Do not forget why we came to have a domestic relationship with horses, and
that as intelligent animals horses have a capacity to learn.
1. As I have mentioned before, read Stephen Budiansky's books: "The Nature of
Horses", and "The Covenant of the Wild". These books detail why the inherent
nature of horses as herd animals allowed them to become domestic animals. Their
social organization, and body language was an absolute requirement for the
change in their status from wild animals to domestic partners with humans. This
partnership has been beneficial to both species.
2. Horses are intelligent. They can and do learn foreign languages. Human is
one of them. Young horses are born with some instinctive knowledge of horse
communication, but have to learn much of it. If you don't believe this, put a
horse that was raised alone into a herd. I boarded a horse for a couple of years
that had only been with its mother and then had been alone in a pasture for 5
years. Every morning she would try to steal food from the herd boss. He would
give her ears. She would ignore him. He would then turn around and give her both
hind feet in the side or rump. She would then move off and sulk. The next
morning it was the same thing. She had not had a chance to learn how to be
polite at the critical age, and never did get it. I was very happy when she
moved on
It is easiest to teach a horse to respect humans and human language, if the
human tries to make his language and requests as close to the herd leader as
possible.
Ed
.
Ed & Wendy Hauser 2994 Mittower
Road Victor, MT 59875
