I had a major breakthrough just now. I was out training Sonny and I decided to try turns on the HQs. Now to appreciate what I’m about to say, you have to understand that Sonny takes Opposition reflex to an art form. I have tried for years to get him to yield his front end to no avail. He’s happy to move his HQs but any attempt to move his front end round resulted in him charging forward. Today I just applied gentle pressure on his shoulder and he soon caught on to what I wanted. I at first, just asked for a hoof moved over to the side. He started off with small moves, and yes sometimes he did try moving forward but he wasn’t charging, he was experimenting, but as soon as Sonny caught on to what I wanted he was moving that front end for me quite happily and those HQs stayed planted. (I didn’t even have to ask for that, as long as the front end moved in the desired direction I was happy.) So this brought up the question, why does Clicker Training make horses more responsive to pressure? The answer, at least my take on it, is that when you just go out and start asking your horse to move around, he thinks your just bullying him around senselessly, and resents it, thus the opposition reflex. However, when you add the clicker, the horse doesn’t mind you asking him to move around because, a. the clicker changes the way you ask, b. he knows he’s going to get something out of it, and therefore doesn’t mind you asking for things.
Now that probably doesn’t make alot of sense, but I just wanted to jot it down before I forgot.
