Artikel vanaf
http://goodhorsemanship.ca/the-dominant-horse/ door Lauren Fraser.
Do You Have a Dominant Horse?
Before we begin, I have a disclaimer: This post isn’t going to delve deep into the complexities of the horse’s normal social relationships and herd structure under natural conditions, i.e. bands of feral horses, living on large ranges. If you want to learn more, I can point you in the right direction (head to the bottom of the page for references). If you want the Coles notes, here they are:
1.Horses usually live in groups, either a natal band (AKA birth band or family group), or in a bachelor group
2.Natal bands are made up of mares, foals, juveniles and one or more stallions who defend and maintain the band
3.Bachelor bands are comprised of, you guessed it, bachelors – stallions without mares
4.Bachelor bands often live in close proximity to natal bands, and members stay ready for the chance to acquire mares, sneak breed, or challenge the resident stallion for his position
5.Bands have leaders, who show the way to resources and initiate activities
6.The leader can be a mare or a stallion, but in certain situations (nearby predators or competing stallions) a stallion may take charge, and herd everyone to safety
7.Social order is very important to the safety and well-being of the herd. Rank isn’t necessarily a straight line all the ways down – i.e. A ranks higher than everyone, B ranks higher than everyone but A, C ranks higher than everyone but A and B. Within the line there may also be social triangles – i.e. C ranks higher than D, but D ranks higher than B. Picture junior high school, on four legs.
What Dominance Is
As it relates to animal behavior, dominance describes a relationship established between animals through the use of aggression, force, and submission to gain access to all important resources considered a priority, such as food, breeding partners, or preferred spaces. In order for that relationship to be established, one of the animals has to consistently submit to the other. Horses do engage in dominance behaviors with one another, as a way of holding/gaining resources. For example, stallions fight to control the right to be with and breed mares. These encounters may be brief, or long, but they only happen to control resources; they do not form the basis for establishing hierarchies and rank. In these encounters, horses must weight the ‘cost’ of fighting: What is the resource worth to each horse? What are the potential costs of defending it? How able are they to win the fight?
Horse Social Structure – Hierarchy, Not Domination
There may be dominant battles between stallions to decide who is going to have access to resources (i.e. a band of mares), but for the most part, horse herd life is cooperative, and the majority of confrontations between horses actually relies on threat gestures and deference, not serious aggression. (See number 7, above) Hierarchies can be fluid, and can change based on different situations, but horse herds don’t survive through the use of domination to establish them, or hold them together.
What Dominance Isn’t
Dominance is NOT a personality trait. If you took 4 stallions from 4 different bands, and threw them together (I’m not advising this, for the record), you would see 4 stallions determine their group rank through aggression, threats, and deference. Yet the word ‘dominance’ is thrown around the horse training world, almost as much as the word ‘natural’, and it’s supposed meaning is just as incorrect. If you Google ‘horse dominance’ a plethora of links come up, a good majority of which go directly to professional horse trainer’s websites. No wonder there is so much confusion!
Many advocate acting as ‘lead horse’ or the ‘alpha’, advise showing the horse who is boss, or tell people that they need to be the dominant one in the relationship. Clinton Anderson, a well-known TV trainer says, “You must establish yourself as the dominant one, the leader in your group of two. That begins by keeping your horse out of your space.” and ”Letting foals get pushy and dominant is the biggest mistake I see people make with young horses.” Another TV horse training couple, Pat and Linda
Parelli, state, “When it comes to an invasive or aggressive horse, there are basically two reasons he would invade your space: either FEAR or DOMINANCE.” and ”Many so-called spoiled horses are just horses that are not afraid of the human and they start vying for dominance.” and “Horses are persistent in their quest for dominance and they are not in a hurry.” “
Parelli Natural Horsemanship teaches horse owners to treat their horse as the horse’s mother or a dominant horse in the herd would treat him. When it comes to leadership, someone has to assume the “alpha” position…and it shouldn’t be the horse.” But to make matters really confusing, they also throw in this statement: “The
Parelli method allows horse owners at all levels of experience to achieve success without force, partnership without dominance and harmony without coercion.” With such conflicting information, what’s a horse owner to think??
Let’s Set The Record Straight
1.Pushy horses who invade your space are not dominant. They are not pushing into your space to control resources, like mares. They are pushing into your space because that is what they have learned to do, to get what they want or need. Horses will also push into you if they are trying to escape, and you happen to be in the way. This does not mean they are dominant.
2.Horses who drag their owners via the halter and leadrope are not dominant. They have learned that’s what it takes to get where they want to go. If a stallion is guarding his resources (mares) he doesn’t lead the other horse away in an act of dominance – he drives him out.
3.Horses are not ‘persistent in their quest for dominance over humans‘. If they lived a social life that was ruled by dominance, we’d probably have a really hard time getting by with them, let alone riding them.
4.Humans don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of treating a horse like their dam or a ‘dominant” herd member, or being in the ‘alpha’ position -as you also learned above, alpha doesn’t exist in the horse’s social structure. And this might come as news to some, but horses know we are human, and we can’t fool them into thinking otherwise, even if we dress up in a horse costume. Shouldn’t humans understand that they are not horses, and can’t accurately mimic horse behavior?
So what are the behaviors that were quoted above? Without having seen the horses described, they are most likely what’s known as learned behaviors. And where did the horses learn them? Humans. Awww, snap. As another famous TV personality. Dr. Phil said, “You teach horses how to treat you.” OK, maybe that wasn’t quite how he said it… Horses learn what works, and what doesn’t – it’s that simple. It’s up to us to decide what is acceptable, and what isn’t, and teach the horse accordingly. It is also up to us to make sure that we are managing the horse in such a way (by meeting all of his species-specific needs, especially Friends, Forage, and Freedom) that he doesn’t feel the need to act in an aggressive manner towards us.
It’s been shown that relationships built on the mindset that you need to dominate the other party have the potential to damage the bond between the two parties. Often what people are describing to me as dominance is actually fearful or defensive behavior, learned behavior, or behavior that has its roots in management issues. Even our pampered and domesticated horses still retain all of their ‘wild’ cousin’s innate characteristics. But we often impose unnatural, and unhealthy living conditions on them that affect their ability to have normal social skills and exhibit normal behaviors. In my world, the top three management issues that are mislabeled dominance are:
Warboel
