Inspiration
A Look at the Horse’s Mind
photo by kiekje.be
Here are several great articles in a series about the Horse’s mind and learning abilities. They discuss positive reinforcement (like clicker training) and how beneficial it can be to horses.
Equine Learning Ability
Horse Learning
Equine Attention Span
Equine Long-term Memory
What does Licking/Chewing Mean?
Horse Training
I thought the article on long term memory was interesting – stating that horses that were asked to identify (or touch) an image they had seen years earlier remembered the specific skill and all were able to touch the image. Basically stating that horses have a very good long-term memory. Makes you sad for all the poor/abused horses out there that can never forget their past. (My Minnow is one of those)
I also liked the article on Attention Span, stating that horses have a very short attention span and will learn better if new skills are broken up into short maybe 5 minute sessions. I typically train this way anyway – but it can sometimes be hard if your horse is sooo close to learning a new skill and you don’t want to give up until they get it. Knowing now that its pretty certain they have a short attention span and that any longer than maybe 5 minutes will just set your training back – I will defnitely try to keep my training sessions short.
-KD
www.ponypaintings.com
Clicker Training Interview
This is going to be my last blog post for a few days…….because I’m going on Vacation! I’m ready for a little break. I have a tendency to go, go, go all the time and don’t take much time for myself. So my short trip to the beach is coming at a very good time. Although I will miss the trick ponies greatly! And my Dachshund, Ammo too!
Now back to the post for today….
I wanted to share with you a neat interview with Sharon Foley about clicker training. You can listen to it here. I have to admit that I haven’t gotten to listen to the whole thing yet (everytime I sit down to listen to it I get interrupted). But I will do so shortly! And if not you can all tell me what you learned!
Anyway hope you are able to enjoy the 4th of July weekend with friends and family (and ponies too). See you when I return!
-KD
www.ponypaintings.com
Targeting
My new target stick infront of some of Minnow's paintings
I just recieved my new trick whip (or target stick) that I ordered from Imagine A Horse. Its advertised as a foal want because the ball on the end is extra large and soft and the stick is more like the length of a riding crop. I chose it (obviously not because I have a foal), but because I needed something shorter that I could attach to my belt and wouldn’t drag on the ground. I currently had one of their combo whips which I use ALL the time. All of my boys are very target oriented and I use the wand to direct them into positions and even point to objects I want them to pick up. For any of you that don’t know what targeting is, its teaching the horse to touch an object, in my case I use this whip with a ball at the end as my target. I love teaching my ponies to target because it can be used for anything, and its such a useful skill to have in your bag. I have used the target to teach all of my ponies to self load onto the trailer. I also have used it with Blitz to convince him the the wash stall is not a scary place. And imagine your horses get loose at a horse show, all you have to do is whip out the target stick and you quickly have an easily catchable horse. (Sadly I admit this has happened to me a few times – Minnow can have a naughtly streak) 🙂
Targeting is the very first thing that I teach all of my horses. Its also a great way to introduce them to the clicker. Everytime they touch the ball they get a click and a treat.
I’ve also found that my target sticks can be used to give cues too. I use the end of the stick pointed towards their ears to signal them to say “No” (or shake their heads), I also use a tap of the stick to the ankle to signal a bow. I even used the targeting aspect of the stick to teach Minnow to bow. The target allowed me to entice him to bring his head down and between his legs (essentially making him put a knee to the ground in order to do so).
I’ve even used the target to help me free jump my horses – and if you buy the extra long target stick I’m sure you could free lunge your horse as well!
As a little side note, Imagine a Horse has a new DVD out about using treats as a training tool. I haven’t seen it yet, but you can be sure that it will be on my Christmas list!
Clicker Training 6 year old Boomer
Yesterday I was able to get some videos of me playing games on Boomerang. I’ve been training him to be my mounted games pony since September of 2008 – but until our recent move to Iron Horse Farm we hadn’t been able to get much detailed mounted games training without a ring. So the last few weeks it has been intense mounted games boot camp for Boomer in the hopes that I can have him competeing in his first mounted games competition in the Masters division at the end of August in New Jersey. He’s really taking a liking to it, and I’m amazed at how this once sluggish pony (the hunter show ring will do that to a horse) now has some get-up-and-go. He’s eager to move off my leg and quickly breaks from the walk to a canter. We’ve even perfected a sliding western stop that will come in real handy when I have him going full out.
So anyway, below you will see a video of Boomer and I practicing in an open field. This was filmed in April of 2009 and its a pretty good comparison to the videos I took yesterday. You can see that he trots most of the bending poles (he was very unbalanced) and his spin around the end pole is definitely not great – he has to break to the trot and he makes a wide loop.
Now watching this next video you can see Boomer is much more balanced and able to canter all of the poles. His spin has improved, but he still gets a little stuck and I’d prefer him to sit more on his hind end rather than putting most of his weight on his forehand. He’s definitely much improved though.
Now this final video is of Boomer and I playing 2 Flag. Races like these can be difficult for a young/inexperienced horse because they don’t understand the concept of running in a straight line when they have no fence to guide them. Especially with green horses they tend to wiggle the line and when they approach the cones most tend to drift away from them making it difficult for the rider to reach the equipment. Unfortunately I don’t have a video to compare this to, but in this recent video you can see that Boomer is running a pretty straight line and his canter is pretty balanced, making it easy for me to gauge when to grab the flags. He requires slight corrections to keep him from drifting, but overall he’s doing pretty well.
The clicker training I have been doing with Boomer has really helped him. I usually run the races and when he completes them correctly I click and reward him when we reach the finish line. Sometimes I will choose a specific skill within the game to work on, such as the spin around the end pole. So if Boomer doesn’t do a nice spin for me he won’t get rewarded at the end. An added benefit to rewarding after crossing the finish line is that Boomer slams on the breaks as soon as we cross the line, which is wonderful because if I ever drop a handoff or need to go back I have him poised to slam on the breaks so we can quickly spin to correct our mistakes.
Overall Boomer is a very eager to learn pony, and I can tell he’s also DYING to learn more tricks. He acts so starved for attention sometimes. As soon as I have Minnow’s trip to Chincoteague over I plan to start working on Boomer’s trick training.
Pedestal Work
My weekend was filled with family, horses and dogs – those are always the best kind of weekends. On Saturday I spent time with Minnow working on new tricks – getting him ready for his upcoming performance in Chincoteague. I’m starting to feel the crunch – I have a lot still to teach him and not a ton of time.
I’m determined to teach Minnow to stand on his pedestal with all four feet before pony penning. I think it would be quite impressive, and he’s just about there…hopefully I have enough time to polish the trick. You can watch the video below of me clicker training Minnow to perform this trick.
-KD
www.ponypaintings.com
