Jackson Horsemanship

16/11/2023

29/10/2023

In hand work is not just for the purpose of moving a horse’s body around, teaching them movements.
In hand work serves the purpose of teaching the rider body awareness, how to balance their steps and create fluid and peaceful energy. It educates the rider to connecting their movement and posture on the ground to ridden work: to create a connection between the two bodies that a horse can understand and translate from the ground to being ridden.

In hand work is largely about the humans body awareness and self control: making themselves clear and balanced, not making corrections erratically and always guiding from a place of their own center first.

The last and least important part is moving the horse around. Good in hand work teaches the horse to follow the human’s balance: teaching humans self control and balance seems to be the least interesting thing for the public, but the most important.

08/10/2023

This!

Teach lessons that aline with your values.

Share them with your students. Teach kids to ride with contact. Teach them to ride without. Teach them to use their legs. Teach them to use the outside rein. Teach them to ride with their seat and not their hands. They don’t get to trot until they can steer, stop and use their legs.

We walk a lot in my lessons here. It’s about building stronger and better riders for the future.

05/10/2023

See, it is not just me… Highly recommend following Amy Skinner Horsemanship.

04/10/2023

There is an enormous connection between a person’s emotional state, how they feel about life and themselves, and how they ride.

When we get into the nitty gritty stuff- when I say I want you to open your chest, to breathe, to take up space, to be fully present, we get into the mud of the mind-

Why does the person shrink? Why do they avoid being in their own mind? Why do they tense, clench and grab?

There is far more behind these so called riding faults than just riding-
There is the perception of self and of life.

And this is where when I ask you to take up space in your own body and to be present in your own mind, you must find the courage to look inside and be who you were meant to be, not just to ride well, but to live a good life.

04/10/2023

Teaching standing vs movement

From day one, we teach horses to move in many forms. Leading, lunging, riding….they all consist of requiring the horse to move forward.

Finally later on in the horse’s life, we wonder why the horse doesn’t want to stand still 🤷‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Duh!!! All we ever taught him to do was move forward.

We never thought about teaching our horse to unplug and stand quietly and calmly.

What!?! You have to teach standing still? Doesn’t my horse just stand around all day in the pasture? I figured he would like stand since that is all he does.

Well that’s true but once you teach movement by association (aka riding, lunging, etc) with a human involved, your horse now thinks that he must move all the time when he is with you because you have taught him that you have an agenda. Horses are masters of anticipating what we might want because they are people pleasers. So therefore they seek to please by guessing what the human might want next but anticipation also creates anxiety.

Anxiety leads to movement when we doesn’t want it because of the guessing game of anticipation.

Horses use movement to help self soothe. That’s why horses that are anxious need to move.
So how do we help our forward movement taught horses to stand still?

Well first of all you cannot make a horse stand still. We have been taught to move a horse’s feet to get to their mind (aka tiring them out). This changes the physical part of it because they are too tired to move but it doesn’t change the mind. Once the horse is no longer tired, he wants to move again.

What if we went for changing the mind first before moving the feet? What if we taught out horses to stand still first before movement?

However if your horse needs to move his feet for self soothing you must let him as you can’t make him stand still!!

You ALLOW your horse to move his feet but you do NOT MAKE him!!

Please read that again!!!

There is a huge difference between allow and make.

Use your horse’s movement to redirect to you and always offer the option to stand still once your horse is ready.

Your horse wants to stand but he thinks he must move due to feelings of anxiety (anticipation) and/or fear.

Redirecting through movement allows for you to help change your horses thoughts towards you and allow him to stand and rest but it does not make him stand and that is the big difference on the journey towards connection!!

03/10/2023

Holding the whip with good technique
Picking up the reins without pulling backwards
Regaining a stirrup without stopping the seat
Holding the lunge line without pulling the head off center
Re-organizing the lunge line without losing focus on the horse in movement
Walking beside the horse in a straight line without pulling the horses shoulder toward them
Saddling, girthing and mounting without tightening the horses back
Taking a horse through a gate with balance and calm

These are essential skills to being a good rider and horseman.
Where are these being taught? Do people still know or care about them?

Everywhere I go, I hear people talk about canter transitions, lateral work, improving a jump -

But I rarely see excellent basic skills

As a teacher, this is where my focus lies. Until you can get organized and balanced yourself, there’s no amount of progress your horse can gain that you can’t disorganize in short order -

Everyone wants to do the fancy stuff. Who wants to get really good at holding their equipment well, putting it on quietly without disturbing the horse, walking better, breathing better, and just being better to a horse in general?

15/09/2023

09/09/2023

⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️⬇️🐎👏

How to train a horse to bolt:

1- regularly lead him with a tight grip, especially on the same side. Resistance to the lead rope on a regular basis will make him feel both confined and worried, and also learn to use it for leverage to seek escape.

2- drive while the hand or lead line or lunge line is closed. This will ensure the horse goes forward into a block, and is forced to go up and away. It’s a very effective way to confuse a horse and bring up the fight or flight in him, and if you’re very effective, he’ll leave in a hurry

3- expose him to something he wasn’t prepared for, or ask him to do something from a place of mental worry, without giving him the skills to understand or accomplish it. Continue applying pressure, or not alleviating it, for best bolting effect.

4- work around or near folks who are not guiding their horse well, with horses who are disregulated. This will give your horse a worried energy to feed off of, and help create energy building to a bolt. Choosing not to support your horse but fighting his energy just to get along with the group will really seal the deal.

5- regularly be unaware of your own energy, your own handling of your tools and have conflicting aids between leg, seat and rein.

It’s not that hard to teach a horse to bolt, any body can do it ! Just follow a few simple steps and you’ll be well on your way to a confirmed bolter- with practice, they can choose it as their default behavior, and you won’t even have to try to create it. Practice makes perfect!

Coming soon:

How to teach a horse to buck
To drag on the lead rope
To not get in a trailer
And many more!

03/06/2023

Two Opposite Training Approaches--Cooperation and Submission

Think about this---There is a species of animal, the horse, and another species, the human, and the human is attempting to turn the horse into an animal that can be safely ridden or driven.

Some humans carefully, calmly and methodically teach the horse what to do and how to do it. They do this by careful repetition, not to the point of overload, and as the horse learns what is expected, the human carefully adds following steps.

Little force is employed, and the human tries to keep the training sessions, insofar as possible, below the anxiety threshold of the horse because the desired end goal is a willing partnership.

Other humans seek submission from the horse, and to that end they use all kinds of bits, rigs and forceful techniques. Their end goal is a horse that does what it is told, and the ends, to these trainers, justify the means to get there.

Each human has a choice about which approach to take. The horse has to take what the human brings to the session, and does not have any choice.

Ask ourselves---“Am I someone who chooses cooperation through quiet education, or am I someone who chooses submission by whatever means it takes to get it?”

It is as simple as that at its most basic level.

27/10/2022

My article about mirroring and horses.

By Kathryn Jackson Most of us know that horses are sensitive, aware, and feeling animals. The horse’s ability to empathize and connect with people is part of the reason they are useful in both physical and emotional human therapy. What is it that helps horses have this ability? I have led a horse-...

22/10/2022

‘MASTER’S TRIANGLE’

IT’S NOT A POSITION, IT’S A PRINCIPLE… NATURE’S NEUTRAL

Always begin and end in stillness…

We cannot create order from chaos, and with a horse whose mind and body are ‘pinballing’ -faster and slower, left and right- trying to contain them between our legs and hands is about as effective as trying to contain water with our legs and hands…

The more we do, and the less stillness we have in ourselves, the more turbulent things become.

Like the pinball player frantically jamming at the controls, we have no true influence, we have only reactionary motion.

A MODERN PROBLEM
We can only create order by beginning from stillness, in both horse and rider.

Only from stillness can we channel the horse into a deliberate, mindful flow.

But stillness from the rider… the quiet mind, the quiet hand, the quiet leg, is sadly missing in modern riding.

In the past, there was a necessity of stillness and efficiency, due to riding many miles, or many horses, or doing a job from horseback, all things which required riders to conserve energy.

So there was no driving a horse with the seat in each stride, no constant kicking, no constant pulling.

Stillness was born from necessity.

Today’s riders, riding less miles, less horses, both themselves and their horses less physically challenged, must instead find stillness in self-awareness and self-discipline.

We must learn to be mindful of things like the ‘master’s triangle.’

The elbow dropping straight down to gravity, the hands finding a neutral place together, forming a triangle between our forearms, is not some arbitrary, formal position.

Neither is the still, steady ‘master’s heel.’

It’s the neutral of nature, found either by wet saddle blankets, or the mastery of our own ‘busyness.’

CALM, FORWARD, STRAIGHT…

Do less to get more.

Establish rhythm…
Find stillness in the natural rhythm and tempo of the horse’s ‘migration’ mode.
It’s not our job to maintain gait, and most steering problems are forward problems.

Establish straightness…
Find stillness in the horse’s natural ‘follow a trail’ mode.
It’s not our job to maintain direction.

Establish relaxation…
Find stillness in the natural tempo and posture of migration mode.
Can your horse start to self-regulate on a loose rein with less and less reminders and co-regulation from you?
On a loose rein, can they maintain their own relaxation in their topline, their own relaxation of tempo?

Are we riding the way the herd moves?

If we can get stillness while maintaining rhythm, straightness, relaxation, if our horse is calm, forward, straight, then we are ready to begin…

Mark Russell, Sarah Dawson

07/10/2022

It is just the "normal" way of thinking when it comes to riding horses is to Kick um to go, Pull um to Stop, Pull um to turn and thats just how it is. But in truth the horse has to figure out how to react to these techniques in search of attaining relief from the discomfort that often times is relentless and even painful.
Its obvious that horses do figure it out and in truth pretty quickly but many times the horse responds out of fear rather than out of understanding and trust. If we slow down and take a little time and notice just how sensitive horses are, it has been proven a level of lightness can be achieved that almost seems magical. It is also a fact that one can achieve Going, Turning and Stopping with no more effort that straightening or relaxing your back to Stop or Go and just looking where you want to go to turn! If a Horse or a Mule can feel and react to a tiny fly landing on them and even twitch just that section of skin then there is little doubt they sure can feel us up there moving around.
The key to all of this is centered around us becoming aware of important elements that can effect our horses response to us on the ground and on their backs. In elementary terms they must be calm so they can be connected to their thinking part of their brain which then allows them to be responsive to your intentions and requests. Seems simple enough but in truth truly attaining "calm" is the hurtle that is the highest and most evasive. Why? Simply put...A predator(that's us humans) is trying to gain the trust of a prey animal(the horse) who's only concern is not getting eaten! When we grip and clutch having hands and legs that close quickly resembles a lion jumping unto a horses back! From the horses prepective the end is near! A vital skill we must embrace is having our hands and legs close slowly and then open up and release our grip quickly! Easily said....not so easily done...we as humans are born to clutch and grasp.... just hold a newborn human up close to your hair on your head!😳🤣....Just thinking.....🤔

03/08/2022

These two are doing an amazing job! Way to go, Lydia!

Amber McLean

13/05/2022

This video is part of a guest trainer course in Horse Tricks Academy. For more information visit www.horsetricks101.com

13/05/2022

Video for teaching the draw - the first thing I teach towards liberty training. Asking your horse to come to you.

13/05/2022

Liberty exercises working towards collection

https://youtu.be/sXlZ5h3Wvas

This video is part of a guest trainer course in Horse Tricks Academy. For more information visit www.horsetricks101.com

13/05/2022

Excellent treat manners video from Horse Tricks 101 - excellent on line trick training courses!

https://youtu.be/mWw2OyNuNaY

In this video I discuss the importance of teaching food manners – even if you won’t be using food to train your horse. The video also shows a short training ...

13/05/2022

Teaching your horse to move with you on line.
https://youtu.be/60sn6_jYBGU

This is part of a course offered through Horse tricks 101 - Horse Tricks Academy guest trainer, Kitty Jackson. Developing Collection at Liberty or on line. T...

27/02/2022

The horse should always be encouraged to think, which means it is allowed to find the right answer through trial and error in a dialogue with the rider.

- Thomas Ritter
artisticdressage.com

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23/02/2022

“Stealing rides”... It’s been a really long time since I have felt helpless and fear when I get on a horse. Ever since I started becoming aware of my equine partner’s need to survive, I discovered I could gain his trust by being respectful, kind, patient and fair. I also knew that in order for me to be successful, I had to start educating myself and developing a good solid horsemanship foundation. Things started getting a little less “western“, there was less drama, less arguing with my horse, less fear of getting on a lion that subconsciously I created by not understanding my horse. I guess what I’m trying to say with all this is that years have gone by since I felt helpless on my horse's back. I try to educate myself a little bit each day because I know knowledge can conquer fear and you will no longer feel helpless because it all becomes awareness.

05/02/2022

28/11/2021

There is no training objective that takes more precedence than the relationship between you and your horse. All of the gymnasticization, straightening, strengthening, and suppling work is meaningless if you are disconnecting from your horse in the process, so always prioritize a healthy connected relationship above everything else.

23/11/2021

More thoughts on liberty training and why it is good for emotionally challenged horses.

16/11/2021

Why trainers PUSH horses TOO FAST

Klaus Balkenhol explains, "Although breeders have created a better horse, the market has created a demand for a stronger, healthier, more powerful horse. It's easier to sell a horse that looks like a carefully developed eight-year-old, and not like a three- or four-year-old just beginning his career. If you force it, you can get a three-year-old to physically look like a developed eight-year-old. Too many colts remain stallions which, if approved, promise breeders higher prices as three-year-olds. Now 250 to 300 young stallions are presented each year, when only 40 or 50 will be approved.

Few breeders have the sense to geld the yearling stallions and leave them on the pasture to mature naturally. Instead, yearling stallions are brought into a stall, fed too much grain, and at three, look like six- or seven-year-olds. They have muscle mass, but not enough bone structure to support it. They look mature from the outside but aren't . . . and when started to work, degeneration sets in. Competitions also create pressure to push horses too fast as competitions are now scheduled throughout the year without any breaks."

Common Mistakes In Pushing Too Fast
Tightening the noseband: "A horse resists by sticking out his tongue. Tightening the noseband too much puts pressure on the nose and on the poll. If it is necessary to tighten the noseband very tightly, then something has gone very wrong in the basic training of the horse. The horse cannot be relaxed, the first step on the training scale," warns Klaus.

Specializing too early: "Drilling every day in the indoor arena is too intense for the young horse. It's very important, especially in the first two years of training, not to specialize the young horse. Training should include a variety of activities, including trail riding, which is good for the mind as well as building strength with hill work. It should include jumping, either free or low jumps under saddle, including small natural obstacles on the trail, and cavaletti. A variety of work will allow the horse to stay mentally fresh and to enjoy his work. Only when the horse is happy can dressage become art."

Not checking tack frequently: "Saddle and tack need to be checked constantly for proper fit and adjusted as the horse's body changes with growth, and as his fitness improves with the training. If the noseband gets too low, for example, and the skin between the noseband and the bit is rubbed and becomes sore, this causes the horse discomfort and loss of relaxation. Regularly check for sharp edges and bit problems in the horse's mouth and teeth."

Working too long: "The goal of our training is to build the horse's mind and his muscles. Suppleness and relaxation require adequate muscle strength. strengthening requires both contraction and relaxation. Blood flow and oxygenation occur when the muscle relaxes. If the muscle is kept in a constant state of contraction, it loses power and strength, and actually becomes smaller. Frequent rest periods, especially for a young horse at a free walk on a long rein, are necessary. The rest periods are not for a rider's fatigue, but to allow the horse to stretch and relax his muscles. The rest breaks will give you a completely new horse. This is the systematic gymnasticizing of the horse."

Riding when the horseman is tense: "Horses are particularly sensitive to the rider's mood. A rider shouldn't ride if she is under undue stress or doesn't have the time to ride. If the rider has a bad day, give the horse a rest day or go for a relaxing trail ride; don't work in the arena. The horse mirrors the rider's mood."

Not praising the horse enough: "The horse must perform from joy, not subservience. Praising a horse frequently with voice, a gentle pat, or relaxing the reins is very important to keep the horse interested and willing. If the horse offers piaffe, for instance, because he's excited, praise him for it. You shouldn't stop the lesson at that point nor make a big deal out of it. If you don't want piaffe, quietly urge him forward into trot, but you should NEVER punish him for offering the piaffe. - Klaus Blakenhol

29/10/2021

POSITIVE REINFORCEMENT
I think all 'good' as in 'effective' training, needs to make use of positive reinforcement for the correct responses a horse offers - be it voice praise, scratching, stroking, rubbing withers, smiling, nodding and getting excited, showing your pleasure and joyful surprise, smooching or even kissing your horse - these are all natural and useful ways of positively acknowledging that we are happy with what our horse gives or tries to give. And horses are so generous! (When you think about what they could do to us given their size and strength!)

I think this acknowledgement from us - noticing what the horse is trying to do for us - is very important, and not only brings out the best in our horses, but indeed accelerates the learning. Similar to quick releases in pressure-release and negative reinforcement training - the horse is learning what 'profits it' and what 'profits it not' (As Tom Roberts would have said). But i see many riders in the habit of relying only on pressure release training and not making use of positive reinforcement. Some even not approving.

When trainers or other riders criticise the use of positive reinforcement we could lead them to think about how they learn best. Do they like being recognised for a job well done, or for a good idea? Do they like encouragement, praise, acknowledgement, rewards, special awards, ribbons at a show, special treats and surprises? Or do they learn best through harsh physical correction, punishment, demanding force, coercive pressure? Something to think about.

Horses are sentient beings, they may not reason the same as us but they do have feelings and emotions. They know our emotions before we do and they know when we are pleased and happy with them. And while they DO need to be safely controlled by us - they also need recognition of all the little efforts they make for our pleasure or entertainment.

In over 45 years of living with horses, students, and coaches from many different countries there is no doubt in my mind that positive reinforcement is incredibly powerful.

Animal trainers in a variety fields use a clicker. The clicker helps humans improve their timing which in turn helps horses understand and learn a task clearly and quickly. As the clicker marks the exact moment the correct behaviour happens. Clicker can be useful , particular for helping people become more aware of the importance of timing in training. But I also think we can replace this with other 'markers' and other 'treats' (joyful acknowledgement/praise/rub etc) and this can be just as effective if our timing and consistency is as good as the 'click and treat'.

Horses are 'programmed' to pick up on the slightest changes in body language and cues - they can be so willing to try and work out what we want when our cues are clear and our releases and rewards are timely. They can teach us much about our communication habits - if we are ready to listen. It is really wonderful what you can achieve with positive reinforcment!

28/10/2021

I think that many riders have not carefully thought through what is meant by the term "to apply the aids" when we are trying to get a horse to respond in some way to something that we have asked him to do.

At the most basic level, aids are communications. Humans communicate by gestures, by the spoken word, and in writing.

But horses don't speak a language of words, not primarily. They can learn short words like trot, canter, but if you say to a horse, "Bend to the right, and perform a small circle," you can say it in spoken words all day long and nothing will happen.

So we don't use our tongues and vocal cords to talk to horses. We use systems of pressure and release, so that the horse learns that by giving to certain pressures in specific ways will cause a softening of pressure from the rider. It becomes a pattern of conditioned response. The rider applies certain pressures for the right lead canter, the horse picks up the right lead canter.

But a nervous horse will not be a learning horse, so not only does the rider need to learn what specific pressures to use to obtain specific responses, the rider must also learn to apply them gently enough so as not to make the horse nervous.

And at first, a gently applied pressure may not get any response from the horse, because the horse does not understand what that pressure is requesting.

At this point it can get tempting for the rider to repeat the pressure harder or stronger. "If he didn't move left from my right leg pressure, I need to kick him harder," one might think. And, while the horse may move from the harder kick, if he does so because it was painful, and it has made him nervous, the rider has won the little "battle," but is in the process of losing the bigger "war," because a nervous horse is not a learning horse.

This training is not a battle of wills, when done by the better trainers. It is a process of teaching. Far better to repeat the gentle pressure persistently enough until the horse moves---heck, a horse can feel a fly land on its flank---It takes patience and persistence, but when done calmly, the trainer/rider can usually stay below the nervousness threshold of the horse while the horse absorbs the lesson.

After a few weeks of this, the horse will still be calm, but will also move calmly away from the leg. If the rider had kicked him harder until he moved away, the horse would have done it sooner, but tension would have been the by-product, and a tense, nervous horse is not a learning horse.

Such an important lesson for aspiring trainers to learn and fully understand and consistently use, and not just when they are "feeling patient." Patience isn't patience if we are only patient when we feel like it.

(The rider in this photo, Mr HLM Van Schaik, explained much of this to me about 60 years ago, but I was too green to grasp most of it.)

26/10/2021

Confidence is not built with punishment, good training can take years.

25/10/2021

Quote of the week
(...well maybe its been a month or so 😄 )

17/10/2021

15/10/2021

It might be controversial, but I think signal devices like hackamores and curbs are more dignified than direct-pull devices like a sidepull or snaffle.

When we utilize them as a signal device instead of a leverage device, and give the horse the ability to work off of signal instead of pressure, I think that is much more dignified than pulling their head around like they’re a four-wheeler.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve seen people use direct-pull devices in a very tactful way and build in their own signals, and I do this myself, but it’s food for thought.

Not everyone who’s using a ‘leverage’ device is using it for leverage, sometimes they’re using it for signal, because they respect the sensitivity of the horse to respond to intention rather than direction.

ON HACKAMORES…
If you think hackamores are about leverage and bumping, you’ve probably become familiarized with them in the Texas tradition.
Well, here is the Californio tradition, which stems from classical riding from Europe.

This is probably the biggest influence on how I have started handling my reins over the past few years, or rather, how I’ve learned to do less with my reins.

Remember the vaquero tradition is direct from the classical traditions from Europe, so this is very classical.

The biggest difference is, keeping the hands in a fairly neutral area and adjusting the reins up to that working area, not taking the hands out, so rein management is key; particularly, being able to slip rein and run rein instead of moving the hands.

When people watch me ride, they don’t think I’m doing a lot with the rein, because my hands don’t really move, but I’m still taking and giving rein and still being effective, even on colts.

The reason behind not bringing the hands out of the box is that working from the same angle as we would if we were one-handed will allow us to progress to riding one-handed sooner, as well as prevent a lot of issues with crookedness and bend and incorrect rotation, not to mention it really forces us to ride back to front and ride with our seat and legs instead of our hands.

The reason we’ve lost some of this knowledge and it’s become common place to ride quite low and wide, is because we stopped riding bridle horses for work, and became more recreational.
I’m not sure the horse appreciates our de-evolution.

The signal and swing that come from the equipment, a lifting hand, and signal against the neck, really gives the horse more time for a dignified and balanced response.

If we watch very advanced riders, they all ride with their hands in the box.

I think we often think this is a result of the horse being finished, when in actuality, the horse becomes finished because the rider starts riding them from the box.

https://youtu.be/r5EKadrhi0Q