As wildfires raged across the country last summer, the media was awash with stories of hope and bravery. Sadly, there were also tales of heartbreaking loss. Volunteers with good intentions were hurt while attempting to load others’ horses, and horses who couldn’t be handled or loaded were turned loose and left behind. It’s a harsh reality that a lack of prior training can be the cause of some of these tragic stories.
Speaking from personal experience, I know too well the threats to my home and animals from natural disasters. The stress is unimaginable. Because climate change will make events like these more likely in the future, horse owners need to take steps now to ensure their horses have adequate basic training.
How horses learn 101
A comprehensive review of how horses learn is outside of the scope of this article, but it is worth touching on one key piece that will impact a horse’s trainability: the role of nervous system activation and emotional states. When animals perceive a situation to be a threat, their sympathetic nervous system (SNS) is triggered. This involuntary ‘fight or flight’ response results in an almost instantaneous cascade of chemicals and hormones being released into the brain and body, along with the triggering of fearful emotions. When this occurs, it becomes impossible for any animal to calmly learn new skills. The brain’s sole objective during SNS activation is to prompt the animal to escape, and survive what they perceive to be a threatening situation.
This relates to events such as short-notice mandatory evacuations. While a skilled handler may be able to get a naïve or frightened horse on the trailer, this event does not teach a horse how to calmly load in a variety of contexts. Rather, the horse will have just perceived the pressure applied to be more threatening than actually entering the trailer itself. Some horses may even suffer a mental trauma as a result of being loaded in this manner. These horses will subsequently be extremely frightened of trailers or being loaded in the future, and these behavioural injuries can be challenging to overcome.
Being easily caught, led and handled on the ground in various settings – and by various people – can help horses be safer. In an emergency, you will not have time to be chasing your horse around the field! (photo courtesy Lauren Fraser)
Skills to train
Imagine that due to a rapidly growing wildfire, your property is given an evacuation order as dusk settles one summer evening. You pull your grab-and-go bag out of the closet, and quickly load the cat and dogs into your truck. As your own straight-haul trailer is at the mechanics having some wiring replaced, you hastily call the neighbours. They agree to haul your horses to the designated staging area, but ask if your two horses can be loaded into the front position in their four-horse angle haul trailer, due to the weight difference between your Warmbloods and their Icelandics.
You run to the pasture gate, whistle for your horses to come in, halter them, tie them to the hitching post, then head to the barn to grab a few bales of hay. You are loading the hay in the truck when the neighbours arrive. As they load your horses for you and leave to go back and grab theirs, you make one final trip back into the house for supplies. Minutes later you follow the neighbours’ taillights in the growing dark and drive in a convoy to the rodeo grounds. There, the horses are unloaded and placed in a long row of temporary holding pens, set up and manned by the local emergency services department.
This scenario gives a glimpse of some of the skills that would be valuable to train before a natural disaster mandates evacuation.
Be catchable
It should go without saying, but if your horse can’t readily be caught, they may not be evacuated.
Teaching your horse to stand calmly when approached by someone carrying a halter is easily achieved. Training in small areas to start before moving onto larger spaces, and using food is helpful in teaching this skill. Make sure to not just catch your horse for things they find disagreeable; play ‘catch and release’ on occasion, catching them only to groom them or give them a treat, and release them again.
Respond to in-hand cues
Horses are frequently cued to perform behaviours through the application of direct or implied pressure. Responding to pressure-based cues to drop the head, move forwards and backwards, and to move the hindquarters and forequarters results in horses that can easily and more safely be led and moved. While cues of direct pressure may come via equipment such as halters or from the handler’s touch on a corresponding part of the body, moving away from implied pressure, such as when a person waves a hand or lunge whip behind the horse to cause them to move forward, is also valuable to teach. Pressure-based cues are the mainstay of how most people handle and work with horses, and in emergencies it is valuable to have a horse who calmly responds when these ‘universal buttons’ are pushed.
Be comfortable with restriction
By nature, horses fear confinement and restriction of their movement. Fleeing from perceived danger is usually a horse’s first-line response, and confinement or movement restriction inhibits this ability. When not trained to accept this, a horse’s fear will quickly escalate, resulting in stronger – and more dangerous – escape responses. Horses who have been patiently taught to accept things which inhibit or prohibit their movement, such as being tied, being contained, or asked to move into/out of small spaces, having a leg held up, and so on, are generally safer to handle and easier to manage in emergency situations.
Be comfortable with temporary social isolation
Horses are a highly social species, and it is unnatural for them to be visually or physically separated from others (see Help for the Herd-Bound Horse). Before training, horses who are socially isolated will vocalize and move in an attempt to reunite with others. When horses have not been sympathetically taught that temporary isolation can be a neutral or even pleasant experience, they will naturally become stressed.
Trailer load and travel
Loading calmly into a trailer is a high-level skill for horses to have, and it is often not given the training due diligence it deserves. It requires the horse be proficient in the skills listed previously, and more. Weakness or a skill deficit in one of these areas can result in a horse who fears being loaded or hauled, and who resists when loading attempts are made (see Trailer Loading Simplified).
Proofing
In horse training, ‘proofing’ is the process of taking a new skill and ensuring that it can be performed when cued in a variety of contexts. This is achieved by first teaching the new skill under easy conditions which make it likely the horse can be successful in performing the behaviour, before gradually layering in variables which may make it more challenging. By proofing basic skills, owners can make it more likely their horses are easier to handle should an emergency strike.
Conclusion
Most barns have first aid kits and fire extinguishers on hand as part of their emergency preparedness plan. Preparing our horses as well by ensuring that they have the basics skills needed to be safely handled should be undertaken by all horse owners in the event that disaster strikes your property.