Learning to Believe the Horse's Communication

A client's mule from a few years ago...

30+ years ago when I started out with horses I never would have thought my journey would evolve as it has... The variety of disciplines and animals I've worked with was not exactly intentional, but rather part of my evolving journey. The more exposure I had to unfamiliar experiences, the more I wanted to learn.

Whether it was 3 Day Eventing, jumpers, Dressage, racehorses, driving, ranch roping, moving cattle, cutting, reined cow horse, packing in the mountains, colt starting, Horsemanship, or rehabilitating dangerous horses, each area had something to add to my foundation of understanding. Over the years my experiences ranged in working with a variety of breeds such as Thoroughbreds, ponies, Warmbloods, Arabians, Heavy and Light Drafts, Chilean Criollos, east Asian horses, gaited horses, Mustangs, Mules, and many others.

Horsemanship: Three detrimental contributors to failing human/horse partnerships

Horses are beginning to arrive for training at my summer facility. The two most common groups of horses have either had the winter off, and the owners realized they either need some refining/furthering of their education, or there are a lot of young horses that need to be started.

If you’ve spent any time reading my Alternative Horsemanship with Samantha Harvey website, or past Blog entries, you’ll realize that I’m not the “quick fix” kind of horse trainer. The two sites help separate those folks who don’t want to have to sift through information and are looking for quick and easy answers, and those who are committed to learning/participating in the journey they and their horse will be experiencing with me.

Ask the Horse Training: Breaking down the philosophy and training theories of Alternative Horsemanship with Samantha Harvey

Ask the Horse Training: Breaking down the philosophy and training theories of Alternative Horsemanship with Samantha Harvey

Over the past three decades, I have had a variety of Ask the Horse Trainer “problem situations” regarding horses offering unwanted behavior and their owners at a loss as to what to do. Typically horse owners who write in asking for help with their “problem” horse are doing so from a mainstream perspective searching for a “how-to” or quick fix answer to change their horse’s behavior. This means that generally the questions are asked with a sole focus on the unwanted behavior these horse owners are seeing, experiencing, or trying to change. They are trying to STOP the unwanted physical action of the horse. Sorry but I’m the wrong person to offer what I call the “McDonald’s Fix” solution- in my mind, you cannot work with horses in a “standardized” manner with a step by step solution.