Artistic Science

thatoddplace:

equinevetadventures:

equine-awareness:

apha4me:

equine-awareness:

apha4me:

equine-awareness:

“Your horse didn’t wake up in the morning and consciously decide to do something that day because he knows it will piss you off. He’s not a bad seed, or inherently an evil animal sent to torture you and make your life hell. If your trainer tells you that he’s a bad horse, you need to get a new trainer.

Here are some options for why a horse is misbehaving, and this is by no means all inclusive. He is in pain. He is worried. He is scared. He doesn’t understand what you’re asking. You haven’t explained it well. He doesn’t believe that it’s possible. He doesn’t know that he can do that with his body.

He’s having a bad day. His lifestyle doesn’t suit him. He’s tired. He feels under appreciated. Your aids are too harsh. Your aids are ineffective. Your balance is upsetting him. He had a bad experience with this in the past. He learned this behavior from someone else. He’s nervous. He has no self confidence. You’re nervous. You’re tight. Every time he tries, you accidentally punish him. He doesn’t have the strength. A plastic bag/leaf/dog/car/gust of wind just blew by and he didn’t notice it until it was right there and super scary. He feels good! He feels fresh. It’s a little cold outside. He’s been in the stall for fourteen hours straight. He is having fun.”

Kate Samuels, ‘Bad’ Behavior Is Not A Character Flaw

And then there are some horses that are just assholes.

There aren’t horses that are just “assholes.” Horses “misbehave” because they have been conditioned to behave that way usually on accident, their needs aren’t being met, or for some other reason. Horses don’t have a concept of being bad just to piss you off or for the sake of being bad. They always have a reason behind the things they do, and it always has to do with what they think is best for themselves.

Sure. If you say so. As someone that has seen babies come out and just be rank and continue to be so no matter what type of training is used. I truly believe that some horses just come out wrong. I also believe that some horses have an almost human-like ability to reason and problem solve because I’ve witnessed it with my own eyes. Are ALL bad horses just “Bad?” No. Absolutely not, most are just reacting to the hand that they’ve been dealt or are simply smarter than their owners. If you say that horses don’t have a concept of being bad you haven’t met a truly dangerous horse or haven’t been around enough horses. 

Believing that horses reason like humans is a really bad mindset to have. It’s only going to cause problems in your training because you’re going to apply anthropomorphic reasoning to your horse’s completely different behavior (like thinking a horse is behaving just to be an “asshole” for instance). Horses don’t just come out bad. They have different personalities, energy levels, life experiences, etc that shape their behavior. The way they behave has nothing to do with you, really, it only has to do with them behaving in a way they see appropriate to keep themselves safe, happy, and comfortable. 

Dangerous horses are the way they are because of bad human handling, or lack of a healthy environment to live in. I’ve never seen a horse who’s mental and physical needs were met, and was trained in a non-mentally damaging way turn out to be aggressive or dangerous. Like I said, horses only behave in a way they see fit to keep themselves safe, happy, and comfortable. A dangerous horse has learned that their dangerous behavior gets them what they feel that they need (whether that’s away from humans, to get food, to run back to their herd, to get away from a scary situation, something is hurting him and he’s trying to evade the pain, etc). They don’t do it because they woke up that day and decided they wanted to try and make you mad for no reason. to think they have the mental capacity to even think that way is to be truly uneducated on basic horse behavior and cognition.

“He is in pain.”

Just to let you know that a high percentage of horses that I’ve seen with complicated lameness issues and pain have a range of behaviours that for the normal owner scream “misbehaviour” but that actually are caused by pain. Assuming the horse is an “asshole” isn’t going to help them or you. I’ve seen countless cases when trainers gave up and advised the vet to look at it, just for us to find the horse was in pain all along.

Not only lameness issues can cause pain. I’ve also seen a number of horse with a painful eye condition named Equine Recurrent Uveitis in which, after the removal of the affected eye the owner reports “(S)He is a different horse now/ I have my old friend back”. We know pain can make people bitter and dysfunctional. A lot of horses will show pain signs before rearing, striking, etc. The problem is that most owners have no idea of pain looks like on a horse, and even though research is underway, we still need to learn a lot more about it.

Also, keep in mind that we know very little about neurogepathic pain (pain related to the nerves), for example, about Idiopathic hopping-like forelimb lameness syndrome or trigeminal-mediated headshaking. I’m sure a fair number of horses that are considered “bad” are actually suffering from problems that we can’t/aren’t able to diagnose and treat.

I have just 2 cents that come to mind after reading this:

Cent 1 - We don’t know all of the things bc no matter how good you are with horses or how many or how long you have been around them, you aren’t actually inside their heads. You don’t know what they are feeling, we can’t even agree on what emotions they have, let alone how their idiopathic pain feels

Cent 2 - taking this into account, you may never really know what the horse does the thing. It might be in pain, maybe you accidentally conditioned a response, or maybe it is just an asshole. Animals have personalities (I’ll fight anyone who says otherwise) and it is reasonable to suggest that some animals are more prone to fucking us around than others. Maybe they just have stronger, more violent reactions to stimuli, maybe they dislike you.

We won’t know why the thing happens unless it is bloody obvious.

So maybe just keep an open mind when looking at ‘behavioural’ problems

If a horse seems like an asshole to you, then you probably shouldn’t be near a horse until you get a new mind set. I won’t deny the exception of a mischievous spirit, but I will deny the fact that a horse would do something “mean” for the sake of being mean.

Animals do not hold human morality. You should not place such expectations upon them.

(via justvetthings)