Natural Horsemanship

The Home Ranch horse program takes a very progressive and integrative approach. Although the term Natural Horsemanship is often overused, it is just as well misunderstood. Natural Horsemanship is, in a sense, the art of effective communication between people and horses. The part that many people do not understand is that the term itself is used to describe a broad range of horsemanship practices. We tend to be a mixture of many different clinicians, and go about it this way because we feel it suits us best when considering our audience, the dude. Unlike the stereotypical term "Cowboy Up", Natural Horsemanship has nothing to do with forcing the horse to understand our language, but rather us as humans trying to understand how horses communicate. Many times the non-verbal communication that horses use goes either unnoticed or misunderstood by humans, ending only in miscommunication.

The Nature of Horses- For starters, let's begin at the root of the nature of horses. Horses are very social and inquisitive animals. They are prey and herd animals which brings a few valid points to light: their instincts are fight or flight. This means when there is a confrontation, they either stick it out and kick/bite the other horse harder or they flee the predicament. Although many people can relate to such behavior within horses, such behavior is known as a 'scream' in horse communication. What the human is really missing is the three levels of inaudible and non-visual communication that always take place before a 'conversation' between two horses gets to the point of biting, kicking or running away. It is this very non-verbal communication that we have to learn in order to communicate with a horse.

Respect for your Horse- Next we can address the idea of using fear, and how that negatively affects the relationship with the horse. What our goal is at The Home Ranch is to treat our horses with as much respect as possible, which tends to come into conflict when people think "cowboy". When many people think of the "cowboy" they see him riding a bucking bronc in a rodeo, kicking and spurring. What truly goes unknown with such a widely accepted stereotype of "cowboy" as described above, is that real cowboys are incredible horsemen, and rodeo was a natural outgrowth of their work with horses in a ranch setting.

In order to further illustrate the previous point, take for instance a quote from a real cowboy, Tom Dorrance, the father of modern day Natural Horsemanship, "The thing you are trying to help the horse do is to use his own mind. You are trying to present something and then let him figure out how to get there." This is nearly the best way to describe the way we like to present Natural Horsemanship at The Home Ranch. It is a practice without using fear but rather, understanding. It is within this willingness to learn how horses communicate that we are able to realize what we once thought was a 'subtle' cue is actually a 'scream' in the world of the horse. It is only once you have the incredible opportunity to get a 'soft feel' with a horse that you begin to realize how to properly use pressure and release. Such a feel is not always by means of visible cues, but still understood by the horse due to their incredible sensitivities.