Do you use your voice to train/teach your horse?

[BeBopTalulah]

Absolutely. I've just broken my mare, and I think voice commands are important. She lunges walk, trot, canter and halt by voice alone, I then taught her my aids in the saddle by voice. She also really understands what 'good girl' means, and she knows when she's doing something right. She also knows what a growl means too! I've found Lu very responsive to voice, perhaps some horses are not so responsive to it?

 

[tristar]

i don't talk , i have long conversations with them, during which i apologise for not doing it right, tell baby horses what they will be doing when they grow up, and how pleased i am with them, and very rarely how naughty they are, but mainly how gorgeous they are, one of my my favourite things is to say say, 'you are so beautiful'! and 'thankyou for being so good'

horses respond to tone of voice, actual words are definately understood, i could not break in a horse without use of the voice, as a command to associate with the aids and to stop without pulling on the mouth, in lungeing no need for the whip except to guide, as a confidence giver in scary situations.

i think we should use the voice more, to compensate for our not always clear aids to avoid confusion and frustration which can lead to the use of gadgets and rough aids, if they don't understand and respond appropriately its usually our fault.

i think the voice should be allowed in in the baby dressage tests, as early competitions are not easy for both horse and rider.

 

[DH1]

Yes, way too much I can move her into trot by say "come on then" and "over" works quite nicely in half pass. It's very bad form I'm told, so I am trying not to talk her into everything

 

[Victoria25]

Absolutely! I actually 'backed' my wild 3 year old arab by voice command (yes, even canter - it's amazing how fast you can run!) so by the time I actually sat on her for the first time she knew everything! She's 11 now and I could sit there still and she's wak trot/canter on voice command although the 'stand' word sometimes gets ignored when shes just tooooooooo excited

On the ground though I will always use ohhhhhhhhh goooooooood girl when shes being bad but boy does she know when she's been bad ... I get the evil eye

Ground trick ... I ask her 'what do we say?' and she's lift her leg to ask for a treat

 

[soulfull]

I use my voice all the time -my welshie is deffo very sensitive to noise-as soon as my phone rings he stops and stands still-great out hacking but annoying in the school-I have to put it on silent now if I m schooling-I didn t teach him to do this its been learnt "by association".
He also opens gates with his nose-I go "Gate Sparks" and he pushes it open.In the stable he does over and back from my voice-I just think its the easiest way and Welshies love learning new tricks!!xx

Yeah my old Welsh did this too, not good when my phone rang whilst crossing a major junction

Use voice for all my horses. fabby for when things go wrong!!! my last one used to get carried away when doing fast work out hacking, no amount of me pulling or using seat made any difference, however one oye TRROOOT you barstool worked every time

I find it helpful to teach new things like canter to walk stand to canter etc

Use to prepare for canter too, saying ready steady go, only one problem I only have to say 'rea' now and he is off lmao I am teaching him that he should wait for the physical aid or at least the whole command. REcently taught him 'polo' bet you can guess it didn't take him long to work that one out

slightly funny story I taught my old Welsh the same command. All the kids on the yard knew it and the one day I was riding one girl that had lunged him a few times for me whispered it as we went past. ARghhh I wondered what on earth had happened especially as they were all laughing at me