What Causes a Horse to Shut Down?

What causes a 3-year-old colt to freeze under the slightest amount of pressure? I've invited renowned equine behaviorist, Dr. Kate Fenner, to talk about what can cause a horse to "shut down" (and how it's more common than you might think!). We'll also talk about how to help the horse recover, prevention, and what her research has revealed to help improve training methods for horses.

 

But first... I have an exciting surprise announcement that's happening right now at my ranch—and believe me when I say that no one was more surprised than me!

 

And in the “What the Hay? Q&A” segment, my friend and assistant trainer, T. Cody, joins me to ask a question about a horse recently that left his rider in the dirt. Plus, I’ll answer a question from a rider whose horse unexpectedly lays down and rolls—with her in the saddle!

 

Want your question answered in What the Hay? Email [e-mail]

 

Show Notes & Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

·· There are a few spots left in my Horsemanship Immersion clinic at C Lazy U Ranch in Granby, CO! Get more info here: https://www.clazyu.com/special-event/julie-goodnights-horsemanship-immersion

·· Certified Horsemanship Association International Conference: https://cha.horse/international-conference

·· Equine Affaire, Massachusetts: https://equineaffaire.com/events/massachusetts

 

Resources Mentioned in the Episode:

·· Dr. Fenner’s Website, Kandoo Equine & her free 30 day video training series: https://www.kandooequine.com ·· E-BarQ - Citizen science project: https://e-barq.com ·· Shutdown Resources: https://signin.juliegoodnight.com/tag/when-horses-shut-down

Episode Transcript

(00:02):
You're an inspiration.
You were there to help me.
You just saw me and said, Can I help you?
We learn a lot from watching other horsesand watching other riders.
I'm Julie.
Goodnight, and thank you for listeningto my podcast about horse training,
equestrian sports and buildinga better connection with your horse.

(00:26):
It's time for a ride on with Julie.
Goodnight.
Back at my ranch, there's actually beenquite a lot going on.
You know, I was gonea lot of the summer on my boating trip.
Had a great time.
Came back, was only home for a weekor so before
leaving for Ireland with my dear

(00:48):
friend and assistant trainer, T Cody.
And little bitmore on that later in the show.
I got back from Ireland and just wanted
to spend some timegetting reacquainted with my horse.
That was super pleasurable for me.
I just spent a lot of time grooming herand hanging out with her

(01:10):
and riding her,trying to get her back into riding shape.
You know, many of you have been involvedwith or following our horse goals
or BUST program that we've been working onover the last nine months.
We've been winding that downand we're still hearing from a lot of you
about the goals you met or the roadblocks

(01:34):
you encountered or the reformulated goalsyou're making.
And we're putting togethera sort of a special edition
to talk about all the really cool storieswe had from that campaign.
So I really appreciatehearing from everybody.
And it's not too late.
So if you if you joined us on the horsegoals or Bust and you'd like to share

(01:56):
your accomplishments or your storywith us, we'd love to hear about it.
And we're we're working onputting all that together.
For me,many of you know my number one goal
this year for horses was to breedmy lovely little mare, Annie,
to a stallion of my dreams,which is that he's a cat.

(02:19):
Of course, Stallion,standing at the four sixes ranch in Texas,
went through a lot of machinations
and with a very expensive machinations,I might add,
and kind of ended with a heartbreakthat she was
briefly pregnant for a few weeksand then she wasn't.

(02:41):
So many of youhave been following that story
because I've received your messages,
your comments, a personand and all of that's been great.
And I just, you know, kind of processthrough all that this summer.
And I know I'm fine with it. So then
here's what happens yesterday.
The vet comes.

(03:02):
She's here to check upon a couple of horses,
one of Mal's horsesand one of wireless horses
that are just gettingsome kind of maintenance work done.
And I went out to the barnto say hello to the vet,
and I started teasing her
about, you know, all the moneyI spent on my horse.

(03:23):
I got nothing but a fatmare to show for it.
And now she's stocking up when I ride or,I don't know, I was just kind
of joking around with her and she said,
you know, why don't we just recheck her?
So Mal runs out to pasture, bringsAnnie in,
and the vet tranquilizers her.

(03:45):
And then pal Pacerand then ultrasounds her.
And lo and behold,
there is a big healthy foal in there.
All but not too big.I'm shooting for small.
But we looked at the ultrasounds, sawa beautiful heartbeat, saw the rib cage.
We saw we could see the head.

(04:07):
So after all that
angstand planning and what was I going to do?
I was actually starting to look atBroodmare is for sale.
Then come to find out my little marespregnant after all.
So woof.
It was quite a celebration, and I'm stilla little bit in shock and still kind of

(04:27):
now having to go back to Plan A
after formulating PlanB, plan C and Plan D,
And so anyway, that'sthat's the excitement around here.
We are sort of rebooting our plans,putting her taking her off the diet,
putting her back on the good stuffin the Hay department
and really thinking ahead to to what'sgoing to change around here next year.

(04:53):
So that's super, super excited.
I've got a super busy fallcoming up ahead of me.
I'm headed to the sea Laser
you ranch in Granby, Colorado,for my ranch riding retreat.
I'll be home for a weekbefore going back for the five day
horsemanship immersion clinicthat runs from October 17 to 20 second.

(05:14):
That programstill has a few openings in it.
So if you go to see Lazy Yukon right now,find out more
or call the ranch and you can find outmore and reserve a spot in this luxurious,
all inclusive retreat which is nestledin the heart of the Rocky Mountains.
My last two events

(05:35):
of the yearare the CSA International Conference
that's in Fort Collinsthis year, October 26th, 28th.
I'll also be teaching classes up therethat week, so I'm looking forward to that.
And then finally, in November,I head to Equine Off
Air Massachusetts, the big granddaddyshow of them all.
So excited to be going back there forthe first time since pre-pandemic days.

(06:00):
So that's very, very exciting.Just head to Julie.
Goodnight dotcom slash events to get more information
on all of my upcoming events and be thefirst to know when new ones are added.
When you sign up for my weekly newsletterat Julie
Goodnight XCOM slash news,
you'll also get brand new trainingarticles and podcast episodes

(06:22):
as soon as they're releasedexclusively deals and updates from me.
You can also find me on Facebook,Instagram, Twitter and YouTube
at Julie Goodnight.
Last week I had the honor of hosting Dr.
Kate Center, a renowned equine behaviorist
and a published researcher from Australia.

(06:42):
She was here at my ranch in Coloradofor a week and we were recording
an educational seriesall about the Canter.
More on that later.
It's going to be a great series,but it will be some time
before that comes out.
But while Dr.
Fenner was here, I just couldn'tlet this opportunity go by,
so I asked herto be a guest on the podcast.

(07:02):
Join us for this episodeas we talk about a three year old cult
that's been overwhelmedwith early training
and has just basically shut downas a result.
I'll also ask Dr.
Fenner about her researchinto different training methods,
and we'll have a fascinating discussionabout how horses learn

(07:22):
and in the What the Hey Q&A
segment,my dear friend and assistant trainer
T Cody will join me with a questionof her own about a bucking horse.
And I'll also answer a questionfrom listeners about a riding horse
that unexpectedly lays down a rollsapparently whenever he wants.
So now let's getstarted on the main topic.

(07:52):
Dr. Kate Fenner
is an equine scientistin the areas of horse training,
behavior and equinewelfare at the University of Queensland
and a researcherwith a PhD in horse behavior and training
from the Sydney School of VeterinaryScience and the University of Sydney.
She's certified in equestriancoaching, in horse training

(08:12):
and has experience, training,competing and judging in dressage,
showjumping, Western working, quotation
hacking polo and much more.
After years of experiencestarting horses for clients, Dr.
Fenner feels stronglythat owners are best served by learning
to train their own horses,so she founded can do equine

(08:35):
and has developeda series of ethical, easy to follow
step by step guides that are suitablefor horses and riders of all levels.
Dr. Fenner, welcome to the showand thanks for joining us today.
Well, thank you very much for having me.
I'm very excited to be here.
And she actually means here at my ranchin Salina, Colorado, up in the mountains.

(08:56):
She came in just a few days agoall the way from Australia.
We've been working on doing some videostogether, some teaching projects.
So she's herein my little recording studio.
It's great to have you hereall the way from Australia.
Thank you. Yeah, really fun to be here.
So tell us a little bitabout your horse background

(09:17):
and maybe some of the researchyou've been involved with. Hmm.
Okay.
Like a lot of us,I studied riding very young.
I actually went up to boarding schoolat ten with my one of my father's off
track horses, and I just
sort of was a pretty casual riderup until I moved overseas.
And then when I was competing,I got quite serious

(09:39):
when I lived in Singaporeand I was playing a lot of polo and doing
showjumping and mostly dressageand I was competing in a Rolex
International one day.
And I'll tell you,I was holding my horse so tight,
like I felt like I was holding the horsetogether completely
and the horse felt really, really tense.
And I knew if I let the horse gothat it would just leave the arena.

(10:02):
And at the end of that particular test,which I won, which I think is quite scary
considering the stake my horse was in,the judge said at the end of the test,
you know, in those collective marks,a horse looks beautiful on the inside,
on the outside,but I fear ready to explode on the inside.
And she absolutely had it.
And so at that moment, I decided,I've got to find a better way of doing it,

(10:24):
not to be a better way.
It's just not working for meso long for the horse.
So I moved from Singapore to the Statesand I was here for a couple of years
and trained with somebodyfor a year in Colorado, which was great.
I then moved back to the UK,which is where I was living at the time,
and I started taking horses infor training and that was wonderful

(10:44):
because I
could make great changes in these horsesand I was really happy about that.
But then I'd send the horsesback to the owners and we then week,
months, six months,
the horses were revertingto the old behavior,
so they were losing the behaviorsthat are taught.
And I began to think, this is not right.
This is not about the horses.
It's much more about the riders.

(11:05):
And so I then moved back to Australiaand I decided that I needed to actually
stop doing that and just teach peopleto train their own horses.
And so I then became very interestedin how the horse learns
and why the horses behavein the way that they do.
And so I went and studied equine scienceat Charles Sturt University in Australia,

(11:29):
and from there I meta fellow could pull McGreevy and
I decided to do a Ph.D.
with him.
And I went straight into that afterwards.
And that sort of focused on a project
that hopefullywe can talk about a bit later called IBAC,
which is the Equine Behavior AssessmentResearch questionnaire,
and we developed that questionnaireduring my PhD.

(11:52):
And it really is a way for everyday horseowners to monitor
and benchmark their horsesbehavior and training
and the idea of that as a citizen scienceproject
is to get a body of informationthat's going to help us
better match horses and ridersand really improve
rider safety and horsewelfare in the long run.

(12:15):
Yes, absolutely.
Of course, our paths have crossed
a few different ways,but when I first heard about Ibarguen,
I just went right awayand filled out the survey
and it's very in-depth
and it's fun to answer.
It's self explanatory, and I love the waythe questions are posed.

(12:38):
They're just subjective and they take awayall the judgment on the horse
or the person.
And so it's funand we'll get we'll get into a little bit
more of that later in terms ofhow people can find out more about that.
But let's talk a little bit more about,you know, I think that is so nice
that research has come a long wayand people are starting to ask questions

(13:00):
and focus on equinewelfare has been a really big part of what
has motivated people to try to finda better way to do things. Yes.
And to use science based informationto understand better ways of training.
So we definitely want to talk about that.
Now, one of the subject I want totalk to you about today, recently,

(13:22):
a horse owner reached out to measking for guidance
about a three year old coltthat came to her in a traumatized state.
And I want to ask your opinion about that.
But first, I want to tell youabout a horse that kind of reminded me of
and this was about 30 years agowhen I was first

(13:42):
starting out in business for myself.
And one day these people, they had,
you know, called me ahead of time,made arrangements and all that,
and they showed up with this horse
and it was a pretty grade looking horse.
It was not distinguishable in any way,not very well-built,
not a very bright expression on its face.

(14:04):
So it might not be a super happygolden retriever type of horse.
She just sort of a rangebred horse from New Mexico.
I remember it was a fillyand I believe she was three years old,
so certainly old enough to start training.
But she hadshe really was just barely halter broke.
And I, you know, spent a week or so just

(14:27):
handling her and grooming herand doing her feet and all that.
And the daycame to start putting a saddle on her
and, you know, I
was kind of youngand just like to kind of get the job done.
Some idea was just pretty muchthrow the saddle up there and,
you know, tighten the cinch slowly. But

(14:48):
then walk around a little bit,let them get used to it.
So I put this little lightweightwestern saddle
up on the horse,and she's tied up at the hitching rail.
That was the first and biggest lessonthat I learned.
And I put throw that saddle on andI just slowly tightened up, essentially.
Well, it wasn't tight,just enough to safely hold the saddle on.

(15:12):
And as soon as I stepped away,
she she just kind of gruntedand just threw herself on the ground.
Well, now she's tied up,but she was tied up with
just the right amount of slackwhere, you know, her nose
wasn't quite on the ground,but her whole body was fully laid down

(15:33):
and she was stiff and like groaning.
Oh, and I don't either,
you know, thank God for the quick release,not iron tighter.
And I started, you know, shaken
the rope and hollered at her screaming,Get up, you know, poke at her.
And she was just like frozenon the ground, grunting.
So then she wasn't reallygroaning and grabbing.

(15:56):
She just kind of did that at first.
But she was kind of stiffand just lay in there like shock.
So I didn't know what to doand she wouldn't get up.
I tried pulling her head around.
I think I even undid the saddle.
And then finally I couldn't I couldn'tthink of anything to do to get her up.
So I pinched her nose closed.
Oh, so she couldn't breathe.

(16:18):
And then she scrambled to her feet
and then she was like fighting.
And then I didn't solo again.
I went and did some stuff with her.
She was just perfectly normal.
And then the next day I saw earlier,it's just same thing.
She put herself on the ground.
I walked immediately to her nose.

(16:39):
She jumped right up.
I mean, as soon as I reached for her nose,she jumped up.
And that was the last timeshe ever did it.
Oh, now why it occurred to her
to respond in that manner to the saddlebeing put on her.
I didn't take time to introduce myself.
I just put it on her. So that was my bad.
Yeah.
And I suppose the first time she did,if you really believe

(17:00):
that was the first time she did itand she, they hadn't tried to bat settle.
See, there's the thing isn't it. Isn't it.
And it's the ultimate freezeresponse isn't it.
That's how I took it.
I don't think this horse had been messedwith.
It literallyhad been raised out on the rain.
And she was a young horse.
And anyway, and everywhereshe trained, there's a lesson.

(17:22):
And so this horse recentlythat we got a message
about on social media,and so I wrote about the blog,
but I wanted to get yourtake on this situation. So
again,
this is from a horse ownerreaching out to me to ask for guidance
about a three year old coldthat came to her in a traumatized state.

(17:43):
Quote, His eyes glaze overand he statue's up in response to any cues
as a result of being just pushed
through everything and into riding.
What do you think about that?
I think it's a sadly very common problem.
The young horses that have been

(18:06):
just bulliedthrough the foundation training
and they haven't had the opportunityto have it properly explained to them.
So they've never actuallygot any of the lessons.
And this is one of the thingsthat, you know, you find with horses
that are a send outto a trainer, for example,
and you say, Oh, you've got six weeks,you can start the horse under saddle.

(18:27):
Then I expected to be ableto, you know, come back to me
walk can candy in the paddock,you know, all by itself.
And not every horse is capableof taking on that amount
of information in that space of time.
And so is this person
says, you know, you can get horsesthat are extremely traumatized.
And I think horses have differentpersonalities, different breeds

(18:49):
have different personalities.
And so some horses might be more ableto take
on training at that level, at that pace.
And other horses are going to beill equipped to do so.
And so they're going to end up in a statelike this who's a horse
that is so traumatized and so anxious.
So it's it's given up on the flightresponse.

(19:10):
The flight, of course, responseis going to be its first response always.
It doesn't feel it can do that.
So it's it's not going to fight.
It's not going to fly.
It's got one thing left, which is phrase.
The problem with freeze is that
it has to stall like it'snot a permanent solution
like flight flightor get out of situation phrase.

(19:32):
They're still there.
So unless thethe thing that's scaring them leaves
they've got to get out of that situationthat can be very dangerous.
That's when they explodeand that's when that puts
the handlers in danger.
And once the handlers in danger,the horse's
welfare is further at risk because nowthe horse is a dangerous place.

(19:53):
So the horse is gone from a horsethat's anxious,
confused, probably frustrated, too.
You know, from the horse is lackingfoundation training,
which is easily fixed to horses, nowlabeled dangerous.
And now that's when the horse starts,get sent
to various different trainersand the future is at risk.

(20:15):
Yeah, absolutely.
And and and people's safety.
Human safety is at risk as well,and it's all avoidable.
Now, I wanted to ask you
along those lines, like I said,I started training horses 30 years ago.
And when you first start now,you you start a lot of young horses
because that's reallywhat people need the help with most.

(20:36):
And that and quote unquote, problem horsesthat, you know, generally
or they've already been screwed upbasically, and you're fixing it.
But Iwhen I first started training for myself,
people would routinely send twoand three year olds for training.
And I started noticing a huge differencebetween a two year

(20:57):
old and a three year old.
And then there's a big difference to meas well between a three year
old and a four year old.
So when you're talking about a horsebeing ill prepared,
how much just the horse's actual maturityto weigh into that preparedness?
There's a there's a lotof things involved in that, isn't there?
And I think we've been very influencedby the thoroughbred industry.

(21:20):
They want to get on those horses,you know, and have them racing it too.
So you've got to be riding themat one and a half.
But we know the growth platesdon't close to that five.
So so you can't realisticallysay that's okay
and it won't damage the horsebecause they haven't stopped growing.

(21:41):
So it's because we like to just the horse.
Yeah, we know it does. We know it does.
So you know, and the various peoplewill tell you the Unico two horses,
you can start earlier, they develop more,you know, sooner and things.
But we also know that none of that's true.
So we actually knowwe have all this information.
I think you can start doinggreat groundwork exercise with your horses

(22:02):
build up, especially liketo build up the top down muscles.
So I teach the horse to travelin the correct frame
when it's young,
you know, from a two yearand a half year old, something like that.
And I'm building up all the spine muscles.
So when it comes time to sit on the horse,the horse understands frame and posture
and it's got the condition to carry me.

(22:23):
Is this another thing you'll find,you know, send a horse out to China?
This all a ride for an hour a dayand I want you in a saddle.
It fits.
And the horse has no top linethat is going to cause
pain, is going to start the anything thingI find with starting
young horses is if you can give thema little bit more time.
They're emotionally much more matureand that's always much easier,

(22:46):
I find to do it with the startingon to saddle process.
If you've got a horsethat's a little bit more mature,
that's what I found
is that different horses are going to becompletely different in this regard.
Some horses as a two yearold are so bright
and inquisitivethat they have fun learning.
And my horse Pepperoni was like that.

(23:08):
And and he also would learnso wickedly fast
that I realized if I could just
like, teach him one thing a day,
not do a lot else with him,but just one new thing.
And if I did it rightand I and I never made mistakes,
which is of course, is impossible,I made mistakes.

(23:29):
And he would always point them out to mewhen I did.
And if I just did thatand then not drilling,
drill him, drill and drill and drill.
So I kind of did that, but I would just
ride him, you know, 15, 20 minutes.
And I just think, okay,what's the next little thing?
And if you get it, be like,okay, we're done here.

(23:51):
But the two year oldthat was learning pretty well.
But you
we went just a little bit too long
and all of a suddenthey're starting to feel dull
and just seems like their mindsstarting to get foggy and they get heavier
and you realize,Oh, I've worked this horse too long,
but that same horse coming backas a three year old,

(24:13):
I don't really experience that.
Yeah, much more able to concentrate.
And I think that, you know,
you're getting back to that issuethat when horses are pushing this,
take that two year oldthat was starting to shut down.
If you continue along that path,the horse learns
the only way to escape is to shut down.
And so they go into learned helplessnessbecause it it keeps them safe.

(24:38):
And they have no no other means of
escaping from the pressure.
So it really is kind of likea shutting down of the emotionality.
Or tell us like how how doesthe scientists define learned helplessness
and what are the common ways you see thatwhen you look at horses being ridden?

(24:59):
So it sort of presents in horsesis completely unresponsive.
The so they they respond correctly,
but they have no so personalityor they're just quite robotic.
But people describe themas emotions, horses very dull
and that probably mean drilling itto do certain things.
So, you know, learned helplessness.

(25:20):
We've shown it in people and shown it indogs.
We haven't, you know, really,really defined it very well in horses yet.
Of course, everything is lessresearched in horses, it seems like. But
give mesome typical descriptions of of that.
I think you find it quite often in ridingschool horses that are subjected

(25:41):
to really poor signals from response,like the pressure
release from a beginnerrider is nonexistent.
So the horse learns to trot aroundthe arena by being kicked
every stride, for example,being yanked in the mouth all the time.
Every time the rider rises to trotdoes so by leaning on the mouth.

(26:02):
And these horses knowthere's no escape from that.
They're going to have to goround, round the arena.
They're going to have to put upwith whatever happens.
And and that is learned helplessness.
How is God bless the dude horses?
Because they have the hardest jobof all horses in the beginner.
Lesson horse is the same thing, butwithout them, none of us would be here.

(26:23):
So yeah.
What about do we see it in high levelperformance horses?
Oh, you know, I picture a high leveldressage horse that's being ridden
heavy handed versus onethat's light and a little more relaxed.
It actually seems to be trying toto be the best performer,

(26:46):
like a ballet dancerwho's trying to be the best dancer.
And you see these other horsesthat seem to be really tight.
Their eyes are, you know,kind of popping out of their heads
and their mouths are sharp shotand they're doing the same movements
and they're actually getting seeminglythe same scores or better.
And and it's interestingbecause what we're doing

(27:09):
is we're depriving the horseof its natural movements.
So we're preventing the horsefrom behaving naturally.
So that horse that you describedthat was actually not being held together
and had a much freer action,looks much more beautiful to train die.
But if you put them all robotic horse

(27:29):
onto a Facebook post,everyone's going, Oh, I love that.
That's so beautiful.
But what have we done to that horse?
Well, we've stepped this mouth closeto prevent all those oral behaviors
that we don't want.
So if we put too much pressureon the reins, the horse is going
to try and open its mouthand stick its tongue out.
So we strap it close so it can't do that,which means we can put even more pressure

(27:52):
on the reins, which is going to tightenthat nose bent even further.
I've done quite a bit of workwith Rein tension devices
so that we look at
we it's a little device that goes betweenthe end of the round and the bit
and you can measure how much tension,
the directions that the rider is holding.
And and that's quite interesting.

(28:14):
But when I remember there was a studysome years ago, there were
the devices are quite, you know, preciouslike they did small devices.
And if you think abouthow you and I might ride,
it's not a huge amount of pressure.
You know, we can measurethat a couple of kilograms probably
most of the time I think these deviceswent up something like 45 kilograms

(28:36):
when the dressage riderswere breaking them. Mm.
Yeah.
So, you know, I was going to ask youif you knew what, what the,
how much weight would be in the handsof a heavy contact rider
because I've just always been curiousabout that.
I talk frequently about this subject

(28:57):
of how much contact is contactand how much is required.
And you know,the horse learns to balance on
however amount of pressureyou're pulling back on the reins.
And I say, you know, is it an ounceor is it a pound or is it £10?
But we don't knowbecause they're breaking the device.
Well, yeah, we don't know.

(29:17):
And also, it'svery hard to convince high level
dressage ridersto let you do those sorts of experiments.
And they're, you know, alreadyreluctant to have the nose bend tightens.
So it is difficult,you know, you know, now
you guys are involved in some researchon the physical effects of strap motion.

(29:39):
Yeah.
So in 2006 day,we put McGreevy and I and a team
did some work with some horsesthat were naive to nose bend.
So we had to find some horses.
It would have been easy in this country.
It wasn't so easy in Australia
to find horsesthat had never worn a nose band,
and we found hosts that were naiveto nose bends and double bridles.

(30:01):
And thethe experiment looked a bit like this.
We had 12 horses.
We had a sort of crush area.
We put the horse in the crush,so there was no exercise involved.
There were no reins on the bridles.
We had the horse in the crotcharea for 10 minutes
and we took Could you say what a crush?
Like aveterinary crush where you have the horse?

(30:23):
Oh, it's like stocks or stocks. Okay.
Yeah, Yeah.
So yeah, the horse in it, the 10 minuteswhere we took baseline rating.
So we did heart rate,heart rate variability, high temperature.
This is a really good measure of stress.
And then we did all the oral behavior.
So yawning, opening up, mouthlicking, swallowing, so that 10 minutes

(30:45):
and then we had the nosebleedand then we put the bridle on the horse.
I see we had the broad on the horseduring that the baseline measurements.
Then we did the nose bend upto one of four different measurements.
The first measurement wasit wasn't done at all.
The second measurementwas what we call conventionally fitted.
Conventionally fittedmeans you can fit to bangor's

(31:08):
under the nose band on the nasal plane,not at the side of the mouth
or at the back or anywhere elsein the middle of the nose.
Do two fingers. That's conventional.
Then we did it so that it was just
loose enough to fit just one finger,but not two.
And finally, the final.
On the final day, the horses had it fittedso that you couldn't fit

(31:29):
your finger under there.
It was just tightened up sothat you couldn't slide your finger on it.
What we found was we found no differences
between the first two settings,so it didn't make any difference
if your horse didn't have itdone up at all or conventionally fitted.
So that was really interesting.
Just watching

(31:49):
the experimentbecause I was doing the videoing
and I was watching the experimentand I said to the young
vet science student,that was also with me.
I says, is terribly boring.
So I went, I can't see anything.
We're not going to find any changesin these volts.
And as I said, this is so dull.
And and then I wentand downloaded the data and on

(32:11):
to say the heart rate was heartbreaking
because they went from normal heart rate.
So, you know, 33 up to 100.
This was it was standing there.
They had no intention. They had nothing.
These heart rateswere really, really peaking.
Just the strap.
Yeah, just doing that noiseband up to 10 minutes.

(32:33):
And then they were coming down againas soon as the nose bent was loosened,
particularlyin that no space under the nose band.
That was where it was been really bad
because they've got a painfulit's got to be painful, right?
But it's very hard to see.
The response
is it's very hard to see a horse in painbecause horse is hard wired
not to show pain

(32:53):
because their pray animals andit makes them very vulnerable in the wild.
So, you know,when we can't see a response, it doesn't
mean the horse isn't having a responseor yes, the heart rates really went up.
The I temperature really went up.
These are all really significant results.
The other things that we foundthat you couldn't really see

(33:14):
because you don't really noticethese things,
the horse is pretty much almost stoppedswallowing when the nose bends with touch.
Sure,
they they didn't open their mouths
because they couldn't well,they couldn't eat sleep,
so they can chew.
But when we took them off,it had this host inhibitory
rebound effect of yawningand opening their mouths.

(33:37):
And it was quite incredible,particularly on those tight ones.
They were yawning like madbecause suddenly, Oh, I can open my mouth.
We call that a postinhibitory rebound effect and we find it.
It's the same as if you lock your horsein the stable for a week or something,
then let it out in the paddock.
We let it out and horse goes runningaround and barking and carrying on.
We think, Oh look that horse, happy horse,how lovely and nice.

(33:57):
Now it's having this postinhibitor group out of it
because it's been preventedfrom behaving in a natural way.
And so I thoughtthat was really interesting.
But what we heard back up to thatfrom the dressage, so in particular
because it was at that time,so we thought it was a dressage
people that were having that tight nosewith insulin, it's

(34:17):
more the event is,but it is across the board.
That was the very much came back and said,Oh, my horse
a bitch weighted to having a tight nose,but my horse doesn't care.
And how did you know that?
I knew that because it always does.
And it doesn't tell you, Hey,excuse me, this does that.
Did you measure the eyeballs?
How do you.
Yeah. So I think we need to.

(34:39):
I like the way science is coming along,
where we're finally trying to work outwhat's going on inside the horse.
Because, you know, horseskeep secrets very well.
It reminds me of the thingthat's I grew up riding, jumping horses.
And I've been around them a lotand I've seen a lot.
And you're always encounter

(35:00):
people that say, Oh,my horse loves to jump.
And so I started early on in my career
when somebody says, I still a day,I say, Really?
What makes you think he loves it?
While when we're jumping, he just seaside
jumping from and he runs full speed at it.
So is this, you know, sort of amazing

(35:21):
capacity Humans have to anthropomorphize
guys and just make it be the wayyou want it to be.
But just this last little discussionabout this research,
I can think of so many questions.
In fact, I've written down some thingsI want to look more into or or talk
more with you about, and we'llwe'll have to plan on another episode

(35:44):
where we can get into some otherinteresting areas.
We talked about learnedhelplessness already.
I wanted to just touch on learning theory.
It's such a big part of what you doand it's such a big part of a lot of this
fantastic behavioral researchand and research
into into effectiveand ethical training techniques.

(36:05):
So can you give us kind of the
the long and the short of learning theoryas it applies to horses?
Yeah, Yeah, horsesand every everybody else
learn in twodifferent ways is classical conditioning,
which is where you putan unrelated stimulus to a response.
So the typical onewe all think of is Pavlov's dog.

(36:27):
And what that scientist worked outwas if he rang a bell
just before he fed his dogs, the dogs,then associated the bell with Sood.
So he would ring the bell and they'd startsalivate whether or not they got food.
And that's a classicallyconditioned response.
And we do it all the time with horses.
You know, we asked him to come,we call them in the paddock

(36:48):
and they come to us and we might give thema treat then or something.
And we're classically conditioningthat response.
The other way.
And with horse training,what we're usually using
is what we call operant conditioning,and that you can remember the difference
because itoperant conditioning has an operator.
So where the operator
now operant conditioning
is divided into four quadrants.

(37:10):
So we've got the positive thingsand the negative things.
We could also say we've got the thingswe add and the things we take away.
People look at negativeand they think it's bad.
So I don't really like to talk aboutnegative, but we've got things we can add
and things we can take away.
Maths is a much less sort of offensiveway of discussing it.

(37:31):
And so we'll talk about additionand subtraction
and then we've got reinforcementand punishment.
Punishment is the same as correction.
We have positiveand negative reinforcement.
So let's think of some examplesof positive reinforcement, things
we could use to positively reinforcesomething in the horse.
So we might cookie cookies, and that's thefirst thing that comes to people's mind.

(37:56):
And when you mention most reinforcement,everybody thinks food.
Now, there's lots of other waysthat we can use positive reinforcement
and that we do every day with our horseso we can scratch the horse on the weaker.
Yeah. So it's a reward with something.
We look at positive reinforcement,we have to add it because it's positive
and reinforcement means we wantthe behavior to happen more in the future.

(38:18):
So we're saying,Oh, that's a good behavior.
So we're adding somethingso we could add the food,
we could add a scratch,we could add, we could add a rest.
I was like, Dad,stand in the shade and any
and we could add a stroke,we could add a kind word.
Okay,all those sorts of things we can add.
So that's positive reinforcement.

(38:38):
Trying to make a behaviormore likely to happen in the future.
Negative reinforcementis the same as pressure release.
So it means exactly the same thingand again is reinforcement.
So we're trying to make that behaviormore likely to happen in the future.
But with negative reinforcement,we're taking something away.

(38:59):
So the classic example
here is if you want your horseto go faster, you put your leg on.
When the horse goes faster,you remove the leg
if you want the horse to go faster,perhaps again,
you might use your voice,so you might clock the horse to trot.
And that's pressure.
The clucking,the noise is pressure for the horse.
Soon as the horse trots you stop crying.

(39:20):
So negative reinforcement again,trying to make the behavior
more likely to happen in the future.
What the horse learns is that if it trotswhen his luck,
the clock stops, when it trots,if you continue
to look after the horse, Charles, it'sno longer negative reinforcement.
It's now we're adding something.
That's the clock.

(39:41):
So it's becoming positive,
but it's no longer
reinforcementbecause we don't want the horse to do it.
So it's going to be.
It's turning into punishmentso we know something's punishment
if we're trying to stop the behaviorfrom happening in the future.
So if we're using positive punishment,we add something.

(40:02):
So the horse kicks me, I'll kick it backthe most throws.
It's headed there. And that, by the way,never goes back at all.
That really stupid idea.
This is why this punishment doesn't workso well with horses.
This is why we really want to try and stayin that
combined reinforcement positiveor negative reinforcement together.
We want to stay in that area.

(40:23):
So positive punishment,we're adding things.
So you add your voice, you growl atthe horse, it's all forms of correction.
Negative punishment is somethingthat's not often used in horse training,
thankfully, but it is, you know, from timeto time we have to take something away.
It's negative.
So taking away the horses, friends

(40:43):
tie the horse to the Tree of Knowledgeor something like that.
That's so putting the horse in solitaryconfinement is negative punishment.
We might take the horses food away.
We might take its companyaway, take its water away.
All these things are done.
All these things are done.
And there's a real problem with thatbecause we're assuming
that the horse knows what it did wrongand the horse can conceptualize

(41:08):
sort of idea of, Oh, if I do that,then I get tied to the tree for an hour
and a half and it's most unlikelythe host can understand that.
And so we want to stayin that reinforcement area.
We want to use combined reinforcement.
It's actually almost impossibleto use just positive reinforcement

(41:28):
or just negative reinforcement.
We always use what I call combinedreinforcement
with the negative reinforcement,the pressure release part of the equation
gives the horse directions.
So if I want to teach the horseto do a flying change, for example,
I'm going to use combined reinforcement.
I'm going to use my legs and seat

(41:48):
to tell the horsewhere I want to put its body,
and I'm going to release that pressurewhen I get the flying change.
And then I'm going to reward the horseby scratching it on the with a
just off to the flying change.
So that's combined.So I'm using the negative reinforcement.
Positive reinforcement comes out laterto mark that behavior that I wanted.
If I'm only using positive reinforcementto teach the flying change,

(42:10):
I have a hard timebecause I can't actually ride the horse
without using negative reinforcement
because I'm sitting on the horseand I'm going to use my legs.
So I'd have to take the wheelin the arena.
But I have to convince those who get tothe arena that says I can't lead the horse
or put a head collar on itunless I use negative reinforcement.
And then if I did get it to the arena,I'd have to just wait

(42:33):
until waiting to dothe final random alley.
I actually performed a flying ledge.
Give it that cookie you've been keeping,and then we'd all be good.
So we get scared of that wordnegative reinforcement, which is why I try
and just say press releaseor just say combined reinforcement.
And honestly, I'd be willing to wager that

(42:54):
the term pressure release,pressure release or check and release.
Sometimes we say about stopping a horse,it goes back in time,
way farther than the termnegative reinforcement.
So it's yeah, it's it'd be very difficultand it's fun
listening to youdescribe all these things in all of this.

(43:14):
These are science based theoriesthat are very clear,
objective,kind of apply to all animals, right?
Humans included in humans include
and you're reminding mewhen you were talking in the beginning
about classical conditioningversus operant conditioning
and then positive reinforcement,and people are sometimes surprised

(43:37):
that we never usea food based reward in training.
I just don't find it necessary.
And I, I deal a lot with
the problems
that result from doing that wrong.
But when I was first training horses
and getting a lot of untrained horsesand some of them would be like

(43:59):
two, three, four year old horsesthat hadn't really been handled at all.
They were very skittish, very shy.
So I used actually classical conditioning
to help me enhancethe positive reinforcement.
So I would get a little pan full of oatsor whatever feed.

(44:20):
I add grain and I would hold it,
let the horse eat it while I'd whisperthis sweet nothings into its ear.
And I have a little way.
I, you know, whisper a sweetnothing to a horse.
For a whileshe was eating the grain I was holding,
so I was right there, close.
I just go, That's a good girl.
That's a good girl. That's a good girl.

(44:43):
And then I'd start scratchingon the withers when I held the pan.
And that's a good girl.And I'd scratch her on the withers.
That's a good girl.
And so she's associatingthat great feeling she had.
That's the classical conditioning of it.
And when I was actively training,once you're, you know, up there train
and doing groundworkor riding a horse that food base rewards

(45:06):
is not going to be very useful anymore.
But I could whisper or
scratch associatedwith a really positive reinforcement.
And I think that's that's really good.
And I think what people need to understandis that food a food reward.
I like youand I don't use them in training at all

(45:27):
because
a food reward very quicklygoes from positive reinforcement
to negative punishmentwhen it's poorly timed.
So pretty quickly, if I'm not fast enough,if my timing isn't good enough
and the horse tries a responseor makes a little bit of a response,
maybe I didn't catch itand I don't give it the food.
I'm now withholding food.

(45:49):
Then it's going to get frustratedand confused and
so that makes sense, actually, that see,that's puts together
connects some dots for mebecause a lot of times those
what we are thinking of as spoiledbehavior is really
just frustration, doesn't understand why.
Why do I get it sometimes and why don'tI and, you know, I'm like, I have nothing

(46:12):
against the positive reinforcementtrainers and the clicker trainers.
And I think it has some great usefulness.
I just don't think it'sin the training of a riding horse
and it can so easily be done incorrectly.
That's really the big problem.
Yeah, like you said,
I think we need to looka bit more behavior
because that was quite interestingwhat you just said there.

(46:32):
Not with Riding Horse is I lookat some of those images, go into YouTube
and look at some of the Libertyhorses on there.
Do you look at the horses behavior,the tail swishing, the head
tossing, the air, pinning?
If my riding horse was doing that,
I'd be off that horse in a flash and go,What on earth if I done?
Yeah.
Whereas on the ground people seem to worrya lot less about those responses.

(46:55):
But the horse is stillwell, I've noticed that with
certain
so-called natural horsemanship techniques,and I've often said
if I'm doing ground work with the horseand he's pen in his ears
at me and posturing, he
I've done something wrong in my opinion.
So it's actually the opposite responseI'm shooting for.

(47:19):
So again, people
tend to see what they want to believeand believe what they want to believe.
Yeah, and I think that that comes backto what you were saying about ABAC is that
the questions are really objective.
So we never ask youwhether your horse enjoys round pen work.
We just ask you whether you do it.
You don't ask, Does your horselike jumping, not riding the scale

(47:39):
it's in loves it, hates it.
Now tell us more about e bark.
Tell us what it bark isand then let people know how they can.
Yeah. Yeah.
Great. Right.
So a bark is it Citizen Science Project
C Equine Behavior Assessmentand Research Questionnaire.
We've currently got,I think, close to 7000 records in there.

(48:04):
It will take you about 20 minutesto complete an E,
but the first time you do it.
And so if you go along to E dash,
be a Q dot,We'll put that in the show notes. Yes.
Yeah. Okay.
Go along there
and then you can have a look on that homepage of the most recent research.

(48:24):
It's a list of papersthat have been published about it.
We've had some quite interesting findingswith about where we wanted
to know, for example, whether a horse hasa number of different riders.
Does that make it less responsive?
We found in fact it did.
We wantedto know if horses behave differently,
if they had males and female riders,and we found

(48:45):
there were a couple of differencesthat to an interesting
one that you often hearis that mares a more difficult
you know, they go into season and moredifficult to ride and that sort of thing.
So quite early on with IBAC,
we did study looking at the differencebetween measures and geldings.
And we, we did another survey with thatwhere we asked people
just to tell us a bitabout mares and geldings,

(49:08):
and we asked them to ascribethese adjectives to mares and geldings
like willing, unwilling,you know, good, bad and easy, difficult.
Those sorts of things.
And the geldings got all the good stuff,but, and the mayors got woeful.
The terrible Oh yeah, was really sad.
Anyway, so we didn't have back studyto see if any of this is true

(49:28):
and we couldn't find any differencesbetween words and geldings on the saddle
at all.
The only differences we found was thatgeldings were more likely to chew on laid
ropes and rugs on the ground, and mareswere more likely to be difficult to catch.
That chewing might just be a stallion,
you know, playing with thingswith a bit more aural fixated.

(49:51):
And the the being difficult to catch mightwell be something also heard related
that dates backfrom when they were in the wild
being moved by the stallionor whatever that might be.
So that was really interesting.
And IBAC is really there to sort of dispelmyths like that
because once you say a mare is difficultor bad tempered or moody or whatever

(50:14):
it is, that we will see
all these things,it changes the way you approach that horse
when you walk into the training sessionor the ride or whatever it is
you're doing, if you're making assumptionsabout the horse, absolutely.
Yeah. So that was quite interesting.
And anyway, you go alongto the About.com page and then there's
a button on there you can press that says,Take you back now.

(50:35):
Now what we're going to ask youto do is set up a, an account,
so you need your email address to do that.
Pleaseremember all the data is de-identified.
Nobody can ever find anybody'sname or anybody.
Horse's name soldier identified.
It's storedvery securely at the university.
What we're interested inis your horse's behavior.

(50:57):
So we we we ask a lot of sortof demographic questions.
We ask questions about where you're from,how long you've been riding,
what you experiences,what sort of disciplines you ride in.
Most demographic questionsabout the horse.
The horse is breed size.
It's a gelding.
When it was gelded and, you know, oftenwe don't have this information
and there's always a buttonthat says, Don't have that information.

(51:20):
Then the survey breaks up between riddenand unwritten horses.
So we you if your horse has been writtenin the last six months,
if it has,we send you down the ridden questions
and if it hasn't we send you downthe non written questions,
basically the same sorts of questionsand at the end when you're finished,
we calculate your results of your horsedivided into 13 different categories

(51:43):
train ability, ride, ability, complianceridden, compliance, ground compliance,
independent, easy to stop pull going
anyway certain different categories.
And we give you a grass that is housed
on your dashboardand you've always got access to that.
So what you can do is you canlook at that group and they, oh gosh, my

(52:05):
horse is really lacking in boldness.
For example, perhaps your horse shinesa lot on something
really dark and bold and so on.
You go away and work on that.
I'm going to try and work on exercisesthat are going to help make my horse
more confident and braver.
I'm going to come back in six monthsand I'm going to take any back again
and your results will beadded to your previous graph.

(52:26):
So you can see changes in your horse.
You benchmark todayand then you can go off six months later
and update and see how progressing.
So it's free touse, which I think is great.
And itis, as I say, a citizen science project.
So if you're interested in horse behavior,if you want to be a part
of a really big worldwide project,please do go along

(52:49):
and you can enter all your horsesor your mules, not donkeys.
We're going to develop a donkey barkat some stage, but yeah,
I'd be interested in hearing sometime.
Well,I'll just say it for another episode.
But while I spend a little bitfascinated by mules and have trained a few
and I just find them intriguingand and the differences

(53:10):
in their behavior and their originsand all that is kind of interesting.
So I'd love to hear more about that.
And I really appreciate you
being willing to sit for an interviewfor the podcast today.
It's been an honorto have you at my ranch.
We've had a lot of fun all weekand you guys are going to love the project

(53:31):
we've been working onand more about that later.
But for sure,I think you've shared a lot today, Dr.
Fenner, that will help listenersunderstand their own horses better and
hopefully just help them have a greaterunderstanding of horses in general.
I know you've given me quite a few thingsto think about.
I've written down a whole page of thingsI want to look into a little bit more

(53:54):
As a perpetual student of horses myself,I can't wait to interview again
and hear more about all this stuffand the research you're involved with now.
Can you just tell listenerswhere they can find out
more about your workand also about can do equine?
Sure.
Well, IBAC is the best place to find outabout my research and my site is can do.

(54:18):
That's K for Kate and Equine Dotcomand there's a free workshop on there.
You can go along and have a look at that.
There's, there's a blogand there's a book sort of 30
day video training seriesthat you can sign up for free.
And there's all sorts of things on thisa go along to can do equine dotcom
and have a look at that andmake contact with me that would be super.

(54:41):
Sounds like a lot of great resourcesthere and a lot of stuff
you're giving away, which is awesome.
Helps horses and people everywhere.
So we wrap up today.
Is there anything elseyou want to share with our listeners?
No, I just want to thank you very muchfor having me for the last few days
and I'm really excited about of coursethat's coming out.

(55:02):
Yep, yep.
Can't resist a tease just a little bit.
It's a pretty comprehensiveseven part series.
All about the canter riding,the canter training, the canter
from the biomechanics of the gateall the way through how you ride, how you
queue collection, helping more controlright up to flying lead changes.

(55:24):
So we've had a busy week working on on it
and the horses are going to enjoytheir well-deserved rest this weekend.
So thank you again, Kate,
for being on the show todayand we look forward to doing this again.
Thanks, Julie.

(55:45):
And now it's time for my favorite segment.
What? Hey, Q&A.
Each month we pick a few unique questionsfrom our listeners
and answer them on the air.
So if you'd like to submit a questionfor what the hey,
just message me on Facebook at JulieGoodnight.
Or email podcasts at Julie.

(56:05):
Goodnight dot com.
Before we get started,I'd like to welcome my dear
friend and assistant trainerback to the show Te Cody.
You might remember her from whenshe was a guest on the show last year.
And this time she's joined meright here in the studio.
In fact,she just sat in on the interview with Dr.

(56:28):
Fenner. So te welcome back to the podcast.
And tell me, what did you think of thatinterview with Dr.
Thinner? Hi, Julie.
Thanks for having me on the podcast.
It was really interesting to sit inand listen to you and Dr.
Venter talk.
I had a hundred questions pop in my head,but I had to be quiet
because we were sitting in the studio.

(56:49):
And unfortunately,that was actually the last day of Dr.
Fender's stay here.
So I have a bunch of questions saved up
for the next time I bump into her,which hopefully is going to be next week.
Well, we're definitely goingto have her back on the show.
And she might not be right hereat the ranch to sit in the studio with us,
but we'll have a chance to pepper herwith questions again, I'm sure.

(57:10):
So this time for our What the Hey segment,
T Cody has a question of her ownand since rank hat that's privileges.
She just decided to jump rightto the front of the line.
So te what can I help you with today?
Thank you for letting me jumpto the front of the line.
Julie,I appreciate that this issue just happened

(57:32):
and in an effort to be succinct,I've written it down,
so I'm going to read the questionsyou, a dear friend
who is an experienced, lifelong rider,recently came off her horse, Wendy.
But luckily she's okay.
No serious injuries.
She's just a little sore.
But she does have a broken heart.
She's taking this very personallybecause he doesn't buck with anyone else

(57:55):
and she thinks she's doingsomething wrong.
She regularly rides five days a week,a lesson
each week with her dressage trainer,and then she hacks out around her farm.
She grew up riding eventing.
She rode for her college equestrian team.
She's a good rider.
She's a kind and gentle rider.
And she and this horseget along very well.

(58:17):
She's worked really hard to buildtheir relationship slowly and correctly,
and she finds most all of her ridesfun and rewarding.
He is.
But twice before with her in the arena.
But she didn't come off.
Each time, she says,it's as he steps off into the trot
and she describes it as more of a jumpingstraight in the air like a deer.
Ratherthan bucking for this particular time.

(58:40):
It was a little cooler in the morningand she was heading out on the trail.
He seemed pretty excited.
So as per normal,she was going to trot him out
to work off the energyand he did his hop in the air.
But this time it camewith a spin and she came off.
Now, you
always recommend the first thing people dois check their horses.

(59:01):
Physical fitness.
So about him, he has regularchiropractic adjustments every ten weeks.
Lately, he has started addiction shotsfor a sore pelvis,
but it should not be an issue for herriding him.
She him some special stretching sessionsto address this issue.
Both her dressage and jumping saddlehave been fitted by her saddle sitter.

(59:25):
So her trainer,who saw both of the previous
arena Bucks,says he just looks cold back to her.
That's a term that gets thrown out often.
What are your thoughts on what's happeningand how to work it out?
Of course, it's always difficultto diagnose issues with horses

(59:45):
without actually seeing it in person.
I know you know this horse and riderquite well,
so it seems like a little bitof an anomaly this this bucking.
But first of all, let's talkterminology here.
When a horse jumps straightfrom the center of his back
and all four feet come off the ground,that's called crow hopping.

(01:00:08):
And when a horse jumps up and kicks out,that's bucking.
And it is a minor distinction.
And people often use the term buckingto refer to a horse as crow hopping
because maybe they don't knowthe term groping or it just felt funny.
So they assumed it was a buck.

(01:00:29):
Now, in general,therefore, crow hopping is easier to ride.
Okay, so let's talk about Hold Back.
Called back is an old, old term,meaning it's a term that's been in usage
for who knows how long,certainly long before in my lifetime.
And it refers to a horse that eitherit hasn't been saddled

(01:00:50):
or ridden in a long time orit has not been cantered in a long time.
It's way more common when you askwhat was a canter than trod.
But some cold backed horseswill sort of bow up
in a crow hoppy type movementwhen you first saddle them.
But if you let's sayI haven't saddled this horse in a month
and I go to saddle him,he gets a little crow hoppy with me,

(01:01:13):
but I ride him the subsequent daysand it doesn't happen again.
So it's oftenrelated to that first time saddling.
You might have a mildly cold backed horsethat you you just have to saddle
real slowly, walk them out a little bit,let them kind of adjust themselves.
It's almost I've always sort ofthought of it as a as a way,
a horse's cowpractically adjusting themselves

(01:01:36):
in reaction to the saddle or in reaction
to the feel of the weight of the rideron horseback or in reaction to.
Oftentimes it's when you first askthat horse to canter, either
the first time you ask them to canterevery day you ride him and then he doesn't
do it subsequently, orI haven't asked him to canter in a while.
And the first time I ask him he does it,but he doesn't do it after that.

(01:02:00):
So we commonly refer to these typesof behaviors as called back.
Now, often timesit seems like more often than not,
these are really good, well-behaved,
well-trained horses that I remember.
One of the best horses I ever hadwhen I was a kid.
Well, it was definitelybest horse I had as a kid.

(01:02:23):
He was called back, and
if he had been ridden in a wild, there'dbe just a little bit of crow hopping.
Maybe when you first put the saddle on,
maybe the first timeyou asked him to canter and that was it.
So sometimes the very best horsesare occasionally displaying this behavior.
And so that's why the I thinkthe term called back just came from that.
You know, the fact that it's otherwisea really good horse, it's just has to get

(01:02:46):
sort of used to the saddle every time,used to the way of the rider, every.
Now generally we walk these horses out,we take our time warming them up.
But a friend of mine
who is a vet and an equine chiropractic,
in fact her entire veterinary practiceis just equine chiropractic.

(01:03:08):
And she told me she does not believecalled back is a thing.
She believes a horse being describedwas called back, has a physical problem,
and that it's likely a chiropractic
problem and that it's likelyit could be adjusted out.
And you know, in her mindand of course she's a healer
that she thinks that horse can be helped

(01:03:33):
through chiropractic treatmentor stretches
and all thatwhile this horse is already getting that
although it doesn't sound like it'snecessarily
for the quote unquote,cold backed behavior.
But what I would suggest
is getting an X-ray of this horse's backjust in an abundance of caution,

(01:03:55):
because obviously it's had plenty
of veterinary treatment and,chiropractic treatment and all of that.
So I would be curious to look at an xray of the horse's back and see is
is there something going on there now,when you describe this to me,
I just I automatically think
physical is a physical problem because.

(01:04:18):
When you have a well trained horseand a really good
rider and everything's going greatand something
just out of the blue like this happens,it doesn't fit right.
So if the horse she'd been having troublewith the horse all along, if, you know,
whatever horse had a history of, you know,challenging behavior and all that.

(01:04:38):
So whenever there'sjust something that doesn't fit to me,
I think physical problems.
So I still would lean towardsgetting an X-ray of the back.
But let's say we didlook at the x rayed everything.
Everything's fine.
Can we rule out I don't
I wouldn't really call thisa training problem because, by the way,
so this is the third timehe's CRO hopped with her

(01:05:01):
and this time he's spun and crowcrop is not hard to ride.
So she's that good a rider, she's eventingand all that kind of stuff.
I would expect herstay on a horse on a crow hop.
But the spin caught her off guardI guess, and she hit the ground.
So that's the third incident.
What kind of time frame are we looking at

(01:05:22):
from the first time to the last time?
And how long has she actually owned thishorse and been riding it?
And how many other ridersare we talking about?
Well, she's had this horse for six months
and the incidents of the crow hopping
have been a little bit spread outwithin the last couple of months.

(01:05:43):
He previous to that was in trainingwith the dressage trainer
for periods of timeand ridden by his owner in the past year.
So he's hadhe's had basically two years under saddle.
I will mention one thing that we do knowabout him is the beginning
of this two year riding,consistent riding period.

(01:06:05):
He was kind of pulled out of the pasturethat he'd been resting for
for a while of this or year old yearand went to a cowboy trainer to kind of
put his first 30 days back on andin that time he lived in a stall 24 seven.
And the cowboy trainer said
that he would buck on cold morningswhen he pulled him out.
But, you know, he was in a stall 24 seven.

(01:06:27):
So that's a little extra informationthere.
The so if I rule out a physical problem,
I'm just thinking training and certainly,you know, being kept in a stall in
any kind of confinementis certainly going to add to the horses
angst when he comes out of it.
Also,hacking out first thing in the morning,

(01:06:50):
maybe it's a little bit cooler day.
All of those are perfectly good reasonswhy a horse
you know, I always like to go from Florida
when the horses felt fresh in the morningbecause it's so hot there.
That humidity
and they come out of their stalland they're already soaking wet sweat.
And then on those nice coldearly mornings, the horses would feel like

(01:07:12):
they had more energyand maybe a little crow hoppy.
And I always love that
because the horses had more energyin an innocent sort of way.
And it's interesting that this horsehasn't really bucked with anyone else
and that it's been occurring
just in the last couple of monthsthese through three episodes.
So that's a little bit concerning to me.

(01:07:34):
If the trainer has witnessed itand felt like
the horse in both instances
was being quote unquote coldbacked, to me, that means that
the horse just went right back to workand it was as if it never happened.
And that's certainly that'sthe common thing about being called back.

(01:07:54):
This is just a momentary little blip.
The horse crow hops a little bit.
It seems to adjust its backor adjust the saddle to his back
and then everything's fine.
So. So then all of a suddenhe adds a spin to it.
So there's where did that come from?
That's not normal. Cold back stuff.
I feel like if this was happeningout of pain,

(01:08:18):
intermittent pain,that there might be more indication of it.
It doesn't sound likesounds like it happens.
And then he's just goingright back to work like nothing happened.
Of course she came off this time.
Does she get back on and ride the horse?
Unfortunately,he turned around and headed home
without her,so she did not get back on that moment.

(01:08:40):
But she said that she has gotten on this
whole week,we've gone through her riding as normal.
She had her dressage lessonand there has not been an issue.
Well Hopefully she'll be a little bitmore careful here.
Here's what I would recommend.
I'd still recommendan X-ray of the horse's back,
just in an abundance of caution.

(01:09:02):
And then she's going to have to be
a little bit more proactivein warming this horse
and knowing that if she goes
first thing in the morning,he might be a little fresh.
So keep his neck bent, you know, move himlaterally from side to side a lot.
I'll movehis neck, bend from side to side,

(01:09:23):
walk him in a circle left to circle right,
help him warm up in waysthat warm up his body and back in
particular, stretch down low and ridea little bit more proactively.
Maybe when she get heads out of the arenaand then,
you know, tell the chiropracticwho's ever doing her crowd practice work,

(01:09:46):
obviously what's been going onand just pay a little closer attention.
But otherwise, I think she's got a horsethat when he feels a little better fresh,
he's he's maybe jumping up a little bit
and she's just going to have to learnto ride through that.
I I'm sadthat she's taken things personally
because that's not going to help her.

(01:10:08):
And it doesn't help the horse either.
He didn't mean anything by.
It he just did what horses do.
And when she came off,it probably scared him.
And he ran back to the barnbecause he ran back to safety.
I hate it
when people take things personally,like, Oh, my horse ran off and left me.
That's just a horse being a horse.
And it's unreasonable to expect.

(01:10:30):
Yeah. Will some horses stand there?
Yeah, because they're not maybe afraidand they're just shocked you came off.
So the turn around like,what are you doing down there?
But this horse must have been afraid.
So he ran home and.
But she shouldn't take it personally.
She should do her bestto figure things out,
do her best diagnostics on this horse.

(01:10:50):
Physically, medically, and then just rideproactively a little more warm up.
Understand that as time goeson, she'll have a better idea
of what conditionslead to this kind of thing.
And either we're going
to find resolution to it or just be more,more proactive and on guard for it.
Thanks for all that, Julie.

(01:11:11):
It really helped to exploreall of the different areas
that you think could have caused this.So good information.
Thank you.
Okay.
So our next question is from Sue,and it says, Hi, Julie,
I love your podcast and all the resourcesyou provide people of all skill levels.
I hope you're able to help mewith an issue.
I'm having with my four yearold daughter, Horse Mare.

(01:11:33):
I bought her in April 2022and she came to me
with 90 days of trainingthrough a university training program.
She has a great temperament and breedingand I'm taking weekly lessons with
a trainer so we can teach herWestern pleasure buttons like Spurs
stops and more.
I took her to a few funshows this past summer and while
waiting in the warm uppen for our next class,

(01:11:56):
she dropped to the sandy ground and rolledwhile I was in the saddle.
This scared me. As you might imagine.
It was a super hot dayand I figured she was just done
and thought the sand looked cooland comfy.
Well, she's done itfive more times since then.
Every timewhen I was in a sandy arena or sandy
shoreline, with one exceptionwhen we were on grass.

(01:12:16):
But it was a hot, sunny dayand I think she was hot and tired.
I'm afraidshe's developed a terrible habit
and I wonderedif you could help in fixing it.
It happened again today in our arena,which just got a new sandy footing.
When it happens, it'sso sudden that I forget to do what
I've learned to do,which is race one rain Hi and kick her.

(01:12:37):
Do you have any suggestions for me?
How do I get my reflexes fast enough?
Is it too lateto train this habit out of her?
I appreciate yourguidance. Thank you, Sue.
Thanks for.
The question, Sue,and thanks for those kind comments.
Well, is it too late to train this habitout of her?
It's already a habit and unfortunately,

(01:12:58):
it sounds like it's been reinforced
at least four out of the five times.
So you you're a long wayfrom breaking the habit.
Let's just talk about this to begin with.
In general, it is not at all uncommon
for a Saddle Horse

(01:13:19):
to given a certain set of circumstances
to just sort of spontaneouslylay down a roll.
Common examples.
A horse has been in a muddy
place or place with hard footing,and you bring him in
to an arena full of clean, dry sand.
He hasn't had a comfortable placeto roll in a long, long time,

(01:13:42):
and his desire just overwhelms him andhe drops to the ground without thinking.
Because you it's like,imagine you were lost in the desert,
had no water, and all suddenyou came upon an oasis
and you just plunged into the water.
So can happen.
It's just there.
Does that desire overwhelms them?
And another time,let's say you're out on the trail

(01:14:04):
and you get a little rainand then the sun pops out and your horse's
haircut starts drying and he gets itchyand then he sees
a spot of sand that would be perfectfor scratching his itch.
And he drops to the groundseeing horses lay down in water.
When you're crossing waterand you know, of course, know on occasion

(01:14:25):
a horse might get struck with real seriousbout of stomach pain and just drop down.
But generally, it's going to be a greenerhorse, a younger horse
that just overwhelmed with desirebecause of the circumstance.
And without thinking, he drops down. Now,
gee, usually there'sgoing to be some kind of indication

(01:14:47):
that the horse is about to roll.
Like he puts his nose downto the ground, start sniffing the ground.
He'll start pawing with a front foot,actually kind of scratch
in the dirt, circling.
All these things are indications of horsesthinking about rolling.
But sometimes they just
buckle at the knees and go straight downand it takes you off guard.
If that happened to.
Me First of all,

(01:15:07):
I know there are certain circumstanceswhere this is far more likely to happen.
Like I just described,we know that when you come upon dry
sandy placesor rolling spots out on the trail
or something, you know,your horses might be thinking about it.
I would be more proactive.
But what's criticalis that the very first time

(01:15:32):
that horse that saddledand or being ridden
drops down to roll,that you hop off that horse and start
screaming and flapping and kick inand make the biggest or deal out of it.
Just I'll just be yell and screamand stomp and,
you know, using whatever I have to a rope,whatever, so that he knows

(01:15:53):
that is absolutely wrongand bad, bad, bad, bad thing to do.
And if if you do that
the first time, it's unlikelythe horse will ever do it again.
And remember, most riding horsesdo not do this.
One reason why is some of themnever even thought of it.
But the ones that have thought itand went down,

(01:16:16):
they probably got scoldedand immediately brought back up.
And in that process they learn, Ooh,I should never do that again.
That was a bad thing to do.
Now your horse has taken you offguard to the point
where no correction was for that behavior.
And in fact, insteadthe horse got a nice little

(01:16:39):
break,got a nice little roll, the rider got off.
So in that way, from the horse'spoint of view,
she was actually rewardedfor this behavior.
So now you have a habit.
Now, can you train it out of her?
Absolutely. I'd probably trying out of her
the very first time,and I would be prepared.
I would understand the circumstanceswhich were going to lead to her doing it.

(01:17:03):
And As soon as I had any indicationshe was thinking about laying down,
I would just start raining on her parade,whooping and hollering, slap and kick her
right up to a chore maker trot,make a really big deal out of it.
If she went all the way downbefore I was able to do anything,
you know, same thing,start screaming and wave and flapping

(01:17:25):
and anything I could do,I'll make a lot of noise
and let her know that it's it'swrong and bad and she can't do that.
I think if you're preparedand you make a big enough
fuss about it,she will get the idea that it's bad.
Up until now,I don't think anybody has explained
to her that that's bad and wrong behavior.

(01:17:48):
So, yes, you can break this habit.
You're going to have to bea little bit more Johnny on the spot.
You're going to have to havemore awareness of what leads up to this
and your horses behavior and be prepared
to just rain down on this horse
in a loud and busy way.
So it's a very it'san unpleasant experience.

(01:18:09):
And of course, you know thatI don't mean hurt her in any way.
I mean, but,you know, put a lot of pressure, loud,
chaotic kind of pressureand in a scolding way
that lets her knowthat you believe that behavior to be bad,
she thinks is perfectly goodbehavior, obviously.
So you need to let her knowthat you think it's bad.

(01:18:31):
Also, just you know,kind of being an advocate for the horse.
Let's make sure this horse has goodrolling places.
Rolling is a really important behaviorfor horses.
It's beneficial to the physically.
It helps take care of their hair coat.
There's so many reasons
why it's important for a horseto have a nice place to roll.

(01:18:54):
And that means a spot that has good deep
soft sand, preferably.
And if if you don't, you might needto build such a place for your horse
and or bring your horse daily
to a place where it is okay for to roll.
Obviously I wouldn'tdo it in your training arena

(01:19:14):
because you don't wantit reinforced there.
But so make sure the horse doeshave a way to roll.
If he's in a stall, it has a hard floor.
He probably doesn't roll in therebecause it's too hard.
So I'll just make sure the horsehas what he needs as well.

(01:19:38):
That's all we have time for today.
I want to thank Ty Codyfor joining me on today's episode
and also, of course, incrediblethanks and appreciation to Dr.
Kate Fenner.
Be sure and check out her stuffin the show notes.
Next month, I'll be backwith another brand new episode.
Remember to hit Subscribe.
So You don't miss a single episode andinvite your equestrian friends to join us.

(01:20:02):
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(01:20:24):
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(01:20:48):
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(01:21:09):
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I'm Julie. Goodnight.
Thank you for listeningand please stay safe and enjoy the ride.