Usually people are saying this in the context of emotions
and I think that part is true, too -
but my example today speaks to the physical body and how our own physical imbalances are so often mirrored by our horse’s imbalances.
The question becomes - which came first? Is our horse our mirror or are we our horse’s mirror? And we don’t always know. Chicken and egg.
Read MoreSo an interesting thing happened tonight.
Someone took my Malachi before and after from the other day and stuck it in a conformation group to talk about why my photos weren’t good comparisons and to express doubt about the truthfulness of my claims or how this could be possible.
The word used was “gimmicky”
Read MoreOther professionals may relate to this… sometimes in our lives the same issue keeps popping up over and over again in different horses.
It feels like we have common “themes” of diagnoses or lack-of-diagnoses at different times.
I’m not sure if it’s just because that’s what I’m paying most attention to, some kind of psychological bias, or if the universe is telling me it’s time to buckle down and figure this thing out.
Read MoreCalling All Barrel Racers
Meet your new best friends!
Together we’ve created Next Level Barrel Racing, a 12-week online program designed to teach you everything you need to know to optimize your performance in the arena and keep your horses sound for years to come!
Read MoreI originally wrote this post for our crew over at Next Level Barrel Racing but I thought it might be useful to the masses, too!
I preach a lot about teaching the horse to move with his head down - withers height or lower is usually my recommendation. This helps the horse naturally activate the “right” muscles - the ones that create the type of supportive spine we can sit on without damaging the horse over time.
And the question I got was:
When does the head come back up? Nose in the dirt won’t work for a race.
Read MoreSo…… the barrel racers got me hooked
I’m playing around with teaching Forrest the barrel pattern and I thought this was a good opportunity to talk about chaining behaviors together with positive reinforcement training.
When we chain behaviors, the previous behavior becomes the cue for the next behavior until we reach an end point with the usual click/treat reinforcement.
Read MoreHello friends!
We’re having a bit of a polar vortex in middle TN this week. We are getting quite the accumulation of sleet and ice instead of snow… and boy it is NASTY! I hope you all are staying safe, warm and dry wherever you are reading from today.
So last week we talked a little bit about behavior science and the different types of reinforcements and punishments that influence behavior. If you missed that email, no worries! I’ve transcribed it into a blog post, which you can read here:
Read MoreHello friends!
Hope you all are doing well this week! Today I want to talk a little bit about something that isn’t directly PT-related, but will lay the groundwork for some other ideas I’d like to share and discuss with you all.
So let’s talk behavior science!
Have you heard of clicker training? If you’re familiar with dog training or marine mammal training, you’ve probably seen “clicker training” in action. Clicker training is also called positive reinforcement training, and our typical pressure and release training is called negative reinforcement. That terminology can kind of upset people, because it sounds like maybe I’m saying clicker training is good and traditional training is bad. But in this case we’re using the words positive and negative in the mathematical sense, meaning to add something or to take something away.
I sent this question out to my Instagram community a few weeks back. Over 60% of respondents said they were unsure if their saddle fit their horse well or not!Truth be told, most of us are just never taught how to check saddle fit correctly. I never learned anything other than looking for sweat marks until I went through my CERP certification course! But the information is SO IMPORTANT! That’s why I made this downloadable PDF guide: Saddle Fitting 101.
Read MoreEvery year around this time, I start hearing lots of questions about when to blanket horses. There are posts all over social media arguing one way or the other. Your friend at the barn insinuates you’re a bad horse mom or dad because your horse isn’t blanketed. Someone else tells you blankets aren’t natural and horses should never wear them. But if I’m cold my horse must be cold… right?
Read More
