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Date Posted: 12:24:27 02/06/03 Thu
Author: Jennifer
Subject: Re: Aggressive 4 yr. old gelding
In reply to: d 's message, "Re: Aggressive 4 yr. old gelding" on 19:52:26 01/31/03 Fri

I certainly do not mean to imply putting fear into a horse by pain. I agree that control by fear is not a good working relationship with your horse. When using the whip, it is not to "hurt" the horse, but to assert some dominance. I only tie them because if they resort to flight, the message is lost. You are right that usually just a popping noise is sufficient, but if the horse doesn't heed the warning, the horse has no respect (better choice of words than fear)for your authority. Ideally you should work WITH the horse, but sometimes they won't work with you. With the two horses that I have had to deal with in this way, I only had to do this one time, and when I say pop the horse, it is mainly like you said, to get their attention - the whip is not always to whip, sometimes it is just to emphasize your point. Some people won't discipline their horses when it is needed (because they don't want to "hurt" them), and I have seen a lot of problems result. I definitely agree that you must understand what they are thinking before you make a decision to punish them this way. If you spend enough time building a good relationship, like you said, then you know enough about your horse or horses to read them. I am a high school teacher and feel from working with both people and animals, that without consequences there can be little discipline. Why should you do anything you don't want to do if nothing will happen to you when you don't? A horse that does not understand the rules can hurt someone. Unfortunately, many horses don't get a chance to learn the rules, but are still expected to follow them. My horses have great manners because I trained them to understand what I want, and because I understand their needs and personalities. When they behave in a spoiled way, like kicking out at me because they are frustrated or angry because they don't get their way, I know this behavior is challenging me. I don't immediately grab a whip and start punishing them, but if positive behavior modification does not work, they will have consequences for the behavior. My reasoning is just reminding them to move away from pressure - in this case, social pressure. I want them to respond to me as though I am the lead mare who will kick at them if they invade her space. This may not be the solution for everyone, but when working with several horses all wanting to be the first to eat, a person is relatively small and fragile, and I will have my horses understand all the rules of a pecking order with me at the top because I do not want to be injured. They now understand my position just with tone of voice to make them keep their distance and wait their turn like a lead mare would bare her teeth or tuck her hindquarters with a threat of kicking if they don't heed her warning. Sometimes they are just so busy keeping each other in their places that they run over me. However, they tend to be more careful if they know they should keep their eyes on me for signals. They don't keep away out of fear of me, but rather out of respect. A sidenote to this situation is to try to establish a routine the horse or horses can be comfortable with and ,as you correctly implied, understand and trust you. I do love and care for my horses greatly and respect them as my friends - I just don't want my friends to take advantage of me. I just wanted to clarify my position on this as well as to agree with yours!! Thanks for your ideas on this - we need to remember that we should never stop learning if we want to become better equestrians!

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