Counting breaths
“Feel” starts with sensing your body in its environment. Here’s a simple, easy way to use breathing to check in with your body and the horse’s body.
The best you can do
Sometimes the best you can do is show up and do the work. In whatever way that happens. Even if it doesn't shine. Even if it's "not good." Even if the mechanics are wrong or the flow is missing. Sometimes doing the work wrong is doing it right.
Complex relationships
They hadn’t seen the dump truck, yet.
What absolutely kills me and what proves to me that equine relationships are infinitely more nuanced and dimensional than we care to notice is that in quite a few situations, these horses are antagonistic, particularly around food.
Granularity is an opportunity
One of the criticisms of a constructional approach to working with horses is that people are turned off by what looks to be a mechanistic way of operating with a horse. That it’s entirely transactional and nothing more. That it’s simply goal-driven, and the relationship piece is missing. That… would be missing the point entirely.
Hoofcare Professional Survey
I'm developing a training program for horses and handlers specifically for foot handling. There seems to be a need for it based on conversations I've had with professionals and horse handlers, and certainly from things I've seen in my social media feeds. Training isn't the answer to every problem horses have with foot handling, but some of the value I'm building into the program is knowing when it's a training issue and when it's a veterinary or other healthcare professional issue.
Siri on the ridden square
I’m using the square (and the cones) as a focal point and a cue for changes of orientation. Just playing with loose sideways movement, seeing what’s possible with the sides and the corners.
Scentwork with Fi, adding “dead” container
This is a snippet from yesterday’s scentwork session with Fi. I was surprised at how quickly she got it, despite my accidental cuing.
Scentwork with Siri, adding “dead” container
This is a snippet of Siri’s scentwork session from yesterday. Again, I learned a TON from just these few minutes, especially the places in which I can clean up my mechanics and be a little more precise with my movement.
Getting Started With The Food-Anxious (Or Any Anxious) Horse
Raya has some anxiety around food, which makes her “pushy” (using her nose to nudge or shove Marcy to show frustration at not knowing how to get the food). So we’re setting up a pattern to help her learn how to get food in a way that’s safe and calm for everyone.
My definition of "feel"
My definition of "feel" includes the element of timing. Here's a quick breakdown of how timing can be operationalized.
Starting scentwork
I’ve been wanting to start playing around with scentwork for a really long time, and yesterday I just decided to go ahead and try it with what I had available.
Behavior analysis webinar
I’m working on an outline for a basic behavior/behavior analysis webinar, and possibly an in-person lecture if there’s enough interest and a great location. It’s designed to give you an overview of what we know about how the horse experiences their world, and help you problem-solve some of the issues you may be struggling with that training alone hasn’t completely solved. The topic is too big to be completely covered in one go, so I’m trying to decide how to narrow it down and structure it so it’s most useful to a wide variety of people.
Another trim for Brandi
Babymustanghorse B (Brandi) had yet another trim, today. We used hay as an “open bar” reinforcer, and everything went beautifully. This is great, because the past few weeks felt like a bit of a backslide and I was starting to get concerned.
Bridging worlds, flag & R+ video
Not annotated - too much to say and the video is already long. Read on for more info.
Sickness Prevention in Horses short course
I completed the Sickness Prevention in Horses short course just in time for spring and Horse Fair!
Bridging two worlds
Bridging two worlds - stick/flag and R+. Probably not what you think. I have a video I might post with annotation, because it pleases me to nerd out on training and critiquing my work, but for now I just really liked this still from the video.
Bucky, oral meds progress
This video is annotated, so I won’t write a whole bunch. It’s some more of the same from the last video, but I’m adding a new stimulus and duration with moving the plunger, which takes a little bit of time and there’s a “click” at the end which also sends a vibration into her mouth. Previously that was difficult for her, but she doesn’t have a response to it now.
Experimenting with affordances and behavior chains
Loosely playing with the idea of going from affordances to behavior chains. Exploring several possible affordances can lead to a the emergence of a behavior chain, which can then be taken into the “real world.”
Agile and adaptable
The point is not to make everything calm, it’s to be so synchronous that together you’re agile and adaptable.
Baby B had her feet trimmed
Baby B had her feet trimmed today almost like any other horse.
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