Scottish Horse Trainer and Behaviour Consultant

21/02/2021

Teddy is so special. He has a strong voice and I listen to him as carefully as possible. He comes across as a very bold pony, but his brash behaviour comes from anxiety and he seems to feel the need to be defensive.
When he arrived with me all he allowed me to do was stand infront of him. No touching!
Over the time he has been with me I have worked carefully with him to build his confidence and reassure him his voice is heard, he has choices and 'no' is always a choice that is respected.
His enjoyment of human contact continued to grow with carefully training. Jump a year and I could plant kisses on his eyes 💋
So today was a hhhuuuuuuggge milestone day for Mr Teddy Bear. He had a rug on (its a little big on him!).
Its been so cold and he would watch me rug Brody and Blue and he looked dejected. So I started to work on a training plan for the possibility of him wearing a rug.
Tomorrow is another milestone...Teddy's very first rug arrives in the post 🎁

09/02/2021

Latency; the time between the antecedent stimulus and the behaviour (response).

Years ago i was taught a valuable phrase about horses; a horse will change leg speed before he gives at the poll.

For my non-horse friends the poll is the join of the skull and C1 (1st cervical vertebrae). To balance in a way that supports the spine for much of what we ask the horse must be relaxed through the poll. If you can relax the poll you start to have access to the spine to ask for more complex movements.

If they are frightened by something they will tense up (especislly through the neck) and spin to get away. Forward movement is more efficient for escape than reverse and spin on the hind legs is a good way to turn round to flee.

With my training I aim to increase the Latency between the fearful antecedent stimulus and the response from the horse. My aim is to teach them to stop and think before responding.

Separately the softening of the poll is taught. And eventually the behaviours can be adducted so that, not only does the horse not flee instantly (latency is increased sufficiently to allow for thinking), but if they do decide to flee it is balanced.

Thus is hugely important when we then sit on the horses. The feel of a horse who takes the time to rebalance himself AND his rider before taking off from a scary stimulus is phenomenal.

It all comes from awareness of latency and building a trusting relationship through fear free training.

07/02/2021

The same is true for all animals, including humans.

With positive reinforcement we are also teaching a growth mindset, we're teaching the skills of problem solving, perseverance and challenging the status quo.

When dogs are trained with methods such as leash jerks, yelling, and shock collars, they have worse welfare than dogs trained solely with food rewards

03/02/2021

Without measurement, all 3 levels of scientific knowledge -description, prediction and control- would be relegated to guesswork subject to the "individual prejudices, tastes and private opinions of the scientist". Zurrif 1985.

Taken from Cooper, ABA.

23/01/2021

One of the principals of applied behaviour analysis; We should not be changing behaviour just for behaviour changing sake, it has to benefit the learner.

15/01/2021

I've been thinking a lot about fear and pain and training/learning.

When the learner becomes fearful or feels pain something interesting happens; they no longer learning cues about which reinforcers or punishers follow a behaviour performed when that cue is present, they now only learn about escape from the fear/pain as motivated by that fear/pain. The fear/pain motivates them to escape the fear/pain. Switching off of the fear/pain is a reinforcer.

Over time they may learn a warning signal, if one is presented, for pain to follow. This is a conditioned signal; a warning signal is presented, the learner responds and the warning signal is switched off. They learn how to switch off the warning signal and thus avoid pain. An example of this is horses and whips. I have heard many times, "I just have to show him the whip and he does what I want".

The learner learned the contingent pairing of that warning signal and behaviour they can perform that will prevent a consequence. This behaviour they perform is called avoidance behaviour, it switches off the warning or delays the onset of the pain.

Switching off the warning becomes a reinforcer.

This isn't a standard ABC relationship where the antecedent is a cue. In this situation the antecedent is a motivating operation and that motivation is to escape or avoid pain. It can't be learned through differential reinforcement (contrast of presence and absence of an antecedent cue).

Its a bit of a brain spinner!

14/01/2021

When the learner asks for something they need or want and that need is not met then 'problem' behaviour may emerge as they try harder and differently.

13/01/2021

Quote from Jaak Panksepp, TEDx; while referring to the emotional circuits in the brain, through science and research we have been shown to be the same as animals. In response to this Panksepp says; "Under the skin we are the same as all other animals, as such we have a massive responsibility for how we treat them.

12/01/2021

Guidance is so important for a learner. Guidance helps them get to the correct answer faster, not because we want them to get everything correct first time, its because we want to keep the behaviours as clean as possible.

It is NOT possible to 'train variations out'. If you have reinforced variables in the behaviour then those less desirable variations will emerge again given the right set of circumstances and that will lead to stress/frustration in your learner.

So rather than start off with wide criterion for the behaviour and narrowing the criterion down, we need to work on the whole behaviour, but start with the first weight shifts in to the correct movements and build the behaviour up that way.

You can NEVER unlearn what you have learned. So if we don't want certain behaviours to emerge later in life then we should never leave getting the right answer to any degree of chance. Use the environment to help guide the learner to the correct answer.

03/05/2020

Teaching your horse to stand for essential vet treatment.
If we can train in advance for emergency situations then we are training for emotional resilience when we really need it. This keeps everyone safe if there is an emergency where we really need the horse to cooperate, and that cooperation is non-negotiable.

https://youtu.be/r4CEIVTNXGM

Giving our horses a solid cue to stand still can be very useful for emergency treatment to be administered, injections and even for x-rays. This head hold ha...

03/06/2018

SHARING IS CARING
Lili Chin’s art is inspired and her generosity sharing it is inspiring. This poster is one of my favorites: "If we can teach wild animals without force or punishment, we can also train our best friends [companion animals] without force or punishment." Lili has shared a free download of this poster here: https://www.doggiedrawings.net/animaltraining. For full effect, share it with a child! What talents, knowledge and skills do you have to share?

09/03/2018

Being able to handle our horses feet without straining, pulling or battling with them at a moments notice is vital. Its also important to teach them to hold up their own foot so that they are not using the handler as a support....your farrier will love you for teaching this.

Using this approach we can teach our horses to know which body part we need to handle (no surprises for the horse) and no pulling away or hanging on to have to do day to day husbandry or medical care.

Fear free and positive cooperative husbandry and medical care.

https://youtu.be/6n2QbuQtuAI

https://www.animalbehaviourconsultantscotland.co.uk/

Being able to handle our horses feet without straining, pulling or battling with them at a moments notice is vital. Its also important to teach them to hold ...

12/12/2017

08/12/2017

I have been asked recently about mentoring and if I would be willing to mentor a few trainers. I really enjoy mentoring people; seeing them grow and sharing knowledge about Applied Behavioural Science, Equine Behaviour, Training, Welfare and more.

If you are interested in mentoring please feel free to get in contact. [email protected]

25/11/2017

Foundation courses are designed to get you started with positive reinforcement training and behavioural science. We will cover the basics of behavioural science and get you started with positive re…

25/11/2017

The Scottish Animal Behaviour Centre....

We are available for behaviour and/training consultations at your home for your pets, at your yard for your horses.

We also offer residential training for horses.

We can help with problem behaviours or training day to day life skills.

Want to change/stop a problem behaviour or train something specific to help you and your animal live together more harmoniously....contact us;

[email protected]
Www.animalbehaviourconsultantscotland.co.uk

22/11/2017

Well here it is.....the Scottish Animal Behaviour Centre has a home!!! Historic Strathaven, Scotland, will be our home.

We are planning the initial buildings that will be on the 20 acres for the centre.

Over the next few months we'll be developing training courses and workshops with a variety of species. Well add a safe dog training area where dogs can be off lead without worry and were even planning a toasty classroom for human comfort.

We'll plan workshops with visiting trainers.....and so much more.

The centre is just a 30 min drive from the airport so it's accessible for all.

Www.animalbehaviourconsultantscotland.co.uk