by Matthew Brendal

Created on: July 24, 2008   Last Updated: March 03, 2010

Understanding a horse's body language is fundamental for horsemanship success. Good communication is the essence of training your horse for developing sound training strategies for your horse. You must be able to understand how you are affecting your horse by understanding the body language of the horse. Understanding how a horse communicates is also important in effectively communicating to your horse.    

Horses communicate almost exclusively using body language. In the wild excessive sound would give away their position to animals that want to hunt them. Within the herd or band of horses they watch other horses for indications of possible danger. Training your horse falls into that intimate realm of close communication using body language. Yes horses can and do develop cues via sound. But body language through touch or reading body language will always take precedence. If you have a trained eye for body language you can see numerous conversations between a horse and a horse, and a human and a horse. Body language fills that bill perfectly as a way to effectively establish communication between horse and rider.

Humans communicate unknowingly vast amounts of personal information everyday using body language. Humans almost always focus more on what is said verbally more than body language. Humans can transmit ideas with such intricate details when writing or speaking that we have become mostly attuned to that method. The verbal form of communication usually means very little to a horse. Horses are experts at reading body language, it doesn't matter if you are a human. If you want to talk to a horse, you must develop two skills. the first is how to speak with your body and how to understand what a horse is telling you. Communication is a two way street. You need a sender and a receiver, and the receiver has to understand what you say to be effective.

It is difficult in this limited forum to cover with any great detail the nuances of reading body language or transmitting what we want to say using body language. This general rule applies when reading a horse's body language, even most novices usually get some idea of what's on a horse's mind by watching their actions. Horses usually have no problem reading what's on your mind by watching your body language. I know you've heard the old adage; a horse can sense your fear, or other emotions. No they don't have any magical senses; they just read your body language. Remember I discussed

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