Be Dominant Without Being Dominating
I have been doing a lot of thinking lately about the difference between how a Lead horse behaves and how a Dominant horse behaves. We recently had a couple of new horses come to the farm so we got to see Rituals in a more amplified version. It provided much food for thought and led me to the BFO (blinding flash of the obvious) this post is titled after.
We introduced one of the horses into each herd. Because of environmental considerations, I felt it was safest for us to pull several horses out of one herd and let the new horse integrate with them one (or two) at a time. This provided me with an opportunity to observe two very obviously different styles of introduction. The number one horse in this herd is a Dominant horse. He is not interested in leading anyone, he is only interested in having the chosen spot at the feeder, in the shelter, and with the one mare. Gunny is near the bottom of the pecking order in this herd of five (now six), but Gunny behaves more like a Lead horse and will probably work his way up in time.
The Dominant horse immediately ran straight up to the new horse, said Hello and squealed and struck at the new horse. Then after that he drove him away. And when his mare was turned back in the pen, he proceeded to very actively work to keep the new horse away from "his" mare. Meanwhile when Gunny was introduced into the herd, he ran over to where the new horse was standing but he circled around behind him and stood right behind him sniffing his tail head. After about 30 seconds or so, he walked partially around and sniffed his flanks, and then finally he walked forward and said Hello head on. And then the two horses pranced off at the same time but in slightly different directions, so they ended up separating and each going their own way.
My interpretation of the interaction was that Gunny was telling the new horse that he didn't want to fight when he walked around him. But then when he stood behind him he was checking to see if the new horse would let him stand in this dominant position. And then when he was sniffing he flanks he was checking to see if he would kick to defend himself or if he would remain submissive. Then when he thought the new horse wasn't interested in fighting he went to say Hello and they pranced off together before splitting apart to each do their own thing.
What became obvious to me during this interaction was that Gunny very quickly and efficiently placed himself above the new horse in the pecking order and he did it with no conflict. Meanwhile the Dominant #1 horse also placed himself above the new horse, but he did it by getting into a conflict with that horse and coming out on top. So the Lead horse must work to become higher in the pecking order if he is going to have any horses to lead. But he does it in a much different way from how the Dominant horse moves himself up in the pecking order.
So the next thing this led me to realize was that because of the way I was doing certain things, I was putting Gunny in a dominant position over me. And then I was wondering why he was not willingly responding to my next request. I will spend some time in a future post talking about some specific things we can do as we are handling our horse in order to avoid inadvertently putting our horses above us in the pecking order and making everything we want to do harder.
We introduced one of the horses into each herd. Because of environmental considerations, I felt it was safest for us to pull several horses out of one herd and let the new horse integrate with them one (or two) at a time. This provided me with an opportunity to observe two very obviously different styles of introduction. The number one horse in this herd is a Dominant horse. He is not interested in leading anyone, he is only interested in having the chosen spot at the feeder, in the shelter, and with the one mare. Gunny is near the bottom of the pecking order in this herd of five (now six), but Gunny behaves more like a Lead horse and will probably work his way up in time.
The Dominant horse immediately ran straight up to the new horse, said Hello and squealed and struck at the new horse. Then after that he drove him away. And when his mare was turned back in the pen, he proceeded to very actively work to keep the new horse away from "his" mare. Meanwhile when Gunny was introduced into the herd, he ran over to where the new horse was standing but he circled around behind him and stood right behind him sniffing his tail head. After about 30 seconds or so, he walked partially around and sniffed his flanks, and then finally he walked forward and said Hello head on. And then the two horses pranced off at the same time but in slightly different directions, so they ended up separating and each going their own way.
My interpretation of the interaction was that Gunny was telling the new horse that he didn't want to fight when he walked around him. But then when he stood behind him he was checking to see if the new horse would let him stand in this dominant position. And then when he was sniffing he flanks he was checking to see if he would kick to defend himself or if he would remain submissive. Then when he thought the new horse wasn't interested in fighting he went to say Hello and they pranced off together before splitting apart to each do their own thing.
What became obvious to me during this interaction was that Gunny very quickly and efficiently placed himself above the new horse in the pecking order and he did it with no conflict. Meanwhile the Dominant #1 horse also placed himself above the new horse, but he did it by getting into a conflict with that horse and coming out on top. So the Lead horse must work to become higher in the pecking order if he is going to have any horses to lead. But he does it in a much different way from how the Dominant horse moves himself up in the pecking order.
So the next thing this led me to realize was that because of the way I was doing certain things, I was putting Gunny in a dominant position over me. And then I was wondering why he was not willingly responding to my next request. I will spend some time in a future post talking about some specific things we can do as we are handling our horse in order to avoid inadvertently putting our horses above us in the pecking order and making everything we want to do harder.
Comments