What should I be doing with my young, green horse?

I grew up under the traditional training style of "push them through it". And when I first started out riding, training and breaking professionally there was always that initial stage that "we just need to get through" and then they would be fine.

You know what that stage is?

Learning how to learn!!!

It isn't natural for horses to be ridden. They don't inherently just know what is being asked of them and how they are supposed to respond to leg and bit pressure. And then add to that the stress, overwhelm and frustration of trying to figure out what the human wants, is it any wonder we see big behavioural problems in young and green horses?

There is a better way!!!

And that way is games!!! Just as I have to teach my students how to cue: guide the behaviour, mark the behaviour, motivate the behaviour, so too do the horses have to learn that process as well! And what better way for them to learn it than in a stress, pressure free environment of just playing together rather than the high performance, high pressure environment of getting broken to saddle.

I love using games with all behavioural issues from arena sour problems, to herd bound separation anxiety problems to stubbornnness and everything in between. Because it is just such a flick of the switch for them from what they are used to in the normal high pressure training environments. And its good for us too!!