Moving on with the Uberstreichen Exercises
Dec 17th, 2009 by Carolyn
Hi again. Today we will be moving on with the Uberstreichen Exercises.
When your horse will stand on his own then you are ready for the next step. Put your hands on each side of the noseband of the halter and do not but in fingers or thumbs inside the halter in order to prevent injury to yourself your horse should jerk his head up. Don’t but your head above his for the same reason. Hold the horse’s head straight, breathe deeply, and relax. If the horse turns his head one way or the other gently bring it back to straight and then float with him holding his head. Do this for a short time as the horse will tolerate it, then let go slowly and walk away and disconnect. The disconnect is very important to practice. The horse is learning to give and to stay put. He is learning to be responsible without you having to police him. This teaches your horse to stay focused in a hold as well as in a disconnect. Self-carriage of the horse’s gaits can only occur when the horse is free from the rider’s active influence. This exercise starts the journey. Self-carriage creates proper carriage and natural collection.
The next step with the first exercise is to pull down gently on the halter in the same manner, remember to breath deeply, and relax. As you are pulling down alternate between pulling down and holding on in a float style going with the horse and returning him to straight when ever necessary. When the horse drops his head slightly then release and take another relaxing walk around your horse. If your horse is the kind that puts his head down to the ground gently lift it up so that his eye is at your waist level or lower. Work on getting him to hold it at the height you ask for on his own while you are holding on to him in a floating style making your adjustments to straight or lower and higher when you need to in a relaxed manner. This will help you acquire communication through the reins that are more effective when you ride.
As you continue to practice this, hold him in this position longer and longer. The result should be complete relaxation in both you and your horse. You should feel that your horse and you are in a deep connection, in relaxation – a state of bliss. Your horse will half close his eyes. After the second week when you ask your horse to low his head, he will automatically go into a feeling of well-being relaxation and a trace like state of consciousness. Initially and periodically, when you take the horse’s head between your hands you will feel that his neck is locked meaning you cannot move it easily. When you try he will give you some resistance and this is good as you work on getting him to unlock. He will at some point unlock it. Proof that he has unlocked his neck is that you can gently nod his head in and out from his chest and left and right and in little circles with him remaining perfectly relaxed.
(Just imagine you are at a show and your horse gets wild over something and if he has been practicing this exercise, all you have to do to gain his composure is to do this exercise with him and he will let go and relax and return to your guidance in seconds.)
Your horse is learning that to give to a request is enjoyable and rewarding. The first thing you want in a horse is control of his head and nose. Where the nose goes so will the horse. When his nose is happy so is the horse. He is learning self-carriage while working with you in the halt.
If you have, any questions let me know. Good luck and I hope you find these exercises I am about to share with you as valuable as I have. I also want to say again that this method will support all equestrian pursuits when you ride and deepen the bond and connection you share with your horse. This is going to be our wintertime project together. If your climate is too cold to work with your horse, you can imagine you are doing them. When I was unable to ride for a year I imagined I was training and riding and when I returned to riding I was ever better at riding that when I left it. So, go ahead and train your imaginary horse. Just studying the exercises will help you in many ways to become a light, and effective rider as well as becoming present to the true art of horsemanship. You will be training your horse to perform in self-carriage without the need of nose bands or even bits. Who knows when you get to your horse he may have read your mind and you discover he already knows what you are asking him to do!
Enjoy your weekend and good luck with the Holiday shopping!
Carolyn
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WOW!!!! After reading up on my prep for exercise one, and actually going into exercise one, I went out to visit my girl, Merle, to give it a try. She did great with the standing on her own exercise, and within seconds of working on the nose drop the most amazing thing happened….my slightly mistrusting, but totally giving horse completely relaxed!!!!! She got this absolutely BLISSFUL look in her eyes. It was so wonderful to see this happen right before my eyes! I can’t wait to see how working further will help strengthen our bond!!
Thanks Carolyn!
I notice that when I attempt to push my horses nose inward to create the neck bend that she backs up. I have tried doing the excercises in front of a wall so that she has no place to go but Im wondering if there is a better way to show her that Im not asking her to back. Everything else seems to work very nicely!
Hey Carolyn, Just checking in. Yes, too cold with wind chills in the neg 30′s tonight. We did a lot of visualizaion on ski team, too. Really helps with the desired outcome, and was a big part of our training. See it, feel it, do it. Works great! Deborah Johnson
Checking in, waaay to late, but are up north on my vacation, and haven`t even got the time to check my e-mail! I really like your tip about imagine the exercises! Can`t wait to get back to my horse and start up!
Just one question…my mare is 2 years old, soon to be 3. I still look at her as a baby, and don`t want to rush things with the riding and so on, I want her to develop the best she can, get more muscles and ready mindset. She got a whole year with her mum, but has gone trough a tough period after that. She is now a very happy, little horse, living outside all the time with all her good friends. She is calm and easy going, and we walk long walks, play and groom, and started this autumn with driving exercises. I`m thinking about starting her at 4, and training at 5. What do you think?
Hi Carolyn,
Just checking in for this week. I have not had much time to practice with Gunny this week, but got much yawning and licking when I did–like pretty much constantly the whole time we were in the floating hold.
I can see a hole in our communication and feel that he “yields but doesn’t give” sometimes, just as another poster commented. I am so happy to find this hole and have an opportunity to work through it with him.
Thanks so much for the post as well as your comments. I have been reading through all of them and find them very helpful.
Merry Christmas!
Holly
Dear Barbara,
I have not yet talked to Mark to give him your message to stop the comments comming to you. I may not be able to talk to Mark regarding this matter untill after the holidays.
Hello Carolyn,
I’m still getting follow-up comments regarding abating the struggle with practice blog. Please discontinue forwarding the comments to my e-mail address. Thank you. I just received the DVD, The 7 Waterhole Rituals. I can’t wait to see it and practice with my Arabian buddy.
Wishing you a Merry Christmas and healthy New Year.
Cheers, Barbara and Monie
birroyal@aol.com
Dear Nancy Pantle,
It really is not the chicker training that is problem but instead the managment of the click training that is the problem and the order of the lessons you choose.
If you had choosen patients as the first thing you click on and the horse got a reward for relaxation, he would have no problem with the UE. If the horse seemed in a hurry for his treat and you had responded by not giving him a treat untill he no long begged this would not be a problem.
You have built a habit into your horse to be in a hurry and need a reward right away.
To cause this not to happen start your horse between the dance trick and the pause trick. Work your horse to perfrom and then work him on the pause. The pause becomes a trick as well as the perfromance. Everything can always be easily reschooled with a horse especialy when it has not been abused by your interaction.
This is easy to fix for you. When the horse is fussing keep waiting untill he relaxes and then chick for that and then the reward is given. This way you can back out of using the clicker once the horse starts to enjoy the pasue and has learned the art of meditation at the moment you ask for it. Remember for best result do not use UE with a clicker. Use the Clicker to be able to give the clicker up.
The clicker brings too much concern and focus on the results and the reward. It does not work well for gaining a personal intintimacy and ejoyment of the process being the reward.
the process must become the reward.
A clicker would not work to creat intintimacy with your husband in how to please you in the romatic department. It would tend to drive you two further way. You are wanting to gain a personal conntection with your horse and you do this responding back and fourth.
I teach clicker to my student as a way to teach my student how to stay focused in the moment and to develop and instenct for expermentation but not as a training method for the horses.
Hope this helps,
Carolyn
To Carolyn and All,
I have been so grateful for what everyone has been sharing and especially your additional insights in your replies to others, Carolyn. I am not a seasoned horsewoman, but had been feeling pretty good about how far my little herd of four and I had come. But doing these exercises, as when I had used your waterhole rituals here, I found a whole new dimension and unexpected resistances. All of my horses quietly and willingly stand as I circle about them. But searching for better ways to train in the past about a year ago, I had begun using clicker training with both my mare Stella and our gelding Johnny. (I must say in defense of clicker training, I am not a master and may lack much art). But in the tucking and holding exercises, both Stella and Johnny were so concerned about trying to find “the right answer” or maybe–put more exactly–about the moment of their reward, neither could relax and simply give and be in the moment. There was much jerking and movement, and we are having a hard time finding a place from which to rebegin. Interestingly, Junie Moon, my mare who never learned clicker training so easily finds her way as we move on with your teaching.
Many, many thanks.
Nan Pantle
Dear Karen Clouston,
What is a wonderful exercise to get a horse comfortable with a halter.
1. Sit in a chair and hold a bucket in your lap and let your horse eat out of it while you have your arms rapped around the rim of the bucket then keep your elbow on the rim and touch his head with your hands while he has a halter on and take it slowly untill you can do anything you want with the halter and his head and that he is fine with it. I even take the halter on and off while he is eating and try not to dsiturbe him at the same time Also you can teach him that he can push your arms way by blocking the bucket with your arms over the top of the bucket like a lid and move them way when he trys to get past them.
You can play “mother may I?” by sometimes letting him push though and at other times not. You and your horse will lerin to work together more closely and your horse will learn the you are the ultimite leader. In an emergancy this is an impornt tool to have for the safty of your horse.
With your horse it might be a good idea to teach your horse to except a pull as well as being light to a suggestion. All he needs is more coping skills on this point.
2.Try this with your horse; Put some food down that he likes to eat with a halter on and when you know he would not respond easily to listening to you, pull him off the food using the halter slowly and be very firm with no give. Pull him to a better food to eat that you had hidden in a bucket close to where he is eathing. You want to work with him when he would not be light. Find the place that would creat a way to communicte with him when he would not be light and work him through it.
Your horse has never experiance a pull so he needs to be introduce to one. This is something easy to teach. It does not have to be a strong pull at first but you want to build the strength of the pull a bit. There might be a day that a pull is necessary for his safty.
Karen this is only a suggestion and may not be valuabe for your horse. If this exercises would not benifit you then someone in the class might find a personal need for their own horse.
Let me know what you think and if you use them share the experaicne with us in the blog.
These are some exercies I used as a kid that I still use today.
Dear Andrea Schwiegel and to the class, 104
When your mare walked away you need to not let her to this. Bring her back to the floating hold once again. This is very important. She needs to learn that she is responsible to stay with you untill you release her by walking way for her. Never let your horse walk away for you. Bring her back very gently to the position you were asking her to be in and then slowly and gentley release her once she has rezumed her role in the floating hold and then when she is fully committed to her part release her slowly and walk away. Then take a longer brake than usual.
You can start again with her when she settles and you can get her to stand again on a droped rein.
This is a great opertunity to teach a horse to feel responsible through the willing moments we share with them.
Carolyn, I’m checking in.
After reading many of the responses of the first exercises, I’ve committed to “being a student” in the UE.
I came into this with an open mind, but honestly colored by what I’ve already achieved with Tamarack. We do much of our training at liberty and he’s amazing in his self carriage. When I do put reins on him (riding or working in hand with a light, loosely fitted jumping cavesson), he is feather light in his response to a lifted rein. He will immediately give his poll, etc.
Before committing to the exercises, although I had not followed the Waterhole rituals to the letter, I did go through them all to see where we were at and whether I could honestly say to you that we were ready for the UE. He did marvelous with all the rituals. We were (and are) ready.
For the first UE, I checked that I could leave him and walk around him. No issues there at all. Lovely.
Then I stood in front of him, took a deep breath and let all tension go in my body.
Because he is already so responsive to the rein, I held certain expectations about the outcome of this request.
I softly took both sides of his halter and softly held…just with my finger tips.
He threw his head. Repeatedly. I finally took the halter off and floated my hands on either side of his face and without contact (deep breathing and relaxation on my part) he put his head down, and he moved his nose in a little. But I with the halter on, no way.
This will take some time!
I did not expect this. Not. at. all.
.
So it’s clear there is a hole in our relationship. Something lacking in his trust in me. His head (specifically his face) has never been his favorite place to be handled, but I thought we’d worked through that. I guess not!
Funny though, that I am not in the least disappointed but rather excited that I have the opportunity to create something even deeper than I thought already existed. I’ve never been afraid to admit when I’m wrong, or that I don’t have enough knowledge, and I am taking this as a brilliant opportunity to learn more about Tam and earn the trust that will allow him to feel comfortable with me softly manipulating his head in this way.
Thank you!
Laurinda wrote: “I’ve been frustrated with trying to remember and perform a certain technique I’ve seen or read about. When I let that go and just went with the feeling the exercise instilled, things improved dramatically.”
Thankyou Laurinda, I love this and I am sure this will help me too!
Dear Carolyn,
Thank you kindly for your response and for reinforcing your approach to the gentle process of riding and communicating aids where the horse is a fully signed up partner.
For the past year people have been asking whether or not I have backed Sun, and if not, why not and when! I am not sure whether hurling my body, uninvited, on a confused youngster would have achieved anything positive seems as we are working with relaxing whilst touching and moving head!
I’m going to try UE #1 on the horses in the herd that I do ride and see how signed up they are.
Your support is very much appreciated.
Dear Carolyn,
thank you for your clarifying answer. I tried yesterday with Clarence, to do nearly nothing,just holding, relax and breathe and also she relaxed, nearly shut her eyes, masticated and licked. After a short while, however she decided to move away. Well, I do now a lot of imaginary work, imagining how our relationship will improve. I realize that the quality of a relationship needs a lot of time and patience, and I called back the image of you on that hill waiting day by day patiently for an invitation by the Indian Medicineman. This really moved me. Through this story I learned a lot and I recall it any time I get impatient. My regret is that I learned or am learning and realizing these things very late in my life (I am 52), and often have the feeling I have not much time, because I would like to change so many things in my life. But the natural process is slow, and so I think I must just let it flow and see where it leads to.
It such a pity, I didn’t meet you before…
I wish you and all the class a wonderful Christmas.
Andrea Schwiegel
Dear Carolyn,
just checking in. Thank you for the clear explanation.
With gratitude
Kerstin de la Rue
Carolyn,
Checking in, after reading and printing your very clear and positive post. I really enjoy how you offer readers choices of visualization if they can’t practice directly at that moment. My 29 year old warmblood sage Prefect has regained his health, it has been a very emotionally tiring week and I can now start practicing the exercises with Ama and the others. A note to anyone reading this if your horse isn’t eating or is ill consider offering as many other small portion alternatives that are appropriate, your horse just might choose something else that gets you back on the road to recovery. It was a lot of little details, like extra turnout, small multiple meals, midnight grooming, time with his best friend in the field, meds, electrolytes and carrot and apples slivered, salted and buried in a different form of soaked feed. He told us what worked. We are tired but happy to have more time with his presence, his attitude is back! You should see how long he can keep electrolytes etc. in his mouth and not swallow. Everyone have a wonderful safe Holiday.
Hello. Wanted to thank you for these exercises. With the rotten weather here plus the crazyness of the holiday season it is so nice to have an excuse to break away and ‘work’ with my horses. They love the attention and we both get to relax. My stallion always yawns and relaxes whenever I play with him, but he actually dozed off while doing the ue. I was able to walk around him, stand or sit in front of him while he tranced, which was a surprise to me as it was a first try. You are absolutely right about reading and working with your imaginary horse. I’ve been reading up on natural horsemanship and communication for several years now. I’ve been frustrated with trying to remember and perform a certain technique I’ve seen or read about. When I let that go and just went with the feeling the exercise instilled, things improved dramatically. My horses and I are more connected, communicate better and can sometimes do things when we are ‘in the moment’ that we’ve never practiced!
Thank you.