M. McCullough Equine

08/02/2024

Horses deserve bettee

07/21/2024

It's important to listen to the horse

07/13/2024

Sometimes all a girl needs is to be told she's okay and she does, in fact, have express permission to fall right asleep in the arena 😅❤️

07/11/2024

This may not look like a lot to most. But to me it's so much progress for me and Ms Sophie, as individuals and as a team!

This pony has taught me so dang much in the short amount of time I've had her. I really thought I'd be the one with things to show and teach her (which I have, and she's come such a long way). It's amazing what an animal will teach you when you listen.

So grateful for the animals I have and my mentors for teaching me what I know!

Call now to connect with business.

07/07/2024

12/05/2023

There is no research that supports the notion that correctly using food rewards aka positive reinforcement and low stress “soft” training methods makes horses inherently more dangerous.

The research, in fact, supports the opposite.

You want to know who is pushing the notion that horses fed food rewards end up being dangerous, pushy and without boundaries?

The people who are not trained in these methods.

The people who don’t have an understanding of operant conditioning and thereby cannot fathom how you could possibly address unwanted behaviour without physical punishment.

And, so, they create the narrative in their heads that people who opt to use variable reinforcement of other behaviours, counter conditioning and addressing the root causes of stress are simply letting horses walk all over them.

That there are these mythical R+ horses who becoming human flesh eating monsters, to the point where R+ training needs to be labelled as dangerous and unsafe…

But, that’s simply untrue.

The research doesn’t support it.

Ironically, in virtually all species, punishment has the highest risk factors of meeting aggressive, stressed and otherwise dangerous behaviours.

In virtually all species, positive reinforcement shows high success with minimal downfalls, unlike punishment.

Studies on horses show stressed horses are the most dangerous as this is when they engage in flight behaviours that injure humans.

Want to know what stresses horses?

Punishment.

Can you make a horse dangerous and pushy if you use R+ improperly?

Absolutely.

But, that requires improper use.

Positive punishment, even when timed and used “correctly” still sees behavioural fallout and deleterious behaviours because at its core it is a behavioural suppressant.

By all means, don’t use food in training if you don’t want to.

But don’t be so desperate to vilify a method that you write fictional reasons as to why it’s dangerous.

People who are confident in the methods they use shouldn’t feel in such competition with R+ that they need invent false reasons why they and others shouldn’t use it.

Research doesn’t lie, but people who are triggered by it sure do.

Sources:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10888700802100942

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168159122001095

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1558787812000950

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0168159107002869

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/jaba.241

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fvets.2019.00350/full

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0003347209006034

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10071-010-0326-9

https://www.mdpi.com/2076-2615/6/3/15

https://beva.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.2042-3292.2011.00296.x

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/jeab.653

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S135917890900038X

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1558787808001123

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0891524502883183

11/24/2023

This is so true!! The biggest thing I focus on as a horseman is how you, the human, can do better for the horse!

- If your torso is collapsing to the right, your hips slipped to the left
- If your right leg keeps creeping up, or you lose just the right stirrup, your hips have slipped left
- If you find it easier to ride to the left, than to the right, your hips likely slip to the left.
- if you find yourself clinging to the right rein, while practically forgetting that you have a left one, good chances are that your hips slept left
- If your left hand is higher than your right hand, it’s possible that your hip slipped to the left
- If cantering counter clockwise, feels okay, but cantering clockwise feels awful, I’m gonna say your hips slipped left.
- if you can leg yield your horse to the right (off your left leg) pretty well,  but cannot lead guild to the left to save your life, your hips are probably chronically slipping to the left.

So many times, when a rider or is collapsing to the right, their coach tells them to fix it by stepping into the left stirrup. 🤦‍♀️ Like, I’ve heard of very famous coaches, giving this instruction.
And the thing is, it does look a little better, because at least when they step into the left stirrup, it gets them to straighten up their entire body -the problem is they are still off-center.
 I think the coach then typically gives students other exercises that bring them back over to the right (like twisting the shoulders to point a little to the left would help), but what I can tell you is these students then talk to me about their ride and they have absolutely no idea how to reproduce whatever straightness they may have accomplished during that clinic. 

The number one, needs solved now, issue in the rider in this sketch is that the hips fell left. I don’t care that the rib cage is collapsing to the right, or that the right leg is creeping way up. All of that will be fixed once the Rider brings their pelvis back to center.

This person is also riding with the left hip forward and the right hip back, but that will also likely resolve once you get this person to scooch over to the right.

 I would tell this student to put their left butt cheek in the middle of the saddle, high centering it, and drop the right butt cheek down into the hole that creates.

Another great exercise (on a trotting horse) is to drop the left stirrup, go clockwise, and posting trot utilizing just the right stirrup. This will feel horrible at first- to the point that I often have to let students try the exercise the opposite direction with the opposite stirrup so they realize how easy it is on their “strong” side. 

If you really struggle to keep from slipping left, it can also help to turn your chest to point a little bit to the left (while traveling right). This can be very effective at putting your weight into your right leg. You can stand up, assume a position similar to riding, and then twist your torso, one way, and then the other. Not all, but definitely most people find that when they twist to the left, it shifts weight into the right foot and vice versa.

Btw- I do virtual video review lessons! Very little tech knowledge needed. $65/lesson.


11/11/2023

10/31/2023

So true!!! You'd be amazed at what horses can sense. Instead of thinking they're the problem why don't you try to see what they're taking issue with?

If you think humans get overestimated just think of what horses have to process... and they're prey animals!!

Great visual.

10/04/2023

When your 27yo arabian tells you exactly what he's thinking because he knows you're listening....

09/18/2023

I love this old man- he tries his big ol heart out for me ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

05/15/2023

So true! Pilates and yoga (and some tai chi) are so good for building core strength

Muscle memory and how it effects your riding.

Cross training is generally healthy, but for adults who are picking up riding later in life and/or have spent considerable time doing a different sport, the muscle memory from your other activities, is going to show up in your equitation. 
Truth time- if you have spent considerable time cycling, or doing ballet before learning basic riding/equitation, you’re gonna struggle!! Cyclists tend to tip forward and draw the leg up. Life long equestrians tend to develop stringy quad muscles, cyclists developing bulky ones…. It’s just such different muscling! Ballet dancers have anterior pelvic tilt and turn those hips way out- equestrians need to turn in to stabilize. Ballet dancers turned equestrians have a heckuva time rotating their thigh so that it lays flat on the horse. Instead, they tend to point their knees out and grip with the calves, and it can be a HARD habit to replace!!

 Once upon a Time ages ago, I had a student that (without me present) decided to ride ba****ck. Her older quiet horse wasn’t used to it and scooted. It didn’t sound like that eventful of a fall, but she was really banged up! I kept having her describe it to me, because I couldn’t understand how she received the injuries she did. Her forearm and the FRONT of one hip were horribly bruised. I had never heard of someone falling like that- especially from such a seemingly benign fall. It was just so weird to me that I suggested she practice some tumbling, so that when she inevitably finds herself hurling towards the ground again, her body find a better position to land in. (Some of you have matched the story with the picture and probably have this all figured out by now.) When I told her she needed to practice falling, she proudly exclaimed, “oh yeah! back when I played beach volleyball we practiced landing in the sand to catch a serve.” Beach volleyball- there was the answer. What the horse did, and how she initially fell was irrelevant. Her body had hours and hours of practice, landing on the front of her hip with an arm reaching out, and as her body found itself caught between gravity and sand, it assumed the position it was taught!!  That position is probably perfectly safe playing beach volleyball, where the only thing tossing you is your own power, but add on the extra Gs of getting yeeted by a horse and….. well, thankfully it was just a simple case of just walking when the horse scooted out from under her ba****ck, because had that been a hard fall from a canter, it would have been pretty bad!

Yoga and Pilates are great for riders. So is walking backwards, and swimming is pretty good too.
Honestly, once you have good muscle memory in the tack, you can then pick up other sports and most likely be fine. The real challenge is trying to learn good equitation when you have muscle memory that is particularly contradictory. 

The great news is, you can absolutely work through it and create new neuron connections, and new muscle memory. But just like in Horses, whatever you learn first has a tendency to stick! So, if as a kid you walked on your toes, you might spend years doing Huntseat equitation with your heels stretched way down, but then you get an injury, or take a riding hiatus during college, or for pregnancy, or whatever, and a few months later, you hop back on, and find out you are struggling to keep your heels down!! I personally was a jumper before learning dressage, and I will forever have jumper tendencies in my riding!! I’ve not ridden one dang time that I don’t have to remind myself to ‘sit back/sit down”. My timing and feel is quite developed from so many years and hours in the saddle riding different disciplines, and so many different types of horses, but honestly, my nine year old students have a better seat than I do!!! 🙈

All that said, contradictory muscle memory is not a limitation- just a challenge that will always be there in the background (if not the foreground at times!)
The best thing you can do is have awareness of it and accept it as a reality that you will always need to work a little extra at building, and maintaining, the muscle memory you need in order to ride well!!

04/15/2023

There's no such thing as an absolute, but as a general rule, this will make you a better leader for your horse

04/15/2023

Couldn't have said it better myself

March 6, 2023

And many horses are in PAIN!!

02/20/2023

01/08/2023

Very important

Have you all noticed that kissing spine is being diagnosed more and more frequently in the past several years?

There are many many reasons for kissing spine to happen but in this post we are just going to talk about one very obvious one that for some reason fails to get considered in the diagnosis.

If we go back to the analogy we posted a couple weeks ago about the pillars on a bridge, and how important getting the foundation right is to the integrity of the deck of the bridge,

Your horse's hoof angles are the foundational pillars of the integrity of the spine (the deck of the bridge).

Negative palmar angle and long toes are becoming an epidemic in the current horse world. This changes how the horse is comfortable holding his legs.

How he holds them changes the support and the alignment of the spine.

Tie a string to two long sticks. Have one person hold one stick and another person hold the other stick. Stretch your sticks out so the sticks are perpendicular to the ground And the string is basically level. Now, start angling your sticks towards each other and away from each other and watch the changes in your string.

This is a simplistic representation but it should give you the point.

Your horse's feet and the angles they are maintained at are Vital to the integrity of your horse's body and function.

If your horse is newly diagnosed with kissing spine, and there is not an obvious, glaring reason why, Get x-rays of all four feet and find someone who actually knows how to plot out the angles of them.

There is a pretty decent chance that if these are found to be off, the kissing spine can be made to go away in time, with help from a competent farrier and likely some chiropractic work.

12/06/2022

02/17/2022

Cooling down a horse in cold weather is not a very glamorous task and is also quite time-consuming, but it remains a very important part of the process to ensure you don’t jeopardize your horse’s health by allowing him to catch a chill.

Our friends at Equus Magazine have a few useful tips to share. You can read the full article on their website at https://equusmagazine.com/riding/coolingout-10486/