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My Horse Training Philosophy

A Holistic Approach

The whole philosophical breadth of what R+ training means to me personally, is understanding, respecting and keeping the equine we are training in a way that’s species appropriate.  It also means having some kind of training guideline, such as the Humane Hierarchy (S. G. Friedman), whereby we have a road map to guide us through our care, management and training priorities and decisions.

I also aim wherever possible, we give our animals choice and control in their management and training, being cognisant of the fact that this improves their welfare and general well being.

I also take a big picture view beyond training and try to ensure the horse’s needs as a species are being met as per the Five Domains, which was described by Professor David J. Mellor.  I really like the way the Five Domains aim to meet their needs and therefore sets them up for success in their environment, which often prevents many problems and unwanted behaviours.

I think the Five Domains is a really excellent model to aim for and also to use to gauge the welfare status of our animals, to assess as best as we are able, if they’re “happy”. 

The Basics

I will always suggest ruling out pain first if there are identified behavioural problems. Then for the first foundation behaviour when starting positive reinforcement training, I recommend teaching a “standing still and doing nothing” type behaviour.  Always starting in protected contact (behind a barrier) – this is the first essential step in training horses with food. 

This sets our horses up to understand the behaviour required around us and around food.  This also begins the process of our horses learning to associate us with good things and this is the beginning of building a relationship built on mutual enjoyment of training and interactions in general, this process is called Classical Conditioning.

Most Positive, Least Intrusive

I am guided by the Hierarchy of Behaviour Change Procedures (Humane Hierarchy) designed by Professor Susan Friedman.  This means as mentioned earlier, that Health, Nutrition and Physical Setting are key considerations before any training program can commence. 

This is naturally followed by attention to Antecedent Arrangements, which in simple terms means arranging our environment and setting our horse up for success in their training.

all-behaviour-is-conditional_

Emotion

I also focus on the emotion of our horses and I understand and promote the view that attention to perfecting the basic skills of training, ensures a horse and their trainer are set up to be successful and derive pleasure from the training.  

New science, studies, observations and information is coming to light constantly, in regards to equine behaviour and I aim to stay up to date with the current science.  I will always consider the horse and how they feel about what we are asking and will put their physical and emotional well being ahead of purely wanting to train specific behaviours that do not have any benefit to the horse.  

But I will always be guided by the Humane Hierarchy, which means physical and mental health comes first. If force free training is fun for the human, then it must be fun for our horses as well – this is non-negotiable for me! 

Past the Foundation Behaviour

Training happens in sequence and the first is the foundation behaviour of our horse standing still and not sniffing, nudging or mugging their human carrying food or showing any other kind of uncomfortable emotional response.  From the foundation behaviour, there are number of options, depending on the individual human and horse and their goals.

You can move on to learning basic targeting and shaping and then utilise these techniques for cooperative care, movement for exercise and/or ridden behaviours, or you can focus on helping your horse feel comfortable with different experiences in their environment.  Whether that be helping a fearful or anxious horses to be trained to willingly accept various stimuli such as humans in proximity, touching, haltering, grooming, hoof handling, rugging, hosing, accepting gear, etc.  This process focuses on the emotional well being of the horse and I build choice into this type of training, so that our horse can tell us at every step, how they are coping with the stimulus we are introducing.

horse standing calm and attentive

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