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[RC] Git 'em (was: Paintballing dogs) - k s swigartBeth Walker said about training horses to "attack" a dog: The trick is to get a horse that will do that. ? I wouldn't have a clue as to how to train one to do that. There are an assortment of ways to teach your horse this; however, almost all of them have one thing in common, which is to give the horse the confidence that the things they "attack" will run away. If you want to teach the horse to "attack" on command (the one I use is "git 'em"), then the lesson is best taught under saddle. Point the horse at some movable object, give the command, ask the horse to move towards it, and then ensure that the instant the horse does, that the thing moves away. What this "thing" is just needs to be something movable, and something that you can count on will move in the right direction when expected. You can use a cowardly dog, a cow, another horse, or even a plastic bag on a string if you have somebody available to "operate" the string. After the horse has built a little confidence, you can "delay" to moving of the object so that the horse has to "push" on it a bit more to get it to move. Then you can have the object come towards the horse, give the horse the attack command, etc. You want to get to the point where the horse is confident (and obedient...more on that later) enough to push on objects that are coming towards them and believe that if they just persist in pushing that eventually it will move away. As the horse advances in its training, you can use all kinds of "natural" objects as training aids. When out riding on the trail around these parts, coyotes play this role beautifully as they can pretty much be guaranteed to run away from a horse coming at them. Chris Anton said: I've got a horse who will go after dogs with a vengeance. And it got me dumped and hurt! We were on a gravel road and he spun to get after a dog coming up behind us,... This is where the obedience thing comes in. Just like when training an attack dog, when training an "attack" horse you have to also be teaching it the obedience to only attack when under command. Part of what you have to teach the horse is to ignore the object until you give the command. My horses don't spin around and go after dogs running up behind them unless I tell them to Unless...of course, they are at liberty. However, I have found that if you have given the horse the confidence to believe that their attacks against dogs, or coyotes, or cows, or other moveable objects will be successful, when they are at liberty, they can figure out for themselves that all they need to do is turn on it and chase it off. Most horses find this to be a pretty fun game. And virtually every dog around my horses knows to stay pretty close to the fence if it goes in the paddock with any of my horses. The neighbor's unsuspecting cat once wandered into the arena my horse was turned out and was VERY surprised (as was the neighbor who was watching) when Marla went after it with a vengance. It managed to duck under the fence in the nick of time to avoid being squashed. However, when riding her in the same arena, she had better well ignore that cat, or anything else that crosses her path unless told otherwise. "Git 'em" (or whatever command you choose) is a really handy tool to have in the tool box of any endurance horse as it will even get the cows off the trail coming out of the vet check and allow you to catch up with the front runners whose horses WON'T go anywhere near those cows (as I learned at one ride on where my out time was ten minutes behind the front runners but there were a bunch of cows on the trail a few hundred yards away, and the head vet pointed at the front runners horses who were refusing to continue and said, "You can catch them." Sure enough, they were still there at my out time, unfortunately, my horse cleared the trail for them too...and I never saw them again, since the only reason I was anywhere near the front in the first place was that everybody else was having trouble with the cows.) kat Orange County, Calif. :) "If the end justifies the means, everybody is justified." John G. Beck, PhD =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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