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When most people decide to get a dog it is for a companion animal. Some dogs are expected to perform certain duties like barking at intruders, playing with the kids, entertaining their family with funny antics and maybe compete in agility or obedience. Many new dog owners will invest in at least basic obedience classes to insure their new family member has some manners like peeing OUTSIDE and staying out of the trash.

The family dog is an animal that spends the majority of its day with you making teaching it fairly easy once YOU attend classes and learn how and what to teach it. Most owners accept that it takes 6-8wks, one class a week, to teach not only the dog but also themselves. And with it taking at least two courses to gain control and up to 4 to advance to a level of rewarding control of the dog. In fact, I have not met one casual dog owner that would go to the instructor, hand over their new dog, tell the instructor to make a finished obedience dog in 6wks and expect to get back a dog that flawlessly obeys every command the owner chirps out. It would be unreasonable to expect of the dog when it should take upwards from 12wks for an expert to get a dog from nothing to a finished obedience dog.

Yet, people ask that of their horse and horse trainers. I see all too often a new horse owner who knows little about riding and nothing about training expecting to ‘train’ it themselves. They run into issues, the horse gets the upper hand and learns all types of bad behaviors and their ‘horse friends’ tell them to send it to the trainer for a month to ‘fix’ it. They expect the trainer to produce for them a cookie cutter horse that will respond with perfection to their every command. I have found that while it might be possible to perform such magic on some horses, it is not the horse that needs the 30 days training.

When someone talks of taking a horse to the trainer they are thinking in terms of number of months or days. They need to be thinking in terms of issues or cues they are wanting to have taught to the horse AND themselves. I talk myself blue in the face about how I will have no problem getting a horse to perform all that the owner wants, but it will do them no good if THEY do not learn to change how they perform around the horse. What takes me a month to teach the horse can take the owner a week or less to remove.

On average it takes 2000 repetitions to break a habit and 2000 repetitions to create a new one. It takes an average of 10,000 repetitions to make an action an unconscious act. When you look at it this way you will begin to understand how important it is for you to learn with your horse, the new behaviors that will keep you headed in the right direction. You also understand how long it can take to ‘change’ you and your horses’ responses to situations. Where most people will commit to spending 20mins a day on each obedience lesson with their dog it is much harder to get that commitment from horse owners. Reason being, the dog is in the cool/warm house while the horse is outside in the cold/heat. Many horse owners find the ‘basic’ horse training boring when compared to riding on trail whereas they are thrilled when a dog will just walk next to them without pulling.

Many horse owners would not believe the amount of success they would achieve if they would stay focused on themselves and their horses learning one lesson at a time by merely spending 20mins a day on that lesson. Starting with basic obedience, yes walking on the lead without pulling. While the horse does not sit, it can stop and stand in a proper position as well as learn to release to pressure, stand tied, lead in a proper position, and so much more. These lessons will not only teach a communication start for horse and rider, it will transfer to saddle work and make the horse a safer and more enjoyable partner to be around. There comes a time when the owner will want to be out working and spending time with the horse making the bond tighter and more rewarding.

Story after story of the phenomenal performances that take place at the end of the Extreme Mustang Makeover gloss over those Mustangs that go through the program and have meltdowns in response to the pressure they are put under and the amount of change they are forced to deal with in such a short time. Makes you wonder if the program needs to be revamped and called THE Mustang Makeover, period. What man will do to an animal for the sake of winning an award or money is beginning to show in this, albeit well intended, show.

There is no getting around the fact that once money and animals enter the same room, money will win and the animal becomes merely a vehicle of human achievement. What is the point of getting a wild animal to jump through fire or into moving vehicles if his new owner cannot even get him through a gate or away from the barn to enjoy a trail ride? Yes, it is a wild animal. I have been taught to give a “domestic” horse up to two weeks to adjust to a new owner and home. One of my own horses took a full year to be “at home.” Only then did he start the bonding process and he was a seven year old show horse.

I am very glad that I have gotten to know so many first generation Mustang owners, but they are the ones that are telling me how many hours, days, weeks, and months it has taken for their ‘wild’ youngsters to adjust to life in confinement. These are babies that have not lived even a year on the range and are still very pliable. How much slower should the adjustments and training of an adult Mustang be? Those that have survived on whit and herd mechanics, that have earned their rights to be alive and have breathed the breath of freedom for so long.

Before you get mad, I give high accolades to those who understand the true purpose of this program and spend the time to get a solid foundation on the horse and steer clear of all the circus training. The program is to take these animals from wild to ‘domestic’ life in 90 days. To produce an animal to be relocated to yet another home, able to adapt and provide its new owner the enjoyment of this beautiful, intelligent, and sound piece of American legend.

So while the crowd loves a good show, consider the object of entertainment. It was not his idea to leave his home of contentment and freedom to jump through hoops for man. While it is awesome to see how much these animals will endure for their trainer, it would be even better to see what these animals can do for their final owners. It really should be a focus on how the trainers have prepared these animals for what they are going to deal with for the rest of their lives; gates, dogs, trailers, confinement, trail rides, only to name a few. It should commend and only allow those maneuvers that pertain directly to the Mustangs new ‘everyday’ life, so they are able to prove themselves happy partners and gain a permanent home with a new owner.

You see, I have to deal a lot with the Mustangs that have been ‘ruined’ by either ignorance or abuse. They are a very impressionable animal and come into man’s world a blank slate. Those formative months and years are paving the way of his life. If well trained and adjusted he can become someone’s life long companion. If his confidence is shaken and his mind is blown he may spend the rest of his life bouncing from home to home only to be labeled unruly and dangerous and left to stand in a stall, forgotten and ignored. Extreme makeover, indeed.

What? Bolting at the standstill? Impossible you say, but if you have a horse that won’t stop at the other gaits, I can assure you he is bolting with you at the standstill as well.

How, you ask? What happens when you pick up your reins from the standstill without making contact with the bit and think back up? If it is nothing, your horse is running away with you at the standstill.

Why, you ask? If the horse understands the bridle he will back off the reins from the standstill. He will understand that he is already stopped so when you pick up on the reins at the stop he must backup. So when he does not respond, he is telling you he does not understand fully understand the bridle.

How do fix the stop? We will start teaching the horse the proper response to the stop cue from the walk. The horse is easier to teach when there is movement, we test their understanding of a cue at the standstill.

Ask the horse to walk out on a loose rein. If your horse will not calmly walk out on a loose rein then you need to start here. If and when the horse increases leg speed, start working on changing directions or serpentine. Every time the horse Stops going one way and Starts going another he, at the very least, has to slow down. Using a direct rein to change directions, release the rein when he changes direction and pick up the opposite rein and use the direct rein to change direction. Continue the changes of direction until the horse maintains the correct leg speed. Then let him walk straight until he speeds up again, then repeat the serpentine work and continue until the horse can walk without changing leg speed on the loose rein for 8-10 steps.

Back to the stop exercise. Ask the horse to walk out on a loose rein. You will vary the amount of steps the horse takes before picking up the reins, but get at least 5 steps. We will start with the right hand. Pick up the reins, evenly, at the center with your right hand at the same time place your left hand beneath your right hand and loosely grasp both reins. Hold your left hand in front of and about as high as the pommel of the saddle while removing all slack in the reins with the right hand allowing them to slide through the left hand.

When all slack is removed and you have made contact with the bit, grasp the reins firmly with the left hand. Release the reins with the right hand and firmly grasp the right rein beneath the left hand with the right hand. Release the right rein with the left hand while taking the left rein firmly with the left hand and anchor the left hand solidly to the pommel of the saddle. The anchored rein should be short enough to keep the horses’ head no more than 4 inches to the side on the active rein side, in this case to the right. You want a death grip on the reins at this point. Under no circumstance during this lesson do you want the horse to be able to pull the rein through your hands.

As soon as the left hand and rein are solid, start applying pressure to the right rein until the horse stops his feet. In the beginning, you may have to use a lot of pressure, so add it until the horse stops. This will tell you where your horses’ stop is located; how much pressure it takes to stop him. We want to teach him to respond to the threat of the pressure or in other words, have him stop when he feels you pick up on the rein. As soon as the feet stop moving, quickly and completely release all pressure on both reins.

You want this to be smooth and fluid movement at about medium speed or about 4 seconds from the time you start picking up on the rein to starting to apply pressure with the active rein to get the stop. You want to alternate the reins and in doing so will discover one side of the horse is harder to stop than the other. One side will pull harder and you need to work that side at about a 3 to 1 ratio to the good side until it becomes the better side. Then the good side becomes the bad side and you will work it about 2 to 1 ratio and so on. When the horse is solid in the exercise you can then feel which side is pulling harder and work that side until it is soft.

When the horse begins to stop before you get your hand anchored, you are ready to advance the lesson. What you will do now is ask the horse to walk, pick up the reins at the center as before, but will hesitate at the place you would like the horse to respond. For example, you have your hand pommel height to walk out and would like the horse to stop when you raise your hand two inches. Raise your hand and hesitate for 2-3 seconds at that spot, wait for the horse to respond. If and when he does not, continue all the steps as before, they are now the correction for not stopping when you raised your hand. You are giving the horse the chance to respond on less and when he ‘misses’ the cue you follow up with the correction. He will begin to notice the pattern and will be happy to find a place he can respond to you without you getting to the bit.

At this point, the horse stopping before you anchor the hand, I like to ask for a back up on the active rein side until the horse softens on that side as well. When you do this it is important to give the horse small releases in the pressure when he steps back, then immediately take the slack out and back him until he is light. In either case, when the horse stops at your hesitation point release all pressure and reward. To add the backup, pick the reins back up to the cue spot. If and when the horse does not backup, continue with the previous steps, but instead of looking for the stop, you are looking for the backup. Any time the horse roots down when he stops or walks through the stop, follow up with the backup steps.

You will want to continue teaching this until the horse is consistent in stopping on your cue spot and will back up when you lift the reins after the stop. Once he understands the lesson, take him to a new location and practice the steps there as well.

Every person has their “favorite” breed and there is nothing wrong with that. The problem comes when that preference becomes a prejudice that interferes with our judgment. We begin to see every horse of that breed as ‘bad’ when in truth there are “bad hats” in every breed. That being said there are some attributes that run in individual breeds; that is what separates them from other breeds.

One of the more difficult horses to work with is the one of high intelligence. The reason for this is that they will not tolerated abuse or lack of stimulation. These individuals can be found in every breed and are usually labeled as “trouble makers.” They are, in the way, have destructive behaviors, become Houdini horses, and in general seem to question the ‘whys’ of everything you do with them. However, when approached with fairness, consistency and systematic training they quickly become the ’star’ student and coveted mount.

One of the breed that hold high intelligence as a hallmark and bred for quality is the Arabian. All too often the Arabian is mislabeled as flighty, unstable or high-strung when in reality they can easily become a solid, trusting and consistent performer on trail as well as the arena. Their high sensitivity allows them to be keenly aware of their surroundings which encompasses an owner or trainers mood. They are renowned for their love of the human and if respected will return almost human emotions. I own such a horse who was known by all in the stables for two traits, a real sense of humor and an obvious display of jealousy.

My boy will ‘help’ anyone working on or near his stall by stealing things or just getting in the way. He would try to get other horses to ‘play’ with him however possible and actually took the neighbor horses’ owner’s parka hood, while she was wearing it, and held her against the fence. Yeah, I know he sounds mean, but he wasn’t. She didn’t laugh, but everyone else did and he knew it. I raised him from a baby and when he saw me with another horse, he would literally stand at the back of his stall with his tail facing me. Much older now and unable to be ridden, there is nothing he wants more then to be ridden; nickering every time I get a halter down. They are much like the Mustang in that once your EARN their trust, a bond will form that is not found in many other breeds.

When the Arabian mind is challenged correctly they can reach high levels of performance in almost all disciplines. Starting with solid training on fear control, “teaching” the horse what to do when he is afraid is the best place to start. I once was given a beautiful chestnut gelding that had become too much for his young rider. He was her first horse and she did not have instruction and he knew he had the upper hand. She was afraid of him on trail and his fears only grew with the lack of leadership he was getting.

In a few months I was able to do roll backs and move him around my round pen without a bridle. He became so quiet on trail my daughter, then 12yrs old, could ride him on trail and would complain that he was too slow. One day I was riding out with a friend when we came across a bulldozer working on the road. My friend kept him looking at it as it passed and he didn’t flinch.

Due to their intelligence, they will not hesitate to show you all the holes in YOUR teaching. After all, how can you blame the horse if you didn’t teach it completely? So you need to cover all steps in your lessons, never skipping anything. Through what may seem like monotony to you, will blossom the most solidly trained horse you may ever own.

All your interactions with your Arabian need to be those of a fair and consistent leader. Just as with any horse, you must be the leader or they will either become “rude and unruly” or filled with fear and uncertainty. Consistency is the key. Confusion of your roll in your “herd” will show in your horse with the previously mentioned behaviors. If you want him to respect your space, you have to be ready to teach him how and then enforce it always and forever.

Arabians are built for endurance and bred to think. Much akin to the Border Collie, this is not a horse that will shine as a weekend warriors mount. They need and want to be worked and challenged on a daily basis. So you need to be ready with different lessons and always ask them to get better at them. They will do their best to reach and exceed your expectations.

I believe the Arabian to be one of the hardest breeds to work with not because they are flighty or unwilling, but rather because YOU have to teach them without force or pain. They are like young kids wanting to learn, but without fair and consistent leadership they like kids will quickly become the “gang” leader.

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Warmly,
Jodi Wilson