The Four Models

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In this post I will introduce the basics, the things that, to me, are absolutely fundamental to my philosophy of horsemanship. I call them the Four Models of Horsemanship, they are the result of a lifetime of working with animals and human beings and observing how the two species interact, to me they explain everything, all the problems, all the behaviours and all the success of our history together over the years. So let’s get started, first of all I better explain what I mean by a model.

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Who is really training your horse?

Horse training 24/7

One of my horses is a thoroughbred chestnut gelding who is socially low-ranking within the herd. I have a problem with him, and the problem is:

All the other horses in the herd keep training him to move his feet! Read more »

Anthropomorphic Addiction

This article is about addiction. But please don’t be put off. It is about one of the most common addictions in the world, an addiction suffered by probably 99% of all people that work with animals and certainly, almost everyone who doesn’t. Like all addictions it is very powerful (addictive) because it is very rewarding – and sadly, like all addictions, it is very damaging not only to ourselves, but also to those around us. This addiction costs us billions every year, globally it has spawned multi-billion dollar industries to feed our passions, on a personal level, it frequently consumes all our time, our relationships and our resources. Our passion and fascination with this addiction can last a lifetime and many of us are prepared to devote our lives to the pursuit of the pleasure that it gives us. Read more »

A Sad Story

Here’s a sad story, overheard in a feed store.

“This woman got a horse and so she decided to give it a work out . What it needs, she thought, is a good old lungeing session over jumps etc. (make the bu***r work). But she worked it so hard it aborted the foal it was carrying, but it was OK because she didn’t even know it was pregnant!” Read more »

Stripping down the horse

Imagine your horse lives at the center of three concentric circles or better yet, spheres and imagine if you can that your horse is imprisoned inside these two outer shells. These shells are curved and semi-opaque and therefore distort what is inside. You can travel inside them at will but your horse is trapped, this is because these two shells are human inventions and under the control of humans, only the human can create them or destroy them through choice. Read more »

Dressage: The art of conflict?

Sorry for not posting anything recently I’ve been away, studying, – and this might surprise you, the world of dressage. For those of you that are natural horse-keeping enthusiasts you may think that dressage is about as far away doing things based on a natural model as it was possible to get, and you’d be right, certainly from a utility model and competition perspective; if you were to imagine a scale with natural horse-keeping and natural horsemanship principles at one end, where the horse is respected first and foremost as a horse then it would not be unreasonable to put dressage which is all too often about submission and compliance of the horse, as close to the opposite end of the scale as it was possible to get. Read more »

What is a Horse?

This is the simplest of questions and yet it is often something that people who have spent a lifetime with horses cannot answer. Even career, equine professionals, with forty years experience behind them cannot answer this question, – and yet of all the things a horse owner must understand about a horse THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING! It is quite simply, the key to understanding everything your horse does, it is the key to your relationship, it is the key to a long happy and healthy life for you and your horse it is, – the key to everything…. Read more »

How Long does a Horse Live?

Simple enough question I suppose but finding the answer is not at all easy. We could more properly ask what is the average longevity of the horse or what is the lifespan of the horse? Or we could be really brave and ask what is the potential lifespan of a horse? The short answer to that one, I’ve found out, after researching over several years, is basically a lot longer than we think. Read more »

The Equine Natural Rug – not an Advert!

There is a Better Rug for your Horse! The Equine Natural.

This rug features all the technology developed over millions of years of research and refinement. The Equine Natural gives your horse a rug that is: Read more »

What is an Ethogram?

My second principle of natural horse keeping states:

We base or relationship on the ethogram of the horse. That means

Life in a herd, a life full of natural movement, a diet that closely relates to the natural fiber based diet and barefoot .

The first thing about this principle that you might want to understand is, what is an ethogram? Read more »

Horse Manure can be Interesting! – Honest

This post is in response to some correspondence I’ve been having on on of the ‘paddock paradise’ websites. It is a site for people who keep their horses on a track based system. The initial issue was raised by a lady in Florida who was having trouble with her horses leaving large amounts of droppings in certain areas of her track and this was becoming a nuisance, especially in hot weather.

Now while it might be rather sad to spend one’s evenings discussing horse manure on a transatlantic basis, really this seemingly simple problem is the starting point for some really interesting discussion and observation about the lives of horses, (trust me! – it is…:-). Read more »