by Polarn » Fri Oct 12, 2012 2:32 pm
Just has to coment on the horse thing, to break horses by weighing them down, restraining legs etc has been proven by a massive amount of studies and research to be far less successful than training a young, or rescue, using positive reinforcement. Eddie my quarter who came here a baby has never felt a whip (I don't even own one), the other nine here no longer had to even those I know comes from regular riding schools where they use em. Non of the horses here has bit or kicked anyone so far. I've been pushed into the bathtub they have to drink from once though when Eddie was a baby and still small enough to play with me.
Both Eddie and Goldie (a paint) is being ridden in competitions with good results. Breaking a horse in rather than trainin it is in my eyes taking an easy route that will more often than not create a vicious circle of a constant dominance struggle rather than a horse knowing it is more rewarding to do what you ask from it than not. We have a neighboring farm who breaks their horses in using old outdated methods, and just the simple fact that all 10 of our horses comes when called when we're taking them in while he has to chase them around should tell him something (since he sees this daily) about what methods are the most effective, besides the fact that not even once has any of his horses beaten ours in a competition and usually because they get disqualified for the horses doing something out of discomfort from carrying a rider, showing behaviors that they doesn't really want a rider there.
And in parallel to this (since most horse trainers has accepted breaking horses being less effective) I can't help but get annoyed from times seeing how people basically break their parots, clipping and flooding.
