Beginners guide to trick-training: 6 simple tricks you can teach your horse

Here's a list of some of the easier tricks I started with when I began trick training with my horse, Pebbles, to give you some ideas and inspiration. Multiple of these skills are then able to lead on to more complex movements.

All horses learn differently and if I've learnt anything through the process of teaching Pebbles, it is that you have to understand your horse, how they learn, and communicate in a clear way that they can understand. I watched countless tutorials on "how to teach XYZ" but the methods never worked well for me. So, I had to think outside of the box. I asked myself "What can pebbles already do?" "How does he learn?" "How can I be more clear with my commands?" "Can I simplify this?". Once I found what worked for us, the sky was the limit and if I could think of a new trick, I could teach it. With this in mind, I cannot tell you exactly how to teach these skills, but I can give you tips and methods that are likely to be successful. However, each horse is an individual and not all my pathways will work for every horse, but they can be adjusted. All the tricks I teach are learned through positive reinforcement. IMPORTANT: remember to always teach a clear "all done" command when you finish so that your horse does not continue and become frustrated for not being rewarded. Only reward when you've asked them.

1. Kiss

The kiss is one of my favourite tricks with Pebbles and a bonus that everyone else who visits him also loves it. I also found this skill helpful when applying sun cream to Pebble's nose in the summer, so it can have multiple advantages other than just looking cute!

Tips for teaching kiss:

• Lure the horse's nose up to your face with a treat hidden in your hand.

• Bridge the reward (treat) and correct behaviour with a "yes, good, or clicker"

• Repeat until confident

• Start to add a command (hand signal or word)

• Repeat until learnt

2. Simple bow

A "simple bow" whereby you lower your body and the horse mirrors you by lowering their head and neck can look very effective and remove the complex nature of a bow where the horse kneels down. This can be a good skill for maintaining engagement as the horse has to change their eye line while remaining engaged.

Tips for teaching a simple bow:

• As you bow point to the ground to encourage your horse to lower their head. You may need to add some treats to lure them down if they aren't interested.

• Repeat the movement and add a word command if wanted.

• Eventually, when you bow, your horse will mirror you.

3. Paw

Paw was one of the first tricks I taught Pebbles, and it can lead on to counting, Spanish walk, and a full bow. Many people like the command for this skill to be pointing at the leg however, similar to the bow, I quite enjoyed my command to mirror his action (as in the image).

Tips for teaching paw:

• Ultimately you just need to reward the horse for lifting his leg at the beginning. Sometimes using a schooling whip as an extension of your arm to tickle the horse's leg can do the trick.

• Pebbles has a "bad side" in trick training where he can learn tricks great on one leg and has the tendency to be a little slow with the other leg. For his "bad leg" I'd sometimes have to physically lift his foot as if I was picking out his hoof and use the clicker to capture the action and reward.

• Once the horse understands that you want them to lift the leg, and that they get rewarded. You can then slowly start to transfer to your command.

• I would touch Pebbles's leg to have him lift it and while doing so I would kick my own leg on the floor to build an association between the action and the pawing.

• With lots of repetition and some patience eventually, you will teach the paw!

4. Hug

This is a really fun trick that everyone seems to love! Bonus that it's really easy to teach!

Tips for teaching the hug:

• Stand at your horse's shoulder with some treats in your hand closest to their tail.

• Encourage your horse's head around and allow them to eat the treats from your hand.

• My command for this skill is wrapping my arms around his neck and saying "Can I have a hug?", so I started to do this while asking him to wrap his neck around me.

• Eventually, I stopped giving treats from my hand during the hug and instead rewarded him after he had completed the hug.

• Sometimes with this skill, the horse can perform a "quick" hug to get the treats faster. If this happens, you may just need to allow them to eat treats from your hand again to learn that they need to spend at least 3 seconds in the position before releasing.

• With some practice, you can teach this in no time!

5. Stay

This is one of those tricks that can actually really come in handy day to day! Teaching your horse to stay! Now, horses will always be horses, and you probably shouldn't trust them to stay somewhere without you. But if you're in a situation where they can't be tied up, but they're in a safe and enclosed environment and you need to grab something, it can be very beneficial.

Tips for teaching a stay:

• I like to play the box game with Pebbles, where I create a box with poles or cones and stand him in the centre.

• I say "stay" with a hand signal and then walk away, or around him, or wherever I like.

• When he stays I return and give him a treat.

• Start with only taking one step away for a few seconds and gradually build the time you are away for.

• When you get really good you can stand them without the box and see how good they do.

• Try to make sure they maintain engagement with you whilst they are in a stay position. If they are distracted or sniffing around on the floor then they're not focusing on the job at hand.

• Have fun with it! See how long they can stay for!

6. Touch

Although this is the last skill on the list, it's often the first one I teach horses. That's because it really gets them thinking and problem-solving. I use a tennis ball on a stick, but you can use anything, including your hand, as the target. Although I prefer to use a prop to prevent horses from accidentally getting too excited and nibbling my hand.

Tips for target training:

• This is a great skill to use a clicker for!

• Hold the target in front of them, when they touch it with their nose, click and reward.

• Target training is all about good timing!

• Ignore any attempt at mugging you or touching elsewhere other than the target.

• Start with the target always in their eye line.

• Then to increase difficulty move the target up and down so that they really have to problem-solve.

• Some horses pick this up faster than others.

• No more than a few minutes at a time to prevent boredom with the game, frustration, or brain fatigue.

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