Part2 Equine Body Lang. Study, Train Horse to Pick Up Feet

Part Two.

In this video, a yearling stud colt is taught to have his feet handled for the first time. Patrick was rescued from a neglectful home and is a very introverted, unconfident baby. He now lives at Equine Outreach Horse Rescue and is available for adoption.

The video's narrator discusses Patrick's body language during the training session. The orientation of his ears and eyes, tension in his muscles, flexion at the pole, stance, and movement all give indications as to the mental and emotional progress Patrick makes as he learns to allow someone to handle his feet. The narrator illuminates these changes for the viewer and explains how they are indicative of positive or negative changes in Patrick's comfortability with having his feet handled.

Patrick receives a click and treat for positive changes in his behavior. Initially, the handler is mainly looking for Patrick to rest his leg in her hand, rather than pulling it away. As Patrick becomes more comfortable letting her hold his leg, the handler asks Patrick to allow her to hold his leg for a longer duration. Ultimately, Patrick allows her to hold his leg long enough to receive multiple clicks and treats - a huge accomplishment for Patrick's first session of hoof training.

The video is 12 minutes long and split into two sections for YouTube.

If you like the video, please leave a comment and a positive rating. It helps the video to show up better in search results. Thanks!

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• hoof
• horse+training
• clicker+training
• natural+horsemanship
• yearling
• stud+colt
• foot+work
• young+horse
• pick+up+feet
• body+language
• horse+communication
• horse+behavior
• horse+psychology
• RBI
• right brain introvert

[abirdslife]

Very good job!

[welcometopemberley]

Thank you!

[cowgirl77m]

Great video! WOW how refreshing to see a competent handler TEACHING the horse to allow his feet to be handled vs the standard cause pain grab the foot and hang on approach. So many people don't take the time to TEACH the horse to have their feet handled. I appreciate your approach you are very insightful and I like your quiet respectful handling style, and the positive reward conditioning. Focusing on what you want instead of 'getting after him' when he is confused or "acting up". Great job!

[welcometopemberley]

Thanks! I really dislike the "just grab it and hang on" approach too. We did this 3 times for 15 minutes with Patrick and he stood great for his first trim. That was all the hoof handling he'd ever had and had only been halter trained for about 3 days when we started the hoof work. He came to the rescue as a yearling. He and his 5 siblings were all feral. It was a super fun project and I'm glad to be able to share it with everyone. Thanks for your great comment!

[slayershayne]

nice vid whats its name?

[welcometopemberley]

The video's name? Equine Body Language Study, Training a Horse to Pick Up His Feet :) The horse is named Patrick.

Thanks for your comment!

[pummy369]

Man would I love to just hang out with you and your horse for a while and watch and learn. Please do more videos for beginning students (of the human variety)and also on understanding horse body language. I'm not confident in all the videos available on-line but I feel confident in what you are presenting here. I like your gentle and patient manner with the horse and his response to you and would like learn more from you. You're a good role model and teacher. Keep up the videos.

[BigDreamsComing]

I love the approach you have towards horses and how you know their behavior so well! I'd love to see more posts on learning behaviors and things for beginners!

You inspire me!

[evanswelsh]

That's a lot to accomplish in 10 minutes. I bet it felt like forever, tho!

[welcometopemberley]

Yes, I was really interested in showing the small changes in the horse's body language here rather than showing people how to do foot work. I'll make another video for foot work showing how to use the demo horse, because that's really the way to go :) I thought this was a great video to see how a right brain introvert improves during a training session. RBI horses make such slight changes that they can be hard to see, but if you know what to look for, you can reward them and lessen frustration.