head rubbing

[mmmcrae@juno.com (Marie M McRae)]

Trish wrote:
>>>     How does one go about training their horse to not rub his head
on.... I'm afraid I've only encouraged the habit by letting him rub his
head on me >>>

I think you've gone a ong way towards answering your own question.  Horse
head rubbing is a potentially dangerous activity for the human involved
unless you are the one doing the rubbing.  
  Teach him that you will rub his head for him,  but ONLY if he stands
still and doesn't invade YOUR  space. 
You rub, he pushes, you stop and back off fast.
You return, he butts, you leave again (meaning out of his range).
Catch him in a one second time frame when his head is still and rub. 
Leave when he moves.  Extend it to 2 seconds, etc.
He only gets the reward (rubbing)when he is still.
And meanwhile make sure he has no other post to rub on so your rubbing
becomes a reward worth working for (keeping still).

I have one of the Grooma tools which  has very very soft rubber
*fingers*.  I use that to rub my horse's face and he loves it.


Marie McRae 

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