How a one-hour demo can distort your perception of behavioural problems and their solutions
A large source of income for trainers is through holding public demonstrations, often involving a horse with a behaviour problem or an unbacked horse being trained within an hour. They are flashy, they are entertaining, but they perpetuate a huge misconception about horse behaviour: that undesired and dangerous behaviours can simply be trained away.
I use the word undesired because all behaviours other than stereotypies are normal and natural, they are only considered problems when they go against the goal and aim of the handler/owner/rider. Common behaviours that are featured in these demos are bucking/rearing, or trailering, as these are very visual and widely considered problematic. As undesired behaviours go, there is a lot of research into both of these: the general consensus for bucking and rearing is that pain is the usual cause, and for trailer loading problems are usually the result of previous negative experience (pain/fear) or ethological issues (sight, feeling trapped). Undesired behaviours cannot be ‘fixed’ as they are not a bad behaviour; reducing them requires resolution of the original cause which is in most cases pain. Attempting to make the behaviour extinct can lead to a shut-down horse or an explosion of alternative behaviours, usually worse than the first.
Examples
I have put together a playlist of various examples of live clinic demos and some video demonstrations from public and semi-public training figures. Some are examples of the issue I’m raising, others are good examples of behaviour modification that doesn't use training. I will give a run-down of some of these videos but not all of them. You can find the full playlist here.
IMPORTANT NOTE: This post is not aiming to target any one trainer, it is discussing a universal concept shared in this style of demonstration
Example 1: Preview of Richard Maxwell's Loading Demo | Your Horse Live 2012
Here we have an example where training can be a solution to the behavioural problem, but all other causes must still be ruled out. Trailer loading is stressful for horses for a myriad of reasons: a trailer is dark, enclosed, and often no taller than the horse. A horse who has never loaded will still be wary of a trailer, but one who might have injured themself getting into or out of the trailer, or during travelling will show more overt behaviours to avoid the trailer. Difficulty balancing or isolation can create added stress to the loading.
A horse who has experienced anything that causes stress with loading might refuse to load, and unfortunately the resolution of trauma can only occur if the trauma is present. Previous negative experiences do require training to change the emotional connection the horse has with the loading or travelling depending on which aspect the horse finds stressful. As a behaviour consultant I would always strive to use positive methods for this – target training has been shown to be a highly successful method to trailer load horses.
The trainer in the video, like many others, uses his own rope halter to ‘control the horse’ and at roughly 8 minutes you can begin to see the seeds of stress, frustration, and the intense application of negative reinforcement. There is no given history for why the horse struggles with loading, and no discussion of a veterinary check to rule out pain as a reason. For me this video was a real yes, yes, no type. The trainer discusses how the horse planting and standing still “doesn’t mean they are stupid, or they’re being thick or that they’re being ignorant” and then five minutes later describes the horse as “huffy”. He also discusses how the horse needs to learn that they must do as the handler says because their size, strength, and speed will not get them free from it.
Example 2: Motivating a Lazy Horse: Ken McNabb Horsemanship
In this video the trainer is discussing a horse who occasionally stops during riding and isn’t very responsive to the leg. Stopping, which is an aspect of gait breaking, is most commonly seen as a conflict behaviour often derived from some amount of underlying pain. Horses will fine-tune their behaviours to reach the most desired outcome for them, this is often the one that contains the least pain. In the case of the video example, the horse would rather resolve conflict and reduce the risk of pain by moving when (and only when) they see the whip, however when the whip makes contact in some cases the conflict from the pain of the whip and the potential pain of movement causes them to move towards rehearsed aggression (striking with the back legs). McGreevy and McLean have a book called ‘The Domestic Horse: The Origins, Development and Management of Its Behaviour’ that discusses a variety of ridden issues and their development along with other ethologically based behaviours. In addition to potential pain, fitness plays a large part in the ability of the horse to engage in activity. The horse in the video has apparent fat on the hindquarters and is described as breathing heavily once they begin to trot around, demonstrating potential unfitness. A horse who is unfit will find exercise more stressful than a fit horse. The trainer also discusses using release as reward, these are not the same thing and they are not equal. A good positive reinforcement trainer will discuss reinforcers rather than using the word ‘reward’, because a reward is a human notion. Release involves the application of pressure and subsequent learning that a specific behaviour will cause the removal of that pressure. This is often a very stress-inducing process as is evident in the video example.
Example 3: Ronan Horsemanship videos: One day clinic to fix horse problems
The video shows a horse who rears and paws, as well as being described as ‘disrespectful’ in the description and ‘pushy’ in the video. Rearing is an escape behaviour, it is often used by the horse to create space to reduce fear and pain. Rearing is one of the mentioned behaviours in Dyson’s ridden horse pain ethogram as well as a behaviour discussed in this paper: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jveb.2011.10.005 where it was shown that the rearing horse in question had cervical fractures (C1 and C2). The cervical vertebrae are also called the neck vertebrae; in the video the trainer is placing large amounts of pressure and most likely pain on the poll (C1) by yanking hard on the rope halter. The horse also whinnys frequently at the beginning which suggests that the horse is isolated, this can cause increased stress and reduce learning ability.
*In addition to these examples of trainers using only training to ‘solve problem behaviours’ I’ve also added some videos of trainers discussing the use of pain resolution to reduce unwanted behaviours such as this clip from the Road to the Horse 2017 live clinic with Vicki Wilson Clinic that shows how chiropractic work and massage can drastically alter behaviour.
These examples show different aspects of the problem at hand. A one-hour clinic cannot solve a horse’s issue, and the training will not be a long term solution. This also follows the same pattern seen from sending a horse away to be trained by a professional, the horse will then return back home to be handled by their owners. They will not be handled in the same way, meaning that the behavioural cues will no doubt be different. This is why it is so important for owners to be present during (and ideally doing) the training, and a good trainer will tailor the training so that you, the owner, can also do it, as well as teaching you how to do so effectively. Many of these trainers also say one thing while doing another: they say that they are being kind or rewarding the horse, when what they are doing is using aversive techniques and only occasionally offering release from pressure.
So are some trainers trying to persuade their audience that their horse’s problems can be fixed using their training solutions? Of course! Trainers make their money from training horses. But that is not a bad thing, horses do need training; any behaviour we want a horse to do has to be trained into them. Horses aren’t born accepting tack, or allowing humans to pick up their feet, or letting a dentist place a hunk of metal into their mouth. But the idea that a horse who bucks, rears, refuses to load, or doesn’t stand still at the mounting block is being disrespectful, or stubborn and all they need to fix them is to retrain them, is not only an oversimplification, but a harmful notion for all horses. Behaviours are communication and horses only use the dangerous ones when they absolutely have to. A horse will always show you some other behaviour before the more extreme one, but the more we ignore those signs, the more they have to escalate, and the more sudden the dangerous behaviours seem. Always hire a vet before you hire a trainer, and consider if behavioural problems need behavioural solutions in the form of a behaviour consultant. Trainers are great for training horses new behaviours, and retraining horses who have either regressed or aiding an owner to understand how to train their own horse better. But anyone who makes their money claiming that their specific (and marketed) method is the best method to train every horse and all you need is one thing, might be selling snake oil that only works in their hands and with their horses.
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