I’ve recently started participating in equine agility and I have really enjoyed training my horses through each course. I love that whips are not allowed, taking slack out of the rope takes points off of your score, and you are allowed to use food. I will expand on why I love these things and more reasons why I think horse agility is a fantastic sport and a step in the right direction for the horse world. To check it out for yourself visit https://www.thehorseagilityclub.com/

Start buttons are a tool used in clicker training where the animal performs one before to let the handler know he is ready for another behavior. I have found start buttons to be very helpful in horse training. I’ll cover what start buttons are and how to use them.

Once the horse is ok with crossing and standing on a tarp, then you can start training the next two behaviors. I’ll explain the process of teaching a horse to be ok with having the tarp over his back and how to teach him to drag a tarp from the beginning.

The usual ways of training a horse to cross a tarp include chasing, pulling, and pressuring the horse until he does it. By forcing a horse to cross in this way you can very easily make going near the tarp a source of pain and fear, making your goal even harder. By using positive reinforcement the horse will be more willing to cross the tarp and will do so faster and easier than any other form of training.

All horses spook at some point. I’ll give you some tips on how to help your horse when he is afraid. Keeping the horse under threshold and slowly building their confidence is key.

Whips are a highly debated topic in the horse world. Much of the debate comes from tradition or opinion and not from science. I’m going to talk about the science behind how a whip functions in horse training. I’ll also cover some of the side effects that can happen when the whip is used improperly.

There is a lot of myths around why a horse licks and chews. The behavior is often explained as a horse showing that it is relaxed. Licking and chewing is actually a calming signal. I’ll explain what a calming signal is and how they function.

I’m explaining the science behind ‘relationship training’ or getting a horse’s focus to get them to relax. Then I’ll talk about the different types of clinics and how they effect horses. Finally I’ll give my thoughts on the movie Buck.

I use protected contact quite a bit in my training, especially for horses who are fearful or display potentially dangerous behaviors. By using protected contact I can still train the behaviors I want, while we both can have the space we need to feel safe. Once the behavior is trained I can then progress to free contact.

Most people overlook this critical piece of training with their horses. How the horse takes the treat and when are extremely important as this information tells the horse what behaviors are being reinforced. I’ll go into detail on how to teach a horse to take a treat properly and when to give the food.