Training to set

[blackandwhite]

I saw a video of a class at the nationals I think it was, and the winning colt's handler had an interesting way of getting the horse to set properly. He touched and put pressure on the horse's hip and his back feet moved back into place. I've never seen this technique before. How would you teach it?

The video is here -



What's your own method of teaching a horse to set up properly for halter? I'd love to hear about different techniques.

 

[disneyhorse]

You can train them to set their hind feet by touching the hip and the front feet by squeezing the withers if you train them that way. I've seen it more with the Shetland ponies, that's where I picked up this trick. I don't know why mini people tend to bend over and hand-set the feet.

When I teach my ponies, I grab their hip or withers and rock them off balance, sometimes using my foot/ankle to physically help move the leg until the pony "gets" the cue. Eventually, they get good at it and will set if you even wave your hand towards them, and ultimately will set their feet with just the halter but this class shown is youngsters so they've got some time still to learn.

You can teach horses anything with any cue, it just takes repetition and patience.

 

[Minimor]

I generally set hind feet with the halter. However, pushing on the hip may help me when the horse decides to slump on one hind foot. That's the only time I use that particular method.

Front feet I set the way Disney describes above, or I will actually reach down and set the foot by hand if the pony is being determined about not moving the foot up. With practice the pony soon sets all 4 feet with just the halter and maybe a hand movement or finger pointed toward the offending foot.

The hip pressure thing is actually very easy--just apply pressure in the direction you want whichever foot to move. A bit of trial and error and you will have it figured out.