Successful tips on how to train your horse

All these tips AND PLENTY MORE!! are in the the book .



Hold them on consecutive days. It's much more effective than spreading them out over a week or two. Consistent, repeated training sessions are needed until a learned response becomes habit. Once the lesson has stuck in the brain through concentrated repeatition, it will be retained over longer periods of time. If you spread the lessons out over non-consecutive days, you will need to go over previous steps far more. Is Your Horse Listening?

If your horse is listening to you, is relaxed and thinking, he'll be chewing and licking his lips. When teaching a lesson, wait for this signal from your horse before prodeeding to the next lesson. It's the sign that he's relaxed, comfortable and ready for the next step. Cos you can't teach a stressed horse much, other than to be scared.

Misbehaving Horse? Check For Pain A horse can't turn his head back toward his rider and say, 'Hey, my back is sore, my neck is cramping up, and my hocks are killing me. Do something!' The only way they can express themselves is through action, or refusal. When they act up in an attempt to communicate or avoid pain, we tend to attribute their behavior to bad manners, and 'fix' the problem by disciplining them for it. Sometimes bad behaviour is dominance or fear. Sometimes it is pain. Take Advantage Of Your Horse's Laziness

Take advantage of the horse's laziness. Set up the lessons so that the horse always has several choices of what to do in response to a cue or request. And make sure that the right choice (the one you want the horse to do) is always the easiest choice for the horse physically. Horses learn very quickly this way. They stay happy and develop that 'want to' attitude. Horse Training Success Is All In The Work From The Ground The time dedicated to building a proper foundation by establishing control on the ground makes the transition to riding much smoother and much much simpler.

You Are A Predator And Your Horse Is Prey And this small but very significant fact makes a world of difference. To view the world from a horse's point of view, you need to put yourself in the position of feeling like everyone else's dinner on legs.

Going Backwards To Go Forwards Give your horse the time to think about what is being asked of him. If he doesn't get something, it's time to go back to the previous step that he can do. If you ever think you are going too far or too fast in one session, it's ok to take a step backwards. You can always come back to this lesson in another session. Or put another way, give bite size pieces to learn. It's much more effective. After all, you didn't learn to read in one sitting now did you?