Have you ever heard the phrase “You can’t teach an old dog a new trick?” Many people assume that once an animal gets to a certain age or practices an unwanted behavior a certain number of times, that it will be hopeless to try to train the animal a new behavior pattern. However, nothing could [...]
DVD Review: The First Week
I recently rented a colt starting DVD from giddyupflix called The First Week. It features Joe Wolter, Bryan Neubert and Jim Neubert working together for a week to start 20 colts at the Four Sixes Ranch in Guthrie, Texas. Note: This review will only focus on disc one of this four disc set. I was [...]
Tex Practices Being Brave
The weather was perfect this weekend for playing with the ponies at the rescue. I spent quite a bit of time on Saturday working with Tex, one of our two year old ponies. He’s friendly and halter-broke, but really hasn’t had a whole lot of training. Tex was absolutely TERRIFIED of people when we first [...]
Introducing Sebastian to a Saddle Pad (video)
This is the first of several posts on introducing a young horse to a saddle. Sebastian and I have been playing a lot with saddle blankets, cinches, bareback pads and saddles over the past month. He’s done great and accepted all of this in stride. In fact, the first time I saddled him, he stood [...]
Are Saddle Pads Scary?
Rosie and I played with a saddle pad for the second time yesterday. In traditional horse training, many horses will learn to put up with saddling without truly ever accepting the process. Or, through rough handling, they later learn to resent the act of being saddled. I want Rosie to like being saddled and to [...]
Overcoming Fear and the Power of Cues
This post is part of a series of several posts on cues. I recently watched one of Alexandra Kurland’s DVDs, Overcoming Fear and the Power of Cues. It was a fascinating look at positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, desensitization, fear and cues. Learn more about the DVD or purchase it on Alexandra’s website. Horseflix subscribers can [...]
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