in defence of natural horsemanship (and numpties)

jeeve

jeeve

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Hi, I am a new member, but having been reading horse and hounds on line for years, and just recently joined the forum.

I am surprised at the negative comments by some people about natural horsemanship, I believe that horsemanship is horsemanship.

Natural horsemanship is about teaching people some of the old horsemanship skills that used to be widely known, before these skills are lost to people that cannot learn these skills from people around them.

I don't want to make this a converstaion about Parelli, but i will say he does not claim to have invented horsemanship or natural hosremanship, he has learnt off some wise old men and is still learning. He is a good marketer, and has made his money from being able to market what he has learned.

I am over simplyfing this I know, yes Parelli has marketed NH, and it is understandable that many people may think NH is only about Parelli, it isn't. Pat Parelli is an amazing horseman whether you agree with what he does or not. But this is not about Parelli. I do not like or dislike him as a person. I do not agree with everything he does, in fact I am unaware of what he has done in the last few years.

People are involved in horsemanship for different reasons, they may be interested in showing, jumping, eventing, western, or natural horsemanship. It does not really matter what their area of interest is they are still involved in horses, and should be welcome to join in a forum on horses, without negative comments made about their specialty.

People also have different skill base and experience, many of us are numpties (that is a word I did not know until joining the forum I hope I am using it correctly), but we are all keen to learn, we all had to start somewhere, and we all love horses, so again, should people be lampooned due to lack of experience and knowledge?

I have two websites in Australia I would like to point you to. One is by two people who were Level 3 Parelli instructors, they are no longer involved with Parelli at all, nor have been for a number of years, they have learned from Parelli and moved on, they have adjusted and refined what they learnt to teach and teach their students to compete, and they have a good solid basis of schooling. They compete in dressage and jumping, they are fantastic horsemen/people and excellent instructors , young horse starters. Their website outlines their philosophy re training, including a training flowchart which I think is really interesting. They started my ISH for me, and have helped with trailer loading issues.

Being a numpty I am not sure if i can hyperlink it. www.markrodney.com.au or google mark rodney horsemanship


Secondly is a local adult equestrian club. Many of the members are natural horsemanship people and many are (old school) horsemanship people, they work together to embrace all philosophies and interests of their members. In fact the NH people are largely why the club exists, they lobbied council for 15-20 years. Finally council bought 10 acres for $3 million and spent $2 million doing it up for use by all members of the local equestrian community. You can ride there in a bitless bridle or halter, or you can do dressage, jumping, hacking, some members have done both.

Some of these ladies were in an private adult riding group together (I was in it for many years have moved out of the area), with an NH instructor teaching from her home. Most of the poeple in it were mums about 40-50 years, that finally were getting back into horses or starting out with horses for the first time. Yes they were pretty ordinary, they looked and behaved like numpties. Now (years later) their horses are looking great, behaving extremely well, performing equal to or better than many other horses in the club. These ladies also volunteer huge amounts of time to the club for the benefit of all members. We all start out knowing nothing, what you achieve depends on time, determination, education, effort, etc.

www.galstonequestrianclub.org.au
 
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I agree horsemanship is horsemanship. What I DON'T agree with is the branding that goes with the likes of Parelli, Roberts etc. Fair enough, if you want to start a youngster using a particular 'method' and keep that horse for the rest of it's days, only handling it yourself and maintaining your chosen training method throughout it's life. There is nothing wrong with that provided it is a kind method and the horse is happy.
What I completely disagree with is people training their horses in these clandestine methods then expecting other 'non-initiates' to be able to handle them. This ends up in a confused horsey and angry humans.
I speak from experience as someone with 'mainstream' training who bought a horse from some NH afficionados. Not Parelli, another 'brand' of training. Horsey and I were speaking a TOTALLY different language for 2 years. My horse was confused, I was confused, knowledgeable friends were confused. Thankfully with tact and consistency my bolshy boy is much better but not through the use of NH methods! He is super-intelligent, can back up a mile, negotiate poles on the ground, does 'join-up' til the cows come home but the only way I have managed to get him some good old-fashioned MANNERS has been calmness consistency and old-school firmness!

The whole problem with NH stems from the sale of it as a 'brand' which you can buy into - because people buy into different methods we end up with confused horses.
 
Popcorn comments give the impression that you would rather sit back and watch a fight than contribute to a rational discussion. I agree with jeeve, good horsemanship is good horsemanship no matter how you dress it up or label it.
 
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I think....this conversation, against or for, has been done far too many times and always has the same outcome - can we not all just agree to disagree? :D
I don't profess to know about NH so I don't tend to get involved....but there always seems to be a thread going along the same argumentative lines knocking about somewhere!
K x
 
The purpose was not an argument about NH, but more that people have different interests, and that they should be allowed to pursue them without being hunted down. I am just surprised at the reaction that is all.

I won't argue - we all can have different opinions, but there really is not a big divide between horsemanship and natural horsemanship that you suppose. It is the same thing. I imagine you can't have looked at either of the suggested websites. I am not looking for an argument, I like the list - I don't really care if someone disagrees with me or has a different opinion.

There are plenty or horse people out there that use cruel methods, large bits, beat there horses and so on and they claim to be show jumpers or dressage riders or whatever. There have been a large number of animal cruelty and neglect cases reported in Horse and Hound over the years. People can be cruel to animals and children, I can't imagine that any one on the Horse and Hound Forum would condone cruelty to horses or animals. NH is not a cruel training method, at all when used properly, the same way backing a horse using normal english training principles is not cruel when done properly. (in fact the two methods are similar) Any one can use the training methods available to them improperly from fear or ignorance or just plain meanness.
 
A well balanced and interesting post.Personally I am on the side of anything that works.No one has yet defined traditional horsemanship to me but judging from a large number of posts and my observations at shows it largly seems to consist of hitting the horse wherever and whenever.However I had a very traditionalist old school instructor who is marvellous.She does occasionally use a stick, but as an aid not a weapon and does use spurs sometimes.She hates chambons and all their ilk with a passion.
 
Good horsemanship comes in many, many forms - doesn't matter what label you give it.

On the flip side, though, even the most experienced person can be a total arse when it comes to dealing with horses - again, it doesn't matter what label you attach to them.

There is plenty to defend about natural horsemanship - but the likes of PP do nothing to promote it I'm afraid.
 
I have to strongly disagree. Parelli is about dominance NOT partnership, Micheal Peace is IMHO a far superior horseman , Parelli is agressive and domineering and downright nasty. I would NEVER buy a horse that has been subjected to this crap.

I have gone as far as to ban it from my little yard, I have seen that many accidents and good horses totally wrecked by this practice. How can belting them under the jawbone with an effin' great metal clip be beneficial????????

And the parelli horses that seem to be in my area are the ones with the problems, which seem to be compounded by this crap.....you are entitled to your opinion but you are in totally the wrong place to start trying to preach this rubbish on this forum.
 
I think the entire problem with NH / Parelli et al is not the methodology, those skills and methods have always existed, they have just been reinvented and as Jeeve so rightly put it 'Marekteered'. The problem is twofold.

1) People who sell instruction have a finite resource, in other words, there is only so much knowledge to sell. So, the solution is to make more product, the recent results of which were all over YouTube.

I have seen exactly the same thing in the world of Martial Arts, where people with limited knowledge add to, embellish and then plain make up techniques, most of which are laughable and some downright dangerous.

2) The second problem and the one that a previous poster suffered from comes from those who have a little knowledge, usually gleaned from a book, DVD or YouTube. Horses are intelligent, sensitive and giving, many people are stupid, arrogant, impatient, aggressive and stupid (yes I know I put stupid in there twice).

We have all seen the results of these untrained egotists who 'don't need' professional help or instruction who in reality should not be let within 1/2 a mile of a horse, let alone own one.

I also think the various NH disciplines get a bad press, I have seen plenty of neglect and poor skill shown by people trained in the more accepted / modern methods, including two neglect cases perpetrated by youngsters who were at the time studying equine care at college.

The root of the problem is that people will take a tiny bit of knowledge and think they have the whole of it, and when someone is selling something there is almost nothing that can be done to stop this happening. In the Martial Arts there are rules, licenses, governing bodies and some pretty 'old school' instructors who would deal with any student teaching without permission in a very 'old school' manner, in the world of horse training and instruction there is no such safety net.

Lets not forget, the ultimate victim in all this is always some poor horse somewhere, trying to comply with the wishes of an owner who's ego won't allow them to accept the fact that they haven't got a clue what they are doing or what they are trying to achieve.
 
Well I've started breaking in my welsh sc d, and doing it the old fashioned way, slowly and gently and he's doing very nicely thank you. Little and often and plenty of praise when he does well. Stop and have a think what I did wrong when he doesn't and go back to what he did well and try again and I always end the session on a good note even if I've only worked him for 5 mins as that sticks in his mind for the next day. Have backed all my horses this way over the years, as have looked and listened to other people and have used what I think is good practise.:):)
 
If you promote yourself as prominently as Pat Parelli does, seek the limelight and market all your thoughts and ideas, you can't really be surprised if you are also subject to public scrutiny. This is not the equivalent of 'hunting' anyone down for daring to disagree with you, this is the examination of PP and whether what he says actually works and whether he does actually practice as he preaches.

Sorry I don't quite see why PP is an amazing horseman any more than I can see why Linda Pareli is a dressage goddess. Hubertus Schmidt, yes there is an amazing horseman, PP not so much!
 
Extremely good post from the OP and I'm afraid I think that the popcorn comments demean their authors.

We should all strive to understand each other a little better, whatever our beliefs, both inside and outside of the horseworld. Nobody gains anything from making cheap retorts based on limited understanding or experience.

And hooray for the older "numpties" that were not born in the saddle with inherited horsey wonderfulness - good on them! :)
 
sorry but have not read every post (maybe i should have before leaving my comment!!) not saying all NH is bad ....

but being at an equine college where they have demo's on NH once or twice a year i have seen behind the scenes before an evening performance and all is not good

these so called bad mannered horses ,bad loaders etc.. are worked on all day before the show -- they are bullied into doing things quite brutally by the time the performance starts they are drained -- how is that natural horsemanship ?
IMO it is just a money making ploy especially for what they charge
 
Like most people I had a long break from horses, about 15years.
Boy has it changed from when I was last riding... I wasn't totally out of the scene I use to follow my friend around with her horses so saw it progress a little in the show jumping world

What I wasn't prepared for was the bombardment of NH... I wont lie it totally confused me (you might know I am an overweight rider, struggling with losing weight to ride my horse). From what I was reading in the beginning I was convinced none of us should ever ride a horse in fact it was one step away from cruelty.

So I tried to get into parelli and play the games etc, even had an instructor out to show me... I felt like I didn't know my own mind that I needed someone to show me how to play with my horse (my friend at this time was in despair at me) I had basically empowered NH. I wasn't happy, my horse wasn't happy. In the end my horse just stood in a field for a year.

Until one day I got him in and lunged him... I then continued with this and long-reining. We play in the field together. We are both in a much better place I,ve taken back control, I,m not saying I don't want to learn more with horse and I still watch the NH stuff on tv but now I know what i want from it.

Just recently I saw Kelly marks say to hold the lead rope a different way it gives you more control/strength and it does, so now when I lead my bargey cob out to the field it's more me leading than him.

There is a place for everything as long as you understand how to 'separate the chaff from the wheat'... And here's to numpties... We might get it wrong sometimes but we know never to male the same mistake twice... (such as putting your horse out on hunt day)
 
jeeve said:
I don't want to make this a converstaion about Parelli, but i will say he does not claim to have invented horsemanship or natural hosremanship, he has learnt off some wise old men and is still learning. He is a good marketer, and has made his money from being able to market what he has learned.

I am over simplyfing this I know, yes Parelli has marketed NH, and it is understandable that many people may think NH is only about Parelli, it isn't. Pat Parelli is an amazing horseman whether you agree with what he does or not. But this is not about Parelli. I do not like or dislike him as a person. I do not agree with everything he does, in fact I am unaware of what he has done in the last few years.
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Parelli ISN'T Natural horsemanship, there is absolutely NOTHING natural about striking a horse around the face and body.

Unfortunately natural Horsemanship has become an easy out for anyone with a half pot training system to set up shop. Far too many of the names resort to knotted rope halters (nasty bit of kit that are very rarely even fitted correctly) whips (a carrot stick is a whip despite the name, your horse does not like being hit whether it is with a carrot stick, racing crop or dressage whip, the horse doesn't give a d@mn about the colour of the object causing him pain). Far to often do they resort to gadgets that many "un-natural" trainers wouldn't even dream of using. In short natural horsemanship has been overrun by over hyped up half-cop trainers, of which Parelli and it's practitioners are the worst.

The only amazing thing about Parelli is it's followers ignorance to the cruel, callous and confusing treatment they subject their poor horses to.

Love Language and Leadership my @rse, Parelli is just brutal, brainless b*ll*****.

If you genuinely believe Parelli is an amazing horseman after the incident surrounding Catwalk, the defence of L.P treatment of Barney or in fact even if you have watch just one of their training DVD's it beggars belief.
 
One of the things to remember about PP is that he did not invent groundwork! Working a horse in hand is a corner stone of classical training, long-reining is a traditional method part of backing young horses, in-hand showing is an extremely popular passtime for many people and it was in the 1890s that Pavlov first laid out the principles of classical conditioning.

What PP did was take bits and pieces of theories, add some scientific-sounding mumbo-jumbo and a really efficient marketing machine - good for him and shows enterpreneurial spirit! The problem is when he makes a mess of it, letting down both the people and the horses who rely on him for guidance!
 
Good posts Booboos and Diet2ride. Any 'so called system' followed slavishly is a mistake imho. We all know the Parellis of this world are out to make money, but that doesn't mean every little thing they teach is harsh or rubbish. IMO you need to be very selective and research the methods and pick out what suits you. I am a great believer that most alternative therapies work and out pick the one that suits you best - which one is irrelevant to the result.
I have friends who are quick to dismiss NH as c***p, yet they will in the next breath say - I just do all that stuff it comes naturally to me!! Well everyone has to start somewhere and even the so called 'obvious' horsemanship stuff can be learnt from and improved by watching Monty and Kelly etc.
Animal communication could be done by anyone, but how many can truly do it? That is because we lead too busy lives, we have forgotten the art of listening and feeling and if the NH movement reminds us of a few of these forgotten skills that is good imo.
 
IMHO and for what its worth, you can't learn any type of ground work skills watching a DVD, any DVD.The most you can gain is an insight.When I wanted to do some horse driving I went to John Parkers yard.I had done NO driving at all.They were very happy about that and told me not to watch any DVDs or read any books either, just come as I was.That way they had no faults to erase before they could teach me.
The problem is though, that like I suspect most people who are general hobby riders, I come from a riding school background.No one taught me how to lead a horse, teach it to stand to be mounted, load a horse or read a horses body language and be awareAt my last yard the AI manager was regularly dragged about by various horses and had no idea how to stop it.It doesn't say a lot about the ground work done at her particular college does it? SO people like the Parellis, Monty Roberts etc have seen a huge gap in certainly the British market and have exploited it.Can't blame them.
Where are all these good traditional horsemen/women we hear about? I have found about 3 or 4 in my lifetime.The natural horse people of course vary, like everything else.Some are brilliant though and will help people floundering and with no other visible means of suport.
 
noblesteed said:
I agree horsemanship is horsemanship. What I DON'T agree with is the branding that goes with the likes of Parelli, Roberts etc. Fair enough, if you want to start a youngster using a particular 'method' and keep that horse for the rest of it's days, only handling it yourself and maintaining your chosen training method throughout it's life. There is nothing wrong with that provided it is a kind method and the horse is happy.
What I completely disagree with is people training their horses in these clandestine methods then expecting other 'non-initiates' to be able to handle them. This ends up in a confused horsey and angry humans. I speak from experience as someone with 'mainstream' training who bought a horse from some NH afficionados. Not Parelli, another 'brand' of training. Horsey and I were speaking a TOTALLY different language for 2 years. My horse was confused, I was confused, knowledgeable friends were confused. Thankfully with tact and consistency my bolshy boy is much better but not through the use of NH methods! He is super-intelligent, can back up a mile, negotiate poles on the ground, does 'join-up' til the cows come home but the only way I have managed to get him some good old-fashioned MANNERS has been calmness consistency and old-school firmness!

The whole problem with NH stems from the sale of it as a 'brand' which you can buy into - because people buy into different methods we end up with confused horses.
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I think that so many people think that a horse trained using NH methods, somehow cant be ridden by anyone else who isnt familiar with the methods. To me this is rubbish. While i am sure there are people who train their horse a certain way and no one but the owner can ride it. But for me, NH is just good training. If a horse cant be ridden by other people, besides its owner, its not a very well trained horse. If someone got on my horse and couldnt ride him, then i havnt done a good job at training him.

Horsemanship is about teaching a horse how to be with us willingly, trusting, obedient, light and responsive, whether you train using traditional methods or NH.
It should be about teaching a horse to be light, responsive and easy to ride so that ANYONE could ride it. If a horse cant be ridden by other people, either a traditionally trained horse or one taught by NH, then its not very well trained.
 
Lovely post & some good replies. My view is not everything works for every horse or owner/rider, so everyone to their own. If it works for you, great, enjoy your horse. That in your club people get on well & respect each other is lovely, sounds like a good thing to be part of.

Personally, my issue with Parelli (who excites debate like no other NH trainer), is that he & his wife have been witnessed (& recorded on film) purpatrating some acts of cruelty (sorry but some cases are so extreme there is no other word). If it were poorly educated disciples it would be bad ebough, but this guy is meant to be the expert, the idol to whom all his clients aspire to be.

I liked the martial arts analogy, I know what you mean. A key to teachings is respect. Respect for your teacher who is trying to make you understand deeper, respect for your partner who will help you in this as you practise with them, & respect for yourself to put yourself in a position where you can listen. No-one is disrespected, even a low grade as they are as you once were, & that you have moved on makes it your responsibility to help them in their own journey. This I endeavour to communicate to the students I teach, & whose journey I am priviledged to help to shape. I see no respect in the PP method as demonstrated by PP & LP, I do see a money making machine latching onto peoples insecurities. That worries me.
 
i personaly dont understand how people justify watching a few dvds and calling them selfs horse people.

in my oppinion whatever works, wokrs. but you have to get out there and get some propper hands on experience and training befor even concidering going near a horse with a correctional headcollar and a whip.

these dvds are plain dangerous in my oppinion.
 
horsedreams said:
these so called bad mannered horses ,bad loaders etc.. are worked on all day before the show -- they are bullied into doing things quite brutally by the time the performance starts they are drained -- how is that natural horsemanship ?
IMO it is just a money making ploy especially for what they charge
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You could really make a difference if you were able to film this happening. You're not the only person who has claimed this and I am not disputing your particular experience. However, I'm not sure it usually happens the way you describe. (I'm not even sure if it often happens.)
 
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