How We Worked Out Our Hill Problems

How We Worked Out Our Hill Problems

If you have been reading about Trifecta's trail adventures from the beginning, you will know that he has had problems controlling his speed going downhill for a long time.  I don't think this is an uncommon problem with young horses at all.  That is, unless they lived in the mountains of West Virginia like Dante.  Cruiser and Cole had no control over their feet going down hills, and I was able to teach them how to do it in just one session by going up and down the hill over and over until they slowed down.  I did it with Cruiser in the saddle, and I did it with Cole on foot.  After just one session, I only had to fine tune their training.  

That didn't work with Trifecta.  He would rush down the hill, we would turn around and do it again once or twice and he would seem fine.  The next time--he would be back to rushing again.  Sometimes he would do well for one or two times--and then he would revert again.  This went on over so many rides.  He just didn't seem to be able to consistently control his hindquarters.

It helped if I stopped him when he got too fast so he could get himself together before proceeding.  Sometimes I had to stop him multiple times to make it down a short slope.

In the early days, he had trouble going uphill, too.  He would put his head way up into the air and with great no coordination, rush up.  Ellen solved this problem for me.  Most people with clicker trained horses teach their horse to lower his head on command by pointing down.  It is one of the easiest things to do.  I also taught Trifecta to lower his head when I was in the saddle by jiggling the rein.  Ellen recognized that Trifecta's problem was that he wasn't using his head correctly.  While we were going up a steep slope, she walked beside him, bent over and pointed to the ground to encourage him to lower his head--it worked like magic.  The very first time, he discovered it was easier to walk up the hill if his head was lowered and he used it like a fulcrum.  That became his verbal command.  "Fulcrum."  I never had any more problems going up hills after that.  We just "fulcrum" up.

The down hill problems persisted.  I am so glad that Ellen has spent a lot of time walking with us on our rides because she figured out how to explain to Trifecta how to go down hills.  We started to realize how much he was paying attention to the way that she was moving.  Ellen showed him what we wanted.  We decided on the command, "control," because he needed to get control of his body.  We have 2 short, steep slopes we have to go down to get to the first river crossing.  Ellen tried shifting her weight back, deliberately placing her feet and making hand motions to simulate his front feet.  My job was to lightly squeeze alternating reins as he stepped down.  I didn't think that that would help him--I was doing that to teach him a cue from the saddle.  

As we would go down the slopes, she would say "control" and use her body language.  He would watch her--and then he started to match her steps.  I couldn't believe it when it seemed to work.  This wasn't the instant cure like "fulcrum," but it was helping.  It didn't take long before he started to watch her hands whenever we needed controlled walking--such as going down the steep river bank--another thing I had been struggling with.

Lately, she has intentionally left me alone to go down the slopes.  I say "control" and give him his rein cues, and it has been nothing short of amazing to me.  When he is really good, I will give him a click/treat to let him know, but I don't do it all the time, and he doesn't seem to care.  I think this is another instance of us showing him how to do something easier--and he likes it better.

Back to Trifecta's ability to follow hand signals; we had one other extraordinary incident.  A few weeks ago, we had some much needed rain, river bank was muddy.  If we ride the horses way on the left side of the trail, the mud isn't so bad.  There is a lot of mud if you ride down the center of the trail.  If we go way to the right--it is horrible.  That morning, Trifecta saw all the mud and decided he would try going on the right side since it didn't look as muddy as it actually is.  When I realized what he was going to try to do, I stopped him and tried to guide him to the far left--but we would have to cross the muddy center.  I called to Ellen.  She came over, talked to Tri to get his attention, walked to the far left, stooped over and with both hands pointed exactly where she wanted to go.  Wouldn't you know that he immediately marched across the bad mud to the spot she pointed where the mud wasn't as bad and then marched down to the river.  I was simply shocked.  This wasn't something we trained for--he just deduced what we wanted him to do.

Sometimes we just need to think outside the box when we train horses.  With Trifecta, it is a common occurrence.