02/07/2023
I recently read an article that brought up some interesting points about horse trainers, their methods, and the industry in general.
It brought up how horse owners send their horses to a well known trainer with the idea that the trainer will teach the horse everything they will need to know as they "install" the buttons on the horse and then send them home. If problems ever arise just send them back to the trainer for a tune-up and repeat this cycle for as long as necessary thus assuring job security forever.
The other thought was how some big name trainers basically make it out like it is there way or no way; allow me to address each together individually.
First as a horse trainer by definition I cannot wrap my head around the ego that seems to plague the horse industry. Everyone seems to want to prove how smart, educated, experienced, and more gifted they are than the next person. Of course this is all to the detriment of the horse because when we think we have learned everything we can't learn anything more. No one has learned it all. No one person's methods are flawless nor do they work to fit all horses all the time.
Or this similar thing I hear it all the time, "I bought this horse and it was so calm and willing when I bought it and now a short time later it is a totally different horse. I don't know what happened? I think they must have sold me a drugged horse. Or how dishonest they are to sell me a horse with these issues, they should have never sold me a horse like this knowing how they acted".
Now I am not saying that people don't drug horses because we all know that has happened but in most of the cases the reason that it seems like two different horses is because the same horse has been treated very differently by two very different levels, or styles of horsemanship.
Let me explain, a common problem that I see in our industry is this idea that horses are programmable and once a trainer with their methods has trained the horse, that horse will always and forever maintain the level that the trainer and those methods produced. This is simply not true, horses are not programmable, they are instead always learning. This can be good if we continue treating the horse with good horsemanship, the horse will continue to gain skills. This can also be not so good if we use poor horsemanship and allow the horse to act rudely and exhibit poor behavior.
A while back I was contacted by a dear woman that was truly the salt of the earth. She had contacted me because the horse that she had purchased after seeing what this amazing horse could do, started acting differently than the horse she bought. After a short evaluation of watching both the very talented and handsome gelding along with one of the kindest hearted, most loving women interact it became clear that one of them had the kindest most innocent motives and no it wasn't the gelding.
Fast forward a bit the fun loving intelligent buckskin decided that he could easily avoid work with a small investment of energy, a few quick bucks. After a couple of thrown riders, a couple of broken bones and some dashed dreams later he was in my barn. I had seen the sale video from a well known barn of this horse and it was impressive. So what happened? What changed? And what did I need to sort out?
What I found was a very intelligent horse that learned to adapt to his handlers and learned how to take advantage of the kind heartedness and well meaning of a very sweet woman. Some horses learn how to take advantage of situations and a very big reason is when we don't hold them to the necessary standard, I now had to remind him, not through a beating or any demanding with a strong hand that I was the boss, instead by reminding him how a respectful citizen behaves and that it was simply in his best interest to be respectful as he had been previously taught.
After a couple of sessions he no longer wanted or felt inclined to buck and went back to his previous training and even continued to gain. Now please understand I am certainly not trying to imply that me nor my methods were the magic potion that awakened him from his shananagins. There are multitudes of people that could have attained the same results, it was however a result of common sense horsemanship that was mixed with a level of humility and respect for the animal that caused him to reconsider his behavior. No ego, no fancy equipment or patented methodology designed to gain a following.
All of this is causing me to reevaluate how I do things. Maybe we as an industry need to put more into learning and then teaching the next generation of horsemanship with the horses best interest in mind. Not the bank accounts, or puffed up egos and snarky know it all attitudes.
Maybe I need to instead put more into helping, encouraging and mentoring others to achieve their goals instead of just training the horse but not the rider.
Maybe I need to make the Chinese proverb more of a motto.
If you give a man a fish you will feed him for a day; if you teach a man how to fish you will feed him for a lifetime.
Pc Tracey Buyce
