Hi Janice, >I must be a sorta hybrid sacking outer then. I do the obstacle course >thing, familiarization, let them discover it and inspect it, but with >my Jaspar who was phobic, I had to find a way to let him know the How did you do that?
>In my description of stonewall, if you will notice, what I did was >take him into the small enclosed area and sorta lay out the menu of >spooky objects and he had no reaction so I went thru the deal with >letting him see it, smell it, pet him with it, rub it all over. no >reaction at all. he was napping. I think there is benefit in letting horses discover things for themselves but it doesn't necessarily carry over to when we ask them to do some with a lead attached or under saddle which is why I like to go through the process step by step and really watch for the smallest indicators of stress - posture, respiration (pulse if you have a heart rate monitor). Some horses freeze, others change posture and other rush to do things. To me rushing over things is the same as the horse who won't go - only the concern is displayed in a different way. I have seen people use plastic - with horses who were afraid of it - and just make them have to walk over it or go through it, in order to get to food or water. While the horse may end up doing it he may be holding the breath or have increased respiration and heart rate so there is concern in the learning process which will often block learning. While a certain amount of stress may be necessary to learn there is a fine line between 'good' stress and when you go over the line there is a hormone released called ACTH that is a stress hormone that actually blocks learning. That is my big concern about the flooding form of sacking out. The same holds true for loading in a trailer - just leaving the trailer out in the pasture for horses to get in and out of does not necessarily transfer to being led into a trailer. Stonewall could have body discomfort - we have been talking about this to people for over 30 years. There is a reason for behaviour and it is generally about some kind of fear or pain. It can be fear of pain - this can be stored in the body (Candace Pert - Molecules of Emotion). So looking at all aspects of him physically, mentally and emotionally are really important. The thing is some horses are very accepting of things - and really no matter how we train them they manage to learn and others, for many reasons, need to have different approaches. For me those are the ones you really learn from (but I still really like the easy ones as well). Robyn Icelandic Horse Farm Robyn Hood & Phil Pretty Vernon BC Canada www.icefarm.com
