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9/28/05: "Does yawning have a meaning for horses?"

9/21/05: "I have a horse that is one-sided. He is perfectly fine to handle on one side, but I can do nothing with him on the other. What do I do?"

9/14/05:"I had two horses at home and I brought a new one in. One horse accepted him and the other did not. Can you help with this?"

9/7/05: "Why do you feel that 'sacking out' is an undesirable training technique?"

Question: "Does yawning have a meaning for horses?"

Listen to Monty's Answer:

Read Monty's Answer: It certainly does, and it has a critical meaning when dealing with horses. The act of yawning is to take in oxygen. One element of tiring is starving the brain of oxygen. During exertion and tension we assign oxygen to muscles needed for work. Horses in their quest for survival will enter periods of extreme concern and rob the brain severely. They’ll push themselves for a long time and then when they become satisfied that they are not going to die, they’ll relax and yawn because their system is taking over to re-oxygenate the brain. When I work with horses at starting gates, I sometimes find that it can take up to a couple of hours to achieve this state. It is a demonstrative act that means, “I’m relaxed now and I feel assured that you’re not going to hurt me.”

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Question: "I have a horse that is one-sided. He is perfectly fine to handle on one side, but I can do nothing with him on the other. What do I do?"

Listen to Monty's Answer:

Read Monty's Answer: This one-sided condition can result from two distinctly opposite causes. One could be that the horse has been handled virtually entirely on the good side, but ignoring the opposite side, or the horse has been abused on the bad side. No matter what the situation is, the process to correct it is virtually the same. I suggest that you use Join-Up. I recommend three or four sessions on consecutive days, or until your horse is relaxed, following you and perfectly comfortable being with you. I would add to that two or three sessions with the Dually Halter. I would then begin to work on the bad side with the artificial arm (see “Your Horse and the Farrier,” page 127 in From My Hands To Yours). I would use the artificial arm as it will allow you to effectively work with your adrenaline down. Gradually, gain the trust of your horse and this problem will go away.

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Question: "I had two horses at home and I brought a new one in. One horse accepted him and the other did not. Can you help with this?"

Listen to Monty's Answer:

Read Monty's Answer: With a new horse, it is important to execute the introduction gradually. Horses have a social pecking order. To fail to address this issue can result in injuries to your horses. The introduction should be made only after you have created a situation where the horses can communicate over a safe fence. The process is often called “buddying up.” When you can sense complete comfort, only then should you attempt to place the new horse in the new field. This can take two or three days to possibly two or three weeks.

-Monty

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Question: "Why do you feel that 'sacking out' is an undesirable training technique?"

Answer: Please allow me the opportunity to first suggest to you that one must seek an agreed definition for the term 'sacking out' before you take a stand on it. The process called 'sacking out' takes on several different forms as you travel around the world. Even here in the United States 'sacking out' will appear as one thing in New England and quite a different process in New Mexico. Nevada will regard 'sacking out' in one way, while Florida will employ a process significantly different.

Each time I have written about 'sacking out,' I have attempted to make it clear that I was referring to the process that my father used all through the thirties, forties and fifties. He would take an untrained raw horse and tie him high to a substantial post in a fence line that was made of heavy planks by passing the rope through the chin piece on the halter and then tie a bolin knot around the horse's throat latch. Ultimately the horse would be tied approximately seven feet from the ground.

With the wild horse securely tethered, he would tie a large cotton rope around the neck of the horse just in front of the shoulders. He would then cause the horse to step over that rope with one hind leg, which would allow him to use the neck portion to hoist the hind leg off the ground. The horse was then standing on three legs and likely to fall if he made a quick move. Next he would fix a canvas to a long rope and throw at the horse causing him to take fright. This would result in horses falling virtually every time it was done.

Injuries were commonplace with this system he called 'sacking out.' Teeth were knocked out as they hit the fence and lifelong scars were evident around the rear pasterns where the rope had broken the skin. My father would alternate hind legs on a daily basis until the horse was too frightened to run and would stand for the 'sacking out' in a state of quivering fear. I was the witness to the 'sacking out' process on virtually a daily basis throughout my childhood.

In England, they may use the term 'sacking out' or 'swinging.' I had one critic write an article for a magazine in England who said that I was wrong to criticize 'sacking out' and that every yearling should be 'swung.' He said that it assisted the horsemen in truly breaking the horse so that the horse became subservient to the wishes of the handler.

'Swinging' is done in a similar fashion to what my father did except that it employs a freestanding single strong post about ten feet high. The yearling is tied to that post right up near the top. No legs are tied up, but the process of frightening the horse with plastic or canvas is essentially the same as my father did. With 'swinging,' however, the horse is frightened and runs around the post wrapping him up like a tetherball. Once he has made sufficient circles of the post, then his rope is shorter and he's actually lifted so that his front legs are off the ground. It is this action that causes the process to be called 'swinging'

I use many forms of frightening objects, plastic, canvas, cloth and any number of others. However, it is absolutely essential in my process that the horses are allowed to move of their own free will. I use a Dually halter and encourage the horse to stay with me, but I do not restrain by tying. In every way I attempt to treat the horse in such a way so that I cause as little elevation of adrenalin as possible.

Once I have the horse allowing the frightening object near it, then I am quick to retract the object when the horse settles even in the slightest. Through this method I am able to cause the horse to rationalize that he is in control of the process of causing the object to go away. It is amazing how quickly this method will affect an acceptance of these scary things. True enough, it is an art form and one must learn how far to go and when to back off, but it is multiples more effective than what I regard as 'sacking out.'

This entire exercise is steeped in the premise that one should never force the horse, but allow the horse a choice. It reaches to endorse my saying that it is not right to say you must to the horse, but to request. The method that I use and endorse will, in fact, cause the horse to accept frightening things in his life, not because he is forced to but eventually because he wants to.

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