The Growth of Horses

Written by Gordon Sulley
I'm taking up an old subject concerning the horse's growth here as a way of sharing a minor "celebration" over a surprise event!

We went down to take the horses in last night and, as Kia had gone up to the field while I filled the water-buckets, I went out to do a quick visual check on whoever had decided to be the first to come in. (We can, and often do, decide the order in which they come in, but as they have some sort of a 'system' that they work out between themselves (most often "reverse age order", -but not always!) we usually leave them to decide, ...-unless Schatty suddenly tries to change what the rest have previously decided!)

In the dark I could see very little, ..and then heard Kia's footsteps crunching on the light covering of snow, then saw Kia's yellow jacket reflecting the light ...-and a few seconds later a dark, silent, shadow at the side of her, but I could still hear no footsteps from the horse -and therefore knew that it must be one of the draughts, ..and a couple of seconds later the shadow resolved itself into Hugin who Kia was leading in a complicated pattern of circles and turns down from the field.

I moved so that I could do a visual check of his movement patterns in the light of the lamp outside the stable door, and suddenly noticed that Kia appeared to have shrunk in size!

A rapid visual check of her revealed that she had her normal winter boots on, ...so, hey, wait a bit, -double-take on Hugin, ...-his proportions are wrong!!!!!!

"KIAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Stop when you get him in, I want to measure him!!!!!!!"

Get into stable and take a g-o-o-d look!

A) Kia STILL looks incredibly small!

B) Hugin's rump looks f-a-r too high!!!

....-Out with measuring stick! Check for 'snow-stilts' in hooves, none!

Now, to all intents and purposes, Hugin has not grown since he had a big growth-spurt, between December 2003 and February 2004 when he was 3½+ years old!

Every time we have checked him since then he has been 148 to 149 centimeters to his withers ("about" 14.2 hh), and 4 to 5 cm (an inch) lower at the back, ...and now, suddenly, despite the fact that Kia has done his feet, ..-and that it is only about 25F with a good wind-chill factor, which normally seems to make most horses "become smaller" by up to about an inch (No, I can't "prove" that, but we, and everybody else we know, find it to be true! -Do they "draw themselves together" to conserve heat? -I've never seen any studies on it!) Hugin is now measuring 151 cm at the withers (if that area on Hugin can really be dignified by the use of that title!)and 149½ cm at the back!
Total shock and surprise!

We moved him to different parts of the floor as it isn't too level, ..and we re-measured and re-measured -just to be sure, ..and, yes!, our "Hugi-titch" is *suddenly* at least 14h 3 3/4+ inches tall!!!

He is having a 'growth spurt' at 6½ years of age and *may* even actually make a *full* 15 hh!!!! .

...Now, WE don't care at all about how tall Hugin is, and he is beautifully proportioned (normally!), but at 148 to 149 cm. he is considered to be 'a bit small' by the modern, though not by older, standards for his breed!

"Right, it's only 1.30 am and we're both off-work tomorrow, so lets measure the rest of 'em!" I said, cheerfully! (Now you understand why Kia often feels like hitting me with something ...like a brick, ..or a car!)

Vitty, oldest and Arab, and 7 in March, is now 159 cm at the front and 155 cm at the back, a very recent increase in size which has also occured since we measured him at Christmas, and an increase of over half an inch over the 157-158 cm he had attained by about 2 years ago!

...Schatal, (our younger Arab) who we still tend to think of as something of "a skinny little runt" compared with the others, is also growing, at 4½ yo, and is now measuring 153½ cm at the withers and ...152 at the rump, ..-and that explains why we said to each other that we thought he looked "odd" when we were looking at him in the field the other day!

He has grown well over half an inch since our Christmas measuring, ...and Oremus, "The Baby" (NSD) at 3½, who is the only one of our four who seems to have grown evenly, rather than in spurts, has now got up to 152 cm at the front and 146 at the back, ..and despite that, looks very high rumped just now, so "things are happening" there as well!

I've come to quite a few conclusions over all this!

The first is that we need to buy a much better quality measuring device with both 'hands and inches' and 'centimeters' on it!

-I'm a middle-aged Brit, dash it, and whatever I may be used to using in the lab, I STILL measure a horse in "hands" and the pull of a bow in "pounds"!!!! ...-In terms of a horse's height I still can't grasp the concept of "centimeters" in my soul!

Secondly, and far more importantly, well, we now have good evidence from four out of four of our horses that the suggestion that "all" horses have finished growing by the time they are 3½ years, or 42 months of age, is not correct!

If I'd realised that this was going to happen I think I would have paid the vet to actually come out and measure them once a year so that I had a "documented and attested proof" of their growth rate, rather than just our own figures, measured without witnesses, on a relatively un-even and old concrete stable floor!

As a horse owner, ...and as an equine masseur and electro-therapist, I feel that this is VERY important stuff!

-This is 'in-admissable' (because of the way we've measured it!) evidence against the "horse-industry's" accepted normer!!!

"De Gamla", "the old ones", ...past generations here in Sweden, ALWAYS taught that a horse should never be asked to pull a "full load" (several tons!) until it was at least 7 years of age! ...-It was okay to start a young horse with a light hay wagon when it was about "2-ish", but it was to be a very LIGHT load!

"Light" riding training does not seem to have been begun until the horse was about 4, (6-ish for more serious riding in the military)...so, ..what are we doing, to whom are we looking for leadership in these matters? Can they be trusted to give us the correct answers, ...-and why are the "official figures" for growth not fitting the reality of our situation with our boys?

Is it that we have fed them mainly on grass and grass-hay and let them grow "naturally", instead of trying to 'feed them up' as though we were producing something for the food industry?

I can't answer any of these questions but ,I'm very, very glad that we have not gone "the normal way" with our lads!

I'm glad that we did get "distracted" from what we originally *thought* we wanted to do, and that we got into so many other things, and have had the fun of all our trick-training and experiments, without putting any up any goals other than that we and the boys should learn together and have fun!

I'm glad we've totally ignored the pressures to 'ride them in' and 'drive them in' by "conventional means" and have played and experimented as we have!

Light riding would certainly have been quite alright for a while now, but we've been too busy to get things started, -and with Schatz (who had lime disease as a 1 yo), it's only now that he's beginning to look as though his body is filling out properly!

He's really only just beginning to lose that "unfinished young horse look", so we're glad we've not put any weights on his back yet. -We don't know "why", but it is a feeling we share and have followed, even though he has been saddled quite a few times!

I am not the same person, ..-we are not the same people, ...that we were 6 years ago, Thank God! ...-We've studied, and we've observed, and we've grown, ..-and the more we see and learn, then the more certain we become that what we both learnt, at different riding schools in different countries, is so small a part of the the whole picture of "what horses and horsemanship are about" as to be totally worthless!

Certainly, the more I look, the more I am finding that the actual real evidence for just about everything contradicts "the accepted view" of nearly everything that is taught!

How did it get this way? Why did it get this way? When did it get this way?

In Europe, I can see that "riding" was for the rich and the military, while draught horses and cobs were for farmers and "teamsters / draymen / wagoners / carters / etc", and that these latter groups' knowledge (along with that of the Gypsies!) would easily be lost, or would only be passed-on inside families, as both farmers and 'transport workers' (and most definitely, Gypsies!) were, to say the least, 'rather looked down on' by "their social superiors", so their knowledge, deep and valuable to them for their very survival, would be highly unlikely to interest the "higher classes" who 'rode' and who were not, in general, too interested in learning from their social inferiors!

The military, generally officered by people from the higher social classes, have had different needs at different time periods and, generalizing to a very large degree in this statement, I would suspect that the typical 'military-aristocratic' riding of the past thousand years or so has been more centered on the concepts of 'forced training' for the winning a war than it has been concerned with the concepts of working with another en-souled and intelligent being, not only for practical, but also for, first "religious", and then later, for "scientific" reasons! (the human being is the 'pinnacle of creation' in both systems of thought, though during the earlier period we must not forget that humans, as well as horses, were often de facto slaves, or very nearly so!)

The highest social classes made riding into an "art form", taking many of the once practical military excercises to new heights for the sake of appearance, and, if I have understood correctly, some of the training methods applied to horses while teaching them these excercises, even during the sixteen, seventeen and eighteen hundreds, were none to gentle and kind.

What happened in the USA?

From the little I have been able to glean, the "civilized" East, with it's roots firmly in Britain, France, Germany and other northerly European states, adopted a so-called "English" riding style, -partly, at least, to show their "social superiority" over the Spanish inspired and influenced "Western" or "cowboy" type of practical riding, ..-and, as 'practial people' are often too busy, both doing their things and generally surviving, to have the time to write about them, it seems to me that this situation has also led to a great loss of knowledge, -especially as the Spanish-Moorish influences, which lie behind the true "western" concepts and ideas are identical with the ideals of Classical Dressage and, like them, go back to Constantinople (which fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453 - 1458) and, in fact, have their origins in Roman Classical times!

Hmm, it really IS an interesting situation is it not?

Can we trust our "experts"?

Why is the "research" that is being done not giving results that appear to fit with reality?

And lastly, who are the best teachers for us?

We can learn from all, I think, but it seems to me to be becoming even clearer that both for information on the horse's physical development, and on its mental condition and needs, and perhaps even more importantly, (if we really want to learn to do it well!), for *how* we ride, we have, in the end, only one single teacher on whom we can totally rely, ..-and that teacher is the horse himself, who doesn't need research grants, can't read very well, but actually has the advantage of being born as a horse, -and I feel that we should accept that all other teachers besides the horse himself must be regarded as being at least slightly suspect!

Gordon.

Foals, Weanlings, Yearlings and MORE!

I just responded on an equine bulletin board to someone who has raised a foal to a 3 year old. The 3 year old is now dangerous ... kicking and attacking horses AND humans. My response was, brutely, she should find a person well versed in Equine Perception Modification through Positive Reinforcement, GIVE the horse to that person and get an older, been-there-done-that horse with whom she can work and play safely. It is, sadly, a case that is all too common: a horse owner decides to either breed his or her mare for the "cute baby" or obtain a foal/weanling/yearling to raise without the knowledge and wisdom of teaching that foal proper, foundational manners and groundwork. Unfortunately, that person has NO idea that its NOT ABOUT THE HORSE! A horse always knows how to be a horse. One of the greatest learning experiences for 2 year olds is within an established herd of older horses. The youngster will learn more in a year from those horses than any human could ever teach him. However, that being said, I know that its not always possible to turn a 2 year old back out to a herd or, raise a foal within a herd setting. Given that, its up to the HUMAN to TEACH that youngster proper equine etiquette ... ESPECIALLY when around humans. That youngster should learn that every human with whom it comes in contact is higher ranking than he is and deserves r-e-s-p-e-c-t. (Kind of like raising human kids and teaching them respect for their elders!) Unfortunately, in my 40+ some odd years of working and playing with all breeds, disciplines, ages, colors and from all backgrounds, including Mustangs and PMU rescues, I've not found too many humans who know how to TEACH horses - of any age. There are plenty of "trainers" - those who drill behaviors over and over and over again using punishment as a prime motivator for the horse. The horses ultimately end up being those who "check out" mentally and then, sometimes, when put into a situation with a human who exhibits behaviors that are lower ranking than the horse, the horse then comes back into its mind with a vegeance. Not a good, safe, situation at all. Not fair to the horse; not fair to the human.

Please, if you have thoughts of raising a foal or breeding your mare to get a cute, little, fluffy, dahling foal ... search YOURSELF first and see if YOU'RE willing to learn and change *your* thinking. Learn how horses behave, why they behave the way they do and RESPECT the horses' ways. One can't change the horse to thinking like a human but one CAN change ones self to think like a horse! Something to start thinking on ... "You get what you reward."

Determining Aggression

Whew ... that's a scary mouthful for a title when talking about horses! Rarely does one find a truly aggressive horse. 99 3/4% of them are true to their design of gentleness, curious, gregarious animals. Determining organic reasoning behind aggression is rarely thought of with horses.

I find it most rewarding to work with horses, though especially ones with PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder). There are far too many horses out there with this condition; some severely impacted and others not so affected.

One horse comes to mind with whom I was not able to continue as the owners became intense "roadblocks" ... they wanted the final results NOW! In other words, they wanted to take a horse that was extremely aggressive (read that fearful and would attack at the INSTANT of feeling fear) and get her undersaddle instantly. Wife was intimidated by the horse and would react with backing away and running; husband was intimidated and reacted with counter-aggression; teenaged boy was intimitadated and took 'control' over the horse with repeated acts of fear/aggression instigation that would cause the horse to rake its teeth over the bars trying to get at the boy, rear and subsequently attack anyone who opened the stall door. Nice, huh? Not.

The photo above shows the 2nd session I had with this horse. The first session was spent trying to dodge its hooves in the paddock for an indeterminant time. Second session I started with positive reinforcement and targeting while standing in the stall door then incremently made my way into the stall then outdoors in the paddock. The second session involved showing all sorts of scary objects to the horse and having her target them. In the photo I'm using a tambourine. What I DIDN'T do with this horse was first teach it to calm down on cue. Now, I know better! *grin* her rapid fire response to rear up then come down and trample whatever the scary object was, had diminished somewhat through a couple of exercises but I know, now, that teaching her a 'calm down cue' would have exponentially reinforced the positive behaviors that were brewing underneath all the turmoil of PTSD. Unfortunately, my sessions with this beautious black gal were only once weekly and in the time between visits all sorts of incongruent and inconsistent attitudinal humans were working with her.

We progressed tremendously in each session but I could, literally, tell who handled her in between session simply by her attitude each week when I arrived. One person would "desensitize" her to whatever it was that was scaring her - "flooding" her with the object over and over and over again with no retained results except further ingrained aggression. Finally, after she very deliberately kicked the husband in the chest (he's lucky he's alive) I suggested that perhaps the horse have a full veterinary exam to rule out any organic "misfiring" in the brain. I was replaced after that. *grin* The horse, from brief account, attacked the subsequent trainer and although she had some positive results with this horse she, too, was dismissed. I feel confident and good about the progression I made with her but am very dismayed at the results due to faulty human decisions. Where this horse is now I have no idea. But I always will remember the little triumphs with this gal that we reached each week.

Rule of thumb for aggressive animals: Is the aggression predictable? If so, continue on with the perception modification through positive reinforcement teaching. If not, get the animal to the vet asap for a thorough, in-depth exam.

The mare I was working on was both predictable and unpredictable ... she was predictably unpredictable! She needed to be examined. However, whether that did or did not happen I don't know. I learned from her; she learned from me and what is, is. *grin*

Uh-uh .. that's YOUR job to clean up after US!

Well, as you can see the horses around here are lazy things ... they can't seem to get up off the ground to even help aggravate the humans while they clean! You'd think they'd at least get out of the way so Anne could dump the wheelbarrow but nooooooooo, they didn't budge! Actually, a bit later on Misty (the grey) did manage to rouse herself and shake off the dirt but Tammy stayed sunning herself while I climbed on her back for a "backing lesson". *grin* She's a long 3 year old filly who will be fulled backed this summer as she shows when she is ready.

Now Dorian is a different story ... he doesn't lie down much but he sure does like to "help" and hug. Here he is sniffin' out the manure fork offering his assistance. Gee Whiz! Now they ALL decide they want to help! Hey Guys, leave the help alone so she can get her job done, will ya?

Horse-Human Equality by Gordon Sulley

"Do you consider horses and humans to be equals in their relationship?"
"In their relationship to each other? An it please the court, Yes, Yer Honour, -or at least, they are if they are allowed to be so!"
Trust you to be able to ask one of the deepest and most important questions possible in twelve words, Charles, ..-and it is a very important question to ask, I think, so my answer is going to be much longer than your question! :-)
I'll start with a thought concerning your question:
What is your definition of "equals"? - And, -is a dance partner who leads more 'equal' than the dance partner who is following?
I believe I have recently read that the horse's nearest relative is the deer: the horse is a walking Burgher King or McDonald's, a 'fast food joint on legs' (pun intended!) that has learned to survive under quite hazardous conditions.
There is a lot of research being done concerning the horse's scenting abilities, which I believe it has been said, are greater than a dogs; they can differentiate colours and shapes (and even select the one they are told to choose or fetch!) -and they have extremely good memories, ..and are capable of planning several steps ahead of the actual moment.
They can feel with every single hair on their bodies and know when even the smallest insect has landed on them, they understand trajectories and velocities ...and can kick a flying insect out of the air, or out-run a predator, so they are very well equipped for their natural world, but they don't seem to be able to judge the speed of an on-coming car or train, and they have to be taught to understand the things in our human world, which are not natural to them, and where the majority of them live as prisoners and slaves.
Now, I chose those words very deliberately!
-A horse has no legal rights (or very few!) and no rights of ownership.
They have no 'voice' or 'language' that *ordinary* people can easily understand, so they cannot go out and call a lawyer if they feel they are wronged, -but they do have feelings and intelligence, a strong in-built sense of fairness and fair play, ...and speech of a sort, even though the majority of what they actually say is not expressed by verbal means, -and I am not meaning "horse whispering" or "communication" here!
They communicate by look and feel, and body language, and occasionally by the use of verbal signals, and, because they use verbal signals themselves and have good memories, they also understand our verbal signals, those that we call "language", and they remember what the different sounds and noises and whistles and grunts that we use mean, -and all that, plus all the thousands of things I have missed mentioning for lack of time and space, makes them, at least in my book, into thinking beings who are not actually that unlike ourselves! (Even physically, if we allow for their lack of a collar bone!)
We, at least in the wild, are very un-equal to horses!
We need clothes and shelter to survive, -which they generally do not require; we cannot run as fast as they do, nor detect predators, prey or enemies at the kind of distances that they can as neither our eye-sight, hearing, nor sense of smell are as good as theirs, but they have only one *hand* in the form of a mouth which, with its adjacent sensing hairs, gives them a fantastic amount of information about anything they can feel or manipulate, while we have two, far less sensitive, hands ..with opposing thumbs, which are even better designed than the horse's mouth is for manipulating our environment!
Now, given even the few facts I have listed above, I would suggest that each of us, horse and human, has powers and abilities that the other lacks and that these just about balance each other out sufficiently to suggest that we are equal, or at least 'equally matched', in many ways, so are we "equal"? Well, not by law! By intelligence, then? Well, a horse probably couldn't get a Ph.D at a human university, ..but can we learn to do what they do? No! -So, perhaps we are "equal but different?
Now, having asked you for your definition of "equal", I shall give mine.
In my view, "the balance of power between true equals shifts in different situations from one to another of them, with the one with the greatest knowledge of each specific situation being the one to make the decision in that particular situation", -so, how does this affect our relationship with a horse?
Well, practically speaking I think that particular form of equality is what seems to produce the best, and most successful, results in almost anything that one does with a horse, be it in a competition, or on a trail!
When we start to 'teach' the horse, as most of us do, to do what it is both designed and programmed to do from birth, then I think that we generally reduce its capabilities instead of enhancing them! -And that is not equality! We create at best a servant and at worst an unwilling slave instead of an 'equal partner with different capabilities'!
Look at any competition, and really look at what all those lovely and expensive devices that we are so fond of attaching to our horses to "control" and to "help" them are actually doing!
-Think what we are doing when we tie the horse's head down so that it cannot see, and then ride it in a jumping competition!
-That is certainly treating the horse as a slave and arrogantly claiming that we know its physical abilities better than it does itself!
-There is no chance for the horse to be 'equal' there, but the horse, when trained and in practice, *should* know where to take off for a jump better than we do ...if it can see it, ...and it can then be a help and an equal to the rider by putting its skills and knowledge at the riders service!
-Think what the over-check does in trotting, ...and look at all the horses who compete in many different sports who are so stiff in the hamstring muscles that they cannot properly get their back legs under themselves! -Horses with artificially shortened strides and bad training are never allowed to be the 'equals' of anything that is not being similarly (mis-)treated!
Can we really "contol" a horse by the use of a bit?
-Yes, we can, -by the use of pain, ..and there is nothing very equal about that, ..., -until the fear and the adrenaline over-ride the pain, ...-and we the human end up somewhere we didn't want to be, like in hospital, on the Intensive Care ward!
A horse is controlled through its mind and not through its body, and when controlled through its mind, by two-way communication, training and understanding, then, and only then, can it become a true and equal partner and helpmate!
So, yes, I DO think that we are equals, 'equal but different', perhaps, which means that in the human world, we, as humans, usually have to be "the senior partner", "the leader", the one who assumes the responsibility for a decision because we have the most complete knowledge of the whole situation, but, even more importantly in that human world, we must be "the educator" who can lead the horse through it's natural fears and help it to overcome its natural instincts as a prey animal, to teach it to be both brave and confident in our world as well as in its own, but we must also, I feel, be sufficiently humble to be able to accept that, at least in some cases, the horse actually does know better than we do and to accept its leadership in those situations!
Is a horse just being awkward and "playing up" at a river crossing, or are you, the human, trying to force it into quicksand? -Has the bank been undermined, since you crossed there last? The list is almost endless and, because the majority of us are so certain that we know best, we do not listen when the horse tells us something, and that means that we are missing a host of opportunities every day to create real and meaningful 'equal partnerships' in the true sense of the word according to my definition above, with our extremely intelligent and potentially equal partners whom we insist on treating as slaves!
If you really want to find out just how 'equal' horses are, I really would recommend that you take Gwen's 'Progressive Equine Partnership Training' course (by visiting http://www.thepenzancehorse.com/ ) and that you read some of the stuff on the following links:
http://synalia.com/
http://grandin.com/references/research.html
http://www.wagntrain.com/OC/
http://clickryder.com/
-And then, of course, last but by no means least, there is a marvellous tool for getting into a meaningful communication with a horse in the first place, ...-a very subtle and psychologically effective tool that allows you to talk to the horse in horse language and that allows you to set the rules and limits that can later be modified and relaxed in order to really allow the horse to become an equal!
It is not "round-penning", and it is not some idiotic attempt to establish one's 'superiority' by attempting to tire the horse out, but a psychological concept that can be applied with the horse on a lunge line, or loose in a corral, or even loose in an 8 acre field!
The use of this at the beginning of a relationship makes the use of all other methods of training much simpler, and that fantastic tool is a thing called 'The Bonder' which is available from a guy named Marv Walker at http://marvwalker.com/ !!!
-We, as humans, really have progressed a little in our understanding of horsemanship and horses during this last few years simply by "scientifically proving", and therefore finally beginning to accept, what many horsemen have known for generations, and we are finally getting, at least slightly, beyond the "a bit made of barbed-wire will get him nicely under control!" stage, ...and at least a little bit more towards Dr. John Doolittle!
-It's there for us if we want it, and if we dare to use it, ...-and if we do want and dare, then there are some marvellous results to be achieved!
-Ever seen a fairly small lady having a play "boxing match" with her horse? I have! -Now THERE was both "equality" and "mutual respect"!

A New Start

Today I decided to combine all my blogs into one. After all - the HORSE is one incredible creation designed with all parts working together ... mind, body & spirit. So here you'll read about teaching, natural hoofcare, healthcare and more ... altogether as one.

The past year was a bit of a haitus for me and for my horses. I think we all needed the rest just to play and to ... be. Now, this new year, 2007, is one to start again in a semi-same direction yet a bit different. We've all learned through the seasons ... more and more I have learned to listen even more closely to the horse and my horses have learned to reciprocate in kind. We lost our Patriarch of the herd. Our beloved J.C's Bubba died in November at the age of 31. He left this world amongst his herd, quickly and without fanfare. That seemed to have been Bubba's way. He lived his life without fanfare, never asking to be the "Star of the Show" but somehow humbly accepting that place. He was never arrogant or unkind but always thoughtful and considerate of the others in his herd, both equine and human. He gave his heart to those who earned it and never looked back. A simple horse but his heart as big as the sky. He gave us courage and taught many to trust in themselves. We will continue those teachings this year ... with Bub's spirit ever present.

Each horse in our lives has something to teach us if we but listen with our whole being. Ginger died the year before Bub, a grand lady of 40 years old. She was here at Penzance a short time but shared her love with bounty in full. She taught many women how to love themselves, just the way they were. That's a tall order but was never too daunting for Ginger. She and Bubba left their legacies for the youngsters to carry on and so they will ... with renewed spirits this year.