What’s Love Got To Do With It? [Horse Version]
We love horses. We love to say it loud and proud. We love the ones we grew up with and...
A Training Question About Hurrying Horses …and a Grass Fire
I see people in the grocery store thoughtfully reading labels and pondering choices. The Dude Rancher and I look like...
The Simple Truth About Complicated Training
It was back around the time the light bulb was invented. My Grandfather Horse was a lanky spooky colt, I...
Affirmative Training: Response Time and a Hail Mary Pass
My client and I were having an online meeting. We'd been working on a systematic process of getting her and...
Being the Railbird: Anniversary Edition
Beware: Colorado Prairie Railbirds, guaranteed to spook more people more than horses. A reader gave me...
Does it Feel Like Everyone is Watching You?
It's you and your horse. Sometimes people looking at him think he isn't much but that's because they don't know...
Training Your Horse: Spring Fever and Fluid Goals
Ants in your pants. It was a childhood affliction constantly mentioned by adults when we couldn't sit still in church...
A Short List of Unfair Things to Ask a Horse
Old mares have a constant dilemma. They get stiff and stove-up. They're stoic so they don't whine about it, but...
A Different Leg Cue
"My horse won't go forward!" the rider says. Many trainers respond with the traditional battle cry, "More leg!" What does...
Tunnel Vision for Problems and the Things We Don’t Notice
The night-feed is my favorite. In the summer, the sky and clouds are as gaudy as the underwear department...
Calming Signal Substitutions: Helping Your Horse
Most of us are old enough to remember what a rolled-up newspaper is for. Wacking the dog, of course. Because...
What Does it Mean to be Domesticated?
If you have been reading along for the last 1300 or so weekly essays of mine, you know sometimes I...
Finding the Ground But In a Good Way
Our T'ai Chi master told us to drop our weight? I was barely legal and my fledgling art career was...
Auld Lang Syne Horses
I've heard it a couple of times just today: "As we head into the third year of Covid..." It makes...
Patience in Real Time
A clinic organizer was telling me about a trainer she brought in, someone whose approach was significantly more aggressive than...
Brain Science and the Art of Play
It's cold on the flat windy treeless prairie of Colorado. The next few months will be even colder but right...
Is Your Horse Distracted?
You want the horse to focus on the task and do it. Let's say your horse needs to stand still....
Calming Signals and Why the Second Time’s a Charm.
Want to know the smallest thing you could change in training for the biggest improvement? I usually say doing a...
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