All natural horse care in the west of Ireland

After trying and succeeding to a small degree to learn the language of Equus for over 10 years I have come to the following conclusion.

The spoken word and the unspoken word, communicating by body language only, (that of the animals without words as we know it) are and always will be worlds apart.

If we moved to a foreign country we would have no choice but the take the time it takes to learn the native tongue if we wanted to live a full life & prosper in this foreign country (foreign only to us the immigrant). Or we could just fumble along and learn only a few phrases to just get by. The same should and sometimes does apply in the horse world or the world we would like to live in with our horses!

We have choices:

1. We can do nothing and hope that our horses can understand our language and sometimes the horse may make an effort and we could just get by or fumble along with a misunderstood horse

2. We could learn a couple of phrases and get by a little better with a better but maybe slightly frustrated horse

3. We could take time to learn the language of our horse and have a wonderful life together where we can have conversations!

Choices of the horse if we choose NOT to learn his language:

1. Do its best to understand

2. Fight for life

3. Give up

Following is just my impressions of some of the differences in the languages:

Human language (spoken words): Be honest (Be honest with me or don’t tell me anything I don’t want to hear. You won’t know what I mean until you give me advise), I don’t think much of this Natural Horsemanship nonsense ( I have never taken the time to find out about NH), NH Doesn’t work (I don’t have the patience to spend time learning the language), My horse was never touched, he is just wild (I have been chasing/preying on this animal for months ), He is head shy and I don’t know why (When I caught him once before, I had to bang him on the face to make him stand still but he won’t come to me anymore), I have tried NH and it doesn’t work for me (I have watched the videos but I just don’t get it)

Horse Language (body language): I need help understanding you (I need help understanding you), Are you going to eat me if I stand still? (Are you going to eat me if I stand still), I don’t trust you (I don’t trust you), I am frightened (I am frightened), I asked you several times to move away (I asked you several times to move away), I need to get away so I can reassess the situation (I need to get away so I can reassess the situation), Are you trying to learn my language? (Are you trying to learn my language?)

You get the picture!!

Author: Liz Cunnane 18th January 2012