Horse Training Tips
Training your horses can be risky business because they can sometimes exhibit aggressive behavior which includes; kicking, biting, bucking and rearing, and pushy. In order to reduce the chances of aggressive behavior, you have build a solid foundation with your horse and show that you are the leader of the herd, right from the start. The following 5 horse training tips will help you establish yourself as the leader.
Good Lead: A horse that has respect for you is a horse that will lead well. Horses lead well when they follow a short distance off your shoulder. If you lead your horse from the left side, like most people do, then your horse should be just to your right with her nose near your shoulder. A horse that leads well will not drag or pull on the rope, and she will not try to lead or move ahead of their trainer. If you find that your horse drags the rope a lot you can stop and ask for a backup. This makes the horse pay a cost for the bad behavior and she will learn. Sometimes your horse just walks faster than you and when they start to pull ahead of you, you can change directions to regain the lead.
Relaxing Your Horse: Horses are prey animals and they spend most of the their time looking for any threats to their safety. Horses walking with their heads up high are actually tense and actively looking for threats. On the other hand, a relaxed horse walks with her head low in search of some attractive greens to nibble on. Try teaching your horse to lower her head on cue to encourage them to relax.
Round-pen Training: This is one of the best horse training tips that will establish you as the leader. In a round pen you do not need any horse training equipment, like a lead line or halter on your horse (this is called “at liberty”), which allows you to control her movements using only your leadership presence and body language. There are very few techniques as effective as this to gain your horses respect and trust. Often, this method is called “Hook-on” in the round-pen. Another name, coined by Monty Roberts is “join up”.
Keep Her Paying Attention: Something you should always do is make sure your horse is paying attention to you during training. If she is distracted during training you can bump the rope to get both of her eyes focused on you again. If one of her ears acts like radar, listening for threats in the distance, then her full attention is not on you. You need to correct this and make sure that both of her ears are pointing towards you.
Do Not Just Ride Off: During your training, take the time to run through exercise such as having her move her front and hindquarters and flexing. These exercises make sure that she is listening to you and while she is listening to you, she is less likely to be probing the environment for threats.
If you apply these horse training tips a solid foundation will be built between you and your horse, a foundation that teaches leadership and respect while still being gentle (similar to natural horse training). If your horse believes that you are the leader she will be far less likely to resort to bad behaviors.
Amanda Spring recommends the Horse Training Secrets Revealed course to anyone who wants to learn how to train their horse properly and effectively. This course has helped thousands become better horse owners and trainers — check it out right now.
