As I near the end of my long journey with horses, I often reflect on the one question I’ve heard more than any other. That is, why have I always felt a natural approach to teaching horses is the best way to establish a foundation on which you can develop the best possible equine partner for your interests? I came to horses late in life, with no previous exposure or experience. It became clear very quickly that this was an activity that was far more challenging, and potentially much more dangerous, than I thought. I knew immediately I needed a lot of help. Fortunately, at the time I lived in an area where I had access to some of the best horsemanship practitioners in the country, and I had the time and the means to study with them from the start.
These horsemen gave me what I came to see was a real gift, essentially that natural horsemanship was the “owner’s manual” for the horse. It allows you to reach and teach the horse in ways that make sense to him and that use his basic instincts to your advantage. A relationship with a horse, based on natural horsemanship techniques, makes more specialized or refined training go faster and smoother. It makes anything you do with your horse more fun and more rewarding, and often safer as well. It also gives you a handbook of techniques and strategies for solving issues with a horse on your own, so that you can deal with the inevitable unexpected events that happen when you have horses in your life.
It’s also the approach that looks at the whole horse: looking at how a horse lives, what kind of diet it has, the quality of healthcare, how the horse is being used relative to its age, fitness, breeding and conformation, and even the mental health of a herd animal that is naturally curious but is often isolated and tightly controlled. It’s also about taking responsibility for the overall fitness of a horse and understanding that just riding a horse does not make it fit for a long and healthy life. It means you invest the time to understand and learn how a horse actually works and what it has to do physically and mentally to do what we want. It means never treating the horse as a piece of exercise equipment or an RV.
A natural horsemanship approach to being with horses gives you the tools to accomplish a lot with these great animals, but it is not a “magic bullet” that gives you an automatic solution to any problem. Horses by nature are designed to confuse the predator and test the herd leadership, and as a human you have the distinct disadvantage of being seen as a predator who is also trying to be a herd leader. There is an obvious natural conflict there. Your only hope to reach and lead the horse on terms that he understands and accepts is to become more like a horse.
Some issues with horses are so deep seated – especially with previously owned horses where you know little of how they were trained – that you may spend literally years doing the same thing to convince the horse it is OK to do something. They have different personalities just like us and they have good days and bad days, so you have to be willing to patiently work through whatever issues they have. They only know how to be a horse, they only can see the world through their eyes, and they don’t solve their problems with rational thought. If you accept this and are willing to teach and lead them on their terms, they will do just about anything you want them to do.
I make these comments because many people see natural horsemanship as some softer, gentler way to be with horses. The very word “natural” implies that you are working with the horse the way horses interact with each other, and that means it can be rough and sometimes scary. I feel this approach can significantly reduce a lot of the drama and dust you see with a lot of horse work, and if you are willing to really learn and practice their language you will be amazed at how much you can get done without a struggle.
The wonderful thing about horses is that they live in the moment, and that requires them to learn and adjust to their current situation. Remember, horses are basically “followers” and what makes them feel calm and secure is the quality of their leadership. The leader of the herd is not chosen based on how big, fast, strong or mean they are, but by their intelligence, calmness and confidence. The lead mare will use as little force as necessary to keep the herd in line but will use as much as is required to keep things in order. They really get things done with their calm decision making.
The basic philosophy behind developing a horse using natural horsemanship techniques is that you will increase the horse’s receptivity to training and our needs. You will improve the margin of safety for you and the horse if you have a strong mental connection with the horse rather than using restraint, control or force. If you work with your horse in a way that makes sense to him in terms of how he sees the world and how he is programmed to react (literally unchanged after millions of years of evolution!), then you can develop a working relationship that approximates or even duplicates what he would get in his natural state in a herd.
The horse’s survival has been based on his ability to see movement, read body language, and flee from danger. In a herd, the hierarchy is established by a simple act of which horse moves another horse first. The horse that causes movement, or a yield from another horse, is a more dominant horse. The most dominant horses in the herd, usually an alpha mare and a stallion, become the focal points for all the other horses in terms of where the herd goes, safety, food, water, rest, etc.
The language between horses that causes the movements that determine hierarchy is very precise. Not only can a horse move another horse by just a glance or pinned ears, but he can also move specific body parts by focusing his pressure on a specific part of the body. In addition, he can do all this from a distance. A horse can move another horse sideways, backwards, forwards, can move the hips, the shoulders or anything else without even touching the other horse.
Yes, contact can be part of a conversation, where one horse “says” I’m not going to move or yield, and the other horse goes to direct physical contact to make it happen. Given that the basic nature of the horse is to seek an environment without pressure, most will choose to yield to pressure as early in the conversation as possible to avoid the contact. This is how they learn in the herd—they yield, the pressure stops and things quickly return to what makes the horse most comfortable, a clear hierarchy and the comfort and safety in the herd.
Our goal in natural horsemanship is to create this same dialogue between the horse and the human so that over time the horse will see the human as being able to provide the same kind of direction, leadership, comfort and security that he would get in the herd. It can never be 100%. At the end of the day, he is still a horse, and we are still humans and a predator in the horse’s eyes. But, with a consistent approach based on the horse’s natural behavior we can go a long way towards giving the horse what he needs when he’s with us.
In natural horsemanship, indeed with all good horsemanship, groundwork is the foundation for building a relationship with a horse that allows it to see us on his level, to watch our movements and to learn to read our body language and intent, just as he would do with other horses in a herd. You simply cannot do this from the saddle, because when you’re on the horse it no longer is a visual experience for the horse but is now much more about “feel” and trust. By nature, the horse wants to see and react or respond to what he sees, and he can’t see you very well when you’re sitting on him. It only makes sense that if you have established a working relationship on the ground, that is based on the horse’s language and values, then it will be much easier to have a better partnership when you ride.
My experiences with horses and riders have convinced me that before you can work on specifics, like solving an issue (trailer loading, eating on the trail, pulling back, spookiness, etc etc.) or advanced training for a specific discipline, you first must prove to your horse that you can do what another more dominant horse can do. That is, you must learn a horse’s basic language. You must be able to move the horse and even move specific body parts, whenever you want to, with body language and focused pressure. When you can achieve this, then you will have a relationship where the horse respects you as another horse, and a more dominant one, that he is willing to follow as a leader. When this happens, you will also have a horse that is willing to trust you – because in his world trust only comes after respect.
It is important to note that in this work dominance never means you cross the line to bully, become abusive, punish or discipline the horse. Leadership and true partnership with your horse is far more about savvy, knowledge, communication and experience.
One of the most fascinating observations many natural horsemanship practitioners have had when they work on these basics before anything else is that many of the other annoying and sometimes dangerous issues a horse might have often go away on their own, without being addressed specifically. I’ve even seen riding relationships improve without any time spent on riding issues.
I think it’s easy to understand why this happens. In a herd, a horse has such confidence, respect and trust in the herd’s leadership that he will pretty much do what the leadership says is okay. A horse that would never go into a trailer or deal with a scary object will do it if the lead horse does it. If you have established yourself as the lead horse based on the horse’s terms, and are consistent in maintaining that position, then some of what a horse does to test leadership or confuse, frustrate or eliminate the predator (i.e., you) are no longer necessary. The horse can fall back into his preferred position as “follower” and you will have a much better chance of improving and developing the horse from that point on.
The obvious final question then becomes, if this approach is so good why doesn’t everybody use it with their horses? I think it comes down to a few basic issues for the average horse owner.
First, in this work you’re really only trying to teach the horse the one thing he doesn’t know at birth, that is, how to give softly to pressure. At its core it’s not much more complicated than that. That simplicity is hard for people to accept. Years ago, Ray Hunt told me that a horse isn’t really halter broke until you can lead him from any body part. That was his way of saying that if you’ve taught your horse to yield softly to pressure anywhere on his body then you can lead him without even using a halter and lead. That is a horse willing and ready to be taught anything, and a horse that respects and trusts you as a partner.
Second, this work is not about training your horse to do anything other than learning to interpret your body language and hopefully learning to respect your leadership and direction, which leads to the horse trusting you. You’re not training your horse to do lead changes, go around you in a circle, load in a trailer, go around the barrels, etc. You are merely building a foundation that allows actual training to be done more easily because you have built a more responsive and willing partner. You’re really never done with this work as it’s a lifelong way to interact with your horse. Everybody wants to train their horse to do something, and then go on to something else, so they get frustrated when you tell them this isn’t about training.
Third (and I feel this is the biggest disconnect for people with natural horsemanship) – you have to carry the same approach into your riding, or all the foundation work becomes meaningless. If you do all this prep work teaching your horse to yield softly to pressure, releasing the pressure to reward and teach the horse and doing things in ways that make sense to him, then you hop in the saddle and have a lousy unbalanced seat, a death grip on the reins and legs that are always clamped on, you are pretty much “voiding the contract” you just wrote with your horse.
This is why I’ve always tried to teach and show people that your groundwork is really “riding your horse from the ground” and you have to take all the same techniques up to your riding. Natural horsemanship will not magically make a horse ignore how a bad, heavy handed, nervous or fearful rider feels on his back. It will not teach your horse to be rational and figure out how to interpret poor communication, badly timed or imprecise aids, and it will not teach him to accept poor fitting tack or painful equipment.
And finally, it took me years to understand that natural horsemanship is really almost as much about self-awareness for the human as it is about helping the horse. Most people don’t like holding a mirror up to themselves and doing a critical self-evaluation of how well they do something. It’s hard to admit you have some weaknesses, either physical or emotional, that will affect how far you can go with your horse.
It’s hard to accept that your knowledge of the basic instincts and needs of a horse may not be what you thought it was, or that the way you’ve been doing things may actually be confusing or frustrating your horse. The time and commitment it takes to improve yourself so you can improve life for your horse can seem so overwhelming that it’s easier to give up on the approach and say it doesn’t work. Afterall, for most riders, it’s just riding a horse.
It's a lot to ask of someone to work on their fitness, to work on moving better on the ground and get better at using each hand equally well. It’s hard to see why learning to twirl ropes with accuracy and smoothly shifting tools and equipment from one hand to the other has any relevance to riding and horse behavior. Developing feel, good timing and soft eyes to see the whole picture are not things that happen overnight. Being willing to change plans, skip rides or call off riding dates based on your sense of where your horse is on any given day sounds like the fun is being taken out of your most important recreational activity.
In our instant world, it’s hard to accept this is an approach that puts a premium on patience and process. And imagine how an experienced rider feels when you suggest they really need to take some riding lessons to become a better riding partner for their horse.
After all these years of working with horses and riders, I get why people don’t believe in this work. It’s hard to accept that what your horse is doing or not doing is a result of something you’re doing or not doing. I’ve always believed the horse is a very simple animal, in that they see the world in black and white and things either are or they aren’t. The complicated piece of the partnership is almost always the human, and we hate to hear that. Natural horsemanship, although it’s a handbook for the horse, has always been more about teaching and training the human to be less like a predator and more like a horse, and that’s a far bigger challenge than teaching a horse.
