by Kimberly Bunch

Created on: July 23, 2008   Last Updated: June 25, 2009

Horse Communication
Your horse communicates to you in a unique way. By learning their special way of communicating through body language will help you better understand and bond with your horse.

Temperament
Most behavioral problems stem from misunderstandings' between horse and rider.
Remember that no two horses are alike. Their temperaments are different. One way of training your horse might not work with another horse. Horses have their own individual personalities just as humans do. Get to know your horse by understanding their individual expressions.

Horse's Disposition to Sensitivity
Horses are usually sensitive creatures to sounds, touch, smells, and taste. If it is noise that your horse has the most issue with than gradually work up a tolerateable amount of noise that they will learn to handle. Work on only one stimulus at a time.

Confidence
Assessing your horse's level of confidence is important, because most behavioral problems originate from a lack of confidence or understanding with owner verses horse.

Communication
Cooperation is part of understanding your horse by relating to them. We tend to make horses adjust to our ways of vocal communication instead of evaluating the horse's personality for signs of understanding.

Horses don't use words. Their ears, eyes, muzzles, tails and body position are in it self the way they are communicating to you. A horse's body position, movements, and are all ways they express themselves.

Look at your horse's facial expressions when you are interacting with him/her. Watch the ears move to auditory sounds for understanding. A high tale is a sign of excitement, but did you realize horses will flatten their tails between their legs when frightened? Tail lashing is a sign of irritability. Tight mouth is a sign of stress or they don't want something. When they are happy and relaxed their mouth is also relaxed. Lines under eyes equal stress. Wrinkled nose is like a human's dislike of something; bared teeth are a sign they are mad and might bite. You will want to know these signs for understanding your horse; if your horse is in pain or what not.

Food/Health
Make sure your horse has fresh good smelling hay to eat. If you smell it you will smell hay that is sweet and fresh smelling if it is good hay or not. Pasture grass and possibly a small amount of pelleted feeds, grains, or sweet feeds add in a balanced diet for your horse. Check your horse's teeth regularly, hoof care and washing down and brushing your horse often are all important in keeping your horse healthy and happy.
Remember smart horses like people, are raised to be smart. Intelligence and good decisions are mostly learned and not necessarily from genetics only. You can train your horse to be smart, or dumb it is all in the way you interact with your animal. Just as in raising children. The environment makes all the difference and whose teaching.

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