KBR Horse Training Information Exercising Body AND Mind

Developing Confident Horses
Part Five
Bonding, Intimacy and the "Friendly Game"

The dreaded "Swamp Thing," a former wild horse
a few months after being removed from the range.

This page is a continuation from Part Four. Bonding: The formation of a close relationship. For many years we put on the national Wild Horse Workshops. These were week-long events where participants, under the supervision of clinicians, would form teams with each team gentling at least four different BLM wild horses and/or burros "straight off the truck." Some of the participants had never handled a horse before. A few were actually riding their "projects" before the end of the week.

First contact. The "human" round pen (Navajo Circle.)

A "first timer" on his first wild horse. Confident horse and participant.

Frank Bell was one of the "Founding Fathers" of the workshops. I base these programs' exceptional results to a great degree in Frank drilling into everyone, "The three most important steps when first working with a horse are bonding, bonding and bonding. Everything else comes after." Clearly in order to start down the path of developing truly confident and reliable horses, trust has to replace instinctive distrust and curiosity has to replace fear. While there are several issues involved in producing trust and curiosity, and while it is important to establish respect once the horse becomes comfortable with the relationship, bonding is the critical initial foundation block. Bonding involves becoming a "sympathetic pair" with the horse, using contact to make the horse comfortable with the handler or rider getting into the horse's personal space and making contact all over. Being with a human should first be a comfortable experience, prior to the human asserting him/herself as the dominant member of the pair. Before I attempted to challenge this former wild horse on the line or under saddle, forming a solid social bond was critical. From there we advanced at light speed. Third day home. This horse is comfortable. Now it's time to get down to business, but not lose the connection. The next day, a willing follower. About a week later, riding out to see the wild ones. Solid with no headgear. The images below are from Wild Horse Workshop '03 held in Tooele, UT. Frank Bell illustrates the extension of trust following bonding with a wild horse. The horse had been worked with for about 4 hours after coming out of the wild horse pens before this demonstration. Please note that this is a demonstration in trust building that should not be replicated unless the handler has sufficiently bonded with the horse and is experienced in accurately reading a horse's body language!

Approaching from the front.

Horse remains relaxed with Frank standing up.

Intimacy: Close Familiarity or friendship; closeness; a cozy atmosphere. When we work with or ride horses, we generally want the horse to "give" to our "ask." In other words, the horse should want to respond to our cues and aids. This relationship is fundamental to establishing unity with our horses. The reliability of a horse is greater when all we need to do is ask rather than demand to get the desired result. "Intimacy" helps support appropriate responses to our "asks." As a generalization, horses tend to respond to our actions in one or more of four different ways. A horse may shut down (typically the introvert,) a horse may become overly kinetic (typically the extrovert,) the horse may demonstrate "opposition reflex" (an avoidance behavior that could get physical,) or the horse could willingly follow what it perceives as its leader's directions. When it comes to horses, "intimacy" involves developing the horse's willingness to respond to the lightest "ask" as a result of a handling approach that encourages soft interaction. A more thorough explanation of the relationship of intimacy with respect to training and riding horses, along with other concepts that relate to this overall objective, can be found in Seven Steps to Safer Horsemanship, an article written by Frank Bell that appeared in Western Horseman. The "Friendly Game:" A game characteristic of or befitting a friend; showing friendship It's a long established fact that horses learn more consistently when curious and when they perceive the handler as their leader / protector. That's not to say that horses shouldn't be corrected when exhibiting undesirable behavior such as invading the handler's space, but the teaching process should be positive whenever possible. We use all sorts of equipment with our horses, usually starting with a lead rope and stick to direct focus and energy, then to simple tools such as brushes and hoof picks, and ultimately saddle pads, saddles and bridles or headstalls. If these items, and even the touch of the handler's hand, are perceived as being threatening to the horse, the horse may well respond with opposition reflex, flight or defensive-aggression. If we want to develop calmness in our horses, all of these activities should be designed as a sort of "Exploratorium" for the horse where he can investigate, accept, then become comfortable with everything we're using. When we ask the horse to move off using a stick or flag (plastic bag on a stick,) we don't want the horse to react out of fear of the object. We want the horse to respond to our directed energy. These are the neuropathways we want to develop inside the brain of the horse, and this difference becomes critical as the horse becomes a riding mount and the rider needs that horse to distinguish between the rider's directed energy (cues) and surrounding stimuli. The friendly game basically involves non-confrontational touching of the horse with various objects, starting with simple things, and working with a level of intensity that doesn't overreach the horse's curiosity. We try to make these encounters positive, first seeking out where the horse likes to be touched and emulating reciprocal grooming motions when possible. Our goal is to develop an expectation in the horse that when we approach the horse with an object, the object is not a threat but simply an extension of ourselves that we use to communicate. Case Study: Scout The horse shown below is Scout, a right brained extrovert. Due in part to some very aggressive initial handling, Scout came in injured and extremely wary. He was one of the most volatile horses we've worked with, exhibiting somewhat instantaneous, physical and extremely reactive PTSD-like responses if something startled him. With this horse, every unfamiliar object was a threat unless carefully presented through some permutation of the "Friendly Game." We also found it important to work with Scout at liberty or on a very slack line so he would consciously engage in our "game" and not feel claustrophobic. Introducing potentially scary objects. Moving through the "zones" with friendly contact. Advancing to feeling the saddle and boat bumpers to simulate leg contact. "Slapping" the stirrup leathers is no longer a threat. In the saddle. While Scout improved incredibly, he requires a rider who has a reassuring riding style and is constantly in tune with the horse. As a result he is generally relegated to the task of being used to teach good ground school skills. Whether a horse has a volatile or calm horsonality, it is still important to develop bonding and intimacy, and for the horse to respond to all of the various training adjuncts and stimuli rather than be reactive. Continue to Part Six Lessons on the Ground Return to Part Four Return to The Beginning Press "Back" to return to the page which brought you here Go to KBR Training Section Go to LRTC Wild Horse Mentors Go to KBR World of Wild Horses & Burros Go to other Wild Horse Links Go To KBR Horse Net KBR Horse Training Information, © 2015 Lamm's Kickin' Back Ranch and Willis & Sharon Lamm. All rights reserved. Duplication of any of this material for commercial use is prohibited without express written permission. This prohibition is not intended to extend to personal non-commercial use, including sharing with others for safety and learning purposes, provided this copyright notice is attached. Email us to submit comments or request reproduction permission.