One way to communicate with your horse is to apply pleasantness or withdraw pleasantness. Another way to communicate with your horse is to apply pressure or relieve pressure. When you think about it realistically, these are the only tools we have and the only tools we need, for every training situation. When you use these … Read more
When I trained horses for a living, I rode between eight and fifteen horses every day. Each horse was at a different stage of training and each horse reacted differently on any particular day. Half the time I couldn’t even remember where I was up to with them. It didn’t matter because each horse soon … Read more
I grew up on a dairy farm in the 1960’s. We milked about 100 cows which was quite a big herd in those days. When I was eleven years old, one of my jobs after school was to feed the calves. There were about 20 calves fed by hand from the time they were a … Read more
My wife Christine has been a music teacher ever since she left school. She’s taught hundreds of people to play piano, keyboard, piano accordion and organ. I’d never had much interest in learning a musical instrument until a couple of years ago when Chris arrived home with a $25 tremolo harmonica. I picked it up … Read more
There are a few key words that we should all think about every time we train our horses. First and foremost is confidence – a word that should be heard far more often in the horse world. Confidence is one of the most valuable traits that your horse can have in you. Confidence is defined … Read more
I’ve lost count of the amount of people who say things like, ‘I’ve tried your method but it didn’t work. Usually I just take a little bit of training from here and a little bit from there and I use whatever works for me.’ I hate to disillusion everyone but it’s not ‘my method’. I … Read more
When I was about fourteen, one of my chores after school was to exercise our racehorse. My father always said, ‘Just sit quietly and canter him up the hill. Don’t take hold of him. He’ll pull if you take a firm grip and you won’t be able to hold him.’ I can remember the horse … Read more
Horse training isn’t complicated. Your horse concentrates on three simple things, every time you ride or handle him. When you concentrate on the same three things, you’re thinking on the same level as your horse. Understanding this is the key to horse training. Every movement you teach every horse comes back to these three things. … Read more
When a horse is frightened, his first means of defence is to run away. When a frightened horse is cornered and can’t escape, he’ll instinctively defend himself by kicking, striking, biting or bucking. These aren’t signs of aggression, they’re simply signs that a horse is frightened and can see no other way out of the … Read more
We’re often told that horses are mimics and will copy whatever their ‘leader’ does. I’ve seen trainers run along in a trotting motion when they want a horse to trot alongside them. Even better, when they want the horse to canter, I’ve seen trainers skip along pretending to canter, thinking that the horse will copy … Read more