Communicating to the Horse With Body Language

To Face You Fully and Latch On (Continued)

Incidentally, it's important to side-note here that whenever a horse is pointing their hind end toward you, that is a big sign of disrespect on their part, and is also about not accepting/respecting you as their leader. If a horse ever turns a hind end toward you like that (in or out of the round pen), use the above-described method to insist with increased pressure that the hind end move away from you, and the head toward you. A lower pecking order horse in a herd would never dream of turning a hind end toward a higher pecking order horse or a lead mare, without paying dire consequences, so staying consistent with your respect expectations will get a horse there faster in respecting you and acknowledging you as their competent and confident leader. So remember that in this round penning exercise, as well! Add pressure to the horse when the hindquarters are facing you; remove the pressure when they pivot the hindquarters away from you and face up to you.

Very quickly the horse begins to conclude that the area closest to you is the least pressure spot, as well as the safest spot.

Pressure is released when the horse pivots the hindquarters away and faces me.

Make your body posture less threatening as the horse first approaches.

If the horse feels safe, the distance quickly closes.

Here is another angle of the horse's latch-on approach. Generally, the horse will begin to approach you closer and closer at this point, because the horse has learned that the areas closest to you are actually where the pressure comes off of them. And all horses learn from the release of pressure what it is you want, not from the pressure itself.

 

The horse comes in closer and joins up!

 

If a horse is not wanting to come in too close at first, but still remains facing you, there is a way to encourage the horse to come in closer: Once the horse is consistently facing you at the stop, and beginning to pivot to remain facing you at all times, you then build upon that by next, again, walking parallel to their hindquarters, making the kissing noise, directing with your hands, and again they pivot to keep facing you, but in essence, they now are starting to technically make a circle around you. Reminder: I only kiss when they are not moving as requested; the second they move the hindquarters away, the kissing pressure stops/is released immediately. The minute they shift those hindquarters away, my rope hand drops limp to my side (release of pressure) along with the kissing stopped. When the horse does what you want, quit asking, go more passive! Quickly the horse learns to come to the farther-away-from-him free hand more, push the hindquarters away from that rope pressure hand. (See photo series below):

Making a kissing noise while asking the horse's hindquarters to pivot away and the head to come toward you encourages the horse to walk forward toward you.

The horse comes in closer and closer by my asking the hindquarters to disengage and the head to remain facing me, as I walk toward and parallel to the hindquarters. The horse is beginning to follow, head forward, hindquarters away.

Before long, they are pivoting/turning circles around and around you, but always remaining facing you respectfully, hindquarters moving away as you step toward the back, and you are walking that circle together, you the leader, the horse, the follower. Soon, you need no pressure cues at all, and where you go, the horse pivots, turns and keeps his head facing you. Life is easy here for him, because no pressure is on the horse when he does this. Just follow and life is easy!

With your body language, and a kissing noise, ask the horse's hindquarters to move away and the head to remain facing you. Walk toward the rear of the horse, parallel to the hindquarters when asking for this.

 

The horse will pivot the hindquarters and turn to keep facing you.

 

Walk repeatedly in a circle in the direction of the horse's hindquarters, asking with your rope hand for the hindquarters to pivot, disengaging the hindquarters (the horses's inside hind leg crosses under/in front of the outside hind leg). The horse is beginning to understand how to follow your lead at every turn.

 

 

Turn and ask the hindquarters to pivot on the other side of the horse, as well. If the horse crowds too close, bump the horse off of you with your elbow. This is about teaching respectful following behavior, and over-crowding is not respectful of your lead mare body space.

 

Here are more photos asking the horse to pivot and remain facing me, in essence: the beginning of following the leader:

 

 

At this point, the horse fully understands the new game and you begin to make the circles wider and wider (careful not to lose them by going too big a circle at first! Baby step increments here!) and quickly they are indeed following you, increasingly in submissive, head-down mode. And at this point you can begin to walk a straight line, perform a zig-zagging pattern, and they remain latched on, will follow you anywhere, at liberty. If they at any time bolt out of this following spot, they will simultaneously get sent, as before, with rope tossed towards the back feet. Remember, when the horse is following you submissively: have no eye-to-eye contact, and your shoulders or back are turned away from the horse – pressure off! Life is good here!

The horse is now following wherever I go, perfectly joined up/latched on via an invisible lead rope!

Why This Works to Set Down Leadership/Follower Foundation

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