Before you run out, buy a clicker and a bag of carrots, you need to consider a few safety issues.

1. The clicker is not a replacement for good judgement / common sense.

2. Use the clicker to enhance your normal training routines. Don't shortcut the basics because the going seems easy.

3. Pay attention when giving treat rewards and don't get bitten.

4. Remove all rings from your hands. If the horse does inadvertently grab a finger, you don't want to get hung up in his mouth by a ring!

5. Stay within the limitations of your knowledge and experience.

6. The explanations and ideas presented here are merely a sharing of ideas and do not relieve the reader from exercising sound and practical judgement. Like any other training concept, you are responsible for sensible application and safe handling of your horse.

We can either confine, coerce and control the horse; force him against his will, or we can use the horse's natural instincts to follow and learn and develop a willing, working partner. When bad stuff happens, the rider is much better off with a mount who wants to follow and has a high degree of respect than one who is merely looking to escape the rider's confining and oppressive presence.

The principles of natural horsemanship are designed around exploiting the horse's natural instincts and developing his beneficial characteristics. In may horses this process is relatively easy. They are curious and the horseman employs some herd leadership games in which the horse invests his interest and curiosity. If the horseman is competent, the horse becomes a willing follower.

However some horses come with baggage which inhibits this response. They may be raised in the wild and have a deep seated inhibition with respect to letting a predator into their personal space. Horses may have learned fears due to some prior bad experiences or trauma. They may have aggressive tendencies, perhaps are simply spoiled or may have been so sheltered that they never learned to process their environments and make non-reactive decisions as to how to deal with unexpected encounters.

One or more of these characteristics create impediments to learning. Fear can create it's own stress-feedback loop; the fear building upon itself when the horse is being worked while in an anxious state. Some horses respond to stress by becoming unfocused. These animals don't pay attention, overreact to stimulus and are poor learners. Other horses may be spooky, failing to process their surroundings then suddenly reacting when they finally observe an object which now is only a short distance away. Some horses simply don't like being handled, perhaps as a result of some bad prior experience. A few horses display more than one of these traits.

The clicker becomes useful as it interdicts these destructive processes and focuses the horse in a more beneficial manner. Having a positive conclusion to each step in the click learning process gives the horse a chance to be right, start to see value in the interaction, and eventually start using his cognitive abilities in order to try to figure out the game and win a reward.

Obviously the clicker requires oral gratification in order to start producing results, however once the horse is desensitized to the presence of the human and the training process, he can start to process other forms of positive reinforcement from soothing scratches to verbal praise.

We were afraid that the use of treats would encourage the horse to mug us for carrots. What we discovered was that if the handler is disciplined and only gives treats following a click, the horse won't look for the reward until after the click is sounded.

We tried an experiment with a very hyperkinetic mare we call "Whoa Nellie" which Sharon had spent just a few minutes teaching the "Touch it!" game. Sharon held a target on one side and I stood on her other side with a handful of carrots. The horse could reach around any time to grab the carrots from me but her attention was on Sharon. When she cued, "Touch it!" the mare would touch the target then immediately swing her head over to me and take a piece of carrot out of my hand. Horses have a great capacity for figuring out such simple and interesting games.

Thus the click precedes any treats and the horse tries to earn a click.

The design of the clicker is perfect. It's easily held and its sound is unique and distinctive, unlike any other sound in the horse's field of hearing. It takes only a few repetitions for the horse to associate the click with a treat reward.

The click can be sounded the instant the horse achieves the objective without the handler generating some visual distraction. The ability to time the click at the proper instant makes the objective more understandable to the horse.

The clicker is distinctive. Humans are usually so verbal that the horse generally accepts our conversation as background noise and when being addressed, often has to think for a moment, "Was that cue intended for me?" The click is clear and unmistakable which is why it works so well.

Once the horse understands the association, the handler needs to set up a very simple exercise that the horse can easily figure out in order to establish the premise that the horse must do something for the click to occur. Once this association is established, the handler slightly increases the difficulty of the objective so the horse starts to reason out the changes which are occurring and curiously tries to determine what he needs to do to earn the click. Once you get that association down, the results that you can obtain is virtually limitless.

Here are a few terms that we use and their definitions.

• Clicker
  
  A device, also known as a "cricket," which makes a loud, distinctive clicking noise when pressed.

• Click
  
  The sound you make with the clicker to mark the instant the horse has achieved the desired behavior

• Reward
  
  A treat or other positive feedback, such as a nice scratch, after the click is sounded. Food rewards are generally used until the horse solidly understands the game

• Stress-feedback loop
  
  An emotional condition where the horse's stress is building based on his own anxiety. An example could be a saddle pad placed on the horse's back for the first time. The pad is quietly resting there but the horse's stress continues to build until he reacts. Typically these would be situations where in the wild, the stress would build up until the horse takes flight. Other situations where stress-feedback loops occur include being held in the chute, the first time at the tie pole and having legs held for farriery work.

• Scattered / scattering
  
  A condition where the horse is not staying focused on anything in particular, but is randomly responding (reacting) to any of a number of environmental stimuli

• Hug-A-Spook
  
  A scattered horse who doesn't pay attention to his environment, then spooks when he notices things and wants to jump into the handler's lap.

• Mugging
  
  What a horse does to you when he has an uncontrolled desire for goodies. Discipline on the part of the handler will soon teach the horse that treats don't come without clicks so his mind will be on his work, not on getting to the handler's pocket or pouch full of carrots.

• Targeting / Click-targeting
  
  Getting the horse to focus on an object, typically by using "Touch it!" or a similar game.

• Focus Training
  
  Directing the horse's attention to the handler or a specific objective, often through use of targeting.

• Stress Interruption or "Click-assurance"
  
  Interrupting the stress-feedback loop and reassuring the horse that the engagement isn't fundamentally harmful or negative and that the horse can elicit some positive results (a reward). We'll often have the horse target a familiar object for this purpose.

• Game / Clicker Game
  
  A scenario that the handler sets up where the horse tries to earn a reward by figuring out the behavior that the handler is asking for.

• Click Reinforcement
  
  Going back over a familiar behavior using click-reward when the horse gets unsteady with a behavior or is just generally in an unsure state of mind.

• "Ryder Draw"
  
  A variant of "hooking on," "joining up," (whatever term you wish to use) where the clicker is an instrument to increase the horse's curiosity and motivate him to engage in the draw.

• "Touch it!"
  
  One of our basic games where we present a target and ask the horse to touch it with his nose. Whiskers count the first few times, then the horse has to bump it, then we make the target harder to reach, even eventually throwing it so the horse has to walk over to it to earn the click.

• "Walk up!"
  
  A basic game where the horse learns to walk to the handler on command.

• "Stand still!"
  
  A game where the horse stands in a relaxed frame regardless of what is going on. This game has to be reinforced as necessary through repetition depending on the anxiety created by the circumstances (e.g., being examined by the vet.)

• Whoa!
  
  This game should be self explanatory. We generally use traditional natural horsemanship moves to show the horse what we want. "Whoa!" comes in handy when first catching the horse in the arena or if he gets loose, in conjunction with "Walk up" for him to approach and "Stand still" to be haltered.

• "Pick up!" Lifting a particular foot which is touched by the handler. This game increases in difficulty until the horse will hold the foot or lightly rest it on the handler's hand or leg for as long as it is being touched.

  Again, you can generate your own games and verbal cues. Be sensible, keep them simple at first and be consistent in their application.

• IceRyder
  
• IcePony

• For assembling and underwriting this program.

• For handling transportation logistics for Judy.

• For discounting facility rates and for assisting in numerous ways to help out the mentors.

• For giving up her weekend to conduct this workshop for free.