For most people, switching to positive reinforcement training requires a massive mental shift and a complete change from everything they thought they “knew” about horses. This can be daunting, but it’s okay if you’re not ready yet.

The first thing you need to do to train your horse to be catchable is to stop trying to catch them! This may seem counterproductive, but your intention during training will affect your outcome, and training is a process, not a one-time event.

Bonding with your animals is really no different than bonding with anyone else. It takes time, consistency, and being someone that the person or animal you’re trying to bond with can trust.

There is a common belief that hand-feeding your equid treats will create a muggy monster that will push you around, constantly search you for food, and probably start biting. However, you can successfully hand-feed treats to your equid without this happening if you follow a few simple guidelines.

There seems to be some confusion surrounding the idea of teaching your equid ‘manners’ around food. The recommendation that I often see is for people to start with ‘food manners,’ i.e., teach your equid to stand next to you, either facing forward or with their head turned away.

When you’ve been told all your life that horses are dangerous and you need to make your equid respect your space, it’s easy to understand why people get nervous when their equids get excited about the food and start crowding them, cutting them off, and frisking them for food.

It can be very confusing and frustrating when you start clicker training your horse, and they seemingly lose interest and walk away. Often this leads people to believe that the horse doesn’t like the food or simply isn’t motivated by food. Horses must be motivated by food, however, or they will starve.

Clicker training is a fun and easy way to train all your animals but there’s a little more to it than just click and treat! Here are five tips to help you get started clicker training your equids…

Unlike most people in the canine and equine industries, I was never really exposed to ideas about dominance, respect, or being the “alpha,” so I had no preconceived notions about how animals learned or should be trained. For me, the lack of a common language seemed like the only real barrier to my relationship with animals…