Horse Welfare, Laterality, Hair Whorls, Cognitive Bias & Early Experience: Subtle Individual Differences, Teaching the Foal to Lead

Take your time with this first lesson. Foals only have a limited attention span. Always stay within the limits of their ability to learn new things. Be consistent in the way you give each lesson. Consistency is more important than continuity. Foals with low cowlicks need more lessons to form habits, while foals with high cowlicks learn quickly and retain lessons longer-good or bad. Significant changes occur in the brain when a foal is learning, including creating new connections between neurons. This phenomenon is called neuroplasticity. A day or two between lessons is a good thing. It’s what I call a period of consolidation, meaning a period for those new connections to solidify and become entrenched as new neural pathways. With more practice, the stronger these connections become.

Remember the Horse Behaviorist UT mantra: “First experiences are critical to forming future responses.” You plant the seed with the first lesson, then with consistent watering, new branches begin to form, and then more branches, then new branches on existing branches, until you have a full healthy tree.

A note here on individual differences: if a foal is of the reactive type with a high cowlick, caution is required to avoid sudden movements during each step to prevent causing a fear reaction. I keep the lead rope loose to prevent the lead rope from tightening quickly and causing a sharp jerk on the halter from the rope if the foal becomes frightened and tries to pull away.

Learning occurs quickly in less reactive foals, and less caution is required, but low fear foals require more repetition for habituation to occur. All foals eventually habituate using my “New School” approach, but differences in reactivity and fearfulness are essential to remember during halter fitting, picking up the feet, leading, and standing tied. NOT ALL FOALS LEARN AT THE SAME RATE. It would be best to introduce new procedures gradually to more reactive foals at each step of the training procedure. It is also important to remember that a time comes when foals are no longer fearful and may refuse to accept the hug, the halter, or having their legs and feet handled. This is the time mild discipline becomes necessary, but never before.

Another critical point to remember is motivation to resist handling can shift from fear to no-fear resistance quickly in some foals and slower in others. Once the foals overcome their fear, a shift from right-brain pessimism to left-brain optimism and motivation for self-gratification takes over, and that attitude can shape resistance. Failing to recognize the cognitive shift is a mistake that, once made, can be difficult to correct. Cognitive bias shifts can occur at any stage of handling, from the initial hug and hold stage, to the haltering stage, to the feet handling stage, and eventually to the learning to lead stage. A firm “NO” at the beginning of a cognitive bias shift is an important reinforcement tool. The goal is to teach the foals that they must tolerate some things, even if they don’t want to. In the early training stages, failure to recognize motivational shifts and deal with them accordingly can cause subsequent resistance in the following stages of training. Learned resistance motivated my self-gratification may stay with foals throughout their lives. However, fear motivation can take over if you use too much force to correct no-fear resistance and a foal starts to struggle. Resistance caused by no-fear motivation is stronger and more common in less fearful foals with low cowlicks. Fear is the primary motivator in resistance in fearful foals, even if it doesn’t look like fear. Subtle signs of fear can include tail swishing and tossing the head. The set of the ears is also important to watch. Both ears forward indicate attention to you, and ears back indicate agitation, which could mean anger or fear. One ear back and one ear forward indicates confusion or could mean the dominant use of one side of the brain. It would be best if you learned to discern between the two. Always stop momentarily and ask yourself, is it fear or not?

The first step in teaching the foal to lead begins after the foal gets used to wearing a halter and having a lead rope attached. I start by leading the mare and encouraging the foal to follow. I keep a long (10ft) lead rope loose on the foal so it can see it out front, but do not pull the foal with the rope. The foal is encouraged to follow with the rope stretched out in front to form a visual memory of walking with a rope in front of it. Once the foal follows, I begin to apply light pressure on the lead rope so the foal learns to lead along with the mare: short distances at first, then farther and farther. When young animals learn new things, each has a limit to how much they can absorb at one time. If a foal gets frisky on this first lesson and starts to jump around (as I’m sure you’ve seen this if you’ve raised as many as I have), don’t mistake it for disobedience unless the foal has a low whorl. The behavior is more likely to cause fear and confusion simultaneously, and it’s best to stop for the day, take off the halter and start again the next day. Doing this contradicts what most people believe, but it’s essential to think to yourself before reacting, is it fear and confusion, or disobedience? I call this a “Time Out” for people, not the horse. The little break you take usually lets the foal calm down, and the confusion stops. Then patiently begin again.

Secondary reinforcement with a food reward is helpful at this stage. I usually wear a fanny pack in front and not behind my back filled with 1/2″ cuts of small-diameter carrots that are easy to get to. Carrots are good to teach foals to eat even before these lessons begin. Carrots are healthy, cheap, have a satisfying crunch, and don’t have much sugar. When foals use the left brain optimist no fear side of the brain (opposite for the right side cowlick), they can multitask and learn to search for food while also learning to see and associate the lead rope with moving where the rope is directing them. Using the “carrot and stick principle,” I reward the foal with a treat each time it moves forward willingly, but they have to EARN the treats, and if given too many, that’s all they think about. I also use a calm, reassuring voice to help to form this habit quickly.

This type of training is called classical conditioning. By first using the lead rope, the carrots, and the voice commands simultaneously (tools), then one by one removing the tools until habituation (habits) forms. Use all the tools first, then remove them individually as the habits form. As you reach this point and the foal is becoming consistent in it’s response to leading, the best practice is to start using a variable reinforcement schedule, which means using the tools one day (the rope and a carrot without voice commands one day, the next day the rope and your voice without carrots) Repeat the variable reinforcement schedule until no more tools are needed except the lead rope, or just your voice without a tight lead rope. When you do this, “Come on buddy” means to them “carrots, lead rope, going somewhere where there may be more carrots.” A variable reinforcement schedule works best on foals with high cowlicks and takes more time with the lows. The lows learn it quickly because of the reward but forget sooner and need more repetition to form habits. The highs learn it slower but retain what they learn longer. I like horses with high cowlick horses because once they get over their fear, they bond better with us and come to see us as their adult protectors (herd leaders in human costumes).