Dressage - off the leg - suggestions please

If you get really desperate you could try the clicker. They say you can motivate anything with a clicker but I have never had the patience to master riding with one.

Mine loves it and is obesessed with it if for instance I click the dog when we're down the yard. Took me two days (about six ten min sessions) to teach him what it meant. I only started with it because I had tried everything else to get him to do ditches but I didn't bother in the end and just went Sj ing!

It's a bit different but if you're at your wits end...

There is a very good book called "you can teach your horse to do anything" (or similar). Something about the way Kyra Kirkland always digs for a titbit after her tests says clicker training to me. I know it sounds potty but you seem to have tried most of the other suggestions!
 
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If you get really desperate you could try the clicker. They say you can motivate anything with a clicker but I have never had the patience to master riding with one.

Mine loves it and is obesessed with it if for instance I click the dog when we're down the yard. Took me two days (about six ten min sessions) to teach him what it meant. I only started with it because I had tried everything else to get him to do ditches but I didn't bother in the end and just went Sj ing!

It's a bit different but if you're at your wits end...

There is a very good book called "you can teach your horse to do anything" (or similar). Something about the way Kyra Kirkland always digs for a titbit after her tests says clicker training to me. I know it sounds potty but you seem to have tried most of the other suggestions!

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LOL, maybe I could also teach him not to be such a miserable git and to put his ears forwards once in a while?!
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It is actually not as mad a suggestion as it sounds as I was discussing it with a friend last night - Mary King uses mm-mmm to get her horses to canter and we were wondering if I could click my tongue every time he responds appropriately to the whip then maybe he would associate the tongue click with the whip and go forwards!!
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So you see I really am thinking outside the box here, and if it is good enough for MK, it's good enough for me! (Although admittedly she does it because she says she doesn't dare put her leg on a 4* fit horse sometimes!! So opposite problem to me!).
 
Ah well, I don't feel quite so mad now!

Of course if your horse tends to fat the way mine does it can be quite tricky! He is very food motivated!
 
Kerilli me either!

I don't need a clicker though, I can click with my tongue surely?! There is no way I could carry one, but surely it is the noise that is important?
 
Oh, clearly there is a food element - mine would be in heaven! Would it not work if every time I flicked him with the whip I clicked, or is that missing the point?!
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Ummm, yes! The click says "what you are doing now is good" and then you can reward after. The problem is holding the clicker and reins!! You can tape it to a whip which is much easier but as you're trying to drop whip it's not much help!

If you used it you need to teach what it means first, lots of clicking and then feeding straight away, I could go into depth but I'm sure it would be dull!
 
this has been a really interesting thread, and there's a few more things I can try. Mr lazy is even like this jumping and hacking tho, it's a constant battle. We have to have a huge row to get him going and the effects are so short lived. It is reassuring that others are struggling as much as I am with their idle horses!
 
Could the click not say 'if you don;t go forwards now you will get tapped with the whip?' Negative reinforcement not positive?! Well, positive in the sense that he would then go forwards and not get tapped with the whip....

I realise that is totally against the principles of clicker training, but putting that to one side for the moment, would it make any practical difference? Also, why do I need a special clicker? Could I not click with my tongue? Clearly I have not done this before! Once I have associated food with click (sounds relatively simple), how do I then associate moving off my leg with click and food reward? Surely to feed him I have to stop him again to give treat (which kind of defeats the object. I understand how to associate click with forwards - presumably you ask for forwards off leg, tap with whip if necessary, amnd click when response achieved, which they know is good as you normally give treat with click). I am probably being very obtuse here, sorry!
 
OK, im not the best at flat work advice but there is something i think would help that i dont think has been mentioned.

I used to work on a yard that had 'problem' horses in to reschool and start off. We had one particular cob that would just *not* move forwards. Im not talking about ignoring the leg, im talking no forward movement what so ever! What really helped was flicking the reins over her neck from one side to the other. It had to be quick and firm, the smack had a similar effect to a whip and the sight of them out of the corner of her eye made her go forwards. After a while i found that i didnt need to actually use the reins but just lift my hand ever so slightly as if i were about to use them and she'd get the idea and move forwards.

Just a suggestion - its pretty simple and if it works you could use it in competition (just by lifting the hand). Hope this helps.
 
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OK, im not the best at flat work advice but there is something i think would help that i dont think has been mentioned.

I used to work on a yard that had 'problem' horses in to reschool and start off. We had one particular cob that would just *not* move forwards. Im not talking about ignoring the leg, im talking no forward movement what so ever! What really helped was flicking the reins over her neck from one side to the other. It had to be quick and firm, the smack had a similar effect to a whip and the sight of them out of the corner of her eye made her go forwards. After a while i found that i didnt need to actually use the reins but just lift my hand ever so slightly as if i were about to use them and she'd get the idea and move forwards.

Just a suggestion - its pretty simple and if it works you could use it in competition (just by lifting the hand). Hope this helps.

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Fee-fee - good point as I actually use this out hacking if he goes a bit backwards and I haven't taken a whip - will try in the school too, thanks.
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I realise that is totally against the principles of clicker training, but putting that to one side for the moment, would it make any practical difference? Also, why do I need a special clicker? Could I not click with my tongue? Clearly I have not done this before! Once I have associated food with click (sounds relatively simple), how do I then associate moving off my leg with click and food reward? Surely to feed him I have to stop him again to give treat (which kind of defeats the object. I understand how to associate click with forwards - presumably you ask for forwards off leg, tap with whip if necessary, amnd click when response achieved, which they know is good as you normally give treat with click). I am probably being very obtuse here, sorry!

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I am probably going to end up confusing you even more....!
But my understanding is that once you have conditioned the horse to understand that click means 'yes!' by using food as a reinforcer, you can then start to only back up the click with food intermittently. The uncertainty of whether the click will be rewarded with food actually makes the response to the click more vivid and less easily forgotten than if they absolutely know that the click is followed by a food reward.

Not sure if that has clarified things for you or not!

With regard to the positive/negative thing, the principles are the same, but if you can use positive reinforcement it will create a much more willing, forward thinking mentality - which is what you want!
 
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I am probably going to end up confusing you even more....!
But my understanding is that once you have conditioned the horse to understand that click means 'yes!' by using food as a reinforcer, you can then start to only back up the click with food intermittently. The uncertainty of whether the click will be rewarded with food actually makes the response to the click more vivid and less easily forgotten than if they absolutely know that the click is followed by a food reward.

Not sure if that has clarified things for you or not!

With regard to the positive/negative thing, the principles are the same, but if you can use positive reinforcement it will create a much more willing, forward thinking mentality - which is what you want!

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Ok, that makes sense. However I was asking because ATM the only way I get 'forwards' is with the whip....(not because I have aything against positive reinforcement!). And back to the 'do I need a specialist clicking thing or can I use my tongue' question? Is there an answer to that or have people always just blindly bought the clicking thing?!
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I think you'd be safe using your tongue
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Clickers are mostly used for dogs, so the loud clicker makes distance work easier than trying to make a tongue noise travel! Also, I think doggie people aren't as tight with their cash as the horsey variety
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It is upto you which way you do it, you know him better than any of us!
I would either use the click in conjuction with the whip and use it as negative, relying on voice aids/stroke down the neck to reward

OR

I would follow the 'proper' clicker training thing more religiously and click and reward when you get the forwardness after using the whip.

Either will work, you just need to suss out which will work better for you as timing is the crucial element to sucessful clicking!
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Well, use your tongue if you can make exactly the same sound every time!
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Theoetically it should work but the clicker is more effective as it is clear and consistent and tends to cut through any noise or distraction.

And further to the negative reinforcement, Bounty is right that the positive reinforcement will stay with you longer and will encourage him to want to work for you. I think you might find he would still get wise to the fact that you can’t carry a whip.

Also, when you are clicking him for doing the right thing and then stopping to feed I know it seems odd but the moment you click is what he should pick up on, it doesn’t matter that he grinds to a halt to be fed as you can just leave longer between clicks as you build up. I’m probably not explaining v well, sorry!

The clicker is one of the most powerful and motivational training tools available if you can get your head around it. After all, you can’t force a killer whale to do anything is doesn’t want to! Apparently you can even train a goldfish using the principles so it doesn’t matter that horses (generally) are a bit thick!

You must make sure they are very established before you only reward intermitently or you will demotivate but you can vary the value of treats quite early to keep them trying, i'e sometimes a really special treat (polo?) and sometimes just nuts.

You're probably getting overload by now, you deserve to crack him if you've got this far!!
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Thanks Matafleur, I can see how this would work and as all the 'normal' routes have been such a dismal failure, this has to be worth a go!

How do I know he is very established? What I am wary of training in is 'click-forwards-halt and look for treat' as clearly that is not a required movement in any tests
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Suggest you petition BE to make it a required movement?!
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This shouldn’t happen, you must not use the click as a command, only a reward. The click says “that’s good, a reward is coming”.

You need to establish the clicker first, do this on the ground by having lots of treats in your pocket (I used some of my horses actual feed ration as you can end up over feeding otherwise) and just standing near him, he will then probably start pestering you for food. Wait until he turns his head away from you a bit and click, then immediately feed. Be patient and just wait but never click when he is touching you as this can encourage very bad manners very quickly (trust me on this!).

Repeat this and always be very quick to feed after the click, my horse preferred to turn his head to the right but I tried to encourage him to be fairly equal, if you wait they will usually present a different behaviour anyway.

Once you are sure he knows what the click means you can move on to mounted work, I’m not so good at this! But the principle is that as soon as he presents anything that you want then you click and stop and feed. Start really simple so as soon as he moves away from your leg at all, click and feed. The more established he is the longer you can leave before before clicking but keep the food coming quickly afterwards. So when he is jumping away from your leg really well leave him goping forwards for a few strides before you click.

It’s quite hard to explain but I find they take to it really quickly. You can’t mess them up with it either as you just stop using it.

Beezie Madden the USA SJ uses the clicker apparently and she does alright!

I leaving work now and won’t be able to get to a pc for a while. I’d suggest just playing with it for a while as it needn’t affect anything you are already trying.

Best of luck!
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Brill, thanks Matafleur. Not totally certain I have the patience for this, but I will give it a go and see where we get to with it.
 
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