Teaching a Reactive Horse to Think Through Problems on His Way to a Safer Life, Part One

By Mary Gallagher

Does your horse look to you for leadership?

The reactive horse generally does not, and that’s why we can learn a lot on the subject from teaching a reactive horse to respond in situations with confidence rather than react in fear.

Recently I had the opportunity to work with a horse that did not look to the human for leadership—not his owners, and certainly not me, when we first met. He was what you would call ‘over the top’—scared of just about everything, scared of his environment, and prone to avoiding any connection with humans—to the point of developing some truly dangerous behaviors. He would easily get out of control, spooking and bolting while being handled, snorting and acting totally checked out. His head carriage tended to be extremely high, and he’d be focusing and fully absorbed far out into the distance, ready to bolt (again) at any moment. Not a safe horse to handle.

So here he was, and I needed a plan. I returned to a diagram I have developed over the years (some of you may remember it from earlier blog posts), The Optimal Teaching Gauge. (I used to call it The Leadership Gauge.) It lays out where the sweet spot can be found between the human and the horse, with a range of behaviors to either side. It’s an assessment tool and a sort of compass for planning how to work with a particular horse, while developing your own leadership.

The optimal teaching environment can be achieved through a bit of informed planning. See my original blog post explaining the gauge for the full story.

Using the diagram to assess. Applying my own method, I observed this gelding at some length. This horse clearly lived on the right side of the diagram—unconfident and checked out. It was like he was on constant adrenaline and had no skills to get off the fear trip. An imaginary needle pointing at ‘unconfident’ could instantly drop straight into ‘DANGER: Fear’, bringing all the risky behaviors described above. So I realized that this very reactive horse needed schooling in thinking through problems, which would naturally move that needle away from the danger zone, and toward that sweet environment of connection, communication, and cooperation.

Making and implementing a plan. So I set about creating an environment for my trainee in which I could engage his mind and keep myself safe. By the way, I knew his behavior wasn’t his fault at all, or his people’s. He had been raised elsewhere in an institutional environment and had very little life experience or behavioral training. He was just stuck in reacting to a world he hadn’t learned to understand or engage. He needed to go all the way back to the beginning. And I needed to keep myself safe while he did! I told the owners I thought we should restart him.

First off, I wanted his head to come down and become more grounded. So right away I created an obstacle course in his pen. I distributed 16’ rails, tires, cones, an old wood post, and feed pans until he couldn’t take more than a step or two without minding his feet. No more mindless racing from one end of the pen to the other for this one! Every foot placement needed to be calculated or there was an immediate consequence if his mind was elsewhere. (See a short video with an example.)

No mindless steps possible in this pen...!

Catching this horse could be a real chore. But no more. Now, when I went into his pen to catch him there were the above-mentioned consequences for avoiding me. The more effort he put into not being caught, the tougher the consequences became, and best of all, I did very little besides watch for the learning to happen. Remarkably soon, catching him became a calm and quiet event.

Conclusion of Part One. When a horse expends energy in reacting to stimuli, it accelerates the heart and brings the emotions and the adrenaline up. By presenting problems for him to solve, we can proactively engage his mind in a manner that is safe for him and us, his handlers. This gelding was now ready to learn. Having engaged his mind through his feet in his pen, going forward I needed strong boundaries and a safe environment to work in outside that limited space.

To be continued: How I created a safe environment and strong boundaries to continue working with this reactive horse.

For further reading: I recommend my original blog posts outlining the development of the Gauge -

The Horse, The Environment, and You (Part One)

The Leadership Gauge (Part Two of 'The Horse, The Environment, and You)