When the mustang has no prior knowledge of the saddle, this process is easy. In this clip Maurin introduces the saddle to Douglas, who has a history of reactivity. Douglas takes it all in stride.

Mustangs that have been handled in the holding facility or failed adoptions often come with hidden histories of traumatic exposure to saddles, ropes, and cowboy attitudes. The resulting handicap can be overcome by careful re-exposure. See the MagicMustangTamer.com for help on this issue.

Good luck with your training. Be sure to visit our training site if you need more help.

There is no reason for a horse to be afraid of the girth. Introduce it in little steps and associate it with something the horse wants, such as midline belly scratches. Managing perception is the key.

Blankets are simple. We want to turn them into signals that something good is about to happen.

The subtasks in blanketing include targeting nose, then withers, to the blanket; being petted with the blanket, and emotional conditioning to give a positive spin on wearing the blanket.

Follow Bravo and John’s adventures learning to blanket on our webpage at the Magic Mustang Tamer. Subscribe to the page there to never miss a chapter.

We are about to want to introduce some tack, so let’s first train the horse to stay put while we work around him. The hardest part for the horse is to notice the rope. The hardest part for the human is to put it on a variable schedule of reinforcement to make the behavior durable.

In the blog on the Magic Mustang Tamer we discuss the problem with actually tying a horse as well as how to train this particular behavior. Be sure to check it out for more information.

Your likes and shares are always very appreciated!

Prepare the horse to understand single sided leg pressure as a cue to move it’s hind legs laterally. This is the matching element to the one-rein stop we will be installing in Task 55.

For more information about this task, check the blog on The Magic Mustang Tamer. More video and discussion of the principles used to train.

Please share our videos to help frustrated mustang adopters find a new fun way to connect with their animals.

We are going to teach the horse to discriminate between types of rein pressure. We want lateral direct pressure to mean only bend your neck. This sets the horse up for riding with accuracy. Bending the neck without moving the feet will help solidify a one-rein emergency stop when the time comes.

There is another video and a complete discussion of this Task on our MagicMustangTamer.com website. We invite you to visit the site and sign up as a free subscriber if you are serious about learning least-coercive horse training methods.

Please like and share this page to help people find out they can train in a kinder and gentler way.

Riding from the ground is fun for the “rider” and the horse. Practice this simple exercise to get control and eliminate resistance. Riding from the ground will also tell you safely where the potential danger zones are while you are still safely on the ground. It won’t hurt to do a lot of this.

For more information on our least-coercive methods of training for mustangs and burros, please visit our website: www.MagicMustangTamer.com

We prepare for riding from the ground, by first helping the horse understand the human is only a little weird, but still fun to play with. Be aware that you are violating that good leading behavior you worked so hard to get in basic training. The key is making the hand on the back the signal that a different behavior will be rewarded.

For more information about how to train this behavior, check the blog on the Magic Mustang Tamer. As always, we appreciate your effort to help us help horses by liking and sharing our content.

We want the horse to understand the two cues that typically mean move in a rearwards direction: lead rope pressure and a verbal “back”. In this task, we focus on the lead rope or rein pressure Installing a low latency response to a rein pressure cue will make your horse much safer to ride.

For more information about teaching this behavior and more video, check the Task 35 blog on the Magic Mustang Tamer