Horse Welfare, Laterality, Hair Whorls, Cognitive Bias “Old School” Breaking to Ride Part V:

Breaking” a horse to ride using the old-school approach is a challenging and often traumatic event in a young horse’s life. It sets the stage for the acceptance of its life spent under saddle. When forced early experiences compromise the horse’s relationship with the people and cause the maladaptive (abnormal) behaviors discussed earlier, breaking to ride is another event that adds to fearfulness. Fear stress is cumulative. Webster defines cumulative as: “increasing, or increased in quality, degree or force by successive additions.” It’s no wonder that by the time most horses are old enough to ride, they have panic attacks and buck, especially those with high hair whorls. Throughout the domestication of the horse until now, this reaction is often mistaken as “willful disobedience,” and the horse needs to be “broke” of his “defiance” to our “presumed right” to dominate them. It says in Genesis 1:26 that God gave man dominion over animals. But modern biblical scholars today agree that the original Hebrew translation was not dominion but stewardship, which means “the job of supervising or taking care of something.”

The height of the hair whorl determines a horse’s ability to withstand this stress and to adapt after the first experience of being mounted and ridden. The lowered fear reaction of a low-hair whorl horse makes its adaptability easier after this first experience, and, over time, it learns that going along means getting along. Because it works on low-fear horses, it adds creditability to the old-school traditions. Horses in the mid-ranges of fearfulness adjust slower but usually adapt over time with patience. And horses with higher hair whorls sometimes never adapt, and when they appear to adapt to the predator on their back, they do so because they’re TOO AFRAID NOT TO. A horse trained like this is unpredictable and dangerous. When this horse is unsure or feels threatened, it defends itself by spooking, shying, or trying to unload its rider.

In the book “Lonesome Dove” by Larry McMurtrey, Captain Woodrow Call, played by Tommy Lee Jones, rode a horse named the “Hell Bitch” for her defiant attitude. The Hell Bitch bucked, and bucked, but before being broke, she bit Woodrow Call before finally submitting. As a prey species, the first reaction is flight, but when they cannot flee from the predator and feel trapped, the last resort is to fight. But make no mistake, FEAR is the motivation behind the fight. They’re fighting for their lives. People often say the Cape Buffalo is the most dangerous animal in Africa because of its willingness to fight with a lion. Behaviorists like me know the truth: the Cape Buffalo is too slow to run from a lion, so it fights out of fear.

When Agustus McCrea, played by Robert Duvall in Lonesome Dove, asks Captain Call why he wants to ride such a horse, Call responds, “Cause when I’m horseback, I wanna be horseback.”

That one line in the book told me Larry McMurtrey was a horseman, not a cowboy. He knew the best horses were those that were the most difficult. I know them as the most fearful, and when pressed too hard, they break down from stress-related injuries and suffer biomechanical imbalances,

immunodeficiency, gastrointestinal problems, stereotypical behavior, and learned helplessness. When they last long enough to perform at the highest levels of equitation, they almost always have some abnormal behaviors or personality quirks. Sometimes, they’re like a stick of dynamite with someone holding a flame close to the wick. One false move, and the fuse is lit and blows your head off.

I learned this in my research with Temple Grandin when I visited racehorse tracks in the U.S., observed top-performing horses’ behavior, talked to their trainers, and recorded their hair whorls. I also visited Spruce Meadows in Calgary, Canada, for the Masters. Because of Temple Grandin’s influence, I got exclusive access to the show barns and trainers. I photographed the hair whorls of the world’s best Show Jumping Horses. I met Ian Miller, who Rode Big Ben, one of history’s most extraordinary Show Jumping Horses. Big Ben had double whorls, and Ian described to me his “personality quirks” and called him a “skittish elephant.” At Santa Anita, I met Charles Whittingham, a renowned racehorse trainer, and his winning horse at the time, Sir Beaufort, who had two side-by-side hair whorls and had his own unique personality quirks, which included a reluctance to enter a starting gate. The big dapple grey stud delayed races and was almost banned from the track until the owners, frustrated and feeling that their horse had potential and needed a better trainer, sent him to Charles Whittingham, who somehow figured out what it took to get him in the gate. When he did, Sir Beaufort came out of the gate smoking and won seven Stakes Races for 1.5M at my sample time. Initially, the owners purchased Sir Beaufort as a “troublemaker horse” for 7K—an excellent return on their investment.

It’s evident to me that the top trainers at both the race tracks and at Spruce Meadows learned to recognize by intuition the traits some horses have that make them winners. But “intuition” is a word that means “knowing without knowing how you know what you know.” By understanding hair whorls, everyone can learn the traits some horses naturally have that give them an advantage without intuition. But just knowing the hair-whorl characteristics is only half the equation. People need to learn how to delicately raise sensitive, fearful, and brilliant horses with double whorls to reach their potential without a life lived in fear and the debilitating effects of chronic stress. When raised incorrectly, they become dangerous and hold a grudge. When this happens, watch out.

I know from experience. Early in my career as a farrier and horse trainer, I had personal experience with a Hell Bitch double whorl horse. The owner insisted on twisting her ear to make her stand still for shoeing. Instead of giving in, she pulled away from his hand, and instead of turning on him, she spun her head around and bit me on the ass. It was the worst injury I ever suffered from a horse. I could hardly walk, couldn’t sit on the toilet, and lay on my stomach for the first two weeks. When her teeth came together, she pinched about an inch of my right butt cheek. It was the color of a ripe plum and put me out of business for six weeks when I could hardly afford a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for dinner. I’m also concerned about the welfare of people. These kinds of horses can hurt people when they’re misunderstood and mistreated.

I learned that fighting with a horse worsens unless the horse is not fearful, has a low whorl, and fights training or handling because they’re lazy and stubborn. However, this type of fight is rare because the low whorls usually give in to the force people use when they’re young. I learned that when a high whorl horse fought me and leaned on me during shoeing, I did just the opposite of forcing them. I learned that their passive resistance to shoeing was motivated by fear from early experience. In response, first, I switched to the side opposite of the hair whorl and started again. Then, when the horse tried to pull its foot away or lean on me, I let go rather than hold on. I would stop for a minute, go to the horse’s head, and calm it with a soothing voice. Each time I did this, the horses learned that I was different and began to gain confidence that I meant them no harm. Two months later, when I returned to shoe the horse again and practiced the same approach, the horses remembered and were easier to handle. They have excellent memories for people who treat them well and those who don’t.

I used the same approach on what’s called a cold-backed horse. Horses with high whorls that buck when you first get in the saddle are the same things the horse did the first time someone got on their back, but the bucking becomes passive-aggressive and doesn’t look like fear. In response, I learned to get off, walk the horse around for a minute or two until they calmed down, then slowly and carefully, I’d get back on. Sometimes, I’d mount from the opposite side, and that was enough to stop the cold back behavior.

My approach to almost every problem with the high-whorl horse is “just the opposite” of what everyone else seems to do. If you mistake fear for disobedience and punish your horse, you just make it worse.