Horses in Harmony

02/08/2023

11/19/2022

The Frustration Trap

Getting frustrated while schooling a horse tends to lead to at least some degree of confrontation. That easily snowballs into fighting and force. The rider wants one feeling, the horse provides something different, the rider’s requests escalate into demands, the horse gets anxious and does more of what the rider doesn’t want, and it all starts to go downhill.

Now the horse gets put away fried---to some degree---the rider walks away unhappy with the result. So the next schooling session can easily turn into more of the same, frustrated and demanding rider, worried and resistant horse. We all know of some riders who are in a constant war with their horses, not nice to witness.

Humans are easily frustrated. Not to the point of throwing tantrums like three year olds, but neither are most of us islands of inner peace, like some ascetic monk, sitting on some mountain side, chanting OOOM for forty years.

So we need to ride with a self-guided frustration meter, and we need to use that self-awareness to tone it down when we feel ourselves getting tight, both physically and emotionally.

Maybe think---“This horse in a progression. What he knows right now, what he is capable of doing right now is what it is. I can carefully ask for little changes, or I can lose my cool and start to grind on him to DAMN WELL DO WHAT I SAY.

But if I do get angry and forceful, is this going to make this horse better? No, it is going to make this horse worse. If I get into it with him, not only have I not gone forward in my schooling, I have gone backwards, so now, in order to win back the trust I have lost by using force, it’s going to take even longer.

There are some people who can exercise this sort of self-control, and, generally, these people make better horse trainers than those who can’t.

photo---HLM Van Schaik---I never once saw him get forceful with a horse.

11/05/2022

A meme that DOES exist, and a meme that SHOULD exist----

The one we see all the time is this---“Everything you have ever wanted is on the other side of fear.”

And one we don’t see---“Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fitness.”

This is truth telling at its most unpopular as it pertains to too many riders. Take most sports, track and field, soccer, skiing, football, lacrosse, hockey, so many others, and it is simply assumed that the athletes who participate will be fit and tough.

You do not expect to go to a track meet and see unfit participants, right? But you can go to many horse shows and see unfit riders.

Those SAME riders, if they would get anywhere near as serious about being athletes as do participants in almost every other sport would be far more competent, be far more confident, and have far more success than they will experience while being weak and out of shape.

Many years ago, in New Jersey, I was watching a dressage clinic being given by a former Hungarian military officer. He had a group of riders practicing the sitting trot. More bouncing, lurching, sweating, panting you never saw.

He lined them up, and announced in no uncertain terms---
“Ladies and gentlemen---May I respectfully suggest to you that dressage riding is not the last refuge of the non-athlete.”

Harsh? Or truth? Think about it----

The photo is of 75 year old Walt Gervais, a a life-long fitness proponent, about to head out on steeplechase in his first long format 3-day event. As an example.

11/02/2022

In riding terms, the word “aids” refers to a system of communication between horse and rider.

Now, to get into and endless and unwinnable argument, try to explain WHAT aids are better to use than some other aids---That said, some aids are intrinsically gentler and less forceful than others.

If we are teaching downward transitions, and we walk calmly, sit up, take a bit more rein contact, say “whoa,” and release contact when the horse stops, and we repeat this sequence over days and weeks, gradually the horse will begin to associate our signals with his response, which is to stop. Conditioned response to non pain inducing aids.

Or, we can take a double twisted wire bit, like this pictured here, specifically designed to cause pain, and we can jerk on the reins to FORCE him to stop. He stops because it hurts too much to keep going.

And there are riders who understand this, and there still are riders who don’t, even in this age of highly available information.

Force, drugging, leverage devices like draw reins, sharp bits, endless lunging, withholding of water, all these adversarial methods should have gone away as education became more easily accessed. You almost have to work at being ignorant in the age of Google.

And despite that, all across the globe today horses will have stuff like this, and worse, stuck in their mouths, held by rough hands, by people who don’t know what they don’t know, and for many, who are proud of it.

10/22/2022

Being gentle with a horse does not mean letting the horse push you around and place you in danger. Horses need to have ground manners. They need to stand reliably for the farrier and the veterinarian. They need to stand quietly while you are mounting or dismounting. They need to let you groom them, bridle them, saddle them without dancing around.

It is not that the horse is allowed free rein. Teaching basic manners, though, is a lot different from routinely smacking a horse around, yanking on the bit with rough hands, grinding on the horse in schooling sessions, or cranking the horse into draw reins or other leverage devices.

Part of being well trained is that the horse respects human boundaries, but the good trainers use only as much pressure as needed to create respect and only in situations that to do otherwise allows dangerous behavior.

10/11/2022

YES!

Ritter Dressage

08/26/2022

Intensity is a normal state for many humans. They talk about “Type A Personalities” all the time. Athletes are pushed hard to be more, more, more. More driven, more competitive, more successful.

Meanwhile, the horse, a grazing animal, has about a zero work ethic. The horse doesn’t prance around the pasture to “get fit.” If he does run around, the nano-second he gets sick of it, he stops.

So now we have this paradox, a driven animal (humans) wanting performance from a grazing animal (horses).

And so we drive them crazy, some of the time, by bringing human drives and needs to a species with absolutely different kinds of drives and needs. We read things like, “My horse has a great work ethic.” What that actually means is that the horse tolerates being pushed. He doesn’t push himself.

Driven humans project their needs onto all sorts of things, golf clubs, footballs, boats, skis, motorcycles, cars, planes, and, yes onto horses.

But those other recipients of those sometimes frantically desperate human needs, being inanimate, are immune to the forces that can create counter intensity. Not so the horse.

To be better riders, better trainers, better horsemen and horsewomen, maybe tone it down a notch. Or ten notches---

Too many humans make the horse anxious, then punish the horse for the anxiety which they humans created in the first place. There are lots of riders who ought to have a motorcycle instead of a horse.

08/09/2022

Soft hands don’t seek weapons.

One of the single most common justifications for use of harsh bits or gadgets is “my hands are extremely soft” or “I barely touch the bit!” Or ”I use X harsh bit because it’s actually softer than a nice snaffle since I barely touch it!”

Your hands stop being soft the second you seek to weaponize them. The BELIEF that your hands are soft whilst using harsh and highly aversive equipment is only yours, you didn’t ask, and couldn’t ask, the horse.

First off, let’s discuss hands in general and the simple fact that the vast majority of riders, even decorated upper level riders, are highly likely to be overestimating their softness and underestimating how hard they’re actually pulling on the reins.

Yes, there have actually been rein tension studies featuring upper level professionals and amateur riders alike, all depicting pretty significantly differences in perceived rein pressure versus the actual pressure applied.

What this means is that all of these “soft handed” people using harsh bits are entirely unaware of the degree of pressure they’re actually applying, all while defending their right to use harsh bits with the sole factor often being related to how feather light their hands are.

That aside — the softness of hands is a moot point when the current market of equine products is creating bits with mechanics that are painful at rest and inflate the pressure applied by even the softest cues from the rider. The rider can THINK they’re being soft all while the bit itself amplifies the pressure in the horse’s mouth.

The desire to rush through the steps and force the horse within distance of your goals as quickly as possible will always come at the expense of your horse’s health and happiness but also the expense of a good foundation.

See this photo? The left side is the terrible neck I developed on my OTTB gelding by use of draw reins, bitting up as a means of slowing him down over fences in lieu of training and all in all, prioritizing what was fun for me over what was in the best interest of the horse long term.

Comparatively to the right photo, my rescue gelding, Milo. He has never worn draw reins, has never been ridden in bits harsher than soft snaffles and has been ridden bridleless and bitless often.

His ability to follow soft cues is far beyond that of any horse I tried to train the “quick” way. His ability to build muscle was far superior due to the fact that I wasn’t rushing him and fatiguing him into building the wrong muscles by trying to manufacture a false frame through force.

We cannot ethically use a lot of the quick fix bits and gadgets that are on the market. Many of these products simply shouldn’t exist. They don’t facilitate good training, they’re harmful to the horse and they enable riders in lazy riding practices and lower the amount of empathy we as a community feel towards horses.

So, here’s your reminder that you don’t get to judge the softness of your hands. The horse does. And, as it stands, there’s very little reason to believe horses “like” any bit, much less ones literally created with mechanics intended to force the horse to bend their will earlier due to the high levels of discomfort.

The bit is only as soft as it’s mechanics allow it to be. After that, no matter how soft you try to make your hands, you’re still riding in harsh equipment.

Give your horse the gift of empathy by holding yourself more accountable in the equipment you select and also having the self reflection skills to be honest with yourself about how soft your hands really are.

As soon as those hands seek to be weaponized with harsher mechanics, are they REALLY still soft?

It does not matter if YOU think you’re being soft if your horse doesn’t.
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Reference Studies:

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=rider+perception+rein&btnG= =gs_qabs&t=1659886067942&u=%23p%3DQF7Mds0a8ykJ

https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/wagac/cep/2017/00000013/00000001/art00002

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0168159106004242

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1558787814000355

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1558787810000626

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/comparative-exercise-physiology/article/abs/fluoroscopic-study-of-oral-behaviours-in-response-to-the-presence-of-a-bit-and-the-effects-of-rein-tension/6DEC594DBD54E56FAF3B55E9EB6AA80A

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/comparative-exercise-physiology/article/abs/fluoroscopic-study-of-oral-behaviours-in-response-to-the-presence-of-a-bit-and-the-effects-of-rein-tension/6DEC594DBD54E56FAF3B55E9EB6AA80A

07/31/2022

Platitudes take on lives of their own---If something is said repeatedly, many people begin to believe it simply out of familiarity, and such a platitude is this one about bits for horses---

“It isn’t the bit. It is the hands holding the bit.”

There’s enough truth here to hide an even more accurate underlying truth. Certainly, rough, hard hands can hurt a horse even with a mild bit like a medium sized smooth snaffle. But those same rough hard hands can hurt a horse so much more when they are attached to a bit specifically designed to be uncomfortable, like a double twisted wire, or to a bit with strong leverage such as a long shanked bit with a curb chain.

When the rider has tremendous power to cause discomfort based on some specific bit, it can too easily turn into that other saying, “a razor in a monkey’s paw.”

The razor itself doesn’t cut if it is used with extreme caution, but that slashing potential is never far away. Same thing with a heavily bitted horse. The hands holding those reins need to be highly skilled and educated hands, and the temperament of the rider can’t be impatient or easily frustrated, and that is not a combination that the average rider brings to the situation.

It can go wrong in a nanosecond.

07/27/2022

Some might call it 'character building'

07/20/2022

The Trail Maintenance Fairy does not come floating down out of the sky to tap with her magic wand all the trees and branches that fell during the winter, to trim back all the overhanging leaves and branches that we have to duck under, to toss the bigger rocks that magically keep appearing underfoot.

The tools that come in handy are strong clippers that can handle saplings up to about two inches, a small chain saw, an overhead pole with a saw and a clipper for the higher stuff.

Then it’s a matter of hiking out and doing the work, which I tend to do one section at a time because otherwise it seems overwhelming. So many jobs around a farm succumb to the “I will do just this part right here” method. Get it done, and start again, and it is amazing how the smaller pieces add up in a week or a month.

After I clear a section of trail, I try to ride it the next day or so, for two reasons. One, to see if I missed something, and, two, for the satisfaction of having a better place to ride. Sort of like mowing or painting, you can see the difference.

I think that boarders at some stables take good facilities for granted, but when you are your OWN Trail Maintenance Fairy, you appreciate it much more.