Nothing to hide.

Yesterday I did some more Velcro desensitisation with Faith. I try to do something different with her every day, partly so she retains her enthusiasm, but also because I am a great believer in latent learning, and giving horses a few days to process new stuff often reaps its own rewards. We have spent the last few days working on head lowering using both my hand on her crest, and sliding a hand down the leadrope as a cue. Faith is very quick, and has learned this well, but now we need to build some duration on it.

Anyhow, I put that aside yesterday, and got the Velcro out instead. I was very pleased to be able to break through a glass barrier that we have been encountering, and was able to rest the Velcro on her shoulder, and tear it slightly. Now just as with the head lowering, we need to build that up bit by bit, until I can rest the strip on her shoulder and tear it apart completely.

Now I do watch her body language very carefully while doing this, and yes, admittedly she is still keeping her weight on the far outside leg when I rip the Velcro. But for the moment, for me, this is OK. I have pushed the boundaries an increment further with what I am asking her to do, so there are some other criterion e.g. standing square, that I am prepared to loosen until she becomes more comfortable. With the Velcro strip touching her body.

It then just occurred to me how important it is that we use the horse’s body language as a barometer of their mental states in this way, and how useful that information is to the trainer. That got me thinking about the idea of solving a problem by training incompatible behaviours. So for example if a horse is a bit toothy while you are working with them in the stable, you could train them to keep their nose on a target, which is obviously incompatible with them taking a swipe at your bum when you pick their feet out.

I recently purchased an Alex Kurland DVD where she is working with an Icelandic pony who has a fear of being saddled. She uses the head lowering as an incompatible behaviour both to help the pony calm down and relax, and as it is not a forward moving exercise, allows her to incrementally work towards saddling the horse.

Now I am a HUGE admirer of AK’s work, don’t get me wrong. However, there is just a niggling little question in the back of my head about how far we should mask one behaviour using another. If your horse is taking a swipe at your bum when you are picking his feet out, I would want to know why. Is he uncomfortable? Does he trust you enough to let you have his foot? Is this just the result of an unlistened to request beforehand? If we are teaching incompatible behaviours are we really solving problems, or are we just masking them, and actually creating conflict for the horse.

I could use head lowering to get a rug on Faith, but how far would I be able to tell how comfortable she was with the process? Would I potentially be setting up a conflict for her if she felt she couldn’t use her body to express how she felt, because I was asking her to do something else with it?

I don’t know the answer to this, but again it’s a potentially useful and powerful tool, but one that needs to be wielded with much thought and caution.