Post by Kelly Marks on Jun 6, 2012 16:27:04 GMT 1
Found this old article I wrote! Funny how I wrote in this month's IH magazine 'Thank Your Critics!' and the same 3 'critics' who always turn up have taken over the H&H forum again to say how Monty doesn't understand about horses at all ...
It really should inspire me to write another article!
Why It’s Time for Scientists and Horsemen to Join Up !
by Kelly Marks and Dr Veronica Fowler
A title ‘Natural Horsemanship Weird or Wonderful’ on the front cover of a magazine caught my eye. On reading it I was concerned that it seemed to be separating the equine academics and those of us considered practical horsepeople. Even though, some of us ‘front line’ horse people are deeply interested in the academic aspects. I feel, with the very best interests of the horse at heart, it’s time for all the Scientists and the Horsemen to truly ‘Join Up’!
The work of Monty Roberts by which I’ve been greatly inspired in my horsemanship journey also seems to come under the term ‘Natural Horsemanship’, in part because he’s studied horses in the wild and encourages people to use body language to communicate with the horse in a way the horse understands. Also perhaps because in his early years he was influenced to a degree by horsemen, Tom and Bill Dorrance, who were perhaps the first people to coin the phrase ‘Natural Horsemanship’ encouraging horsemen to understand the "feel" you need to develop to get the best from horses.
As the article started by mentioning ‘Natural Horsemanship’ it brought to mind though the main problem, that always develops around any discussions pertaining to this – what exactly is ‘Natural Horsemanship’? Depending on who you talk to, it might mean having your horse shoeless, bitless, rugless, treeless, herbally wormed and with 24 hour turnout. It might be talking about some form of Western inspired training, but it can’t be taken for granted that because it is called ‘natural’ it is necessarily any kinder or fairer to the horse. It tends to depend on the individual trainer’s interpretation.
If we want to be strictly accurate I guess the only ‘natural’ horsemanship’ is if we let our horses loose on some plains somewhere and leave them completely alone. Continuing that theme, I suspect it would be ‘natural’ to kill and eat the odd one as well, although that may not suit all our tastes. It was because of this possible confusion that I named our organisation ‘Intelligent Horsemanship’ so that we could incorporate those parts of ‘natural’ we thought benefitted the horse, but could leave behind elements that didn’t seem appropriate to what the every day horse person could manage or we felt, wasn’t strictly speaking in the best interests of the horse.
Nowadays very few horses would survive without the guardianship of some human and it’s educating people to give horses the fairest lives possible that needs to be uppermost in all our minds, scientists and horsemen alike. At Intelligent Horsemanship we’ve chosen our guiding star as ‘be the owner your horse would choose’. If you were a horse, what would you want from an owner? I’d say caring, sensitive, practical, and yes, I would definitely want an owner who did their research into what was truly beneficial for me. That’s why Intelligent Horsemanship students and enthusiasts are now putting together their own studies for peer review so we can separate fact from fiction and pseudoscience (i.e. invented for one’s own benefit). Did you know there are still people advising you to pull a horse over backwards on concrete for rearing or splitting a horse’s ear to ‘calm his nature’? And yes, I do mean in Britain today.
I am perfectly well aware in my own case that growing up with horses and winning championships in showjumping and racing constitute no qualification whatsoever (quite rightly too). I’ve also acted as a consultant for The Brooke Hospital for Animals charity, helping train their vets in horsemanship, travelling out to such places as Jordan and India. I’ve personally taken time to study horses worldwide including the feral horses of Namibia. I was honoured by a letter and extensive research material from Dr Telane Greyling, whose PhD was gained from studying these horses, as a thank you for the support I’d given her. It seems a shame that taking time to work and study with some fabulous horsepeople means nothing if you don’t have a piece of paper from a recognised college or university. It seems ironic as I’ve lectured at various colleges and universities in horsemanship; I’ve just not attended one.
Although most people in the horse industry consider Monty Roberts purely a hands on horseman. Anyone wishing to investigate his academic credentials could discover that at 17 years Monty graduated number one in his class from Hartnell A & M with an agricultural degree. Continuing his education he graduated number one in his class at the College Level. With 4 years Monty completed University training at California state university SLO with triple majors including Animal Science and Psychology. After two years of study by professors and a required paper Monty was granted a doctorate from University of Zurich, Switzerland and then the same from University of Parma in Italy.
Monty and I and the Intelligent Horsemanship Recommended Trainers are working with owners and their horses on a daily basis and have many testimonials to prove we’re making a real difference. Then one can come home to read that there have been ‘scientific studies’ that prove Join Up ‘doesn’t work’ when it’s quite clear that those involved have little or no understanding of how the communication works at all. On my courses I tell my students a funny story about a little girl coming to me saying ‘I did Join Up with my pony but I don’t think it worked’ and I asked her why she thought that. She said ‘Because when I came out of the round pen and walked across the big paddock he just stopped and started eating grass’! This is such a sweet story. The little girl not realising that Join Up is simply (though profoundly) that initial communication, a starting point in your relationship where the horse sees you as the ‘safety zone’. She thought the pony was going to follow her around forever! I couldn’t believe it when I read “When German Scientists studied round pen training in 2007 they found that it didn’t really work because afterwards the horse did not follow them outside”. What can you say but ‘ahh bless!’
Let’s imagine for one moment that you or I watched an Ellen Whittaker DVD and then attempted to ride round a Grand Prix course (because after all we know how she does it now). If our Grand Prix debut doesn’t go so well for us are we going to say she’s got some trick or she’s really not a good rider? I want to know why aren’t the equine academics thinking these things through? It’s scaring me; does this sort of thing happen throughout all of academia? What about the people responsible for making our medicines are they checking with the patients and nurses as to what is actually happening?
Could it be the case that some equine scientists are watching Join Up and only seeing a man sending a horse round the outside of the pen and then later the horse follows him? I guess, to be honest, that’s about all I saw the first time I saw Monty, but to give me some credit, perhaps due to a great deal of full time horse experience, I did figure out ‘there’s got to be more to it than that’.
One of the things I discuss with my students on the first day of a practical course is what are the benefits of them learning Join Up. Many believe its main use is for Join Up with horses in the future. In fact, what is far more important is what Join Up is going to teach them about horsemanship. Making the same moves as Monty isn’t going to make you Monty any more than making the same moves as Ellen Whittaker is going to make you Ellen. Imagine now you’re about to do a Join Up or a Show Jumping round. First of all have you made sure your timing is as good as theirs? Have you honed to perfection that moment when you push the horse on a little, or hold back?
You have to have ‘body awareness’, not just your own, one needs to know where the horse is at any given time too, when are you going to need peripheral vision? When will your eyes need to be entirely focused? Indeed are you capable of remaining focused for several minutes, being fully ‘in the flow’, allowing no distractions?, How do you think you will need to use your energy? Many people forget to breathe when they feel under any sort of stress at all, their pulse rate goes sky high which sends the horse’s pulse rate up the same (Scientific tests have proven this!) Can you handle your emotions when the pressure is on? Certainly we can attempt to ‘model’ exceptional performances, but we’ll never make it work without understanding all the facets that bring the performance together.
I believe part of the issue is that some equine academics distrust Monty Roberts’ popularity with the public, this coupled with the success of the Intelligent Horsemanship courses, is pushing just a tiny band not to think entirely rationally. People who objectively study horsemanship and its teaching methods should be careful not to jump to the conclusion that because something (or someone) is ‘popular’ they are necessarily ‘without substance’. This would be as silly as imagining that all attractive women are stupid (comforting maybe, but not true).
In one horse book I read, written by a PhD, after explaining how ‘advance and retreat’ is ‘very stressful’ for a horse’ goes on to give an example of one of her case studies. She explains how a horse was frightened of a newsagent’s stand so she took the horse and the stand home and got the horse familiar with the object. Very sensible I would agree. However, she put the stand back at the newsagents and attempted to take the horse past and he shied at it again. This came as a great surprise to her and she concluded that it was because the headlines had been changed! It worries me that people might read this book and really believe this is in the least bit likely.
Any person who has been around horses a while know that horse’s need to generalise their learning. How many times have you heard ‘my horse will load in the trailer at home but won’t load at the show’ or ‘my horse jumps everything at home but when we go somewhere new it all goes wrong’? Precisely. To be fair this writer’s doctorate was in sheep not in horses but how are her readers to know that? If she had discussed her theories first with experienced horse people someone could have helped her come to a more logical conclusion. Instead we’re now going to have horsepeople ringing ahead when they ride to check what is written on signposts and billboards – checking the likelihood it could upset their horse.
Some of the scientific world still struggles with the concept of the emotional animal; after all, to have emotions one must have a sense of 'self' or 'I', which is one of the factors the scientists will often argue separates humans from animals; we have it, they don't. Therefore they are not emotional. While in the recent Horse and Rider article it was stated that horses don’t have the mental capacity to understand concepts - such as ‘trust’, ‘leadership’ and ‘respect’ and therefore ridicule someone saying ‘your horse doesn’t trust you’, those of us ‘in the field’ (often literally) know that working with the owner is perhaps even more important than working with the horse. I do discourage people saying things like their horse is, for instance, “naughty” or ‘deliberately making a fool of them’ because believing comments like that doesn’t help the owner improve matters. They don’t look into the whys of the behaviour, how in fact, if the owner makes a few simple changes in her behaviour her horse will improve in a quantum leap. I agree for scientific studies one needs strictly objective language but if it’s to benefit horse owners it’s got to be to enlighten rather than further confuse.
Surely if we have the horse and owner’s best interests at heart we can find a language that the owner can relate to and that benefits both the owner and the horse? As most horse owners aren’t trained in science speak I do believe it’s going to be heavy going in future if I’m not allowed to say ‘Well done we can all see how your horse is really trusting you over jumps and you both seem really confident now’. Instead I must say ‘The operant conditioning appears to have produced results, though not scientifically validated it would appear that neither you nor the subject are seeing the ‘jumps’ as an aversive stimulus at this moment in time.”
So come on you last remaining sceptics! Now is the perfect time for practical horsepeople to come out of their anti-scientific world and recognise the benefits that we could all offer our horses is we DID study what we do and how it really works, and scientists... come and see for yourselves how ‘learning the language of Equus’ really does work for the benefit of horses and their owners. Then let’s keep working together to continue to find measurable, workable solutions that are truly going to benefit horses and horse lovers alike; what do you say?
The Scientists Viewpoint – Is Horsemanship an Art or a Science?
Dr Veronica Fowler
Years of University education could not have prepared me for the day when my beloved mare could no longer be separated from her stable companion without the fear of injury to myself and her. Worry not I thought, I am a scientist, I have a distinction at MSc in Equine behaviour I CAN resolve this! The trouble was … I couldn’t! That is, not until I discovered the work of Monty Roberts and Kelly Marks
In my opinion, the most successful equine behaviourist would start with what current theory (and I say current as we must remember that scientific theory is ever evolving), tells them and then add experience and trial and error to suit individual horses needs. Unfortunately, this type of behaviourist is extremely rare. You usually find there are one of two options ‘university educated’ with little or no practical experience, or ‘practical’ with little or no theoretical understanding. I had the theoretical understanding but not the practical experience, hence me needing help. It was at this point someone mentioned ‘Intelligent Horsemanship’ established by Kelly Marks and mentored by Monty Roberts. I didn’t need to be a scientist to see that their techniques worked and I wanted to know more.
I enrolled myself on the horse psychology workshop taught by Kelly Marks and was pleasantly surprised to not only to be acting out both positive and negative reinforcement (something we never did at university) but also being taught the practical application of our current understanding of horse psychology. I was in awe, an organisation which not only understood the theory but also knew how to put it into practice; I decided I had to be part of this organisation!
That was three years ago and not only am I am now proudly part of Intelligent Horsemanship as the horse psychology project supervisor but I can also say that with their practical guidance (thank you IH Recommend Trainer Sarah Weston), my horse is doing wonderfully well. Kelly Marks and Intelligent Horsemanship are probably one of the few that recognise the need for the synergy between scientist and practical behaviourists and have pioneered this synergy by incorporating science into their studies and teachings in order to advance our understanding of equine behaviour. Students are taught not only the how (practical horsemanship) but also the why (science theory). Recently under guidance of scientists such as myself, Intelligent Horsemanship have begun to scientifically validate their methods in order to understand how and why they work, something which has never been done before. For example, recently we have undertaken a study investigating the science of a bad loader and its resolution. This study was the first in a line of many which has combined scientists and practical behaviourists and it is clear from the results what we can learn by such proactive relationships.
As scientists we all know the theory of our chosen subject area but do we really know how to effectively put this theory into practice? This is a question which has troubled me for a number of years. It is of my belief that every scientist instead of reaching for their text book companion which has helped them through university, should in fact be reaching for the nearest practical horseman in order to further their understanding. Theories are ever evolving and just because they are considered as ‘fact’ does not necessarily mean that they won’t change. Horses are not computers or phones or even TVs that when they go wrong you can reach for the convenient ‘trouble shooting page’ and work your way through a standard set of instructions to resolve the problem. They are living animals and have ‘minds of their own’.
For every single behavioural problem there are hundreds of possible reasons for the behaviour and perhaps hundreds of possible solutions. Who is going to get to the solution first, those that use theory or those that use practical experience? I would put my money on the practical horseman any day. Through my own experiences theoretical knowledge can never prepare you for the body language and timing required to positively communicate with a horse, only experience can provide you with this. Can you then imagine the progress we could make if scientists and practical horsemen worked together?
For More Information on courses in Horse Psychology courses with Intelligent Horsemanship go to www.intelligenthorsemanship.co.uk or ring 01488 71300
It really should inspire me to write another article!
Why It’s Time for Scientists and Horsemen to Join Up !
by Kelly Marks and Dr Veronica Fowler
A title ‘Natural Horsemanship Weird or Wonderful’ on the front cover of a magazine caught my eye. On reading it I was concerned that it seemed to be separating the equine academics and those of us considered practical horsepeople. Even though, some of us ‘front line’ horse people are deeply interested in the academic aspects. I feel, with the very best interests of the horse at heart, it’s time for all the Scientists and the Horsemen to truly ‘Join Up’!
The work of Monty Roberts by which I’ve been greatly inspired in my horsemanship journey also seems to come under the term ‘Natural Horsemanship’, in part because he’s studied horses in the wild and encourages people to use body language to communicate with the horse in a way the horse understands. Also perhaps because in his early years he was influenced to a degree by horsemen, Tom and Bill Dorrance, who were perhaps the first people to coin the phrase ‘Natural Horsemanship’ encouraging horsemen to understand the "feel" you need to develop to get the best from horses.
As the article started by mentioning ‘Natural Horsemanship’ it brought to mind though the main problem, that always develops around any discussions pertaining to this – what exactly is ‘Natural Horsemanship’? Depending on who you talk to, it might mean having your horse shoeless, bitless, rugless, treeless, herbally wormed and with 24 hour turnout. It might be talking about some form of Western inspired training, but it can’t be taken for granted that because it is called ‘natural’ it is necessarily any kinder or fairer to the horse. It tends to depend on the individual trainer’s interpretation.
If we want to be strictly accurate I guess the only ‘natural’ horsemanship’ is if we let our horses loose on some plains somewhere and leave them completely alone. Continuing that theme, I suspect it would be ‘natural’ to kill and eat the odd one as well, although that may not suit all our tastes. It was because of this possible confusion that I named our organisation ‘Intelligent Horsemanship’ so that we could incorporate those parts of ‘natural’ we thought benefitted the horse, but could leave behind elements that didn’t seem appropriate to what the every day horse person could manage or we felt, wasn’t strictly speaking in the best interests of the horse.
Nowadays very few horses would survive without the guardianship of some human and it’s educating people to give horses the fairest lives possible that needs to be uppermost in all our minds, scientists and horsemen alike. At Intelligent Horsemanship we’ve chosen our guiding star as ‘be the owner your horse would choose’. If you were a horse, what would you want from an owner? I’d say caring, sensitive, practical, and yes, I would definitely want an owner who did their research into what was truly beneficial for me. That’s why Intelligent Horsemanship students and enthusiasts are now putting together their own studies for peer review so we can separate fact from fiction and pseudoscience (i.e. invented for one’s own benefit). Did you know there are still people advising you to pull a horse over backwards on concrete for rearing or splitting a horse’s ear to ‘calm his nature’? And yes, I do mean in Britain today.
I am perfectly well aware in my own case that growing up with horses and winning championships in showjumping and racing constitute no qualification whatsoever (quite rightly too). I’ve also acted as a consultant for The Brooke Hospital for Animals charity, helping train their vets in horsemanship, travelling out to such places as Jordan and India. I’ve personally taken time to study horses worldwide including the feral horses of Namibia. I was honoured by a letter and extensive research material from Dr Telane Greyling, whose PhD was gained from studying these horses, as a thank you for the support I’d given her. It seems a shame that taking time to work and study with some fabulous horsepeople means nothing if you don’t have a piece of paper from a recognised college or university. It seems ironic as I’ve lectured at various colleges and universities in horsemanship; I’ve just not attended one.
Although most people in the horse industry consider Monty Roberts purely a hands on horseman. Anyone wishing to investigate his academic credentials could discover that at 17 years Monty graduated number one in his class from Hartnell A & M with an agricultural degree. Continuing his education he graduated number one in his class at the College Level. With 4 years Monty completed University training at California state university SLO with triple majors including Animal Science and Psychology. After two years of study by professors and a required paper Monty was granted a doctorate from University of Zurich, Switzerland and then the same from University of Parma in Italy.
Monty and I and the Intelligent Horsemanship Recommended Trainers are working with owners and their horses on a daily basis and have many testimonials to prove we’re making a real difference. Then one can come home to read that there have been ‘scientific studies’ that prove Join Up ‘doesn’t work’ when it’s quite clear that those involved have little or no understanding of how the communication works at all. On my courses I tell my students a funny story about a little girl coming to me saying ‘I did Join Up with my pony but I don’t think it worked’ and I asked her why she thought that. She said ‘Because when I came out of the round pen and walked across the big paddock he just stopped and started eating grass’! This is such a sweet story. The little girl not realising that Join Up is simply (though profoundly) that initial communication, a starting point in your relationship where the horse sees you as the ‘safety zone’. She thought the pony was going to follow her around forever! I couldn’t believe it when I read “When German Scientists studied round pen training in 2007 they found that it didn’t really work because afterwards the horse did not follow them outside”. What can you say but ‘ahh bless!’
Let’s imagine for one moment that you or I watched an Ellen Whittaker DVD and then attempted to ride round a Grand Prix course (because after all we know how she does it now). If our Grand Prix debut doesn’t go so well for us are we going to say she’s got some trick or she’s really not a good rider? I want to know why aren’t the equine academics thinking these things through? It’s scaring me; does this sort of thing happen throughout all of academia? What about the people responsible for making our medicines are they checking with the patients and nurses as to what is actually happening?
Could it be the case that some equine scientists are watching Join Up and only seeing a man sending a horse round the outside of the pen and then later the horse follows him? I guess, to be honest, that’s about all I saw the first time I saw Monty, but to give me some credit, perhaps due to a great deal of full time horse experience, I did figure out ‘there’s got to be more to it than that’.
One of the things I discuss with my students on the first day of a practical course is what are the benefits of them learning Join Up. Many believe its main use is for Join Up with horses in the future. In fact, what is far more important is what Join Up is going to teach them about horsemanship. Making the same moves as Monty isn’t going to make you Monty any more than making the same moves as Ellen Whittaker is going to make you Ellen. Imagine now you’re about to do a Join Up or a Show Jumping round. First of all have you made sure your timing is as good as theirs? Have you honed to perfection that moment when you push the horse on a little, or hold back?
You have to have ‘body awareness’, not just your own, one needs to know where the horse is at any given time too, when are you going to need peripheral vision? When will your eyes need to be entirely focused? Indeed are you capable of remaining focused for several minutes, being fully ‘in the flow’, allowing no distractions?, How do you think you will need to use your energy? Many people forget to breathe when they feel under any sort of stress at all, their pulse rate goes sky high which sends the horse’s pulse rate up the same (Scientific tests have proven this!) Can you handle your emotions when the pressure is on? Certainly we can attempt to ‘model’ exceptional performances, but we’ll never make it work without understanding all the facets that bring the performance together.
I believe part of the issue is that some equine academics distrust Monty Roberts’ popularity with the public, this coupled with the success of the Intelligent Horsemanship courses, is pushing just a tiny band not to think entirely rationally. People who objectively study horsemanship and its teaching methods should be careful not to jump to the conclusion that because something (or someone) is ‘popular’ they are necessarily ‘without substance’. This would be as silly as imagining that all attractive women are stupid (comforting maybe, but not true).
In one horse book I read, written by a PhD, after explaining how ‘advance and retreat’ is ‘very stressful’ for a horse’ goes on to give an example of one of her case studies. She explains how a horse was frightened of a newsagent’s stand so she took the horse and the stand home and got the horse familiar with the object. Very sensible I would agree. However, she put the stand back at the newsagents and attempted to take the horse past and he shied at it again. This came as a great surprise to her and she concluded that it was because the headlines had been changed! It worries me that people might read this book and really believe this is in the least bit likely.
Any person who has been around horses a while know that horse’s need to generalise their learning. How many times have you heard ‘my horse will load in the trailer at home but won’t load at the show’ or ‘my horse jumps everything at home but when we go somewhere new it all goes wrong’? Precisely. To be fair this writer’s doctorate was in sheep not in horses but how are her readers to know that? If she had discussed her theories first with experienced horse people someone could have helped her come to a more logical conclusion. Instead we’re now going to have horsepeople ringing ahead when they ride to check what is written on signposts and billboards – checking the likelihood it could upset their horse.
Some of the scientific world still struggles with the concept of the emotional animal; after all, to have emotions one must have a sense of 'self' or 'I', which is one of the factors the scientists will often argue separates humans from animals; we have it, they don't. Therefore they are not emotional. While in the recent Horse and Rider article it was stated that horses don’t have the mental capacity to understand concepts - such as ‘trust’, ‘leadership’ and ‘respect’ and therefore ridicule someone saying ‘your horse doesn’t trust you’, those of us ‘in the field’ (often literally) know that working with the owner is perhaps even more important than working with the horse. I do discourage people saying things like their horse is, for instance, “naughty” or ‘deliberately making a fool of them’ because believing comments like that doesn’t help the owner improve matters. They don’t look into the whys of the behaviour, how in fact, if the owner makes a few simple changes in her behaviour her horse will improve in a quantum leap. I agree for scientific studies one needs strictly objective language but if it’s to benefit horse owners it’s got to be to enlighten rather than further confuse.
Surely if we have the horse and owner’s best interests at heart we can find a language that the owner can relate to and that benefits both the owner and the horse? As most horse owners aren’t trained in science speak I do believe it’s going to be heavy going in future if I’m not allowed to say ‘Well done we can all see how your horse is really trusting you over jumps and you both seem really confident now’. Instead I must say ‘The operant conditioning appears to have produced results, though not scientifically validated it would appear that neither you nor the subject are seeing the ‘jumps’ as an aversive stimulus at this moment in time.”
So come on you last remaining sceptics! Now is the perfect time for practical horsepeople to come out of their anti-scientific world and recognise the benefits that we could all offer our horses is we DID study what we do and how it really works, and scientists... come and see for yourselves how ‘learning the language of Equus’ really does work for the benefit of horses and their owners. Then let’s keep working together to continue to find measurable, workable solutions that are truly going to benefit horses and horse lovers alike; what do you say?
The Scientists Viewpoint – Is Horsemanship an Art or a Science?
Dr Veronica Fowler
Years of University education could not have prepared me for the day when my beloved mare could no longer be separated from her stable companion without the fear of injury to myself and her. Worry not I thought, I am a scientist, I have a distinction at MSc in Equine behaviour I CAN resolve this! The trouble was … I couldn’t! That is, not until I discovered the work of Monty Roberts and Kelly Marks
In my opinion, the most successful equine behaviourist would start with what current theory (and I say current as we must remember that scientific theory is ever evolving), tells them and then add experience and trial and error to suit individual horses needs. Unfortunately, this type of behaviourist is extremely rare. You usually find there are one of two options ‘university educated’ with little or no practical experience, or ‘practical’ with little or no theoretical understanding. I had the theoretical understanding but not the practical experience, hence me needing help. It was at this point someone mentioned ‘Intelligent Horsemanship’ established by Kelly Marks and mentored by Monty Roberts. I didn’t need to be a scientist to see that their techniques worked and I wanted to know more.
I enrolled myself on the horse psychology workshop taught by Kelly Marks and was pleasantly surprised to not only to be acting out both positive and negative reinforcement (something we never did at university) but also being taught the practical application of our current understanding of horse psychology. I was in awe, an organisation which not only understood the theory but also knew how to put it into practice; I decided I had to be part of this organisation!
That was three years ago and not only am I am now proudly part of Intelligent Horsemanship as the horse psychology project supervisor but I can also say that with their practical guidance (thank you IH Recommend Trainer Sarah Weston), my horse is doing wonderfully well. Kelly Marks and Intelligent Horsemanship are probably one of the few that recognise the need for the synergy between scientist and practical behaviourists and have pioneered this synergy by incorporating science into their studies and teachings in order to advance our understanding of equine behaviour. Students are taught not only the how (practical horsemanship) but also the why (science theory). Recently under guidance of scientists such as myself, Intelligent Horsemanship have begun to scientifically validate their methods in order to understand how and why they work, something which has never been done before. For example, recently we have undertaken a study investigating the science of a bad loader and its resolution. This study was the first in a line of many which has combined scientists and practical behaviourists and it is clear from the results what we can learn by such proactive relationships.
As scientists we all know the theory of our chosen subject area but do we really know how to effectively put this theory into practice? This is a question which has troubled me for a number of years. It is of my belief that every scientist instead of reaching for their text book companion which has helped them through university, should in fact be reaching for the nearest practical horseman in order to further their understanding. Theories are ever evolving and just because they are considered as ‘fact’ does not necessarily mean that they won’t change. Horses are not computers or phones or even TVs that when they go wrong you can reach for the convenient ‘trouble shooting page’ and work your way through a standard set of instructions to resolve the problem. They are living animals and have ‘minds of their own’.
For every single behavioural problem there are hundreds of possible reasons for the behaviour and perhaps hundreds of possible solutions. Who is going to get to the solution first, those that use theory or those that use practical experience? I would put my money on the practical horseman any day. Through my own experiences theoretical knowledge can never prepare you for the body language and timing required to positively communicate with a horse, only experience can provide you with this. Can you then imagine the progress we could make if scientists and practical horsemen worked together?
For More Information on courses in Horse Psychology courses with Intelligent Horsemanship go to www.intelligenthorsemanship.co.uk or ring 01488 71300
I have decided that I will avoid the contentious topics from now on and just read the more trivial fun-type threads!
