We got back from James Roberts on Friday night,
reluctantly ! It was a great week with huge amounts to learn and watch,
my brain is a little fried.
It started on the Sunday with the job of getting our horses to Wiltshire. A 2 hour journey. We considered taking them both together in the trailer, but as it was Filly's first trailer journey chickened out of that idea and did the extra round trip to take them separately. A total of 7 hours driving.
Bonitao loaded and trailered really well. It was the most relaxed we have seen him. He spent most of the journey munching hay.
Filly was a different story. She loaded easily enough, but when we started moving it was a different story. Unfortunately we have a camera fitted and so Ritchie could watch her as we travelled. This was not good for her peace of mind. For about the first hour she tried to take the trailer apart, I could feel the car rocking. The snag is that if we stopped then and let her out we would have rewarded her for being upset, anxious and fidgety. Whilst there was a small risk involved we had to just keep trucking. James has often said that the problem with the UK is that it is not big enough to travel long enough to get horses really relaxed and confident in a trailer. Bearing this advice in mind we determined that if she was not confident by the time we got to JRFS we would just keep on driving for as long as it took. So long as we were moving she was fine as she had to concentrate on keeping her balance, but if we stopped she kicked off again. After around 1 hour, however, she settled right down. Not happy, but also no longer trying to demolish the trailer. By the time we got to JRFS she was much better, not perfect but good enough that we could stop. She was however soaked in sweat so I had to spend a long time moving her around in the indoor school to cool off and dry.
She was then put in a field. This upset her a great deal. I spent a long time with her as a comforting presence whilst she explored the surroundings and met her new neighbours. She spent a good amount of time cantering away from me towards the gate, then when I did not following galloping back to me for comfort. Once she had settled a little I left her which was a hard thing to do. She immediately tried to push through the rope gate to follow me and ran up and down the fence line whinnying. Like with the trailer it would have been a mistake to give in to the urge to return and comfort her as this would have rewarded the behaviour of being upset and running around. With gritted teeth I just walked away, but asked Josh to go and check on her later. Around an hour later he found her quietly grazing.
Not giving into the human urge to comfort an animal in distress like this is very very tough, but in the end it is the only way to allow the horse to sort out the issue. It is too easy to reward anxiousness and this only positively reinforces anxiousness as a learned behaviour. It makes us feel better but actually does harm to the psychology of the horse. I would like to distinguish this emotional stress from the physical harm. If the horse is physically hurt then of course it is our duty to do all in our power to relieve that pain.
I have noticed that one of the biggest mistakes I make in removing cues from a horse is to release when only the physical action has been achieved. It is also important to wait for the correct emotional state before releasing as well or we teach our horse that, for example, a porcupine cue to disengage the hind quarters means 1) move my inside hind leg and 2) get emotional and evasive about it. The correct time to release is when we have both physical and emotional softness. This might be just a small movement of the leg, but combined with a relaxed emotional state. No tail swishing, ears back etc.
These episodes with the trailer and field, stripped of the physical response and only requiring an emotional response, have really brought this message home to me.
It started on the Sunday with the job of getting our horses to Wiltshire. A 2 hour journey. We considered taking them both together in the trailer, but as it was Filly's first trailer journey chickened out of that idea and did the extra round trip to take them separately. A total of 7 hours driving.
Bonitao loaded and trailered really well. It was the most relaxed we have seen him. He spent most of the journey munching hay.
Filly was a different story. She loaded easily enough, but when we started moving it was a different story. Unfortunately we have a camera fitted and so Ritchie could watch her as we travelled. This was not good for her peace of mind. For about the first hour she tried to take the trailer apart, I could feel the car rocking. The snag is that if we stopped then and let her out we would have rewarded her for being upset, anxious and fidgety. Whilst there was a small risk involved we had to just keep trucking. James has often said that the problem with the UK is that it is not big enough to travel long enough to get horses really relaxed and confident in a trailer. Bearing this advice in mind we determined that if she was not confident by the time we got to JRFS we would just keep on driving for as long as it took. So long as we were moving she was fine as she had to concentrate on keeping her balance, but if we stopped she kicked off again. After around 1 hour, however, she settled right down. Not happy, but also no longer trying to demolish the trailer. By the time we got to JRFS she was much better, not perfect but good enough that we could stop. She was however soaked in sweat so I had to spend a long time moving her around in the indoor school to cool off and dry.
She was then put in a field. This upset her a great deal. I spent a long time with her as a comforting presence whilst she explored the surroundings and met her new neighbours. She spent a good amount of time cantering away from me towards the gate, then when I did not following galloping back to me for comfort. Once she had settled a little I left her which was a hard thing to do. She immediately tried to push through the rope gate to follow me and ran up and down the fence line whinnying. Like with the trailer it would have been a mistake to give in to the urge to return and comfort her as this would have rewarded the behaviour of being upset and running around. With gritted teeth I just walked away, but asked Josh to go and check on her later. Around an hour later he found her quietly grazing.
Not giving into the human urge to comfort an animal in distress like this is very very tough, but in the end it is the only way to allow the horse to sort out the issue. It is too easy to reward anxiousness and this only positively reinforces anxiousness as a learned behaviour. It makes us feel better but actually does harm to the psychology of the horse. I would like to distinguish this emotional stress from the physical harm. If the horse is physically hurt then of course it is our duty to do all in our power to relieve that pain.
I have noticed that one of the biggest mistakes I make in removing cues from a horse is to release when only the physical action has been achieved. It is also important to wait for the correct emotional state before releasing as well or we teach our horse that, for example, a porcupine cue to disengage the hind quarters means 1) move my inside hind leg and 2) get emotional and evasive about it. The correct time to release is when we have both physical and emotional softness. This might be just a small movement of the leg, but combined with a relaxed emotional state. No tail swishing, ears back etc.
These episodes with the trailer and field, stripped of the physical response and only requiring an emotional response, have really brought this message home to me.
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