Posts Tagged ‘natural horsemanship
By Golly, I think you have it
After much anticipation I finally have some videos to share of Chincoteague Minnow learning his Spanish Walk. I started teaching this by asking him target a knee to his target stick, I then asked him to alternate legs – eventually asking him to do the left leg, then the right all while moving forward slowly. I used a neck rope to gently ask him to walk forward. Sometimes I think Minnow can just read my mind. These videos are after two 10 minute sessions. I am in awe at how fast he’s catching on.
Chincoteague Minnow
The very best part about this is that after I was done working on his Spanish Walk I was explaining to my mom how it originally was started as an attempt to get him to rear. I was sort of goofing around and showed her that eventually I wanted to be able to lift my hands (and target stick) into the air and Minnow would rear. When I did this movement and took a step forward Minnow lifted a front let into the air. Immediately noticing what he had done I clicked him.
My mom walked back into the barn to mess with the horses (or perhaps I would have had a video of this as well) and curiosity began to get me. Minnow obviously had leg lifting on his mind because we were just working on it…but there was something I could use here. I remembered something my trainer always says to me. She’s always telling me that if you think of the action you want from the horse – your body will give off that energy even if you don’t know it. The trainer I use is very much into Parelli but she also loves working and learning with me about the clicker training.
Giving my best friend a kiss. By Photographer Kali Wallace
So I pondered this for a moment. I stood directly infront of Minnow with my hands at my sides. I imagined gathering up all of my energy into a big ball infront of me – and I took a powerful step forward and thrust my hands into the air – I thought rear. Instantly Minnow rocked back on his hindend – lifted one leg and then the other. Click! I gave him a huge reward – Minnow is big on rewarding, he knows that if I get really enthusiastic and energetic (like you would with a dog) that he’s really catching on.
Obviously I had discovered something here with him. I tried this a few more times with the same result, then suddenly it happened. On about the fourth try Minnow lifted both legs off the ground at the same time. It wasn’t very high – but it was a AIR! I was so excited. I thrust my arms around his fuzzy neck, gave him several “jack-pot” treats and scratched his favorite spot.
I stopped right after that one because I knew I had to be careful how far I went with this. See Minnow has Ringbone (equine arthritis) in his front left ankle and if I work him too much he tends to get sore – especially in the winter. Its good for him to use his ankle but to much and I’m afraid he will start to resent the tricks due to pain. He wouldn’t do it if he didn’t want to (and I would never make him) but I know his signs of its time to call it quits for the day.
So his next Rearing/Spanish Walk session will have to wait for another day. I think the next time I attempt this rear method I might have Minnow positioned with his butt to the corner of the fence, that way it will guide him to rock back on his hind end more.
So that’s my exciting tale that I’ve been dying to post about. Has anyone else ever tried this method of teaching the rear? Or has anyone else used energy and mental envisioning to help succeed in teaching an animal a skill? I’d love to hear of any other experiences that are related. Or maybe you just think I’m a total nut! 🙂
Spanish Walk Miss-step
So I really contemplated posting this video for the world to see – because I know I’m going to get a whole bunch of flack for it. I guess its to be expected. But I finally decided I should just post it anyway – because if anything maybe it will stop people from doing what I did.
Yesterday I decided to start working on the steps to teach Chincoteague Minnow to rear. After mucking 9 stalls and blanketing/turning out horses – I got a little lazy and rather than bring Minnow into the arena I decided to work with him in his pasture. His pasture that he shares with the two younger Chincoteagues, Blitz and Boomer. I sort of knew it was a bad idea, but I rationalized it with – I just gave the others three HUGE Piles of hay, Minnow is the boss – they will respect his space, and I have worked with one before while the rest were in the arena. What I didn’t anticipate was #1 its winter, there is no grass and grain is a heck of a lot more enticing than hay, #2 Boomer especially really hasn’t learned boundaries when it comes to the other ponies yet, #3 horses vie for their position in the herd everyday – its constantly changing, and #4 I hadn’t “done” anything with any of them in such a long time that they all wanted attention from me. So after saying all that I will first let you watch the video.
2005
Ok, so rather than dwell on the “bad” parts of this video I’m going to talk a little about what did happen that was positive. Minnow picked up that I wanted him to target his legs to the stick almost immediately (I worked with him a little bit before I shot this video – hence why it seems like I started asking for the second leg so quickly – he already had down that I wanted him to target a leg to the wand). Before Boomer goes after Minnow – you might notice that he started mimicking Minnow in an effort to get a treat by lifting his front leg. An interesting concept that I might have to apply to his training later on.
After I shot this video the camera battery died or you would have seen that I immediately removed Minnow from the situation. I re-entered the pasture (without food this time) and took Boomer on a little “space respecting lesson” by leading him around the pasture, asking him to back away from me, and basically respect my area.
Chincoteague Minnow
I then took Minnow into the ring and began working on his leg lifting again. The intent was to develop this into the rear, but as Minnow began walking AND leg lifting I realized he was really beginning to offer me the Spanish Walk. So instead I switched tactics and began asking Minnow to walk forward while alternating legs. We successfully got several nice steps of the Spanish walk and today I’m hoping to fine tune it a little more.
Anyway that was my little adventure in Spanish Walk training – I’m sure I’m not the only one to have a few miss-steps in the world of horse training. Everyday my horses teach me something new.
Minnow Caught on Film
I really am on this “looking back” kick. Can’t help it!
I decided to check out some of my REALLY old videos on my Youtube account, so I went back to the very first video I ever posted onto Youtube. And of course it was a video of Minnow painting – published on February 21, 2007.
I had filmed this video for a class I was taking at Kutztown University. Now I must disclaimer first I am not a videographer, in fact I really suck at making videos. My brother is the videographer – and I’m dying to have him make me another video of all three of the Trick Ponies. But alas he is living in North Carolina right now (if you are in North Carolina and need a Videographer/Editor contact my little brother!), so it looks like I may have to reach my 2010 goal of making a new film of the ponies myself. I know it won’t be pretty.
But speaking of stinky videos of mine. Here are a few more I had done for the class I took in college. My downfall is music choice, I really can’t choose a good song if my life depended on it. So when it comes to making my new videos I may just have to enlist everyone’s help out in blog land!
I’ll be waiting until the Spring/Summer to start my new film project – as the ponies will look much prettier without their fuzzy winter coats. So I have until then to really work on some new exciting tricks for the new video.
The Rear
Minnow rears during competition
So one of my 2010 Goals is to teach Minnow to rear. And by golly, I’m going to do it! So since its blistery cold here right now, and I’m sort of a weenie, I haven’t actually started any training yet. Do you blame me? I am sort of ashamed.
Anyway, since I haven’t actually started working on my goal yet, I thought I would share with you how I prepare to teach one of the ponies a new trick. There is a lot of thought and preparation that I do before I even begin to shape a new trick. Ok I lied a little bit there – sometimes I just head out to the farm with clicker in my hand and see what happens. Some of the best tricks I have taught the boys happened that way.
For example, Minnow’s shovel trick. I saw a sand shovel and bucket at the store, brought it to the barn, showed it to Minnow, and let him decide what to do with it. He decided to dig in the sand with it, I liked it, clicked it, and viola a new trick was born.
But for the more complicated tricks I usually like to do a bit more research. Most of the time I start out on Youtube, mostly because I am a very visual learner. In the case of the rear I searched “clicker training rear”. And this is what I came up with:
I spared you most of the not-so-great videos (many of which were a little too harsh for me). But from this collection I’ve gathered a few options for training the rear.
Minnow on his pedestal
Option 1: Teach the rear through mimicking. I lift a leg, Minnow lifts a leg, I jump, Minnow jumps. I’ve never done mimicking with Minnow, but could be a good time to try it.
Option 2: Teach Minnow to target his knees to a target stick, start with one knee, then add two, then add height to it. Minnow loves to target, but it might take some coaxing to get him to not target with his nose, but I’m sure he could do it.
Option 3: Teach the rear on the pedestal. Reward for upward movements of the legs instead of getting onto the pedestal. Could end up with a neat trick of rearing onto the pedestal, but this requires a lot more coordination on the horse’s part.
Option 4: Capture the behavior naturally. Catch him playing out in the field and click/reward him for the rear. Capturing hasn’t worked well for Minnow (on bigger skills). I once tried capturing the lay down, but as soon as I approach Minnow to give the reward he panics and gets up. This wild born pony still has trust issues when it comes to his most vulnerable position. This option would work better with Blitz and Boomer.
I might do a bit more research before I commit (checking my clicker training books, checking the clicker training yahoo group archives), but from just these options I came up with I think I am going to start off with Option 2 – teaching Minnow to target his knees to a stick. I chose this option because I think it will work best for MY pony. I know how he prefers to learn and I think this option will produce the best results with the least amount of stress for Minnow. If I was going to train one of my other ponies this trick I might go for a different method. Training is about tailoring everything to the specific horse you are working with. Maybe your horse is deathly afraid of whips, asking him to target a dressage whip is probably not a good idea (not to mention I probably wouldn’t even think about teaching this trick if I knew my horse had underlying issues to be worked on).
And as a side note – for now I only plan to teach Minnow how to rear. Minnow is retired from riding due to a diagnosis or ringbone (equine arthritis) in 2008, so I run no risk of having a rearing pony when I stick someone else on to ride him. I believe at 6 and 7 years old, Blitz and Boomer are still too young and immature to learn this trick. I’m sure they would take advantage of their new and fun skill and I would end up with a problem. My equine sport of Mounted games is an emotionally intense sport for horses that is prone to bring on rearing due to the adrenaline horses experience – I definitely don’t want to advocate this trick during competition. So that being said, Minnow will be the only rearing pony, atleast for a while. 🙂
-KD
www.ponypaintings.com
Please do not attempt any of these tasks at home without the help of a professional. I am not responsible for any harm or injury that may occur.
My Journey with Minnow
Minnow arrives at my farm
Since I’m on a looking back kick lately I thought I’d delve into the past a little more today. The day I’m thinking of was an extremely important day for me – its the day Chincoteague Minnow came to live with me.
I had actually met him several weeks before he came to live with me. He had been trailered out to a mounted games practice I was attending so that I could try him. When I saw his fat little body waddle off the trailer I instantly fell in love. I was warned he had a bucking problem – an extreme bucking problem – as in every other stride was with intent to dump. So as I trotted around the arena I suddenly felt Minnow start to bottle up his energy for an attempt to dump me, I gave him a tap on the butt and sent him forward before he had a second to think about it. He never tried to buck with me again. As I circled the arena I could feel Minnow bottling up his energy – he desperately wanted to let it all out – which led me to believe he had the speed I needed for mounted games. I really should of recognized he was good at holding in his emotions.
I didn’t even really need to ride him that day. The second I laid eyes on him I knew I would take him home.
On June 30, 2003 I headed out to pick Minnow up. His owners were sad to see him go, but knew I would take excellent care of him.
When I got him home I decided to take him for a short ride in the arena. I should have known then that he was going to be the most challenging horse I had ever met. He kept atleast 5 feet between him and any object we passed in the ring, including cones, poles, and jumps. Anything I showed him he pretended wasn’t there – its like he was in denial about being faced with something scary.
I had a few short months before I was set to leave for college so I got started training him right away. We did dressage work, took lessons and I introduced him to the games equipment. He seemed like the dream pony as he calmly adapted to everything I presented him with.
As the months passed Minnow was gaining more and more experience. I was gearing him to compete competitively with me the following summer. If I had had known what I know now I would have noticed that Minnow wasn’t actually “seeing” everything I showed him. He was ignoring situations that frightened him, and he was bottling up his fear with each new situation I put him in. He didn’t trust me to keep him safe. But at 19 years old I have never met a pony like him. From my eyes I saw an adaptable little pony that seemed calm and fine in any situation I put him in. True it took him extra long with the games equipment, and it took him months to get just one step closer to it, but I had no explosions, no bucking, no fits.
It wasn’t until June 28, 2004 that what was really going on under the surface came out. I had taken Minnow to many low-key competitions before this date. I honestly thought he was ready. I entered him in to the USPC Advanced Qualifying Games Rally.
I think it was the noise the ultimately triggered him. The smaller competitions didn’t have the crowds that this competition had. The cheering, the yelling, the loudspeakers, the music – it pushed Minnow to his breaking point. He had always been sensitive to sounds and I think this day they just pushed him over the edge. After a year of bottling up his fears they were finally released. I had on my hands a pony that was racing around the arena uncontrollably. He was bucking and rearing and there was nothing I could do to stop him except hold on for dear life. I managed to survive through the competition – barely.
Getting ready to explode
I wasn’t even upset with Minnow, I was upset with myself for not recognizing his signals before. The turning of his head to avoid looking at scary objects, the complete avoidance of anything new.
Looking back now I’m sort of glad it all happened. I may never have recognized his distress if this hadn’t happened. I would have never searched for new training methods, I would have never discovered clicker training.
After the competition one of my childhood trainers approached me. She had seen Minnow in the arena and thought she could help us. She mentioned she was starting to learn more about the Parelli method, and natural horsemanship, and she thought she could help Minnow. That summer I began retraining Minnow to trust me. We experimented with the Parelli method and made great strides to become better partners. Slowly I was chipping away at Minnow’s wall. The wall that was put up after a life that had once been filled with distrustful humans, neglect, and suffering. Each day I saw a little bit more of his true personality come out.
no brakes
By year 2 Minnow was more trusting but we still weren’t there yet. We still had our uncontrollable rides and he still avoided the scary stuff – but I saw improvement. I was starting to feel a little discouraged again, so by the end of the year I found myself searching for any and all new training methods. The Parelli was moving a little too slow for me and I wasn’t sure it was REALLY getting through to Minnow. Enter the first Trick Training book I ever owned, Trickonometry by Carol Fletcher.
It was January and I was teaching Minnow to give me a kiss. I watched as he actively began THINKING about what I was asking him. He started experimenting. How do I get that food, if I do this will she give it to me, if I touch that will I get more? After about 20 minutes Minnow had learned his very first trick.
2005
When I went to the barn the next day I was greeted by a bight eyed pony that looked generally HAPPY to see me. He WANTED to learn more. I quickly recognized that I had stumbled across something that made Minnow want to learn, and want to be with me. I decided to take him to college with me that semester so that I could delve a little more into this trick training. In the beginning I merely saw it as a way to get Minnow interested in me, which it did. He started to look forward to my visits and I was having so much fun teaching him to shake hands, pick up objects and even bow.
After several months I finally realized how I could use this training in my riding. Not only was it improving our relationship, but it was creating a language between us. I started using it to teach Minnow how to play each mounted games race. I even began using my new found reward method to teach him a western stop among many other useful tools. By the next spring I had discovered clicker training and Minnow and I were well on our way to a relationship full of trust and understanding.
Looking back these 7 years I barely remember how Minnow used to be. I now use him as an example to my younger horses, who seem to learn merely by watching Minnow. I am always amazed at how far he’s come. He’s now truly MY pony and I’m really HIS special person. He’ll always be the pony that taught me the language of horses.
