What does it mean to have a horse with try?
What about putting the try back in a horse and why do you need the try to gain the trust from your horse..
Getting a try from a horse is really about the horses willingness to do something that might be against his own instincts when you ask him to.
For example crossing a tarp or going through a curtain or even loading into a box on wheels!
Often a horse loses its try.. this can be because the horse has not been communicated with or asked in a way where he has a choice so he becomes resigned and is often doing things due to force and pressure rather then trying for us from his own free will..
Or on the other hand he has learnt to ignore our requests and tune out..resulting in a horse that just quits and will no longer respond but stands his ground or resists whatever he is being asked to do.
Either way he no longer tries.
When he doesn’t choose to try we can no longer be proved to be trustworthy..
What do I mean..
Well if my horse chooses to put effort in and try something that may be against his natural instincts but he does so out of the respect he has developed for me and then discovers that the ‘thing’ whatever it was is not something to be wary of after all and is actually where he can find release and relaxation his trust is increased by miles.. but the try has to be there to start this process.
Sometimes it takes considerable contrast training to start a horse trying again.. but once the horse learns that his try will be observed and rewarded he will start to build a bigger and bigger try.
Rewarding a try can be a subtle as rewarding a thought.. a horse may not even move his feet but his expression and body language can still be rewarded..it can still be seen as a try..by rewarding the smallest of tries we start to create momentum towards a cascade of obvious tries.
By missing the tries and adding more pressure at the wrong time, we can literally kill the try.
Horses innately want to work with us not against us but we must become skilled at hunting for that try and then making sure we make it clear that we noticed it.
There is nothing better then feeling your horse choose to do something you ask rather then be forced. Conversations are what build relationships and the more you ask questions and wait for answers from your horse the better your relationship will be.
A horse with a big try = a horse that trusts in you and that’s worth the effort of learning how to reward the try and how to create one that has been lost.