Little Chief's Equestrians

08/17/2024

08/15/2024

08/15/2024

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER 🔥

08/14/2024

“Horses have the ability to think and plan ahead and are far more intelligent than scientists previously thought, according to a Nottingham Trent University study that analysed the animal’s responses to a reward-based game.

“The horses cannily adapted their approach to the game to get the most treats – while making the least effort.

“Previously, research has suggested that horses simply respond to stimuli in the moment, they don’t proactively look ahead, think ahead and plan their actions – whereas our study shows that they do have an awareness of the consequences and outcomes of their actions,” said the lead researcher, Louise Evans.”

https://www.theguardian.com/science/article/2024/aug/12/horses-can-plan-ahead-and-think-strategically-scientists-find

The actual research paper…

“Whoa, No-Go: Evidence consistent with model-based strategy use in horses during an inhibitory task”
Louise Evans et al.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168159124001874?via%3Dihub

Read about Akhal-Teke Foundation programs here…
https://www.akhaltekefoundation.org/programs.html

Join our email list here…
https://www.akhaltekefoundation.org/email_list.html

08/11/2024

HERE WE COME 😎

08/11/2024

What a romantic idea

08/11/2024

"Customer service IS NOT slavery" 🙌

As a barn owner, the hardest line you'll ever draw is the boundary of who you allow in and who you allow to stay.

A friendly reminder to my fellow trainers (and any horse person in general)-

-Nobody is worth your peace of mind..if they cost you your peace, kick them out!

- No one can buy your trust, when you see their true actions...believe them.

- If they can't respect you or the facility, they need to leave.

- No amount of money is worth harboring negative energy in your work and play atmosphere.

I am done trying to hatch bad eggs. I am no longer willing to try to fix, help, slave or suffer for those not willing to give the same effort or at the least carry themselves with class and integrity.

Say it with me friends:

Your barn, your rules. And your happy place. If they don't like it, they can leave.

Customer service should not feel like slavery. You shouldn't feel uncomfortable when people pull into your barn driveway. Stick to your guts. And your boundaries. 💕

- Ian Baese O’Connor

📸 Kaly Madison Photography

08/05/2024

🙌

Great words 🥰
credits: Pinterest

07/21/2024

07/18/2024

Giddy up, y'all! Saddle up for the 2024 Vanderburgh County Rodeo, proudly sponsored by BASF and Lile’s trailer sales. Get ready to rope, ride, and wrangle your way to victory at this rootin' tootin' event! 🤠🐎

07/16/2024

🙌

Many of the social media horse influencers go on and on about pain in horses. It has become the go-to reason for almost every unwanted behavior in horses. Someone must have started a "I care more than you do" contest about horses and whoever can raise the issue of pain the most wins. Which is not to say that the decline in horsemanship standards, resulting from a lack of interest in horsemanship, has not increased pain in horses. But still, pain is not the cause or answer for everything.

Pain as a cause for many things including bucking is very popular today. In my experience, the most common reason for bucking is instinct. Predators attack from the top. Natural selection has instilled a brainstem instinct in horses to get living beings off their back. Therefore, the solution to not creating a bucking horse is to start or restart a horse carefully from the beginning by backing them correctly so as to remove or overcome their instinct to get rid of you on their back. Backing is a method of laying across a horse's back in stages.

Another often overlooked reason for bucking is exuberance. Smart athletic horses know when they "do it right" and they regularly celebrate with a kick out or a buck. The solution to this is to be ready and able to ride through the kick or buck. If you punish exuberance too severely, you can ruin a good horse.

07/14/2024

Due to the heat advisories this week lessons & training are being extremely limited
Stay hydrated especially our local 4H kids!!!

11/11/2022

"Puppy Love"
Our Daniff puppies have found wonderful homes - whats a Daniff? (English mastiff x great dane) This breed has proven to be loyal, protective & smart - the best trail dog we could of asked for💗

11/06/2022

Wise wise words

10/31/2022

Happy Halloween!!!

10/25/2022

🙌🏼🙌🏼

10/24/2022

Best view in the world!

10/11/2022

Sometimes it's not ulcers.

Sometimes it's not kissing spine.

Sometimes it's not EPM.

Sometimes it's not the bit.

Sometimes it's not the saddle.

Sometimes it's not the trainer.

Sometimes it's the fact you're a crazy human who continues to anthropomorphise these behaviours and insist that it couldn’t possibly be a pain related issue or anything related to you.

Sometimes it’s the fact that your horse was designed for the purpose of moving 20+ kilometres per day with their head down grazing and is now confined to a box stall and fed up on high energy grain whilst going without hay for hours each day, creating a sore tummy and a greater likelihood of having ulcers as a domestic horse than not in addition to being chronically understimulated and largely unable to exercise unless they have a human on their back playing puppeteer.

Sometimes it's the fact that you dress your horse in a variety of equipment with the purpose of restricting the movement of their mouth (flash) or creating more leverage for you to be able to ride and direct them easier by using a number of different harsher bits or gadgets like draw reins. This effectively removes any ability for quiet communication, so when your horse can’t take it anymore, they must get louder.

Sometimes it’s the fact that way too many unqualified trainers play saddle fitter and tell students their tack fits when it actually does not.

Sometimes it's the fact that your horse absolutely adores running away from you because it is one of the few things that brings them relief from the otherwise high pressure, high stress lifestyle that can be rides, especially when their communication of stress and/or discomfort is being labelled as personality and otherwise viewed through an anthropomorphic lens.

Sometimes it's the fact that you think your horse will wait for you while you mount or dismount but your horse is chronically stressed and cannot fathom the idea of standing still for a couple of seconds while they’re in fight or flight mode so they instead use the opportunity for relief by moving.

Sometimes it's the fact that the majority of the stress and avoidance behaviours we see ARE correlated with mental and/or physical discomfort and have shown consistent correlation in extensive equine behaviours studies.

Sometimes it’s the fact that we have a 70-90% rate of stomach ulceration in domesticated horses so your horse is more likely to have them than not.

Sometimes, the issue is that we as humans are really great at denying anything that would push us to self reflect and see the gravity of what is an industry wide issue of ignoring the horse and then when they finally get loud so we have to notice, blaming their loud behaviours once again on them.

Horses do not lie, their behaviour is honest. Humans, on the other hand, DO lie. Especially to themselves. To protect from having to sit information that is hard to hear.

It’s taking the easy way out to anthropomorphise your horse. But, I can promise you that if you actually put the time, money and belief into diagnostic work, you will have a very good chance of finding out what physical issue is causing their behaviour. Many who claim it can’t be pain related just don’t actually put the work in to find out because the real truth is often expensive and could be painful. For years, I avoided the truth for the same reason, all without knowing that was why.

If you learn to look for the reason behind their unwanted behaviour instead of just looking at the behaviour at face value, you also may find what situations, equipment and other factors contribute to it.

If you consider ruling out pain first and honestly looking at your horse’s living situation from a welfare standpoint, you may just realize how often pain and inadequate management cause behavioural issues, because these factors are behind the vast majority of issues we run into with horses.

After all, I thought it was “never the horse’s fault” or are we just saying that to sound good?

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You can support my work for as little as $1 a month by subscribing to my Patreon. You can get free access to behind the scenes, early video uploads, training help, tutorials and more: http://Patreon.com/sdequus

You can also see my website for more about me, my horses & free learning resources: http://milestoneequestrian.ca

10/10/2022

Fantastic last trail class of the year!