Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Hi there,
There is an issue with role permissions that is being worked on at the moment.
If you are having trouble with access or permissions on regional forums please post here to get access: https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058365403/you-do-not-have-permission-for-that#latest
There is an issue with role permissions that is being worked on at the moment.
If you are having trouble with access or permissions on regional forums please post here to get access: https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058365403/you-do-not-have-permission-for-that#latest
"Natural Horsemanship" movement
-
27-03-2008 12:50am#1
Comments
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
Ok, well I agree with all of you!!!
Esp with Dr evil about a novice seeing a demo and then thinking they can do it - very dangerous. I don't like demos because of that and other reasons which deal more with the instant results required which may not be in the horses best interests. Alibear - yes one or two NH trainers do go about as if they 'invented it' which as you pointed out is complete rubbish They promoted it and made their version of it accessible. Parelli (one of MANY thousands of trainers out there) makes a strong point that he didn't invent it.
BUT to really figure out NH you've got to get past the trainers egos (the best ones dont have any ego by the way, thats how you can recognise them) and get to the horsemanship.
Right, here’s how I got slightly into NH (but I’m still traditional too by the way!!)
My grandfather was great with horses too. I rode about on ponies for years and hunted, pony clubbed, hunter-trialled, did some dressage tests etc All great fun, loved my horses, all various ponies & horses worth their weight in gold etc When I got my first shetland my first instructor (I was 6!) taught me that you should always use light hands when riding.
But……. the problem arose when doing my B test in pony club and having to ride my horse in a double bridle with the arms pulled out of me, & bleeding hands (yes seriously, and the horse felt like about 3 tons in my hands) just so we looked like we should nearly broke my heart. I could ride and jump, but the part about how to bring on a horse doing flatwork (the basics of everything!!!!) with softness & lightness was missing. Maybe I was in the wrong place but I didn’t know of anyone who could teach my & my lovely hunter hwo to go 'on the bit' with the draw reins, double bridles, etc, etc.
So yes I could ride & jump, but I wasn’t comfortable with how I was expected to reach training goals. So I got my B test, then went back to jumping, riding out at home, I NEVER wanted to put my horse through that kind of training again – it probably wasn’t even that severe in most folks eyes, but I just couldn’t pull on those reins like that. I knew it wasn’t right.
I stumbled across a trainer out in NZ who by pure fluke did NH along with everything else they did, and they showed me simple ways to being on a horse which had more softness & feel & lightness than I had been taught before. Because they worked well and I could also see the results quickly, I added them into my training.
NH is like anything else - there's great bits and there's awful bits, I do agree with the previous posters. Same as your bog standard horsemanship - you see great practioners and then the ones that make you go 'ouch'. I’ve seen some NH trainers and thought – no way mate, you’re having a laugh.
The skill for the human is to pick the best skills & techniques and use them. Doesn’t matter if you learnt them from your Grandad or an Australian cowboy. if they work for you .......
Also - its not about the style you use - its about what’s inside you - my Dads not NH but he was brought up to know that you get the best out of a horse to treat them fairly. Its about how you are - if you've got feel, empathy for the horse and an ability to read & understand your horse, you'll be a great trainer no matter where you picked up your skills.
As for trainers - I don't go by my disclipline / style they teach - if they can teach me something useful and make learning fun and productive for me & my horse then I'm all for it. If they're crap (nh or otherwise, you get crap teachers everywhere!) then that will be my only lesson with them.
So maybe judge the trainer alright – you don’t like the way Parelli flogs dvds, you think the Monty join up is a waste of time, and fair enough but there are good, even *great* teachers everywhere if you look hard enough for them, that are true horsepeople and aren’t out to rip you off – and you do get those type of people in every walk of horse life.
And the good 'NH' type people. dont even like to be called 'natural'/ To be honest, the word natural menas very little these days, as it says a lot but says nothign at all, as people ahve so many different interpretations of it. In my book there's two kinds of horsemanship - good horsemanship and bad horsemanship.
The best I can recommend is to go by word of mouth. I’m an experienced rider but some of the stuff I did in Oz was so simple and worked so well I nearly fell over a few times in amazement the stuff was so easy - but I’d never thought of doing it that way.
I've met lots of horse people (both traditional and natural) who can do stuff, but they NO IDEA WHY they are doing stuff, so it all gets a bit messy.
If you know WHY, and you realise that no one will ever know it all about horses so you'd better try to keep on learning, you've got the potential to be a very talented horse person. Doesn’t matte if your NH or traditional Irish, or came up through UK riding schools, owned your first horse at 3 or 50, do western, or dressage, only hunt every Sunday or whatever.
Anyway! If anyone’s interested in how I learnt to go 'on the bit' without the double bridle!! here's a write up of how I did it......
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
How can I get 'on the bit' nicely and easily with no gadgets, side-reins, double bridles or over bending and without needing arms of steel is a very common question.
‘On the bit’ isn’t just one thing. It’s actually lots of small things. When you put them all together then you get the rounded back, the engaged hindquarters, the vertical head flexion and the softness and suppleness and ease of movement that all come together under the ‘on the bit’ catchphrase.
The big question though before you begin, is why do you want to go on the bit?
Do you want your horse to look pretty? Do you want your horse to resemble a picture in a training book? Do you want to do it because people expect you to?
Or do you understand that to go ‘on the bit’ is really about developing an equestrian athlete who is physically prepared to be as successful as possible in your chosen equestrian pursuits?
Train your horse so he can do his job to the best of his ability while minimizing the risks of injury. Prepare him physically and mentally to be a top class athlete, whether you hack out with friends or compete internationally.
Your horse is an athlete.
To prepare an athlete you first need to make sure his whole body is soft, supple and flexible, and ready for your chosen equestrian discipline, whether it’s western, hunting, jumping, dressage, polocrosse, etc.
Imagine your horse is a gymnast. Before every performance, a gymnast needs to warm up their muscles and make sure every part of their body is flexible. It’s the same for horses.
For the best results when you are in competitions, riding for pleasure or practicing at home, first start by checking if your horse’s body is soft and supple all over.
Can you move his head and neck on their own? Can you move just the back legs? Can you move just the front legs? Can your horse take a step back? Can your horse take a step forward? Can your horse take a step sideways? And can your horse do all of these things from the lightest of cues showing softness through his body, without any arguments, braces or tense muscles?
It may sound complicated, but all of these things are the basics any horse should be able to do before you go for a hack, compete in your local dressage competition or hit the road for the national showjumping championships in Dublin. And the good news is that they are all pretty easy to do.
I teach all of these on the ground first, but if you know how to teach them in the saddle that’s fine too.
1. Lateral flexion – head and neck turned to one side - groundwork.
When riding on a circle, your horse’s head and neck should follow the arc of the circle. You can practise this on the ground first to get it right by asking your horse to turn his head a little while he is standing still. Don’t over bend, just ask for a little.
2. Hindquarter yield – groundwork.
A hindquarter yield involves moving the back legs in a circle around the front legs, which remain relatively still. Working properly on the bit means you need a soft flexible horse all over. The first thing you need to do is teach your horse to hindquarter yield on the ground. This also encourages the horse to step his hind legs under himself, similar to what you will be looking for soon. Hill work is also good to get the hind end engaged and working under the horse.
3. Forequarter yield – groundwork.
A forequarter yield involves moving the front legs in a circle around the hind legs, which remain relatively still. It is very good to loosen up your horses shoulders and take the weight of the forehand.
Imagine your horses back is long and straight like a dressage whip. Someone is standing in front of you holding both ends of the whip. You place your hand on the middle of the whip and press lightly downwards. The middle goes down, and both ends go up. If this was a horse, his head would be up, his shoulders would be tense and stuck, his back would be hollow, and his hindquarters wouldn’t be under him.
Now look at that straight dressage whip again. Put your hand under the middle of it and press upwards. Now the middle is raised and the ends are lower. If this was a horse, his head would be down, his shoulders would be free moving and raised and his back rounded, and his hindquarters would be underneath him.
A horse which is tense or defensive or stiff will often have both front feet stuck into the ground. This means the shoulders will be braced and the head will be up. It will be very difficult to ask a horse like this to backup or to turn his front end.
If you can get the front end moving independently then the forelegs won’t be stuck into the ground any more, the shoulders will free up and the back will be physically able to round. You’ll also find you are getting much longer steps with the two front legs. Your horse will cover ground more economically (fewer strides) and it will be more comfortable for the rider.
4. Backup (reverse) – groundwork.
Backing up is a very good exercise to get weight off your horse’s forehand, and is also very useful as part of training a horse that very light pressure on the reins means slow down. Like the forequarter yield, if your horse’s shoulders are braced or locked you’ll see this immediately when you ask them to take a step backwards from a light cue.
5. Sidepass and soft ribs – groundwork.
The sidepass is when the horse walks sideways. You get this by doing the hindquarter yield and the forequarter yield at the same time. The sidepass is very important. Your horse needs to start to understand that a little pressure with one leg while you’re riding means that he needs to wrap his ribs around that leg.
Often times when you start doing this with a horse, if you put on one leg your horse will start to go faster without bending his body. Instead we need to train your horse that while light pressure from your two legs do indeed mean ‘go faster’, light pressure with just one leg means ‘go sideways’.
So when you’re circling if you want to go from a walk to a trot, put on two legs briefly until you’re in trot. Then take them off again as its your horse’s job to maintain this gait, not yours. Then when you want that bend in his body like the circle, just put on your inside leg lightly and your horse will stay at the same pace, but gently arc his ribs around your inside leg.
This is also known as ‘soft ribs’, and is crucial to be able to do in order to work towards ‘on the bit’. Lateral flexion (bend in the neck) plus soft ribs (bend through the rest of the body) performed together, is the final step you do before going on the bit.
6. Repetition.
Repeat these in the saddle, until each is good, soft and easy on both reins. Conformation plays a small part but every horse has potential.
7. ‘On the bit’.
To be able to go ‘on the bit’ as it’s known locally, all of the things above need to have been done already. You should now be riding a horse who you can hindquarter yield, forequarter yield, backup lightly, sidepass, and circle on both reins with his full body (from poll to dock) arced in the same way as that circle. In the beginning you can work on very small circles. If you can do a small circle, the big circles will be easy.
The next step is teaching your horse how you want him to carry his head. Soft ribs and lateral flexion equals vertical flexion. To work on this walk your horse in a circle, maybe 10 or 15 metres.
Because of your inside leg, his ribs are soft (practise your sidepassing), causing him to arc around your inside leg from shoulder to hindquarter.
Your inside hand is gently asking for his head and neck to turn towards the inside. Your outside leg and hand do nothing at all.
There is a light contact on the inside rein as you maintain that inside flexion. Every now and again your horse will reposition his head either up or down slightly as he moves around. If your horse repositions it upwards, just keep that little bit of tension in the inside rein. If he repositions it downwards, loosen that inside rein completely. You are rewarding this behaviour with an immediate release of pressure.
You are teaching your horse that if he lowers his head a little, you are going to loosen that rein. If he keeps it where it is, or puts his head up, that rein is going to stay as it is. Remember, this is all just done in the walk. You’ll end up really concentrating waiting for the next split second when he gives his head a little. It’s actually quite fun!
Once your horse has started to figure this out, you can refine it a little and only release the rein totally when his head is lowered, and his nose is perpendicular to the ground. At the beginning it’s a great idea to have a friend watching who can tell you each time he does it, as it can be difficult to see it from the saddle if you’re not used to how it feels.
8. The final result.
Your horse’s shoulders are free, so his back is able to round and you have lovely athletic long strides.
Working on the circle, his body is arced around your inside leg, and his head and neck are flexed slightly inwards.
Your horse has started to figure out that if he drops his head a little and brings his nose in a bit, that you release pressure on the inside rein (you're not using the outside rein at all). Now he is inclined to do this by himself, dropping his head in, rounding his back, and his hindquarters have started coming in under him a lot more than before.
From your perspective, light pressure with your inside leg automatically results in an arced horse. A light cue from you on the inside rein will result in your horse adjusting his head position to where you want, which is followed immediately by a release of pressure by you on that inside rein. When your horse comes down ‘on the bit’, you’ve actually got no weight at all in your hands.
While I say ‘on the bit’ you can actually do all of these things bitless. Keep it simple and you’ll have a relaxed, balanced, supple, soft horse who floats over the ground.0 -
-
-
-
Hiya convert if you've been doing this stuff since you were 4 or 5 thats briliant, you sound like a very talented horse person But I think those who have natural ability, empathy for the horse, and had briliant teachers from the age of 4 or 5 are hard to come by.
So for the rest, maybe who started in their teens/twenties at riding schools, or like me had empathy but were missing the really good teacher, if we find a really good teacher (of any type, NH, trad, whatever) we'll learn what we can to improve our horsemanship.
Agree some of the prices for stuff are crazy, but on the other hand people wont pay for the stuff if they dont want to, or will find cheaper alternatives that work for them.0 -
-
-
-
-
I'm new in this forum, but this post caught my attention. Feel free to ignore me if you wish since Im new, just thought I'd throw my two cents in!
Most NH trainers that I've seen in person do not claim to have invented it. Most acknowledge that they are using old "tried and true" methods. Thier ploy is that they are trying to make it like "horsemanship for dummies," i.e. for people that have no horsey common sense.
That being said, I don't really like Pat Parelli! :rolleyes:
I have trained my horses with a little of this and that I have picked up over the years, but incorporated a few NH trainer's techniques. I really like most of John Lyons and GaWaNi PonyBoy's points. But I do not use them exclusively.
I do agree with those of you who have said that NH techniques can be dangerous in the hands of over-confident amatuers, but from what I have seen personally, most of those lose confidence when it comes to actual saddle time, and usually just have very well behaved horses on the ground that are not broke to ride!
I got my first horse when I was 22. He was an untrained Mustang. I had only started one other horse, and that was with much supervision and assistance from a professional. NH did help me get my Mustang going (when I had no professional help) and now he is one of the best horses I have ever ridden! But I do have common sense, and I think that is definitely required in order to train a horse.
All in all, I would recommend someone looking into it, and picking and choosing the aspects that they like, and leave the rest. But PLEASE do not spend a ton of money on the carrot stick or other such nonsense! A regular lunge whip would do!
P.S. I live in the USA, and it is VERY common around here for some people to be so wrapped up in NH that they look down thier noses at people who do not religiously follow the methods. I am against any kind of cult following, and I think that's what it becomes for some people! Kinda scary!0 -
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
Yep, Monty doesn't start a horse in 1/2 hour - someone sits up on a horse in half an hour. Doesn't teach rein or seat cues. BIG difference. So I'd take all that stuff with a pinch of salt.
Making the horses mouth is an interesting point. Ideally as you progress you want to ride more from your seat, with less use of the reins to get stuff done. We tend to teach young horses to respond to rein cues first (forwards, backwards, left, right) but some of the NH folk teach rein AND seat cues right from the start.
I rode a horse out in Australia who had 2 weeks of starting work, and did walk, trot, canter, stop, backup, go right, go left, HQ yield, FQ yield, sidepass without me touching the reins at all (you can use the reins too of course, but horse had been trained both ways). The softest, lightest, beautifully balanced horse I'd ever had the pleasure to ride. Folks take YEARS to train up a normal horse to be that soft and responsive. This youngster could do this with a bit and without a bit, didnt make a difference.
If you do want to follow up on a few good trainers, have a look at Buck brannanam, tom widdicombe, ray hunt, steve halfpenny, brad weeks, mark rashid etc. They are true horseman. 0 -
-
![[Deleted User]](/applications/dashboard/design/images/defaulticon.png)
Advertisement