the horse successful all the way through the process. A clicker-savvy horse knows that if the click&treat is withheld, they need to try something else.
Developing the two skills above will greatly increase the ‘feel‘ of the handler. That ‘feel‘ will translate to the times when a good choice is use of ‘release reinforcement’ by itself. Feeling what the horse is doing — understanding what his body language is saying and knowing how to respond to that with our feel and body language, is the key to training with signal pressure and release of signal pressure (‘release reinforcement’).
What horses gain from positive reinforcement Horses trained with the click&treat dynamic discover that they can have a voice. Once they learn that a certain behavior will earn them a click&treat, they can become pro-active in offering that behavior. For many horses this is huge because in the past things have only been done to them or demanded of them — they could only be re-active.
When a task is thin-sliced so they understand each part of the training process, the horse’s learning can progress in leaps and bounds. We’d all rather work for a boss who praises what he likes rather than one who only criticizes what he doesn’t like.
Horses are not blank pages on which we write what we want. They already have a perfectly good language. It seems logical to learn it and use it as best as we can with our non horse-shaped bodies. Horses are very generous with their interpretation of what we mean. No doubt we have a very funny accent, but unless they have been traumatized by humans, they are happy to learn new things and accept us as part of their personal herd.
Social Group Once the horse accepts us as part of her personal ‘ in-group’, we have a position in the group social order. The two things go together. We can’t form a bond of understanding with a horse unless he or she lets us into their social group. Once we are part of the social group, we have a ranking within it. If the horse can move our feet at will, she or he stands above us in the social order. If we can ask move the horse’s feet, we rank above him her in the social grouping recognized by the horse. When people don’t understand this dynamic, or chose to deny/ignore it, things might not go well.
Horse Character Types Like us, horses can be innately anxious or innately confident and imaginative. They come as extroverts who like to/need to move their feet a lot and they come as introverts who prefer the quiet life. A careful look at how our horse perceives and reacts to things can give us insight into how we can best proceed with an individualized training program. What works perfectly with one horse can be quite problematic with another.
Universal Horse LanguageHorses have a complex communication system using their body language and a few vocalizations. They ‘message’ other horses with body tension, body orientation, neck position/movement, ear position, tail activity, posturing, striking out, kicking, biting, nibbling. How they use each of these depends on their intent at the time. An ‘alarm snort’ will instantly have the whole herd on alert. Quietly turning the head away as another horse (or a person) approaches is an appeasement signal.
With the aid of body extensions which make us as tall and long as a horse, and simulate a horse’s expressive tail, we can more clearly emulating universal horse language. If we are good at it and use our movements consistently, any horse will understand our intent without us ever needing to touch the horse or use a rope. We can establish our position in the social order by ensuring we can move the horse’s feet in a variety of situations while the horse is at liberty to move away, as it would be in a natural herd situation.
Once we have established our social position, we maintain it by the way we behave. Anxious type horses may rarely challenge our position. Confident, imaginative type horses may well challenge our position regularly. In a natural herd situation, they have the drive and sparkle to work their way up the group’s social order.
With an understanding of, horse character types, equine body language, and how the social order works, we can flow with the information the horse gives us via his behavior and body language. Skills of observation, timing and ‘feel’ allow us to decide how we will use clicker training to make his life in his strange human-dominated world a little bit more interesting and understandable.
With equine clicker training, we experiment to find out what the horse can already do, then build his skills in a way that has him being continually successful.
The link below contains a bit more information about horse character types.
Photo: Sitting with the horse in a roomy, enclosed area, asking nothing of him except politeness. This is a superb way to build a new relationship with a new horse or to to build an improved relationship with a horse we have already.
Safety
It’s only when we feel safe with our horse and our horse feels safe with us that real teaching and learning can go on. If our horse makes us feel worried or afraid, we need to take heed of the feeling and organize our environment so that we can be with the horse in a way that allows us to regain our safe, calm, centered core. Maybe we need to sit in our chair just outside the horse’s enclosure to start with.
It will be difficult for a horse to remain in his calm, centered core in our presence if we are sending out vibes that tell him we are uneasy and nervous. A good first step is to spend undemanding time with the horse, in his home if we feel safe there, or on the other side of a fence or gate if we don’t. We need to carry a swishy type body extension so that we can enlarge our bubble without offending the horse by striking out toward him. Horses are very sensitive to the air movement of two swishy twigs or dressage whips, or the swishing of a string rotated like a helicopter blade.
Horses easily understand when we are merely enlarging our bubble of personal space. If we strike out toward their personal bubble rather than just protect our own space, the horse will realize it instantly. It is important to be aware of the difference between acting in an assertive way and acting in an aggressive way, and to be mindful of which one we are doing.
As we sit with our horse, we can read, meditate or just enjoy the quiet of being in the moment, looking and listening and breathing. It’s nice if the horse can be in a roomy area where he is comfortable, able to see his companions but not where they can interfere with your special time together.
It works well to set a time limit. It doesn’t matter what the horse does. We are there as a companion, a paddock mate for the time we have set. We expect nothing of the horse except politeness. If he becomes overbearing, we move away with our chair or ask him to back off by swishing the air toward his feet to protect our personal bubble.
The PDF attached has a look at ways to ensure our safety.
Photo: Teaching the horse to target a pool noodle with his hind foot to help his confidence with standing on three legs is one half of the task.
Photo: The other half of the task is to teach relaxation while being rubbed all over with a pool noodle, keeping all feet on the ground.
Keeping the Balance
For everything we teach our horse, we have to be mindful of also teaching the opposite. If we teach a very good ‘whoa’, it is also important to teach an excellent ‘walk on’ signal.
For most things we teach, we have to also teach a counter-balancing task.
If we teach ‘head down please’, we also need to teach ‘head up please’.
If we teach ‘back up please’, we need to teach, ‘come forward please’.
If we teach targeting a mat with the front feet, we have to teach happily stepping off the mat and walking away from it. Some horses get strongly attached to their mats.
If we teach a turn followed by a ‘halt’, we have to teach a turn followed by a brisk ‘walk on please’.
If we teach entering a trailer, we need to carefully teach exiting the trailer.
If we teach the horse to ground tie, we also need to teach him how to move with a dragging rope so he learns not to step on it and isn’t frightened if something happens to make him move dragging his rope.
If we teach the horse to come to us when we are playing at liberty, we also need to teach him to go away from us in a way that is fun rather than seen as a punishment. Being sent away to the outskirts of the ‘herd’ can be seen by horses as a punitive action because it’s a less safe place to be.
If we teach a move or behavior on one side of the horse, we need to teach it again on the other side of the horse. Maybe also from in front of the horse and from behind the horse. This concept is explored in detail in my book, Walking with Horses:The Eight Leading Positions (see the BOOKS link above).
If we don’t do these things, the horse will become fixated on one way of doing a task. He’ll be determined that he’ll always do it this way. In some situations, the power of the click&treat dynamic can work against us rather than for us.
So, for everything we teach, we need to counterbalance it with another task. How much time we spend balancing out these sorts of tasks depends on many factors. As we get better at understanding our horse, it will get easier to know when we’ve done too much of one dimension and need to consider the other dimension. We’ll find it easier and easier to keep a better balance.
The clip below looks at how we can generalize working with mats to balance the expectation of landing front feet on a mat to earn a click&treat, which we teach first. Once the horse heads straight to a mat as soon as he sees it, we can use tasks like this to balance out his eagerness.
This article gives a brief overview about what is involved with using markers and treats to make it easier for a horse to understand what we would like it to do.
What is Positive Reinforcement Training
also known as Equine Clicker Training or Reward Reinforcement?
‘Clicker training’ or ‘reward reinforcement’ is also called ‘positive reinforcement’ because we add something (usually a small morsel of food the horse likes) to the situation. ‘Release reinforcement’ is also called ‘negative reinforcement’ because we put signal pressure on the horse to do something. When we ‘release’ the pressure we remove something from the situation.
The terms ‘positive’ and ‘negative’, in the field of animal behavior, are used in
a mathematical sense, not in the sense of being ‘good’ and ‘bad’.
Clicker training can work with ‘reward reinforcement’ only. You can observe and wait for the horse to do something, and click him for it. For example, you can click and treat each time he itches himself. Once he’s made the connection, you can put a signal (either a gesture or a word or both) on that action, and then you can ask him to do it whenever you like.
The ‘click’ is the ‘bridge’ between what the horse has done and the treat he will get for it right after the click. It allows us to ‘mark’ the exact behavior we would like the horse to do, or at least a first approximation of the behavior we would eventually like him to carry out.
This is called ‘free shaping’. Once he responds correctly to your signal most of the time, you have created a ‘conditioned response’. If your horse comes to you every day at feeding time, you have created a ‘conditioned response’. If he sees you with a halter or bridle and moves away so you can’t catch him, you have a ‘conditioned response’.
They key is to set up the environment to make what we want the horse to do as easy for him as possible. Most often, we introduce a ‘target’ object. The natural curiosity of the horse causes him to put his nose on the target, we click and deliver a treat. Once nose targeting is firmly established in the horse’s mind as a way to earn click&treat, we can use targets for all kinds of things’
follow a hand-held target
move between stationary targets, gradually put further and further apart
sent toward a target
reach around to touch a target for lateral flexion
gain confidence with tight spaces by seeking out the target, eg. trailers
move on to targetting mats with the front feet
target feet to a mat beside a mounting block
target a mat on a pedestal
always stand on a favorite mat for foot care
mat destination on the outside of a reverse round pen to encourage movement
The click/treat system causes the horse to be strongly focused on finding out what earns the click and treat. He’ll start to offer behaviors to ‘earn’ the treat. It gives him a way to communicate with us. It also allows him a stronger ownership of the new learning. Soon after starting to learn things with click&treat, the horse will begin to offer the behaviors we have taught this way, hoping to motivate us to ‘pay’ for his effort with a click&treat.
At this point, it is important to put a new task ‘on signal’. A signal can be a gesture, a touch or verbal. Often it’s nice to use touch or gesture and voice together. Signals usually arise naturally out of the nature of the task we are teaching. For picking things up, I ask Boots to, “Pick!” and point to the object. At the end of a session, she likes to come around with me to pick up all the cones and rags we were using as arena markers.
Once the horse knows the task and the signal, it is important to only click/treat when you have asked for it by giving the signal. Otherwise it might be hard to use cones as arena markers while riding or doing ground work exercises!
Using the click&treat only when we’ve asked for the behavior, will slowly tone down the horse’s desire to ‘throw the new move at you’ as soon as he sees you (much like a child dying to show you his new painting). When I taught Boots to ‘spin’, it was quite startling when she wanted to show it to me and visitors all the time, while standing right beside us!
There is more information in the GLOSSARY which you can access with a link at the top of the page.
herthamuddyhorse 