Gentling Mustangs with Positive Reinforcement: Part 2

You're an inspiration. You were there to help me. You just saw the need and said, can I help you? We learn a lot from watching other horses and watching other riders. I'm Julie, good night and thank you for listening to my podcast about horse training, equestrian sports, and building a better connection with your horse. It's time for Ride On with Julie. Good night around the ranch. well, these days, everything is all about Annie's cult.

Like all proud parents out there, Annie and Rich and I think our cult is exceptional in every way. He's beautiful, he's smart, he's talented. I know a lot of you have been curious. It took us a while to come up with a good name for him, but we have, officially nicknamed the Cult. Rip, of course, is registered. Name will be something fancy, but, just is a barn name.

And the name we know him by, we're calling him rip, and we primarily came up with that just from watching him running around out in his paddock and how he, you know, he he can be just cantering along and then take off like a bullet. He seems to be a bit of a sprinter. Any he likes to rip some big moves too. Like like you would expect of a cutting bred horse. So he just rips around that pasture like crazy.

And also, those of you who have watched Yellowstone, the TV series, well, you probably know that one of the main character's name is rip, and he is, a bigger than life character to say the least. And that really seems to fit as well, because the colt sire is a stallion by the name of Bette. He's a cat and he stands. The stallion stands at the famous Four Sixes Ranch in Texas, which is partly owned by Taylor Sheridan, who is the producer of Yellowstone.

So it's kind of, a name that that fits and and on a number of different points. So today, as I make this recording, rip is just a little over two months old, and I've started to introduce him to the rest of the herd up until now. And he's been very clear she didn't want anything to do with the other horses. But as, rip gets a little older and she gets a little, more tired of him, the other horses are looking better every day.

And Rich's older horse, Casper, who lives in the stall right next to Annie. And he's always been real close to her and a protector of Annie. And now he feels that way about rip. So he has turned out to be the perfect uncle horse, and he keeps a close protective eye on both Annie and Rip and he tolerates most of Rip's rowdiness, although he's doing a stellar job of teaching rip about boundaries and manners and stuff like that. So rip is, at this point minimally halter trained.

He's leading pretty well, and he stands nicely for halter and unfaltering. We started leading the two of them, Annie and rip up to their grassy paddock first thing in the morning, and then back to the barn at night and we started that on his very second day of live. So he was 24 hours old when he first went up to the grassy paddock. And it's a few hundred yards away from the barn, so it's a nice little walk in hand twice a day.

And, this is what you may have, before, if you've been following my stuff for a while, you may have heard me use the term organic training. and what I mean by that is that it's we're we're not really doing any kind of formal training session with rip. we are just practicing in the way it's going to be done every day for the rest of his life.

we're doing it that way from day one so that it's not really so much he learns as it just becomes a normal pattern in his life, and it has a purpose, which is to go from the barn up to the grassy paddock. And the great thing about that is the halter ring and unfaltering and leading all of that is a really positive event for this little guy, because it's fun and entertaining to go up there in the mornings. He can't wait to get out of the stall and go up there and run around and see new stuff.

And then by the time, you know, mid afternoon and he doesn't like to stay out all day, she, she lets her needs be known and stands at the fence and knickers and anyone that comes by that she's ready to go back to the barn by then. they want to be in the cool stall. They want something to eat. Not. And, you know, the colt wants to lay down, take a nice nap in his cool, comfy crib. And so to him, it is just a normal thing that we do. And it's it's works out really well.

Now, if you tried to lead him, you know, somewhere different or separate him from his mother or anything like that, he wouldn't look like he was very halter broke. But, while we're doing a daily routine, he is just all business, and he just marches right out beside me or whoever is leading him, and he, he he knows the task at hand. So right now, I'm just gradually teaching him by every now and then when he comes back to the barn in the stall, I just will momentarily hold him still.

And he's learning. I actually started doing this when? From when he was first born on. So I'll just kind of put my arms around him in a hugging type of way and just ask him to hold still for a second. And as soon as he just relaxes and hold still, I let him go. So it's like a two second ordeal. And gradually, as time goes on, he will learn, that at times he has to stand still. At times he will be restrained from movement.

And it's a nice thing for a horse to learn early on when it's actually possible to, physically restrain him. So he gets always gets a nice little scratch, during that time. And he loves that. And we don't really scratch on him a lot and rub on him because that gets him a little pushy. So, that's kind of what I'm working with him now, teaching him to hold still momentarily and also to allow me to rub him with a rag that's damp with the all natural Ultra Shield green fly spray.

So the flies this time of year are really starting to get bad. We don't have terrible flies, but this time of year in August particularly, they start actually biting. And and you know, if you get your legs or arms fit, you know how much it hurts. So I'm trying and I of course, I wouldn't want to use a stronger chemical fly spray on him. but the Ultra Shield, all natural green fly spray has a really nice kind of, kind of eucalyptus tea tree oil type smell to it.

So it's pleasant and, so I just, I just spray it on to a rag and then I rub it on its body. Now, easier said than done. When you get to the parts of his body that he's not used to being touched, like his belly or his legs. We're just working slowly on that. oddly enough, because we spray Annie every day with the green fly spray, I also wouldn't use a stronger chemical, which I would normally use on her when the flies are biting.

But because the colt is suckling and he's putting his mouth all over her all the time, I don't want him. I really don't want him around the really stronger stuff. So, So he's learning a lot. Again, an organic way. But when you spray Annie, if he's standing there next to her, you can spray him just as easily. He thinks nothing of it. He just. He just thinks it's a perfectly normal thing that happens. And it's kind of interesting to see.

Now, when I try to rub it on him, he gets a little squirrely still. So that's kind of a backwards way of thinking about it. for all of you that may have had trouble getting an adult horse to accept fly spray, and this little guy thinks nothing of it because his mother thinks nothing of it. So it seems normal to him. But aside from the handling that we're doing minimal, you know, like less than five minutes a day. I'm really a big believer in letting foals be falls, letting them be babies.

There will be plenty of time to train on him when he's older, like 2 or 3 and under saddle. Training goes so fast that there's really no reason to do it ahead of time. And a lot, a lot of negatives can come out of handling a foal too much or trying to train on a very immature horse. And, and you really don't gain anything. You have a lot to lose and you don't really gain much. So we will tread that line very carefully, handling him only enough to make sure that he's easy to manage.

And he doesn't develop bad habits like biting or, you know, bumping into you or slang has had at you. So we want him to learn boundaries and some very basic manners. Otherwise we just want him to have fun being a baby and and now and focus on growing up. Believe it or not, around here in the high mountains of Colorado, it's already starting to feel like fall and the fall flowers are blooming, which we're having a wet and cool summer, so the wildflowers are just amazing up in the mountains.

I'm actually looking forward to fall and getting back on the road starting in September with my clinics at the close of You Ranch that's up in Northern Colorado and Granby, Colorado, and I'm starting in September with my brand new program. It's something we've been working on, for a couple of years now. It's called Good Nights Ultimate Riding Vacation, and basically it's a four day, luxurious, horse centric vacation high up in the Rocky Mountains. at a ranch with 200 head of riding horses.

We're going to we have some great trail riding events, social events, clinics, lessons in the arena, plus all kinds of other resort activities available. And fall is such a glorious time of year in the Rocky Mountains. right after that, vacation clinic, I'm also hosting my ever popular ranch riding adventure that's early in October, and the ranch Riding Adventures, one of my most popular events. It's for the people that just can't get enough riding, all levels of riders.

But, there's four riding sessions a day, so two in the morning, two in the afternoon. And, you'll definitely get your share of riding in on that clinic. And then finally, at the end of October, I'll be in College Station, Texas, for the international conference. It's going to be there at Texas A&M. I'm really excited about that.

By the way, this is a hands on conference for horse professionals, trainers, instructors, barn managers, trail guides, therapeutic, all kinds of, professional level people. it's a highly educational event. But the cool thing is it's open to the public. Anyone who has an interest in learning more about horses and riding and training, is welcome at this event. It's one of the few conferences I know of where you actually get to ride horses, school horses during the, conference.

And in the workshops and stuff. So you'll you'll learn a lot at this clinic. It's, for me, it's a lot like, it's it's always had the feel of a family reunion. I've gone to this conference for about 25 years, and, it's just so much fun to go back and see old friends and, everybody kind of networking together and learning a lot and meeting new people. So it's open to the public. You can find out more about all of these programs at Julie. Good night.com/events.

And there you will find information on all of my upcoming clinics. You'll also be the first to know about new events when you sign up for my weekly newsletter at Julie. Good night. Com slash news. When you sign up, you'll also get my brand new training articles podcast episodes as soon as they drop exclusive deals and regular updates from me. You can also find me on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube at Julie. Good night! Today's podcast is part two of my interview with Doctor Sarah Matlock.

She's a professor of equine behavior at Colorado State University, and we'll be talking about her research on the impacts of positive reinforcement on the training of wild mustangs. She explains the unique challenges associated with channeling Mustangs, as well as the importance of understanding horse behavior and motivation.

And in my What the Hay Q&A at the end of this episode, I'll answer questions from listeners about a horse that panics when he's alone on the trail, a horse that's easily distracted, and a mare that just trots faster and faster. When asked to canter. Before we dive into today's topic, let's kick things off with. Long story short, I'll tell you a story from the early days of my horse training career.

Funny or amusing, exciting or inspirational, each story has hard won lessons I carry with me to this day. I hope to inspire and entertain you by sharing my real life experiences, even the tough ones. So maybe you won't have to learn the hard way.

About 30 years ago, I had some horse training clients that decided to adopt a wild mustang from BLM, and when they went through the adoption process, they had picked out a approximately five year old mare and beautiful dark bay mare, and they went ahead and hired the the prison facility where she was at to put 30 days of training on the mare. And that obviously would be under saddle training.

And I guess I can actually officially say, the purpose of the training was to break her, because first of all, this was 30 years ago. And second of all, these were wild mustangs and this particular prison facility would bring in, oh, I don't know. There were hundreds and hundreds. there was well over 500 horses in these holding pens and stuff. And they had, I'm going to say six or 8 or 10 round pens. And of course, they had an unlimited supply of,

people to get on these horses when they bucked them out. And, being the prisoners there. And so they were training a lot of horses and they were basically, you know, they were using some, more modern natural horsemanship techniques. But at the end of the day, they were kind of cramming and jamming on these horses and, and creating the 30 day wonders.

And on the day I was appointed to go pick up this horse, the idea being I would drive there with a trailer, they would show me what they had done with the horse. I would actually try the horse out, and then I would come home with the horse and continue its training. And all of that happened. there were some, really highly interesting things about going to the, to the prison, but we don't have time for that now. So, I'll save that for another time.

But when I went to pick up the horse, as I pulled up and I was parked in my trailer alongside all the round pens, there was this horse which ended up being the mare we were taking home was already in the round pen. She had a rider on her. She was soaking wet with sweat from nose to tail, and they were cantering around the round pen and you know, so that was sort of my first red flag is like, I've got an appointment to be here.

I'm here a few minutes early, and you have already ridden this horse up into a full lather. Why didn't you wait for me to be there to see that process? So I got out of the truck and I, you know, kind of. Yeah, whatever. Met the guy that was in charge, and we wander over to watch the horse being worked. And then I started noticing more things. First of all, by now, the guy was trying to bring the horse back down to a walk, but she he couldn't get her to walk. She was prancing.

She was over collected. He was holding the reins, like, really short and tight. They were riding her in a shanked bit. Now, this is a horse that has no more than 30 days of riding on it. And it was actually a rather harsh bit. It was a Tom thumb, many of you have heard me talk about the harshness of that bit. and also another big glaring red flag was the guy had spurs on and he could not get this horse to walk, and it was just a lot of stuff that didn't make sense.

And, you know, it was no great surprise that he couldn't get the horse to walk because he was holding her way to die. You know, it was just a it was a very, very tense situation. Also in the process, the men were out there and the guy on the horse was was a prisoner. And then there were always the supervisors around who were either guards or BLM, trainers that would be supervising everything.

And I picked up on some really interesting comments that were being bandied about like, oh, this one's got a lot of go. And, you don't have to ask her twice. And boy, she really knows what she wants. And, you know, just kind of a lot of stuff that was, also causing, you know, red flags to pop up in my mind. But pretty soon it was time for me to get on the horse. I wasn't concerned about the prancing. I knew the guy was causing that, and I knew that was a quick and easy fix.

But when I went to get on the mare, two big men, both men in charge, one worked for the prison, one worked with BLM, and they they jointly ran this program. As I get ready to get on this mare, they both just kind of subtly slinked up to the side of the horse at her head, and each of them grabbing the cheek piece of the bridle. So now I'm getting ready to get on this horse, and there's two big men on each side of her, holding the cheek pieces of the bridle.

Now, what that told me was they did not trust her one little bit, and they didn't want her to explode. When I got on her. And, on top of the two men positioning themselves there, the one man on the left, which was obviously on the side, I was mounting from cheeks, the horse down. Now, for those of you that are unfamiliar with that term, it's a very old school way of, again, I'm going to use the term breaking the horse.

So when we used to talk about saddle breaking a horse, there was a lot of different techniques involved in that. But one of them checking the horse down would mean you would just grab the lefts at you.

Being the person about to get on this bucking bronco would grab the left side of the cheek piece instead of holding the reins in your left hand, you're actually holding the left side of the cheek piece of the bridle just above the bit, and you make the horse turn its nose back towards, let's say back towards the horn of the saddle or back towards the girth of the saddle. As you get on the horse.

So the horse's cheek down when you've grabbed him by the bridle and pulled his nose all the way around, basically to where your knees going to be when you get on the horse. And it's very effective, because it's very difficult for the horse to take off or start bucking from that position. So it's not a it's not a terrible thing to do. And it's not an abusive thing to do or anything like that. It's just what you do if you're riding a bronc, you know? And, I'm not saying I would use that technique.

Never have, never will. But, anyway, the technique in and of itself is not abusive. You just basically have by turning the nose all the way around like that, it's not really possible for the horse to take off, until you let the nose go. So it's just kind of a thing people used to do. So they kick this horse down. As I got on her and she just stood there. She didn't. She she was very tense, but she didn't do anything. And so they gradually I was like, okay, men, you can step away now.

And the first thing I did was just kind of take a deep breath on her so she could feel it. And then I loosened the reins way up, and she just put her head down and took a deep breath, and I stroked her on the neck a little bad. She took another deep breath, and then and I. I had no prior thought of this, but just it occurred to me in that moment, I decided to show her I didn't have spurs on.

So I slowly took one leg and then the other, and I just slowly closed it on her sides and just kind of softly rub my lower leg, you know, just above the foot, the Achilles area. I just rubbed it up and down the sides of her rib cage just so she could see I didn't have spurs on, and that seemed to calm her down even more. And then when I just gently reached forward and barely asked her to go, she just stepped right off and a nice relaxed walk and we walked around on a loose rein. She was great.

I eventually asked her to trot a little bit and she again she had her head down. She was, quiet. Shouldn't necessarily trot slowly, but she was nice and quiet and I felt pretty good about it. I knew she'd had some intensive, riding, but I also recognized it for what it was, and I knew I could fix her and I did. Indeed. I got her home, and the first thing I did was put her in a snaffle. we started riding around a loose rein. We, just worked on being low and slow and quiet and relaxed.

And she was going great. About three weeks into that is when I ran into an issue and I was in the arena, outdoor arena, riding by myself, and I was riding around the short end of the arena, and I had already myself seen that my son was riding up towards the arena on his horse, big buckskin horse. And as I was turning away from the barn and kind of riding away, in a direction that put both her back and my back to the barn, that was about when he came riding up and she didn't see him.

So as we came around the corner and were turning back towards the barn, she caught sight of Hunter on that horse and she instantaneously went into a full blown panic. I mean, she went from relaxed to full flight in like a heartbeat, and you could feel it in her whole body. We were all the way at one far end of a very big arena, and she took off across that arena in a dead run. I in that moment had been riding with very loose reins. I had been trying to teach her that loose reins were good.

And so as she kind of spun and bolted for the other end of the arena, I'm scrambling to trying to gather up my reins, and she's gaining speed. She's running towards the fence, and I get the clear impression that this fence is not going to slow her down or stop her one little bit. She's just going to jump the fence and continue on across the prairie.

I had just a few seconds to kind of think things through, and I literally reached up and grabbed the left ring of the bit, and I took my left hand and my right hand, and I pulled with all my might up and back on the actual side of that bit. And just before we got to the fence, I was able to turn her and bring her to a stop. Of course, I immediately jumped off of her and she was just shaking all over.

I've never seen a horse that was as traumatized in the moment that went from just everything was fine, to acting like she was going to die that fast. She was shaking all over. She was way over threshold. she she was panicked. Her eyes were big, sweating, breathing hard. It was clearly fear in the most raw and pure form from the ground. Just kind of standing there holding her. It took me a good 5 or 10 minutes just to calm her down and to calm myself down, to. I was just scared.

She was by then and, you know, she settled down and, after that, we backed up her training a little bit. I stayed better prepared. I didn't leave the reins quite so loose anymore. I feared that this bolting incident indicated that the mare was inappropriate for their teenage daughter. I really was concerned about that. But when I discussed it with the owners, you know, they were there. They didn't see it, but they decided to just not worry about it and continue her training.

And they turned out to be ride because she never did it again. And she turned out to be an amazing mare for their daughter. But none of this actually is the actual point I want to make with this story. So a few weeks later, after that bolting incident and I was back to riding her and I had a lot of a lot more confidence in her.

Again, the brand inspector was out at my farm and, I'm sure many of you aren't familiar with brand inspection, but in the state of Colorado, when you buy a horse or sell a horse or transport a horse long distances, they have to get clearance from the brand inspector. And, he does cattle as well as horses. And whether or not your horse is actually branded is irrelevant, but they just monitor the movement and the titling of horses.

So the brand inspector was out, and we were looking at a horse that was in the pen with, along with that Mustang, and he said, oh, you got a mustang here. And I said, yeah, I'm turning in this horse. And and we're just chit chat. And he's an old friend. And he launches into this story about Mustangs. And he says, yeah, you got to be really careful with these Mustangs.

The ones that were rounded up from horseback sometimes when they catch sight of a strange horse with a rider on it, they just panic because that's the first thing they saw when the roundup process began. And all of a sudden, in that moment, this was an unsolicited story this guy told me. But in that moment, it was abundantly clear to me. That's exactly what had happened with this mare. Everything was fine. She was relaxed and peaceful and accepting and willing.

She unexpectedly caught sight of that horse with a rider on it, and she was instant PTSD, traumatized and of course, I have no way of knowing this for a fact, but it made total sense.

And back then, most of the horses were rounded up from horseback, and so that association that was created in her mind from that first sight of a strange horse with a rider to the traumatic events that would then follow, of being rounded up and separated and, you know, confined and run through chutes and all of that. Obviously, it's a traumatic event.

And, so it's understandable that for some of the feral horses that are rounded up, if it all started by the unexpected sight of that unknown horse with a rider on top, then that's an unforgettable memory that will stay with that horse forever. Now, this horse went on to be A48 show horse, and obviously she got used to having strange horses around there and she became just a regular old horse, super nice horse. But it was just that early experience that that kind of set her back a little bit.

But there were a lot of lessons to be learned in that story. not just about how clearly associations can be made with horses, but also about how the flight fight freeze response can happen so fast because of triggers that we may not know or understand. I could have just as easily never heard that story from the brand inspector and put those things together, and it would have remained, in my mind, a question mark of what caused that horse to bolt. So, it was an interesting story.

And, you know, I've never in my entire life trained a horse I didn't learn something from, I usually learn something every single day. And this was just another case in point. And I think it will be an interesting story to think about while you listen to my interview with Doctor Matlock. What was the overall result of the Mustang journaling? What was the outcome? Yeah of that. So really interesting. We had 15 horses altogether. We had five horses that were all stars.

They were trained, they were gentle, incredibly fast, faster than like the traditional rate of of even gentle halters on them. Day one, that kind of stuff. and they were lined up at the gate ready for our sessions anytime we were. And they couldn't wait to go to. School. It was so cute. I mean, they'd all be there just waiting to go. So they were our all stars. And then we had five that were more traditional in the time or the duration it took to gentle them.

They took a little bit longer, but it was still effective. So they were about the same time frame. Is probably an average horse, too gentle. You don't have like good numbers on the average time it takes. There's not real studies on that. But when we look at like kind of the time it took, it was pretty average. and then we had five that we were never able to actually kind of breach the touching period.

So we could we could touch their face, we could touch their neck, even get to their withers, get the tags off of them. But they wouldn't let us go beyond that at the time. I didn't know what I knew about negative reinforcement. And so now looking back, I think I would have done the study a little differently. And what I mean by that is we have horses and horses that are really scared of people, or I've had some significant trauma.

They're going to be more reinforced by their ability to leave you than they are about staying and engaging. And those horses were so highly reinforced that they could leave us if they wanted to. We never really made good progress with them. So, They were just more highly motivated to leave. Yeah, exactly. They, they they had a comfort zone. And when we breached it, they would just walk away very slowly. Walk away.

That was I think, the great thing about clicker training because from the very get go, they knew that they could just walk away if they got scared. That was the biggest behavior we ever got. We never we never had any aggression. We never had horses bolting or spooking because when they got nervous, they would just very slowly walk away. Interesting.

Now our, our all star group would circle, so they would walk away a couple feet and come right back to us, And let us continue on right where we were. So it's pretty cool. But the five that never graduated, they would just walk away and stay away. They wouldn't go back right. So eventually you, you would have gotten there. It's just that it was way beyond the time. Or do you think you had never gotten there with those horses. that's a good question Julie.

In retrospect like I mentioned now I think what I've learned about negative reinforcement, I think that that would have been more, successful with those five horses, the. Release of pressure. Yes. And just so that everybody is clear, by that you mean pressure release pressure, release pressure release to train the horse. Yes. Except rather than using pressure to force a behavior which is, pretty common method, a pretty common way of using it.

what I mean by using it is we would still shape behavior by capturing pro-social behavior and releasing when we capture that behavior. So the only way to capture pro-social behavior is to be outside of their threshold. So, as I'm approaching the horse that scared of me, him just looking at me. Turn around. Walk away. Exactly, exactly. Yeah, that's that release of pressure. That means everything to the horse, whether it's scared or not, to be honest. They just really respond to that.

So this brings me to the next thing that I wanted to talk about, which, you know, we've talked about the resource guarding and the rules and why those rules are important. But with all your experience with positive reinforcement as a sort of singular method of training, when does it not work? You touched a little bit on it with this last group of horses, and you discovering that the removal of pressure was going to be more meaningful to these horses.

So what would you say are the limitations of positive reinforcement when it comes to training horses? This. Let's go beyond this, gentlemen of raw horses and move in to actually training horses to perform, to be ridden and all of that. Yeah. So I think the two biggest limitations would be first, that our feeding management doesn't really support the use of food as a reinforcer. And I think we try and use positive reinforcement with hungry horses too often.

And so that arousal state is just too high and the motivation isn't in the right place. They're not motivated in the way that we need them to be as a learner. Right. So and so that's one of the biggest limitations I see. I actually have three. The second limitation is that in traditional negative reinforcement or pressure release we've kind of learned that ask tell demand approach. And what happens is our criteria is always really high.

So when we want a behavior we have a high expectation for that behavior. And we don't always understand how to shape it. And so when we try and use positive reinforcement in the same way, you can't just get a behavior from 1 to 20 in two clicks and reinforcers. You have to learn really the art of that really low criteria. To shape that behavior. Just beginning to move in the right direction. Exactly. Yep. Yep. And it's really difficult for people to understand how small that is.

Yeah. Little movement that I need to shape. Their behavior is so very small. We were just doing a video yesterday with a yearling Colt that had never had his feet picked up. Yeah, yeah. And, no horse like that, especially the hind feet. Right. And, and you, you really do have to shape that behavior, starting with, I might touch your leg. I'm going to touch your leg now and wait until that horse is no longer trying to get away or squirming or.

And he relaxes, and then you walk away, and then, you know, and it might take, I don't know, 20 or 30 approaches before you actually got your hand down to the foot of the horse. But with every approach you got a little bit further, and the horse became more accustomed to it. And anyway, so that's that. That's what you mean by the shaping of behavior, I think. I love that where you put it, we, you know, we start out with a really high criteria, like, oh, I want you to do a flying lead change.

Yeah. That horse, you didn't do it right. Or I want you to hold your foot up in my hand for 10s. Yeah. Even though I've never held it before. I've never. You've never. Even though I've never touched your leg before. Yeah, exactly. So, yeah. So I think that's a really important thing. And that's a simple it's a seemingly simple concept. But I think you're right. It does come maybe out of that ass tail command. Okay. So what was the third thing. Yeah.

And then the third one and probably the most problematic and we see this in the research is we call it a poisoned cue. So when we pair negative reinforcement and positive reinforcement in training. So let's say you have someone who wants to incorporate positive reinforcement to try and make a more meaningful training experience.

But they're also using, pressure release in a way that might be kind of punitive if the horse feels that negative reinforcement to be punitive and you're trying to partner it with positive reinforcement, we get what's called a poisoned cue. So in essence, the positive reinforcement has no value as a motivator for the animal anymore. Excellent. Give me an example of what that looks like. Yeah. So the research they actually did I don't want to butcher it.

So I should probably just share the article with you. It's been a while since I've read it, but the research that sticks out in my mind, they've done this with dogs where they were trying to shape the behavior, to teach a dog to sit on a particular square. And so these dogs, were on a leash and they were given a little like negative reinforcement, with a choking collar. Right? Like a can't think of a term.

But, if they were on the wrong square and then if they went towards the right square, they were clipped and reinforced. so they were using a combination of pressure release and positive reinforcement to try and shape the behavior. and then in the, control condition, it was just positive reinforcement. They used positive reinforcement to help the dog learn which square they needed to sit on.

And so what they found was that when the dog had a choice to do it on their own, the dogs that had that like, double reinforcement or like combined reinforcement, excuse me? They just didn't do anything. They just and seemed to have a negative association with the trainer in general. whereas the dogs that were just trained with positive reinforcement were very, very eager to participate. I think kind of speaks to that cognitive bias. Right? Right.

You know, if it's tainted with something that doesn't feel very. Good, they lose their interest in learning or trying to figure it out or. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. In my mind, positive reinforcement does not have to entail a food based treat. So when you praise a horse after he's completed a good response or he's he's responded appropriately, is that an example of positive reinforcement? Yeah, that's a great question.

So when we think of like what truly is a positive reinforcer, we have to think of the individual specifically. So really only the animal can tell you if that verbal praises reinforcing or if that food is reinforcing or if that. But scratch is reinforcing. and so that's where it gets really tricky with horses. When we look at what is motivating, what truly motivates behavior. Because at the end of the day, that's what a reinforcer is.

A reinforcer increases the likelihood the behavior will happen again. So when you think of whatever you're using to reinforce that behavior that's the motivator. and so what's motivating. And so if I think if the relationship is really strong between the horse and the human, and we have to really think about what could be in that relationship that might be aversive. And that's a hard thing to look at in our industry. Right.

Like that's and and speaks to the other side of the research that I do is looking at like low level behavioral indicators of stress and horses that are in equine assisted services. so I've watched a lot of horse behavior in writing sessions. And once you see stuff, you can't unsee stuff. Yeah, I know exactly what you're and I've worked a lot in therapeutic settings too. And and there you get it gets back to, oh, he's just grumpy. That's just who he is. But yeah.

Yeah. But why. Right. Right. Yeah. So when we think about I say all that to say when we think about is that meaningful to the horse, the pet or the verbal praise? Is it meaningful? That's a hard question to answer, right. Because we just don't really know if it's truly motivating as a reinforcer. It would be hard to shape behavior with scratches with horses, but that doesn't mean I haven't used it before.

So at the point where, you know, a lot of training in the early stages of a riding horses, simple desensitization. But then we also have to sensitize the horse, teach it cuz and we also have to teach the horse that there are certain expected, behaviors. We have to teach it what I would call a work ethic, which the whole thing in classical training is without free forward movement, a horse cannot be trained so early in that horses training, we have to ask it to move forward.

And if it refuses to move forward, we have to sort of cross that bridge before we can train it. Anything else? A horse that won't move forward can't really be trained. Yeah, I don't see a lot of application for positive reinforcement in that process. I do see the amazing result that negative reinforcement in terms of pressure and release and the removal of pressure. I've never met a horse that wouldn't work for the release.

And what's lacking is the human's ability to give the release entirely and at the right time. 100%. Yep. I think this is where it can get tricky, because it speaks to the point of teaching a horse on cue. Right? Like, theoretically we should be using negative reinforcement to teach a behavior that then paired with a cue, and then the horse should always respond to the cue. Right.

And and then we don't have to use pressure anymore because they understand the expectation and they have a high enough rate of reinforcement that it's just ingrained. They know what to do. Yes. But the problem is I think with us with, with people is that like you just mentioned, we don't release pressure. And so we we think we're releasing pressure, but we're, we're still maintaining some type of pressure. And in, in behavior science, that's what leads to extinction of behavior.

Yes. They no longer do it anymore. And that's where most horses riding horses are trapped between stop and go cues. And, they're just got their head up there and they're kind of plowing around the arena mindlessly because nothing, nothing has any meaning anymore. Yep. I think your, your views and your experience with positive reinforcement is, is really interesting.

And so I guess my final question and I've kind of already alluded to the answer is do you think a riding horse could be trained solely with positive reinforcement? I don't think a riding horse should be trained solely with positive reinforcement, and to my knowledge, there hasn't been one that's been fully trained solely with positive reinforcement. I know that there are trainers out there that are attempting it. I think it would be good to document it and see if it's possible.

but I think from my experience and my understanding of learning theory, it's really not possible because if we're riding the horse and using tools for riding any kind of, engagement, even with the cue, could be seen as pressure for the horse. And with the release of that pressure being the reinforcer, we're still using negative reinforcement. Yeah.

And to go a little bit further, I think it's really important that horses learn that pressure isn't scary, that there is a way to avoid pressure, and that there is a way to make pressure go away when we're dealing with humans. And that's really for the safety of people, for our safety and for their safety.

So if we have a horse that never truly experience of being caught up in a wire or being caught up in a rope or getting, you know, they get away and the rope is dangling behind them or something, spooks and they run. it's important they have the tools to get out of that. And pressure release is the most effective way.

But I think the key for me with that is that when we're training these skills for these horses, that they're always under threshold because it does go back to the need to establish a strong reinforcement history. That they feel good about them. So if they're over threshold and scared when we're using pressure release. And I'm not so sure we're always making a good association. how would you define I mean I think probably everybody has an idea of what it looks like.

But how would you define a horse being over threshold? Yeah. So when I think of over threshold, I think of a true fight flight or freeze response. So we have they are running and trying to get away from you. So any like actively avoidant behavior or they're being what seems aggressive but it's most likely just offensive. So that's the horse that tries to chase you away or bite threats or kick threats when they're over threshold when they're trying to get away. the freeze response is the hardest.

And I think it's the one that we don't recognize a lot. And when I see a freeze response that can go wrong, it's usually after a flight response. And the flight response didn't get the pressure to go away. So they just stop responding altogether. And then we release the pressure at that point. And we think they've learned the right behavior. And really they're just shutting down. Yeah. Yeah. So you've reinforced that. Yeah. And so how I actually like challenge students.

How do you test if my horse is still scared of something when I've really worked with them to not be scared of it? If they're still spooking every time it comes out, they're still scared of it. Yeah. They have, they haven't identified that thing as non-threatening. so we and that's honestly this gets a little bit into the weeds, Julie.

But another really fun test with this is, exposing them to something on one side when I'm in training that they might be a little scared of under threshold, to where they're no longer reactive at all. Under threshold, then, we know they have a really developed corpus callosum, that transfers information from one side of the brain to the other side of the brain. So they should be able to identify that thing as non-threatening if they're not afraid. So it gets really kind of an interesting thing.

But so in other words you might have trained a response on the one side even though the horse is still afraid of it. Absolutely. You bring it to them. And a good test is if they spook on the other side. Interesting. Yeah, yeah. Now, you know, as we talk about negative reinforcement or, it's maybe better understood as pressure and release, that is something that, is constantly being done and riding.

So when you cue a horse and then they respond, you release the pressure. Now when people tend to think of negative reinforcement as bad, they are always thinking of the pressure, always being, aversive and, and really negative to the horse.

And I guess my personal feeling on that is the reason why pressure and release works so well with horses is because they are animals that feel pressure of all kinds very, very keenly, whether it's mental pressure, environmental pressure, or actual direct physical pressure. we know the whole fly lands on the hair and they shake the skin. That's the sensitivity level to touch. But there is also sensitivity to. And environmental pressure.

There's sensitivity to mental pressure, which, I think most people don't get right about horses. Right. You know, the minute you're approaching the horse, you're putting pressure on it. Right? So I guess I get frustrated with people that, you know, you were talking earlier about everybody's in one camp or the other. Either you're all positive reinforcement all the time or you're like, no, I'm never going to use it.

And so it bothers me that people, even when they talk about negative reinforcement or pressure and release, it's as if the pressure is always bad, right? And I just don't think it it has to be that. I don't think it is that way. And I don't think it has to be that way. And I think that's maybe related, you know, to what you were talking about in, in teaching a horse that pressure doesn't have to be bad.

Absolutely. And I think it also kind of speaks to the traditional sort of ask, tell demand, because I think what can happen is for people that might struggle with the concept of shaping behavior with low criteria. And you use the ask, tell demand approach, and the horse isn't performing exactly the way you want. We can get punitive pretty quickly.

and, and so that's, I think the downside of negative reinforcement, the, the dark side of pressure release, pressure release in and of itself is not a bad thing at all. It's actually a wonderful tool to use in training, and it's a tool that they use with each other. but it can slip very easily into the punishment categories. When we look at the learning quadrant, reinforcement reinforces behavior. Punishment stops behavior.

When we look at the science behind those, we know that punishment in people and animals is the least, has the least long term effect on behavior change. And, you know, I'm going to make sense. Our prison systems are overcrowded and never seem to work right. So punishing a behavior doesn't change. Motivation and punishment leads to fear and aggression in animals.

So where we have to be really careful with pressure release is when we start to use that pressure in a way that is truly aversive, is truly punishing because the animal's not cooperating. Well I, I, I gotta tell you, Sarah, I have struggled and struggled over the years to try to help people understand when they are crossing that line and because of your knowledge and background and experience, you see it as much as I do.

Where sure maybe one reinforcement was needed, but then it immediately morphs into this repeated, let's say jerking of the lead rope. Or now I'm back in the horse across the arena or whatever. Yeah, and it crosses the line into retribution. Yes. Really quickly. Yes. And the horses feel like they're just being attacked at that point. Totally. And they learn not to trust you. And they, you know, they become fearful of your reactions, fearful of their own reactions, fearful of trying.

But the person doing that often has no clue that they have switched from a correction to a punishment, and then to highly ineffective punishment. Yeah, because it goes on and on and on and on. Yes. Injudicious. Injudicious for for punishment, to work in it for animals, non-human animals. It has to be it has to be implemented during the behavior. So if it's after right it there's no longer an association between what's happening and what they did. And yeah.

And so I but this kind of it's kind of interesting you bring this up Julie because I think and this is I think where working with students in the classroom really helped me change my perspective on horse behavior. When we look at why a horse is doing this traditionally we we use terms like disrespect, dominance.

And I don't mind those words in and of themselves, but for human beings, we take those words and we give them way too much power and meaning so that when we feel disrespected by a horse, and then we become corrective to the point of being injudicious, we actually get a dopamine hit in our brain. Wow. So the yeah, the science behind like when you feel like you've been wronged and you, you know, you serve justice, you get a dopamine hit for that.

And so that's why I'm always real careful to use terms like disrespect with horses. So in other words, if I'm a person that goes out to a restaurant and then some, my food comes cold and I start yelling at the server. I feel like I've been wronged and I yell at the server and that makes me feel better. I get a hit, a dopamine from that, or.

I think you can that it's interesting you bring up that scenario because usually when we think of these dopamine hits, it's it's a really true like an injustice has occurred to you. But when we think of yelling at your server for cold food, that's probably more, like redirected behavior. There's something else going on in your life, and you took it out. You're still out. Hop along. Yeah. And so? So in other words, that you you had a sense you were truly wronged, that this was a, a bad thing.

And so you're lashing out in response to it makes you feel better. Yet like you are fair and judicious and and you are indignant. You are angry as the result of something unjust. Well, that's exactly what you see when people are doing this to horses. Yes, they've taken it personally. Because because we label it that way. We say they're being dominant. We say they're dominating you, we say they're disrespecting you.

And so as human beings that already struggle with our own emotional regulation and our own ability to identify, like how we're actually feeling about stuff, it's really easy for us to sort of redirect stuff going on in our own life. Now, to say, all right, horse, I'm gonna make you do this. And I feel good about it, even if you're in the corner trembling, you know. Now, I've seen it. I've seen it in myself. you know, say when more when I was younger.

I see it every day in the way people handle horses. And I've worked really hard to try to come up with phrasing and wording that helps, you know, people kind of get that on their radar. And one thing we came up with, it was one and done. You're out of there. Let's move on. It's a whole new day. Yep. And is it the importance of not taking a horse's behavior? personally? He's a horse. He's responding like a horse, and he's responding to whatever it is you're doing. Right? Right.

And you might be doing it right, and you might be doing it wrong. But whatever it is you're doing, it's getting the response in the horse. Exactly. Yeah. Good or bad, right? Good or bad. I tell students, you know, if you don't understand a behavior that a horse is doing either under saddle or in hand, film yourself and watch you like. Watch yourself, watch your body language. Watch your facial expression, watch for your release.

because most of the time we're just we put on so much mental pressure. And here's the thing we don't quite have the science behind understanding this yet, but we do have pretty good evidence that horses can evaluate your breath rate and your heart rate from up to four feet away. And so, you know, if if you're feeling scared, if you're nervous, if you're angry and on the outside you're stoic or you know, in other words you're incongruent, you're outside doesn't match your inside.

they're not going to trust this. They don't trust what's happening right now. so your body language is doing the right thing, but they can sense that your heart rate and your pressure and everything is not okay. Absolutely. Yeah. So now they have a contradiction that they can't explain and it seems untrustworthy. And if they know you well enough, maybe it's something externally you both should be scared of.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. But if they don't know you very well, then they're probably just scared of you, Yeah. Well, to kind of think about wrapping this stuff up, then how about let's get let's kind of delve into learning theory and this new era, shall we say, of horsemanship and the quotation science. Just can you kind of talk about what all that is. Yeah, yeah. So a quotation scientist is really the science and research behind horsemanship, whether it's writing or in hand.

But it's it's really looking at the what does the science say. What does the research say about this human animal interaction as it relates to riding and horsemanship? And, and, and honestly, you know, a lot of our, a lot of what we know is really based on sort of historical methods passed down. Right. And it can be different based on where you're from, what part of the world you're from.

And, and there's a lot of, incongruities even in that, even in the tools we use, the training methods we use. And so equity in science is, is really asking those hard research questions and exploring the tools we use, the mechanisms, how do they work, how are they applied and learning theory and what are the, possible, impacts on welfare, on, on horse welfare. And another area that they're really looking into as well is it's known as the five domains of animal welfare.

and it's, that's an expansion of the Five Freedoms. If anyone familiar with the Five Freedoms, it's really looking at freedom of disease. freedom from, starvation, freedom from fear, freedom to express normal behaviors, specifically to livestock production animals. But the five domains, through good, really good research over the past decade has morphed into it's not enough to just look at the negatives, like preventing negative welfare.

we actually have to start being able to measure for, positive welfare markers. So because we know now that you can meet all of the basic needs of an animal and they can still have a poor wellbeing, right. Like poor mental health, if you will. And still be depressed. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. You could have a full belly, a roof over your head and free from sickness and you could be really depressed, right? So, bored and. Exactly under stimulated.

And so, the five domains and you mentioned it earlier, Julie, most of the times, not most time. A lot of time, I should say, when we see behavioral issues in horses, they actually stem from those five domains not being met, even just one of those five domains. So if I have a student, for example, that that says, hey, you know, Sarah, we've got this behavior that's happening in the arena and they'll explain this long behavior happening to me.

And and the reality is, I can't even begin to dissect it until I know where do they live, what's their feeding schedule? Do they lay down when they sleep? Are they around other horses? Like there's so much more to the story than just what the behavior is in the moment. And a lot of times what is showing up in the arena is the direct result of something happening in their home life. So the equity science piece is really exploring the impacts of those five domains on welfare and behavior.

in the human animal interaction. Can you give a description of what learning theory is? And it's not just relative to horses, right? Right. Yeah. So when I think of learning theory, I really take it to that sort of, I think most specifically on how we teach a behavior, like what quadrant are we in when we look at reinforcement versus punishment, what reinforces behavior and what motivates behavior?

I think the most specific thing with horses, for me, the most important thing for me is truly motivation. What is motivating the behavior? All behaviors for a reason with horses. So, you know, humans, we can do things out of pettiness. We can do things because we just simply don't like each other. But when we think of, horses and that just innate need for survival, all behaviors they exhibit are for a reason.

And so if we think of learning theory, the three things that I think about specifically with behavior is this truly a learned behavior? They were reinforced by doing this right, like it was a reinforced behavior sometime in their history. Is it a behavior that rose from a problem or a pain? And now there's an a pain association. And and so that association of pain triggers the behavior. And it's not actually really a learned behavior. I think of since horses for example. Right.

Like a horse that since she had some type of pain previously, whether it was ulcers or an ill fitting saddle or a too tight of a girth, something happened and now there's a pain association that's triggered by that stimulus. I think the same thing, having started a lot of class, it could be a fear association. Yeah. And most, most cults are not going to if you shape the behavior correctly, you're not going to have much reaction to the search.

But some horses will and we may never know whether it was pain or fear, but I've seen it be just as much of a fear response, like all of a sudden this thing is attached to them. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And so then this kind of makes a great case in point, Julia, if we so if we attach this saddle to them and they bucket out bucket out bucket out, bucket out and finally stop bucking and then we say okay, good. You've learned that this saddle isn't going to kill you. Good job.

How could we test this theory. If it never happened again? Exactly. exactly. But you could also say. And this is why, as a young horse trainer, I was like, no, I'm pretty sure I do not want the horse to ever, ever, ever, ever buck or react negatively to the center of the saddle or anything. Yep. Because you could also say that that horse that's bucking it out is associated bucking with the saddle being on his back.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Right. And so yeah, I think that's kind of the importance of shaping behavior, preparing a horse for the worst case so that they don't ever have to experience the worst case. Right. They have the tools to feel safe. And for me, at the end of the day, when I think of learning theory and applying it to horse training, for me, teaching the behavior is the easy part. Teaching what we want them to do is the easy part.

Teaching them how to feel about it is the hard part, and we forget that. And and how they feel about something is what really falls over into our future interactions that end up potentially dangerous. so one of the studies in equity in science is that was quite the groundbreaker, I think, in the research was they looked at bucking, rearing and bolting in horses under saddle. And the number one cause of bucking, rearing and bolting was pain. And so oftentimes we think it's a fear response, right.

Or even a learned behavior. But it was actually a pain response. And the number one cause of pain was improper use of the bit. And that's why I like, you know, I tell people like film yourself, if your horse is doing a behavior, film yourself and be critical of what you're doing in that moment. Yeah. I don't think most riders realize the amount of pressure they're putting on the mouth.

And then even right down to I watch people leading horses around that are bridled and they're holding that bit clamped, you know, they're pulling on the bit from the ground in the complete opposite direction. It's designed to be putting pressure on, you know, and and there's there's absolutely no awareness. Not only that, you want to preserve that mouth and any pressure it feels on the mouth. You want it to have specific meaning.

Then you get off and you pull the horse around with this bit and it's going all over his mouth, jabbing into his roof of his mouth and stuff. Yep. And the people doing that are not intentionally. They they would never intentionally hurt their horse, and they would not intentionally try to degrade the cues that the horse may or may not have learned from the bit, but they're doing it just without any thought at all. Right. And yep. So part of that is we we talk a lot in a about

we not only have to teach horsemanship, but we have to teach empathy. Yes. Yeah. And people that are learning to ride and people that do ride horses tend to be doing it for their own personal fulfillment and on their own agenda. and so it, it can become a me, me, me, me, me thing, with lacking empathy for the horse and also ultimately confusing the horse because you're you blow right past his ability to think and understand what's happening to him. Right, right.

Well, and and to kind of exacerbate the issue, we tend to punish or correct those low level behavioral indicators of stress. Right. So for example, you're riding a horse and maybe you're putting too much pressure on the bit or won't let go of the bit. So they raise their head in the air to try and get away from it. That's a low level indicator. Please raise your head in the air instead of go straight up in the air, right? Yes, yes, but we don't think of that kind of behavior as an indicator.

So we think of it as like we don't want that. We want your head down and inflection or whatever. And so we tend to punish it by pulling their head down, getting stronger with the bit. So I think that really with the empathy piece is, is also understanding what behavior means when they do certain behaviors. You know what what does a tail swish mean when you're riding them. Or oh he's just being grumpy. That's just you. Yeah. But what does grumpy mean for a horse. And why is he that way?

Yeah, yeah yeah yeah. Well, you know, Sarah, I always love talking to you. And I always learn something. And you mention at least three times, maybe four, that this would be a subject for another podcast. So does that mean you'll come back on my podcast again and we'll. Well, you might wait to see what your listeners have, but. All right. Well, if they. Give you a thumbs up, I'd love to be. Okay. Okay, listeners, there you have it.

And also, I would throw another gantlet out to the listeners if you, would like to have Doctor Matlock back on the show to talk about some of these training methods and behavioral research. So let us know in your comments and also give us some specific things that you would like to hear about. Sarah mentioned quite a few different side subjects that were interesting. but we'd like to know what interests you as well. So, Doctor Sarah Matlock, we'll look forward to having you on the show again.

And thank you again for being here today. Thank you. Thank you so much. And now it's time for my favorite segment. What? hey, Q&A. Each month, we pick a few unique questions from our listeners and answer them on the air. If you'd like to submit a question for what the hey, message me on Facebook or Instagram at Julie good night or email podcast at Julie goodnight.com. The first question for today comes from Kayla.

Hi Julie, I have a horse who my trainer and I believe is truly afraid when by himself on the trail, his respiration escalates, his body tenses. He panics to the point of bolting. It happens very quickly and we cannot always identify a specific trigger or pattern. We have reason to believe this horse was abused. I've had him for 16 months. He is making progress except in this one particular area.

I've tried groundwork alone on the trail, including changes of direction, obstacles, and just hiking alone with a buddy. He is much better, but I'd really like to be safe riding him alone too. Will he ever get over this? Am I being impatient? What else can I do to help him? Thank you. I'm going to start with the impatience part, and I'm going to say maybe you are being impatient.

Whenever I hear somebody tell me a story about a horse and they say, oh, you know, I've had them for a year or so or six months or two years or whatever. And the context is that when you first got that horse, he really had big problems, but now he's doing a lot better. What that tells me is you're making progress with the horse. And so except that and give the horse time. So I do think that having more patience will help. This horse simply lacks the confidence to leave.

Leave the herd and be alone. You are not giving the horse what he needs to gain that confidence, and maybe all he needs is more time. Maybe all he needs is more rides with the buddy. But it's a big ask. You're asking the horse to leave the herd and to stay out there by himself. And I think wherever possible, you should address these things a little bit separately and keep this point in mind. Only perfect practice makes perfect.

So for every time you go out on the trail alone and it's a big scary incident on the horse, is worried and it has a stressful time of it. If you go out there 100 times, you're going to be practicing the wrong thing 100 times. So until you get him out there, when he is in a relaxed, confident, accepting frame of mind, you're practicing the wrong thing.

So first what we have to get is that calm and relaxed, accepting attitude out on the trail will worry about him being alone much later in the deal. In other words, if he still tense out on the trail with a buddy, you said he's better with the buddy. I would want him to be well beyond perfect with a buddy before I'd start working on the being alone part.

in terms of you riding out alone so again, every time you set up a training session that results in the horse being scared, you're just practicing the horse being scared. So also, let me discuss this thought that you have reason to believe this horse was abused. I'm just going to tell you, I wouldn't spend a lot of time worrying about that or thinking about it because it's academic. You'll never know the answer and it doesn't really have a bearing on how you train this horse.

Just ride the horse underneath. You just handle the horse that is present in front of you in that moment, the past doesn't really matter. You just need to deal with the moment. Yes, maybe, rough handling or bad experiences have taken away the confidence of the horse, but it doesn't matter because your job is to instill the horse with new confidence. He is what he is at this point in time. So focus on the horse's current emotionality. Fear is fear don't matter what its origins are.

Your aim is to reduce or diffuse the fear and build the horse's confidence. You also want to in that process, build the appropriate habitual responses. and you want to do that over time. So focus more on exercises that are calming by nature. Don't do high energy groundwork that amps the horse up. you remember you can't run a horse into calmness. You can't exercise a horse into calmness.

For many horses, particularly those of the anxious, tense variety, the more movement that you ask, or the more amped up they become. The hotter the more forward they become. Those horses will never be exercised into calmness. It actually amps them up. So instead, what you want to do is activities that get the horse addicted to calm, that get the horse addicted to slow. I've done scores of live presentations, videos, demos, articles, podcasts.

What have you on this subject of of getting the horse addicted to calm and, well, for sure. Throw some links down in the show notes for you to check out some of those resources. But you have to teach the horse. Calm down, cuz, and you have to have a number of different tools, in order to de-escalate the emotionality of the horse. So I would encourage you to ride this horse in company for a very long time, longer than what you are thinking.

So build that confidence and habitual behavior, over time. And, you want that horse to learn that? Oh, when we do this, this is the way we're supposed to act. separately, you can do some groundwork exercises increasingly farther away from the barn. And you can do these by yourself, to help address the part of the horse being alone. but keep in mind that you're trying to teach the horse to to maintain a calm state of mind. so as soon as he shows any signs of worry, just bring him up, you know?

Stop what you're doing. Slow things down for his head down. Take a deep breath. get him back into a relaxed and accepting frame of mind. Remember that returning to the herd is the reward for calmness and acceptance. So with a horse like this, as I start increasingly moving away from the barn, every time he relaxes and gives in and, sort of, lets go of some of his fear, I'll take him back closer to the barn as a reward for that.

So just keep in mind that your exercises, should be engaging with the horse. Positive fun. and give you ample opportunity to praise the horse and release it from pressure. and, you know, again, check out the show notes and, look at some of the videos, etc. on, some actual calm down cuz you're going to teach the horse our next question is from Sue. Hello, Julie, I have a pressing need and I'm wondering if you can help. I'm going to be leasing a ten year old paint soon.

I'm working with him on the ground right now and he gets distracted easily and often looks away from me when we're working. What is the best noninvasive way to address this? Is it covered in a video? Thanks in advance for your help. So that's a great question, and it's something you can easily fix. When a horse is looking around excessively, it can cause the horse to become more anxious. There's, a couple of real easy approaches to this.

First of all, I am very clear about my boundaries for a horse. And in terms of looking around when I'm either handling, the horse from the ground or riding the horse, and, I'll get into that in just a minute. But when the horse is looking around excessively, it can actually lead to the horse becoming increasingly anxious. So often the horse that's looking around excessively, that horse is feeling frightened or unsure of its safety, and it's looking for a way out of the dilemma it's in.

or it may be worried about something else. Another horse, a scary thing, an unfamiliar place. the boogeyman is out there and going to get him. So this is a frightened horse that's looking for alternatives. He's. He's either looking for what is scaring him because he's not sure, or he's looking for a way out of there. And generally, it's an indication that a horse is anxious and wants to be somewhere else.

In this scenario, the horse is not engaged with you or responding to your cues or or even thinking about you at all. I've published a lot of videos and articles and podcasts on this subject as well. And again, I'll throw some links down in the show notes. so that you can refer to these resources, whether you're riding, or on the ground. As I said, I'm going to disallow excessively looking around, and it's very easy to do.

First of all, I want to be I need to be very clear on what that boundary is. If I am unclear on it, the horse will never be clear on it. So for me, any horse that I'm on the ground with or riding, I imagine two parallel lines coming out from the horse's point of shoulders. That's a width that's generally about as wide as your shoulders. And so I imagine these two parallel lines going forward from there.

And within those two lines, imaginary lines, my horse can move his nose, as much as he wants, he can look a little bit to ride, a little bit to the left. He can see all the way around him from from that position. It is only when the horse crosses that line, when the nose goes past the point of shoulder, that I will apply a correction, an if and I will do it at the exact instant that nose crosses that line. I'm very clear on that line, and I'm very clear on the corrections.

So if the horses nose were to turn left and I was riding that horse, I would just immediately kind of squeeze my right fingers on contact of the bit so that as the horse move left, he moved into the pressure of that bit. I would instantly release it because as soon as he hits the pressure, he comes back. So I'm just going to take a not even a second let. Well, less than a second touch of the horse's mouth, and as soon as his nose comes back towards my hand, I completely release the pressure.

If he then looks right, I'll take the left rein and give a little correction. If I'm lying on the ground, I'll take my lead rope and give him a little bump. but only when he crosses the line. I'm never going to pull his nose back with the rain or the rope. I'm just going to let him kind of move into some pressure, some momentary pressure and this, teaches the horse kind of a couple of different things.

One is it teaches him where that boundary is and that when he crosses that line, he will find pressure. There, but also at the same time, it teaches him when he brings his nose back to neutral, there is never going to be pressure there. So if you hold the reins and pull the reins, this won't work. If you just touch the mouth when it gets to that line. and the horse will learn, no, don't go cross the line. And as long as I keep my nose in front of me, there will be no pressure.

So in short order, the horse learns the boundary and it will start. The first thing you'll notice. And for me, this is going to happen within about a minute or two of, maybe I've done 4 or 5 corrections, I don't know, depending on how much he's looking around, but in short order, the horse learns where the boundary is, and you'll notice the horse will start hesitating when he gets towards that line and he starts thinking about it. And when he doesn't cross the line, he doesn't get the pressure.

So even eventually he learns, oh, all I got to do is keep my nose in between these two lines and everything is good. Once he is resigned to not looking around excessively, he will immediately calm down. It's almost like magic because that excessive of looking around actually amplifies the horse's anxiety. But when he brings his nose back to neutral and gives it up, what he's doing is is accepting where he is and he's accepting being with you.

So you'll notice a really big change once he learns the boundary. And then he starts kind of correcting himself from crossing that line, you'll start noticing a very big change in the horse, and he will completely relax and the the next phase of this is that my horse learns to either focus on me or focus on nothing. He doesn't need to worry about everything that's all around him or or the the mysterious boogeyman he can't find.

He doesn't have to do that anymore because he's accepted being here with you, so it's not hard to do. Watch some of the videos. Read some of the articles to make sure you have all the details accurate. And, just, just keep the horse focused on the job ahead of him. That's, what you want to do. And and one more little piece of advice in terms of a horse that is easily distracted, engage the horse in a trained activity. If you're riding a horse that has training, he knows how to go.

He knows how to turn. He knows how to speed up and slow down. So if you just start riding the horse, he will have to focus on you and the accused that are you are giving him and will not be so easily distracted. So all of that stuff should help you out a lot. And I'm, I'm guessing you're going to be off to a good start with your new paint horse and and congratulations. That's going to be fun. And the last question today is from Judy.

How do I cope with a horse that is just lazy instead of loping when asked, she goes into a bone jarring, very fast trot. Do I just keep pushing her to lope? Well, Judy, I would say, right off the bat, that lazy may not be a fair description for this horse. Maybe she's a quiet and calm horse, and that's great. We want that. Right. but when we start kind of using value judgment terms like lazy, that might be implying a situation that doesn't really exist.

Most horses that are quote unquote lazy have often been trained to respond in the wrong way. In other words, they've gotten a release of pressure for not moving. And, they they've gotten a release of pressure in a way that trained them the wrong thing. Horses that are often called lazy have become non-responsive to the rider for a lot of reasons, and that might be the rider is unclear, the riders giving conflicting signals.

The rider, gives up right away and and therein, reinforces the horse not responding. Horses are just responding to what you do and and they learn from that. So when you cue the horse in correctly or you don't release him at the right time, or you do release him at the wrong time, the horse then learns to respond according to that. So it's not really that the horse, you know, I just would avoid using the term lazy.

I know we do it all the time, but just think that through as you're as you're labeling a horse like that. Calm and quiet is good. We like those horses. And, you know, so a horse might be, in its temperament, calm and quiet versus his other horse over here who's very hot blooded, high energy horse. And, you know, in general, most of us like the calm and quiet horses. So not let's not put a, negative label on that.

And also keep in mind the horse may be responding in a way that he's inadvertently been taught to respond. So this, by the way, is a very common problem with amateur trainers. Remember, if you are riding or interacting with a horse in any way, your training it because horses learn fast. So I would say this is simply cue confusion caused by the rider. So in your mind you're cueing the horse to canter, but in the horse's mind you're cueing it to go faster at the trot.

And when it does go faster at the trot, you're actually riding the long trot, so you're going along with it, so to speak. In other words, you're condoning the long trot that tells the horse that what he's doing is what you asked him to do. So you're inadvertently confusing the horse and teaching it that the cue to canter is actually the cue to long trot. So you're coming from, opposite directions here. So the more you cue it to go faster, the more the horses go.

Like, how fast does she think I can try? You know, I'm driving as fast as I can, so here's how you're going to fix this. it's easy to fix with reinforcement and simply clarifying the cue and clarifying the response that you would like from the horse. So here's what you're going to do. Ask the horse to canter from the slow trot or walk. Hold the horse back as you set the horse up for the lead, and you kind of go through your progression of cues. in preparation for the canter.

And then right as you ask the horse decanter, you're going to release him to forward motion. Obviously, he has to go forward if the horse does not immediately step into the canter, which is not because you've already trained him to go into the fast trot. What you need to do at this point is clarify and say, no, that's not actually what I was asking you for. Let's try that again. No, no, not what I was asking for. Let's try it again. Let's try it again. Let's try it again.

So the way you say no, that's not right in that moment. So I just set my horse up and I showed him to canter and he trotted instead of cantered. I would immediately shorten both reins, sit back, check back on the reins and bring the horse immediately back to that slow trot or walk wherever I was when I started the cue, and then I would immediately require the horse to canter. Do not allow any time to elapse between when you bring him back to the walk or trot and recompose.

You want to keep the pressure of the cue on the horse, and you check the horse back every time it steps into a fast trot and reapply the cue. Say no. Reapply, no. Reapply, no. Reapply. Well, after 2 or 3 times, the horse is realizing, well, this answer I've been giving her every other time. She was satisfied with it every other time. But she's not taking this answer today.

So he starts thinking for a different answer, and eventually he'll step into the canter, because there's not a lot of other different answers when it comes to speeding up from the trot. So in this process, you are clarifying that fast trot is not the right answer. That's not the response you're looking for. And then you re-issue the cue and you allow the horse to start thinking about, well, if it's not that, then what is it?

And and then when the horse does finally occurs to the horse to canter, you're just going to kind of canter off, release the pressure of cueing him, pat him on the neck, loosen the reins, canter, you know, enough strides to where the horse gets it. That canter was what you were asking for. And then stop and don't go right back to it. I would try to wait for another day to do that again.

And canter departures and cueing for the canter are very thoroughly explained in my streaming training video called canter with confidence. It's available online. We'll put a link in the show notes. It is also thoroughly explained with some great exercises for you to do in my brand new online training program on riding the Canter. This course has just been released. none of you hearing this have, seen this material before. It covers gates, footfalls, and leads.

It covers the most common mistakes riders make at the canter. How to cue for canter, how to set your horse up for the correct lead. It covers developing and refining your canter departures collection at the canter. Speed control, lateral work, lead changes and troubleshooting the canter. We'll put a link in the show notes to this, brand new cantering program. And I think that, Judy, if you want to give that a review, it's going to help you out a lot.

All you need to do is clarify the cues for your horse. But obviously, before you can do that for your horse, you have to be clear on the keys yourself. So I would encourage you to check that out. Well, that's all we have time for today. I want to thank you all for listening. If you have a horse training question or issue you want me to talk about, please message me on Facebook or Instagram at Julie good night or email podcast at Julie. Good night. Dot com.

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I'm Julie goodnight. Thank you for listening and please stay safe and enjoy the ride.