The time it takes for your horse to learn a new trick will depend on several things. These include age, temperament, attitude and previous training (both yours and the horse’s).
How long to learn a trick?
Also horses are very much like people in that they learn at different speeds and they find some things easier or more enjoyable than others.
It’s easy to teach a horse two or three simple tricks. Holding a treat in a certain position will tempt most horses to do simple things like drop their heads or give you a hug – they are just following the treat. But if you really want to increase communication with your horse and teach them more complicated tricks you need to teach them to actively work to learn a trick. This makes it possible to teach them just about anything.
Working out a trick
Active learning is a stage a horse gets to where they understand that you want them to do something and they will try really hard to work out what that is. For example when I first taught Trigger to follow me backward by pulling (very gently) on his tail he initially didn’t understand what I wanted. At first he actually pulled away from me. (Pulling away from pressure is a natural response for a horse). However because Trigger and I now have an excellent system of communication he will keep trying different things until I tell him that he has done the right thing.
When I first tried the tail pulling trick he tried pulling against me, then he tried stepping sideways, then stepping sideways in the other direction, then standing still but I just stood there and he kept trying. Finally he stepped backward and I told him this was the right thing to do.
Loading ...