Question:
Hi there. I hope you can help. We have recently bought a wonderful 13.3hh pony for our daughter. He is great for her to ride but, when she needs to correct him with a smart whack with the crop he instantly bucks and turns into an evil pony. Our daughter is experienced, she’s ridden for the last 3 years. But this situation has gotten the best of us all. How can we fix it?
Answer:
Well, let’s see. The first thing I would ask is how would *you* feel if every time at work that you needed ‘correction’ your boss would haul out a ruler and hit you over the knuckles with it? Now while that may seem a bit harsh, think about it for a moment. Would it not work better if your boss were to say, “Hey, you’ve done a really good job of trying but let’s see if we can get through your stymied points. Here, let me help and teach and show you what needs to be done correctly.” Now, wouldn’t that set with you a bit better?
The same applies to the pony.
Horses and ponies are … horses and ponies. They aren’t children who can go through a ‘reasoning conversation’ but they CAN and DO recognize what feels right and what feels wrong to them. Getting whacked with a crop for ‘correction’ only makes the one yielding the crop the focus; totally takes the focus off the ‘lesson’ and it does nothing to teach what is the ‘correct’ answer but does everything to set up fear of the human and avoidance behaviors. At the point the pony even sees the crop his focus is entirely and totally taken OFF the ‘lesson’ and put on “how the heck do I get away from this situation !!?” … at which point he may exhibit another behavior that is totally ‘unwanted’ and thus, corrected with the crop again. Round and round that goes and can easily morph into a very dangerous situation.
Instead of ‘correcting’ or ‘punishing’ an unwanted behavior, have your daughter be extra vigilant and start REWARDING for the pony’s TRY … ponies and horses always ‘try’ for us as best they can (Unless they’ve been pushed beyond the ‘teaching’ stage and gone into the flight or fight stage) … and its important to let them know that what they are TRYING is Yes! Good! or, ignoring and saying, Nope, let’s try this again. Or, nope this isn’t what I wanted, try again, please. It’s also VERY important for your daughter to learn to control her own feelings of frustration and learn patience so these little ‘Oops” are actually great ways to teach HER life lessons, too!
Rewards can be food treats (although I don’t recommend this unless your daughter is very savvy as to the timing of the treat reward and how to keep the pony’s attention on the ‘lesson’ and not transfer to the ‘treat’) but a simple release of pressure is also a very strong ‘reward’ for a pony or horse. And, while your daughter may have the total picture in her mind of just what she wants her pony to do, the pony doesn’t necessarily have the same picture. So breaking the lessons down into the smallest increments as the PONY needs (not what your daughter thinks the pony SHOULD be able to do) is also very important … and rewarding each step, as small as it may be, along the way.
Nobody likes to be ‘spanked’ and horses and ponies don’t understand what a ‘spanking’ is … they just know that the human in whom they placed their trust is now hurting them and scaring them. So that needs to be explained to your daughter and perhaps a ‘sit down’ with her to figure this all out BEFORE she goes back to ride her pony would be a good idea.
Ask her to put herself in her pony’s position and tell you what SHE would like in terms of learning a new lesson …. does SHE want to be whacked with a ruler or crop every time she makes a mistake? How would that make HER feel? And then ask her to think about how it makes her pony feel and what she can do to CHANGE the situation and CHANGE HERSELF to be a better teacher for her best friend.
This is a great “Life Lesson” that will not only help your daughter’s pony but also help her to become a kind grown-up with patience and compassion for another spiritual being.
🙂
