by Laura Crum
In
the comments on my last post, Val mentioned that a friend had tried to
“desensitize” a horse that was frightened of the farrier. And I replied that
the word “desensitize” just made my hackles rise. I’ve never seen it used by
anyone who was a competent horseman.
So
I got to thinking about this and realized that it may, of course, be a
completely unreasonable prejudice on my part. I don’t like the word, or what
I’ve seen done in its name, but then again, I don’t really understand the
concept. I only know what I’ve seen.
Today
I am going to describe what I’ve actually seen done under the heading of
desensitizing, which was mostly aimed at creating a horse that wasn’t so spooky
out on the trail. In my view, it was a dismal failure. And then I am going to
talk about something that will actually help a horse to be a solid horse
outside (and in the ring, for that matter). After you read this, you can all
tell me where I’m wrong about this desensitizing issue, if you want.
Maybe
twenty years ago my friend and I had permission to access some trails behind a
local training barn. We parked our rig in the barnyard and rode our young
horses (three and four year old QH rope horses in training) out the back gate
and through the hills. Our goal was to teach our young horses to be calm and
reliable on the trail and to this end, well, we rode them on the trail…a lot.
On
our way to the trails we passed the various rings and arenas where the trainer
and her assistant worked with the horses they had in training. These people
were, as it happens, NH type trainers. I always looked curiously at what they
were doing, because it never looked anything like what I did when training a
horse…or for that matter what any horseman/trainer that I knew did. One young
woman was schooling a rather flighty looking bay mare with a big blue tarp one
day. The mare was walked over the tarp and then she walked under it (they had
one part of it draped over a pole to make a tunnel). The mare seemed fine with
this.
I
smiled at the young woman assistant trainer as we went by, and asked idly what
she was doing. “Desensitizing,” she said rather brusquely, as if I should have
known.
I
shrugged, and we went off to ride several miles through the hills. Here we climbed
and descended steep trail and met various obstacles. We were patient with our
young horses, but persistent, as they learned to cope with what the wild woods
had to show us.
One
day, on the way home, we met the young woman assistant trainer on the same bay
mare. She was less than a mile from the barn and her mare was pitching a fit
over passing a small tarped stack of hay. The tarp was brown rather than blue,
a cube shape, and flapped briskly in the breeze. The mare quite clearly was
having no part of going by this odd obstacle, despite all the “desensitizing”
with the big blue tarp in the ring.
Our
two young horses cocked their ears at the tarped hay, but went on by, ignoring
the nervous mare. They had, of course, been by this obstacle before, they were
tired, and they knew we were on the way home. We stopped and offered to give
the mare a lead past the tarp monster, if the gal wanted.
We
got what I can only call a venomous look in reply and a curt “No need.”
Well.
(In my view, she would have been wise to take the offered lead. Would have
built her mare’s confidence with no conflict needed. But instead, she
dismounted and began some sort of training from the ground…and quite truthfully
I felt that dismounting was exactly the wrong thing to do. Merely reinforced
the idea the haystack was a problem and taught the mare that pitching a fit
causes rider to dismount.)
Since
then I have seen (and heard) of many things like this. Rub the plastic bag all
over the horse at home and its all good. Meet a different plastic bag blowing
along the trail and the horse goes bat shit crazy.
My
answer to this is simple. You don’t desensitize a horse to specific stuff (I
don’t believe this works). You teach a horse to be confident out on the trail
and able to handle the various unpredictable stuff that comes along without
losing his mind. It’s two completely different approaches to the same problem.
Training
a horse to be a calm, confident trail horse is in some ways simple. Uhmm, you
put a lot of miles on the horse on the trail—preferably when he is a green
horse in training. I realize this is oversimplified, but it is the root of the
answer. The best way to do this is, at least initially, is following an older
steady horse down the trail. If no such horse exists to help you, then a
companion of any sort, including a calm confident human on foot (a husband who
hikes, for instance) will work.
Second
point, again obvious. If you want a calm, confident trail horse, choose a horse
with a calm personality. A sensitive reactive spooky horse can be a good trail
horse within his limits, but he’ll always spook. This can be OK, if you don’t
mind the spook.
My
horse Gunner was and is a hugely spooky, very sensitive, reactive horse. I got
him broke to death—I rode him on hundreds of trail rides and gathers. He
spooked on every single outing, at least once or twice, if not twenty or thirty
times. And I mean really spooked—instant relocation twenty feet to the left. I
was used to it; I rode with one hand on the horn; Gunner never dumped me. He
also never bolted or became in any way out of control. He spooked, he jigged
when scared, but he stayed in my hand and went where I told him. In my youth I
found this to be fine. And this is the best you will get out of the truly
sensitive, reactive horse. Trust me on this one.
As
for horses like my Sunny and my son’s Henry, who march intrepidly past just
about everything, they first of all are very calm sensible horses by nature.
Secondly they have been exposed to a lot—many miles outside, hauled everywhere…etc.
And there is a third thing. The big secret—worth far more in my book than any
amount of desensitizing. And it is this. These horses have been tied up for
long periods. They’ve learned how to be calm and patient.
Tying
does a lot of things for a horse. It is the single most under-rated training
tool there is. Ranch horses are caught and saddled and tied—every working day.
If they are young horses they may only be ridden for a short ride in the
company of an older horse than can give them a lead, or not ridden at all, if
the work of the day is too tough for their skills. They are watered at lunch
time. They learn to be patient and calm through this tying—without any other
“training.”
And
now I am going to tell you something I just learned last week about tying. It
really opened my eyes. I’m still sort of pondering it.
My
Sunny horse came from Mexico. He is the single most calm, confident trail horse
I’ve ever ridden. He goes just as well alone as he does in a group. He can be
first or last or in the middle. He has no problem leaving the others. He is a
calm, intelligent horse by nature, but even so, his complete lack of herdbound
behavior and his self-confidence continue to amaze me. I’ve often wondered how
he got this way. Well, now I think I know.
I’ve
known maybe half a dozen of these horses that came from Mexico in my life—and
they were all like this. Nothing bothered them. They all tie perfectly. My
friend Mark has a little gray horse from this same place right now, and he is
just as bombproof as Sunny. I asked Mark, “How do they get this way?”
He
laughed. “They tie them up every night to trees—each horse where he can’t see
another horse. That’s what I was told.”
I
thought about this. My first impulse was to think—wow, that’s rough. I could
never do that to a horse. But then I thought a little deeper.
I
believe in the tying method as we used it on the ranches. But here was
something more intense. The horse must cope with a lot of fear to begin with,
certainly. I imagine the first few weeks are pretty rough. But then the horse
learns that nothing bad happens. The humans come in the morning and bring him
hay and take him to get a drink, so he is happy to see the humans. They saddle
him and ride him and he gets plenty of exercise doing ranch work. In the end he
accepts that there is nothing to do but wait patiently by his tree alone all
night. Being alone will not hurt him, fretting will not help him. And thus is a
horse like Sunny trained to be such a calm confident trail horse, with zero
herdbound traits.
Those
who will cry “How cruel!” need to take a moment and think. Yes, I think this
training method would be hard for a horse, especially to begin with. I’m sure
some horses are injured or colic due to stress. I’m not sure I could ever bring
myself to do it, to be frank. But…
Half
of the folks I know (both on the internet and in real life) who would protest
such “cruelty” to a horse cannot climb on their horses and go for a trail ride.
They are literally scared to do this with their horse. Their horse is too
spooky and nervous, too herdbound to ride alone outside an arena. This is not a
problem if it’s not a problem for the owner, of course.
But
in many cases it IS a problem for the owner. The owner finds the horse
frustrating, or the owner gets hurt on the horse and realizes the horse is
truly dangerous. The owner WANTS to love the horse, but the owner also wants
(very much) to enjoy riding in a relaxed way down the trail. And eventually the
frustration and anxiety and sometimes true (and realistic) fear is just too
much for the well-intentioned owner and the horse is sold. Very frequently such
horses do not come to a good end—we all know this.
Contrast
this to a horse such as Sunny, who is a real pleasure to ride down the trail.
Anybody who can ride can ride a horse like Sunny on trail rides and enjoy him.
I enjoy Sunny’s ability to go solo or in a group and his complete lack of
herdbound behavior makes him a joy in so many ways. If Sunny did not have these
traits I would not have bought him (I was looking for a solid trail horse)
and/or not have kept him. These traits (acquired through the “cruel” method of
tying) have earned Sunny a forever home. And to top it off, they have given him
a calm, relaxed, non-fearful attitude towards anything life sends him. If Sunny (or
any horse) had the sort of brain that allowed him to ponder and choose, don’t
you think he would have chosen the stress of his initial “tying” in order to
get the happy life that has resulted?
Contrast
this to the nervous, unhappy horse whose owner dares not ride him down the
trail. Consider the potential conflicts, the frustration on the part of both
owner and horse, the likelihood of the horse being sold and ending up at the
killers. Which life would you rather have if you were a horse?
Something
to think about, for sure.
