Episode 307: Through Their Eyes: A Horse’s View on Group Riding

Episode 307_ Through Their Eyes_ A Horse’s View on Group Riding.mp3: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

Episode 307_ Through Their Eyes_ A Horse’s View on Group Riding.mp3: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Speaker1:
When other horses come within 20ft. 15ft. Ten feet. The distance is going to be different depending on the horse, but for Luna, that’s about 15ft. The question that Luna is asking as that horse comes inside of her bubble is what should I do?

Speaker2:
Podcasting from a little cabin on a hill. This is the Stacy Westfall podcast. Stacy’s goal is simple to teach you to understand why horses do what they do, as well as the action steps for creating clear, confident communication with your horses.

Speaker1:
Hi, I’m Stacy Westfall and I’m here to help you understand, enjoy and successfully train your own horses. In this episode, I’m answering a listener question about riding in groups of horses. Let’s listen to the question.

Speaker3:
Hi Stacy, it’s Ross here. I was fascinated with your the recent podcast. Um, when you went out with five riders, because that’s from going from 1 to 2 back to one and then going out with five. It changes the dynamics quite a lot. And I was sort of intrigued with that. How you how Luna coped with that. Because some horses want to, you know, when they’re two of you, there’s always one in the front. But it’s not not an issue. But once you’ve got five horses and one, you know, and what the other horses are like. But did you pick did you pick the people that you went out with? Did you pick the terrain where you were going? I’m just wondering how you worked out, worked it out with five of you because people tend to talk and it was just fascinating. Perhaps you could answer that question. That would be great. Thanks very much, Stacy. Bye.

Speaker1:
Thanks for the question, Ross. In case you haven’t listened to the most recent episodes in this question, Ross is referencing episode 304 of this podcast. During that podcast, I was sharing that I had just started trail riding my horse Luna. The first time I went out alone, just myself and Luna. The next time I went out with my husband Jesse and his horse. Then I went out alone again. And then I went out in a group of six, five other horses, plus Luna. To answer your question, Ross, here are six things that I was considering when I was preparing to do this. Number one, I was considering my at home evaluations how she was responding to me. Number two, I was reflecting on my on the trail evaluations from those three trail rides I had done. Number three, I was making predictions based on the information I had gathered. I was making predictions on what I thought might happen, and I was creating plans for that. Number four, I was actively communicating with the other riders before we even started. Number five, I was actively communicating with the riders while we were riding. And then number six, this is a biggie. I was evaluating myself during the ride as much as I was evaluating Luna. Now, if I wanted to summarize all of that in one sentence, I would say it like this. How much can I see this ride from Luna’s point of view and create solutions for what I think might happen? Let me say it again.

Speaker1:
Here’s what I was trying to answer before I went on the ride. How much of this can I see from my horse’s point of view and create solutions for what I think might happen? So let’s go back through those six points that I mentioned in a little more detail. The first two points were number one, my at home evaluation, how she’s responding to me in my normal everyday environment, which is my indoor arena. And number two, my on the trail evaluation. Did she stay consistent when I took her on the trail with how she’s responding to me in the arena? And if not, how did things change? Now, if you want to know the details about that, I actually went into great detail on that back in episode 303 of this podcast. That’s where I was actually out on Luna’s first trail ride, explaining what I was noticing the same or different. After that trail ride, I had two more trail rides where I essentially repeated that type of an evaluation. And I also gave Luna more experience by simply putting in more miles out on the trails, because there’s a gap between episode 303, her very first trail ride, and this one I’ll share with you that on those additional trail rides before the group ride on both of those rides, I chose to lead her from my house up the road to the trail, but then I mounted and rode the whole time without dismounting.

Speaker1:
I still had the equipment with me in case I wanted to lead her. She was wearing a halter. I had a lead rope. I was carrying a dressage whip, but I didn’t feel the need to dismount on either of those other trail rides. And that’s important, because if I had felt the desire to dismount, I would have honored it. But because I didn’t feel that urge to dismount, it’s actually a part of the report card. It’s not that staying on is the important thing. The important thing is I didn’t feel the desire to dismount. So that feedback loop from my own body about how safe I was feeling was 100% in line with what I was doing. I felt safe, so I stayed mounted. I wasn’t suppressing the desire to dismount, so that tells me that I really fully felt safe to be riding her. This actually plays a part in number three, my predictions and my plans for how I’m going to go on this large group trail ride. So my prediction number one before I headed out on the trail was I might feel safer walking at some point. So again, on this group trail ride, I had everything with me in case I wanted to dismount. Prediction number two Luna might have a reaction to other horses coming inside of her space or her bubble, and that prediction was based on evidence of her doing that in the arena.

Speaker1:
So I had noticed that if another horse came within 20ft, within 15ft, within ten feet, as they got closer to her body, I could feel her having a response to that. So that helped me predict that I might need a plan for that. I’m going to come back to this in just a minute. Number four, I was actively communicating with the other riders before we started, so I told the other riders who, to answer your question, are also friends of mine. I told them that I was taking Luna and that she had only been out on a handful of other rides, and that I might end up leading her. So that communication, before we even started out from the barn made it more normalized that, hey, this is what I’m dealing with, and these are some of the things you might see me choose to do, and I find that very helpful, because then I’ve already broken the ice with what’s going on. Then number five, I was actively communicating while riding. I had the least experienced horse of the group, although there was another one that was still pretty green, hadn’t been out very often, and we individually chose the order we wanted to ride out in. We put a more experienced horse in the lead and a more experienced horse in the back, but then we changed the order throughout the ride.

Speaker1:
We were out there for about two hours and we kept changing the order that we were in. So at one point I was second to the last, and then for a while I was at the end. And then I worked my way up through the group, and for a while we led, and then I would switch back and move back through the group of horses. So that required a lot of active communication, which again, I’m going to talk a little bit more about in just a minute. And then number six, evaluating myself as much as Luna during the trail ride. This is a big one. I think that oftentimes riders focus solely on the horse. They will make lots of observations about the horse’s behavior, but they’ll often miss their own part in it. So if you head out on a trail ride in a group and you feel tension, and it seems like that tension is coming from you reacting to the way your horse is behaving. So let’s make up an example. Your horse is nervous and wanting to prance, and then you feel tense because your horse is nervous and prancing. Even though it might seem like the horse started it, you’re still a part of the equation. So oftentimes the horse that starts out a little nervous or a little anxious has that problem, compounded by a rider that just keeps looking at the horse’s behavior without acknowledging what’s happening in their own body.

Speaker1:
So if you do start to notice that tension is creeping into you while you’re in a situation like that, do you have a plan for it? What I find is that oftentimes the thing that you might run into on the trail, nervousness or tension, is probably something that you have experienced in the arena, even if it’s only a 10% version of it. If you think it might happen, have a plan for it. So if you think you might be out on the trail and your horse might start to act differently and that might make you feel nervous or tense, what is your plan for addressing that tension? It could be something as simple as noticing it and taking a deep breath. Or that could just be step one of many that you’ve outlined before you even head out there. So again, evaluating myself as much as I was evaluating Luna is a huge piece of my ability to create success in writing in a large group of horses. Now, let’s just pretend that something happens out on the trail and you didn’t think of it ahead of time and you didn’t have anything planned, then what you are forced to do at that moment is do your best, and then create a plan that includes that new thing later. But what I also want to remind you of is don’t pretend that your nervousness is a new thing.

Speaker1:
If you notice that you tend to get nervous with changes in the arena. So if you tend to get nervous, admit it and come up with a plan for how you will handle it because it will probably happen on the trail too. And the better you get at handling those things that you kind of wish you could pretend didn’t happen, that’s actually not a plan. Pretending is not a great plan. The better you get at planning for those uncomfortable feelings that you don’t like, but you also know could happen. That’s when you’ll actually begin to come up with a better plan for how to handle those things in the arena or at home, as well as on the trail. So a couple of the specific questions that you asked, Roz were, did I pick the people that I went out with? And the answer is yes. And did I pick the terrain that I was going on? Yes. I went on the same trails that I had been on when I had taken Luna out before. So we already knew the trails. I already knew the people, and although they were on horses that I didn’t know, we were openly communicating. Now let’s go all the way back to point number one, my at home evaluation and one of the predictions I said that I made based on the way Luna was behaving in the indoor arena. I mentioned that Luna had been reacting to other horses in her space.

Speaker1:
So what I had noticed was that at home in my arena, when horses got within, let’s say 15ft of her, she would begin to feel different. She would begin to have a response or a reaction to them being inside of what feels like her bubble. In my world of being around lots and lots of young horses over the years, this is something that I consider normal in young or inexperienced horses. Remember my one sentence summary from earlier? How much of this can I see from Luna’s point of view and then create solutions? One reason that people often find riding in groups to be a challenge is because of what I’m about to explain, and I’m going to use Luna as the example. When other horses come within 20ft, 15ft, ten feet, the distance is going to be different depending on the horse. But for Luna, that’s about 15ft. The question that Luna is asking as that horse comes inside of her bubble is what should I do? A different way of phrasing that would also be who’s in charge? Or yet another way of phrasing that is, am I going to be attacked? Some horses, when another horse comes inside their bubble will have a response and the question will sound more like, should I drive this horse out of my bubble? Or do I need to defend myself? Or maybe it won’t even sound like a question.

Speaker1:
Maybe it will sound more like a fact I need to drive this horse out of my bubble. I need to keep myself safe. So these questions that horses ask sometimes don’t make sense to a lot of riders, because oftentimes the rider in this situation looks around the arena and sees a horse being ridden by a rider and another horse being ridden by another rider. But inexperienced horses often just see another horse. So I realize that when I’m riding Luna in my indoor arena and somebody comes within 15ft, she begins to ask very similar questions as what she would in the pasture. What does their presence within my space mean? So you might look around and see horses ridden by other riders, but the horse looks around and sees strange horse after strange horse, and that can bring up different things. One horse might feel vulnerable or unsure another horse might feel the need to take charge. I remember when I was growing up, we used to get together in large groups to ride from time to time, and we just assumed that horses were going to act up. We just assumed that some horses were going to kick, and some horses were going to try to bite, and you tried to position those in places where they wouldn’t get to kick anyone or wouldn’t get to bite anyone. And then we also just accepted that some horses might be nervous the entire ride.

Speaker1:
And then I remember as a teenager going to the Quarter Horse Congress when I was around college age, and I remember seeing hundreds of horses very close to each other. No kicking, no biting, no nervousness about being in each other’s space. And I was amazed. And I don’t know about you, but have you ever noticed that wherever you have this major awareness, this major light bulb moment? Have you ever noticed that wherever that Happened. You tend to remember that moment really clearly when you get near it again. So the Quarter Horse Congress happens about an hour from my house, but it only happens once a year, and it’s going on right now. And I was just watching the live stream yesterday, and while I was watching a group of horses in the ranch class lineup, I remembered that moment of awe, that moment when I first saw all these horses together, 100% comfortable being near each other. I remember that feeling of being amazed and wondering how. And now, on the other side, now I know how. Now I understand that as the horse learns to respond to the rider, their behavior around other horses comes in equal proportions. So as the horse that you’re riding learns more and more detailed responses to your cues, you are essentially answering their questions, you are directing them. So when the horse, like Luna, sees another horse come inside their bubble and she has the thought, what should I do? The more consistent she gets about responding to the rider, responding to the rider as her desire to respond to the rider gets stronger and stronger, it overrides her desire to make the independent decisions on how to respond.

Speaker1:
So what that means is that the horse that may have wanted to kick or bite learns that the rider is asking them to bend this direction, asking them to move their shoulder this direction, asking them to move their hip this direction, and in the answering of the rider’s questions to the horse, the horse begins to accept that the rider is the one making the decisions. This is very like the kid in the candy store analogy that I used a few podcasts ago. And what starts to happen is that the horse begins to realize that somehow the rider is keeping them safe. I imagine it like this. Luna does not understand how I’m able to keep horses from coming into her space. Luna does not understand that when I speak to another rider and I ask them to not come any closer. She doesn’t know how I keep that horse at a specific distance, but she begins to realize that when she’s with me, other horses aren’t attacking when she’s with me. Other horses aren’t threatening to kick when she’s with me. Other horses aren’t running into her. She doesn’t hear me communicating that with another rider. She doesn’t understand it.

Speaker1:
But what she does understand is that when she’s with me and being ridden, other horses that are in the arena with us don’t behave like horses in the pasture. Do So back to one of the questions that you asked Ross. I am picky about who I will ride my young or inexperienced horses with, because I want to control the horse’s experience. When I think back to all the years of being around horses, the two leading causes of riders not creating that environment that will help the horse have that type of experience tend to be number one. The rider’s inability to see the problem coming before it happens. So another word for that is inexperience. So maybe you don’t recognize that someone else doesn’t have their horse under control and then they’re out of control. Horse does reach out and bite your inexperienced horse. At that point, your horse will no longer believe that you have the ability to influence the environment. In that moment, that horse would be much more likely to feel the need to run, flee, or defend itself, because in that moment you’re not protecting the horse just from inexperience. And the second, or maybe the even the leading cause of this is the rider’s fear of offending another rider. So if you go out on a trail ride with people and you feel uncomfortable saying, could you stay further back? Or can we swap places so I can go further behind? Or if you feel embarrassed at the idea of getting off and walking with your horse, then that fear that you have of offending or appearing incompetent around another rider that will become another one of the problems that will change your ability to create a specific experience for your horse.

Speaker1:
And I mentioned it earlier, but sometimes if you’re inexperienced and you get in a situation that’s less than ideal, sometimes that just happens in life, and then you have to take that Experience and move forward with it. But many times these are more predictable than you might give yourself credit for. Because if you feel less than by looking at the challenges that other horses are having around you because you feel like you’re somehow judging another rider, or if you are afraid to say something like, can you stay further away? Or can we change positions so I can stay further away from you? A lot of times those are going to be things that you can notice happening in smaller versions. When you are in different environments. Before you head out on the trail ride. And remember, if you can see a little version of it, then you can make a plan for it. And the final piece of this question that I want to answer today is how Luna coped. And I’ll say it like this. She was consistent with what I’ve been observing. She did feed off the energy of being in a group of horses.

Speaker1:
So the questions that she asked, she had a little more energy than when she was alone or with one other horse. There was a little bit more energy and movement in her body, but this wasn’t a problem. So it was consistent with what I’ve been observing. And even though it was a little bit higher, it wasn’t a problem for me because I had already been riding her very proactively as opposed to reactively. Reactive is waiting until there’s a problem and then addressing it. So let’s say she speeds up, then I address it, she speeds up, then I address it proactively. Is addressing or handling or shaping the energy before it becomes a problem. So I mentioned it on a previous podcast. It’s not uncommon for me to be giving her more information every 3 to 5 steps during a trail ride. So I’m proactively shaping, handling, moving, shaping, handling, moving, shaping, handling, moving. I’m addressing things before they’re a problem, as opposed to waiting until there is a problem and then addressing it. And this way of writing reminds me of something they talk about in dressage, where they will talk about recycling energy, or they’ll talk about creating energy in the horse that flows from the hind end, comes through the body into the reins, and then is recycled by the rider back into the horse’s hind legs. So in dressage, there’s this idea that the hind end of the horse is the powerhouse, and it’s going to create energy that flows up over the back into the horse’s head and neck, into the reins.

Speaker1:
And then it’s the rider’s job to recycle that energy back through themselves, back to the horse’s hind legs. And that is consistent with this feeling that I’m talking about when I say I’m being proactive about handling or shaping the energy. And because that’s how I’ve already been riding her in the arena when I was the one creating the energy, and then out on the first trail ride when it was just myself and Luna, and then on the trail rides that followed where the trail or my husband being there, or the newness of the place. All of those things have the ability to create energy. But because I’ve been in this quick cycle of recycling, resetting, recycling, shaping, recycling, resetting, because I’ve been doing this every ride and every trail ride. When I went out in this larger group where the other horses were added to the mix and creating more energy, it didn’t really shake things up a lot. There was just a little more energy to shape. This would be a huge contrast or a completely different approach than if somebody had been riding out on the trail, doing as little as they could and only picking up when there was a problem. And what happens a lot of times there is that it might work when you are in a very quiet environment and you leave the horse alone essentially until you need to correct or change something and then you pick it up.

Speaker1:
But what happens in that situation is that when the energy level goes up, not just the energy level, but the frequency of you touching goes up. And oftentimes the horses react to that, especially if every time you pick up it feels like a correction. So if you were already proactively shaping very frequently on every ride, then when you go into a higher energy situation, that frequency doesn’t change. Now remember, my goal was to see this ride from Luna’s point of view and to create solutions for what I thought might happen. So the way I was riding at home was already congruent with the way that I was going to ride on the trail when there was that opportunity for a lot of things to be happening. My plan is to ride very intentionally and very actively for, let’s say, the next six months to a year. And by me doing that, very active, very intentional for the next six months to a year, that’s going to set Luna up for life. That’s what makes this heavy investment on the front end well worth what I will reap in the long term. Thanks for the question, Ross. That’s what I have for you this week. Thanks for listening and I’ll talk to you again in the next episode.

Speaker2:
If you enjoy listening to Stacy’s podcast, please visit Stacy Westfall. Com for articles, videos and tips to help you and your horse succeed.

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