#basic clicker training for horses

[delusinaldreamer19]

Ok yeah Dadbastian is a thing, but I propose a new concept…✨Demon pet owner Ciel✨

This includes but is not limited too,

-Ciel has to make sure Sebastian gets appropriate amounts of enrichment time and exercise so that he doesn’t tear up the furniture.

-like he has to take Sebastian to a big field to let him get his zoomies out (I’m a horse person so ofc I’d think of this but if a horse hasn’t been ridden for a bit they sometimes act like their on crack and forget half their training when they get ridden again)

-use a spray bottle whenever he does something bad

-needs only one look at a guilty faced Sebastian to ask “what did you do” (he shit on the floor killed someone)

-honestly idk this all started cus I saw videos of indoor rock climbing and thought wow Seb would love the enrichment

-Ciel has to take him to playgrounds

-Ciel is working on clicker training him

Basically Sebastian’s just an animal in a humans body cus u know demon. I mean he’s already named after a dog 🤷‍♀️.

[local-hellhound-steals-spaghetti]

I'm coming to the sad realisation that I pretty much can't access horses unless me and my partner move out to a rural property and I have my own horses.

Not just for financial reasons - riding lessons/trail rides aren't exactly cheap. But just because I find the horse industry so toxic and so behind in basic equine behaviour science and modern training that it exhausts me to be around it.

Because I know I'll get some snide comment about feeding a horse treats or I'll see someone tell off or whack a horse for showing any sort of discomfort or someone will laugh off an obvious sign of discomfort/pain.

The last place I did riding lessons at were okay but they put me on a very poorly trained horse that had developed some very problematic behaviours that I would never have tried to ride through if he was my own horse.

But of course, even as a paying student, I had to ride a horse that needed some serious groundwork and basic cues re-trained. And I just was expected to ride and punish my way through it and have an extremely unpleasant and frustrating experience.

I got really upset and had to stop because I don't want to interact with animals like that anymore. I've had to unlearn so much crap I learned growing up about animal training to become an effective, kind and ethical animal trainer. And I do not appreciate being forced to backslide into being a nasty piece of shit so I can ride a damn horse!

I just want to clicker train horses and hang out in the paddock with them giving them treats and ride horses that actually enjoy their job...

The way I see it is that buying a Traditional model Breyer horse is even cheaper than a 1 hour lesson, so I could just stick to collecting model horses as my way to still be close to horses... It just sucks that it has to be that way.

And I want to visit the rescue horse that I had for 4 years and eventually had to sell (for practical and financial reasons) to a trail riding place but I'm also scared of seeing him handled in ways I don't agree with and being powerless to do anything about it.

I know he's getting at least his needs met and gets to live in a herd in acres of pasture for most of the week, so that's good. Maybe I should check up on him...

[child-ofdust]

assigning fidget toys to my f/os because umm :3 i just got two new 1s in the mail abd its on my brain

OK!!! Starting w/ sam first

in general i don't think he fidgets a lot. he jst...doesn't really need to, any stimming is done through his wings & that's usually good enough but if he were to pick up anything from my collection it would be fingears !!! i think his favorite way of fidgeting with them would be spinning in his non-dominant while working on a new script or something similar:-)

bella time

SLUGS. this isnt even a question i know she would love those slugs, i don't think she's a noise person like me i think she'd just like the act/feeling of throwing something around like a rag doll w/o getting in trouble for it. kind of similar to sam, i don't think she rlly has the need or want to fidget, she gets bored rather quickly and that carries over to fidget toys

caesar

maybe i'm projecting. idc. but he loves tangles & knucklebones. anything he can roll/move around his hand, especially the top knuckle area (ME TOO!!!). i also think he'd be partial to pop-its but specifically the squishy bubble-like ones (this doesn't make sense & idk how else to explain it help but it's silly and reminds me of bubbles)

ok i know joseph isn't like 'officially' an f/o but i can't selfship w caesar if his boyfriend jose isn't here so..

another rlly easy one, begleris. i don't know ehat else to say help i wanted to make this post specifically because of this part lol. not rlly a fidget toy but i think he'd just enjoy spinning pens n stuff in general. OH AND FIDGET SPINNERS!!!

hol horse

i accidentally exited out while writing jfhdu so oopsie. rewrite Tl;dr - hol would definitely just use his emperor to fidget. if this was a non-stand au he'd love those silly little clickers in the shape of revolvers hffu i know it...

dio

dio dio dio... gah. He could use anythign and also nothing help i dont think he's a fidgeter, that seems 'beyond' him in a sense. but i know i could get him on the fidget toy train i know it. like, bike chain fidgets

am i projecting again? maybe!!! but bike chains r so ... flippy... easy to hide, pretty quiet too so basically unnoticeable/mindless. i think he'd default to flipping 'em w/o even noticing while doing one of his villain monologues.

also just. since im talking abt bike chains rn, i think rohan would also use them! but also just small clickers & anything he can use in his non-dominant hand in general while he works on his manga:3

[madrivervalleyicelandics]

(From the first week of January, I’m catching up on backlogged cross posting from insta)

She’s coming 5, the first filly from our own breeding (out of Skvísa & by Reykjalin (Kria//Þristur) & spent her first years roaming free at @efri_raudilaekur . Since import at age 2, I’ve clicker trained her each step of the way, including basics like halter-training & hoofcare. Using R+ from the start makes SUCH a difference, she’s so happy, confident, & emotionally regulated when I work with her😍

Last summer, I started her “formal” training with a month of liberty, in-hand, introducing longeing, & finally backing / short walk rides. Everything was so easy & relaxed! I tossed her back out to keep maturing, but right now I have a bit of free time, so why not pick back up? Through the magic of clicker training, her first session started exactly where her last one in August left off. Focused, relaxed, & remembered all her cues❤️

I’ll spend this year hacking her quietly & continuing to prioritize balance & spinal integrity in her in-hand work.

No competition goals for her this year. That’s one of my big 2022 reflections actually… I’ve lost some faith in The Sport™️ & its scoring/evaluation & education systems. It started with Covid shutdowns & realizing I didn’t miss shows. When they resumed, I felt burnt-out watching top-level horses with weak toplines, long hooves, & visible signs of stress/discomfort. I suddenly couldn’t ignore points written into the judging/breed standards/training pyramids/etc that I feel really contradict our modern knowledge of horses’ bodies & needs😕 It’s not to say shows can’t be fun, or that I won’t participate at all! We might 🤷‍♀️ But I’ve de-prioritized them as a tool for quality-assessment, & find them less rewarding now. It’s almost felt like a breakup? so I’ve been quiet about it while I sort my complicated feelings😅

If anyone else is grappling with similar realizations, you aren’t alone! But I find I’m happier than ever with how my horses are moving & developing. I think clearing these skewed external pressures & reducing burnout, for me, was key. I’m looking forward to a rewarding 2023 💫

[huntmark]

Clicker Training: What it is and How to do it?

Clicker training is a positive reinforcement-based training method that has become increasingly popular among pet owners and animal trainers. This method involves using a clicker, a small handheld device that makes a distinctive clicking sound, to mark desirable behavior in animals. Clicker training can be used to teach a wide range of behaviors, from basic obedience commands to complex tricks and even some advanced behaviors such as agility and sports training.

What is Clicker Training?

Clicker training is based on the principles of operant conditioning, which involves using rewards and punishments to modify behavior. Unlike traditional training methods that rely on punishment or negative reinforcement to correct undesirable behavior, clicker training uses positive reinforcement to encourage desired behavior.

In clicker training, the clicker is used as a signal to let the animal know that they have done something correctly. The sound of the clicker is associated with a treat or reward, which reinforces the behavior and encourages the animal to repeat it.

How to Do Clicker Training?

Clicker training can be used to teach a wide range of behaviors to any kind of animal, including gundogs, cats, horses, birds, and even some exotic animals. Here are the basic steps to start clicker training your pet:

Get a Clicker and Treats

To start clicker training, you will need a clicker and some treats that your pet likes. You can buy clickers at most pet stores or online. Choose small, soft treats that your pet can easily swallow and digest.

Get Your Pet's Attention

Before you start training, make sure your pet is in a calm and focused state. Call your pet's name or use a treat to get their attention.

Mark and Reward Good Behavior

The key to clicker training is to mark and reward good behavior immediately. Click the clicker at the exact moment your pet does something good, and then give them a treat. This will help your pet associate the sound of the clicker with the reward.

Repeat and Build Up

Repeat the process several times, gradually building up the behavior you want your pet to learn. For example, if you are teaching your dog to sit, start by clicking and rewarding them for simply looking at you, then for standing still, then for putting their weight on their back legs, and finally for sitting.

Add Verbal Commands

Once your pet has learned the behavior, you can add a verbal command to signal the behavior. For example, say "sit" just before your dog sits down, and then click and reward them. Eventually, your pet will learn to associate the verbal command with the behavior, and you can phase out the clicker.

Practice Regularly

To reinforce the behavior, practice regularly with your pet. Make sure to keep training sessions short and fun, and always end on a positive note. With regular practice, your pet will learn the behavior and be able to perform it on command.

Benefits of Clicker Training

Clicker training is a gentle, positive, and effective method of training that can be used to teach a wide range of behaviors to any kind of animal. It has several benefits over traditional training methods, including:

Builds Trust and Bond

Clicker training builds trust and strengthens the bond between you and your pet. By using positive reinforcement, you are rewarding your pet for good behavior rather than punishing them for bad behavior, which creates a more positive and enjoyable training experience.

Increases Focus and Attention

Clicker training helps to increase your pet's focus and attention, as they learn to associate the sound of the clicker with a reward. This can be particularly helpful for pets who are easily distracted or have difficulty concentrating.

Encourages Creativity

Clicker training encourages creativity and problem-solving, as you and your pet work together

[horsesarecreatures]

Hi ok so this may be a stupid question bc I know maybe like a whole two things about horses but how similar/different is clicker training in horses compared to like dogs?

Oh great question! I'm just going to speak from my own personal experience rather than generally because I haven't clicker trained many animals that aren't my own and have only read like a book per animal on the subject, but I would say horses are far more likely to get overwhelmed or frustrated during clicker training sessions if they don't understand something. I've found that it's really important to keep sessions short with them, especially in the beginning, because if they don't understand something or feel like they are not being awarded quickly enough for their efforts they will put their ears back and might nip or try to grab the treat. With dogs, the sessions should still be kept short because they learn better that way, but I’ve never had a terrible consequence for starting with 20 minutes as opposed to 10 minutes when working with them.

If my dogs don't understand something, they might get fidgety and break their focus by spinning or yapping at me. But their tails will always still be wagging. I don't think I've ever clicker trained a dog and had the dog get upset. But with horses, especially when I was starting out and just assumed that they would love it, I've actually gotten some very explosive reactions. For example, when I was teaching my old horse Chip to do some stuff at liberty like back up, I got an angry rear once when I delayed rewarding because he had gotten the basic concept and I wanted him to do it a bit faster. It's very, very important to make the sessions short with horses and quit while you're ahead. Here is a link to one of sdequus' videos where she was doing liberty work with her colt; she does a great job of explaining how to keep their energy level low. Sometimes you have to quit training whatever you intended to teach them for the session and just reward them for exhibiting relaxed behavior when they're prone to getting overexcited or frustrated.

With dogs, the first thing you do with clicker training is get them to make eye contact with you then reward. But with horses, the first thing you teach them is not to mug treats from you and respect your space, because most will become pushy and even dangerous if you skip this step.

I would say horses are also more likely than dogs not to be food motivated, and you may have to find some other way to reward them like massage.

I tend to research the best way to train a particular trick with horses a lot more than I do with dogs because with dogs I’ve always gotten away with winging it while with horses I haven’t.  

[faereth]

List of Ideas for 1st class triggers and suggestions in Hypno-play because I keep forgetting a lot of ideas.

Trigger :

-Visual trigger

Seeing an animal

Seeing a person

Seeing a color

Seeing a number

Seeing a vehicle (train, boat, plane)

Seeing a specific object

Seeing a hypno-themed object (pendulum, spiral, shiny object, light pen, metronome)

Seeing someone hypnotized / hypnotize

Seeing someone naked / clothed

Seeing themselves through a mirror or a camera

Seeing a body part

Specific movement (- eyes : wink, blink, circle, fixation

- lips : biting lip, licking chops

- breasts : groping, swaying, bouncing

- hands & fingers : a lot of things

- hips : swaying

- ass : groping, wiggling, swaying, bouncing

- feet : swaying)

Seeing someone dancing

Seeing a certain piece of clothing

Seeing someone in costume (firefighter, magician, tuxedo, clown, military, waiter(tress), swimsuit, gymclothes)

Watching a movie or a specific scene / TV show / anime

Seeing a painting

Being on a website

Specific ways of writing (formating, using spaces, ..., ~,

using

lign

return,

using bold / italic / CAPITAL, msseing wtih the odrer of the ltetres)

brackets [ ]

double brackets [[ ]]

quotation mark " "

Seeing a date on the calendar

Having an alarm on the phone

-Auditory trigger

Hearing someone's voice

Hearing someone singing

Hearing a good joke

Hearing a bad joke

Hearing a certain topic (weather, date, video games, chess, traveling, work

Hearing an instrument

Hearing a specific music

Hearing a specific sound (bell, cowbell, ringtone, tone, metronome, snap, clicker)

Hearing an animal 'speak' (bark, meow, growl, roar, purr, moo, howl, neigh)

Hearing a movie line

Hearing nicknames (sweety, honey, babe, love, beautiful, sunshine)

Hearing hypno-words and sentences (good boy / girl / toy / doll / puppet / thrall, sleep, drop, sink, deep, blank, empty, pause, play, freeze, unfreeze, obey)

wake up, up up !

-Kinesthetic trigger

Feeling cold / hot

Wearing a specific accessorry (glasses, cloth, headphones, collar, kilt, head cover (hat, cap, wig, top hat, beret) plug, dildo, ring, gloves)

Using an accessorry (ray gun, finger gun, TV remote, dial, ball, jar, glowing ball, rope, mirror, screen, feather, chest, key, pillow, ice, water)

Taking the bus or subway (perhaps fractionation with each stop (but careful with your belongings))

Spanking

Brushing hair

Brushing skin

Kiss (on the body, on the lips)

Eating specific food / drinking specific liquid

Blowing their nose

Yawning

Sucking / licking on something

Thinking of specific memory

Taking a shower

Going to sleep / waking up

Smelling a flower / a perfume

Feeling a taste

Being naked or in underwear

Suggestions

-Wholesome

Eat less / more / healthier

Spend less / be less miser

Less procrastination

Be more productive

Be happier / at peace

Smile

Laugh

Better sleep schedule

Exercice

Learn the thing you want to learn for so long

Suppress / tame bad habits, reinforce good habits

Less swear words

Be kinder / less naïve

Control their own emotions

Be an awesome person

Be an awesomer person

Be loved and cared

Feel pretty

-Recreational

Act like an animal (chicken, puppy, cat, snake, cow, sloth, horse, pig, bee, dinosaur, Pokemon)

Be an animal (act and think)

Shout or say something random and crazy ("The monkeys ate my bread !")

Say something embarrassing ("I love penis")

Can't stop telling the truth

Can't stop lying

Wanting to high-five

Positive and negative hallucinations

Feel a taste / spiciness / sweetness / sourness

Feel hot / cold

Body / body part (usually hands or eyes) heavy / light / impossible to lift / impossible to put down

Body part (usually hands) having a mind on their own

Feel an unsatisfying itch

Roleplay and changes of behavior (Won the lottery, become the hypnotist, a movie star, a dancer / professional dancer, stripteaser, soldier, clown, mime, TV journalist, newcaster, cartoon villain, child behavior, teen behavior, Scooby-Doo)

Speak with an accent

Mirror the hypnotist's movements

Body / body part bound

Body / body part frozen

Body and mind freeze / time stops

Constantly walking / talking / moving / touching / chewing / sucking / licking

Everything is the funniest / least funny thing ever

Write something

Forget a number, name, person, situation, location, concept (how to dress up, how to tie shoelaces, how to speak)

Only able to say yes / no

Only able to make one word / short sentences

Feel what you watch / read (movies or books)

Be blank for 5 seconds and resume as if nothing has happened

Boomerang trigger / suggestion (the subject tries to trigger the hypnotist but it boomerang back and stuns them)

Be jealous / possessive

Losing on purpose every game they play

Mindlessly pose

Be very ticklish

Drooling and / or unable to close mouth

Snore

Intelligence is reduced / increased

Focus is reduced / increased

Can't speak their native language (usually English)

No sound comes from their mouth

-Erotic & sexual

Experience arousal

Experience sexual pleasure

Experience an orgasm

Undress / dress

Be attracted to someone or something

Masturbate / urge to masturbate

Edge / urge to edge

Impossible to explode / explode without permission

Urge to have sex

For men : Be limp, be erect

For women : Be wet, play with nipples / breasts

-Control

Think of a person

Call the hypnotist by a nickname (Sir, Miss, Master, Mistress, Chief, chef, Lord Farquad, Optimus Prime)

The hypnotist's words are their thoughts

Unable to think

Feel pleasure

Write an email / a post on social medias

Transformation (doll, fuckdoll, slave, puppet, robot, tree, object)

Urge to satisfy the needs of the hypnotist

Urge to obey the hypnotist

Repeat a mantra in their head or out loud

Kneel

-Flavours

Aware / unaware

Able / unable to resist the suggestion

Wanting / not wanting (with consent. always.)

Resisting / not resisting / resistance fading

Forget / remember the trigger or/and the suggestion

Believing they were / were not hypnotized or given the suggestion

Thinking the suggestion was their idea

Dial from 0 to 10 to control the intensity of the suggestion

Sources and inspirations : BigTriggerList (3) by Leeallure

Suggestions List by Lex

Lydia Salia's stories

It is my current view on hypno-play from what I've experienced and what I can think of. I chose not to follow exactly the already existing lists even if the methodology and content are great, in order to bring a different point of view to hypno-play. Perhaps it is too reducing to simple concepts and actions that one can fit together. It is made to help people try complex things from these basic ideas and tools.

Feel free to suggest some !

[scruffydogposting]

Anyone have any good book recs for horse clicker training basics? Or just R+ training focus in general(besides Don’t Shoot the Dog)?

[welshponies]

And I am back again!

Man, a lot has happened. After our colt passed away a few days after being born, we got a foster filly. She’s a KWPN filly who lost her dam shortly after birth and the introduction process went flawlessly.

I call her puppy, and she’s a strange character. She’s sweet, yet at the same time very distant. She likes to observe from afar and only approaches the two people that handle her daily (me, and my mum). By now she’s learnt to pick up her feet, she eats some big girl pellets and slowly learning to walk on the lead. She fucking hates it.

Syb is doing very well. I’ve gotten the green light a while ago to start groundworking both Syb and Uk. For Syb, as a yearling, it’s just light ‘work’. I wouldn’t even really call it work. I use liberty combined with clicker training and the only things we practice so far, are some basic things like standing tied, being rinsed off, backing up and following my body language. This was more to improve her respecting personal space and to allow us to play safely together. She’s loving it.

We did participate in a working equitation clinic, for the experience of being around ‘weird’ stuff. She did amazing and was not fazed by most of it. Friesians are just really smart horses, I’ve started realising more and more over the years. Intelligent, curious and often cool.

Uk had a bit of a break for motherhood but now we’re slowly getting back into work. I attempted liberty work first, but she was awful scared of the whip. Tried desensitising her to it; we are only using it as a “direction” tool, not as an actual whip, but it terrified her. That’s okay, so we stopped that. For now I’m focusing on long-reining/dressage in-hand and she’s picking it up well so far. Gives her a break from motherhood and Puppy the chance to race around the arena. She enjoys the attention.

I’ve also started riding again. Another boarder offered me to ride her horse now and then. I’ve been riding once a week and man it’s good to be back in the saddle, at the same time, god I’m out of shape!

Overall, I’m excited. I’m picking up equine photography more. I’m back in the saddle with a new mindset to just improve myself. And I’m learning a lot about groundwork in different ways than I had previously. Horse life is good!

[scrappy-appy]

okay so, Ryan Rose on youtube is always on my recommended list, what do you think of his training methods? I know my way around dog training, but since I only started to truly interact and ride horses 2 months ago, I'm still not sure what to look for and what to avoid when it comes to horse training

I'm not super familiar with him, as in I haven't studied, appraised, and critiqued his methods like I have with other major Natural Horsemanship trainers (Parelli, Schiller, Anderson, Gore.), so I can't give a good analysis about what is ideal and what's not great about his methods. However. I did watch one video that was basically spot on to the horsemanship methods I use. From what I can see from the 3 or 4 videos I have watched, he uses a similar ideology to me (As gentle as possible, as firm as necessary) whereas other big-name NH trainers either shoot for mostly gentle or mostly firm, which I don't agree with. That being said, what works for me as a human person in terms of training methods won't work best for everyone and as long as no dangerous animals are being created from allowing dangerous behavior, or good animals aren't being harmed, there isn't really a "right" answer. Balanced NH is perfect for me, but it may not be perfect for the next person.

Here's the video I liked a lot! I will probably study more of his methods later down the road. Take this with a grain of salt as it is an opinion, but I would avoid anything with the word "exclusive." When you start to get exclusivity in training, you are finding trainers that are closing mental doors and have decided "this is the method I am using and I refuse to look elsewhere for answers". Each horse needs to be approached somewhat differently, so if you see "Clicker exclusive" or "Horsemanship exclusive" or "Old cowboy training" you can come in knowing that that specific trainer is only coming from ONE perspective, when you really need as many as possible to figure out what will work with a specific horse.

[bayofbalar]

Owned TBR-list of Doom

Or; I own too many books and I have too little time to get to them all.

I want to say that I’ll entirely pull my reads this year off my own shelves, but it’s rather unlikely to actually happen. Mood reader and all that.

Shamelessly stealing @lettersfromthelighthouse ‘s formatting - bold is started, strikethrough is finished. Imagine that the titles are italicised; tumblr refuses to copy formatting done in another file. I hope I shall keep updating this post, but I am notoriously forgetful, so there’s that.

Sorted into categories, but no alphabetical order under the cut:

Non-fiction, historic:

The Illustrated Red Baron, Peter Kilduff

Crossroads, Reizen door de Middeleeuwen, David Abulafia (red.)

Five Miles High & Forty Below, Bill Williams

Vergeten volkeren, Philip Matyszak

The Discovery of Middle Earth, Graham Robb

Nobel Streven, Frits van Oostrom

The Darkening Age, Catherine Nixey

The Histories, Herodotus

Where Poppies Blow, John Lewis-Stempel

Een paleis voor de doden, Herman Clerinx

The Edge of the World, Michael Pye

The Silk Roads, Peter Frankopan

Danubia, Simon Winder

De uitvinding van de natuur, Andrea Wulf

Vriend Over Vijand, Peter van Damme

Non-fiction, historic equine:

Dressage, Sylvia Loch

The Royal Horse of Europe, Sylvia Loch

The Warhorse 1250-1600, Ann Hyland

The Medieval Horse and its Equipment, John Clark

The Horse in the Ancient World, Ann Hyland

The Horse in the Middle Ages, Ann Hyland

The Medieval Warhorse, From Byzantium to the Crusades, Ann Hyland

Non-fiction, equine training manuals:

True Horsemanship Through Feel, Bill Dorrance & Leslie Desmond

Grondwerk met paarden, Inge Teblick

Pferde Gymnastizieren mit dem Clicker, Viviane Theby

Gymnasium of the Horse, Steinbrecht

Basic Training of the Young Horse, Ingrid & Reiner Klimke

The Scales of Training Workbook, Claire Lilley

Non-fiction, miscellaneous:

Stolen World, Jennie Erin Smith

Dier, bovendier, Frank Westerman

The Old Ways, A Journey On Foot, Robert Macfarlane

Entangled Life, Merlin Sheldrake

The Travels, Marco Polo

J.R.R. Tolkien Artist & Illustrator, Hammond & Scull

Zout, Vet, Zuur, Hitte, Samin Nosrat

Fiction, ‘classics’:

Moby-Dick, Herman Melville

Don Quixote, Cervantes

The Master & Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov

Maurice, E.M. Forster

The Complete Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Gone With the Wind, Margaret Mitchell

The Picture of Dorian Grey, Oscar Wilde

Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf

Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte

Lord of the Flies, William Golding

Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte

Metamorphosen, Ovidius

Fiction, ‘classic sci-fi’:

Frankenstein, Mary Shelley

The Great Science-Fiction, H.G. Wells

Treasure Island, R.L. Stevenson

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, R.L. Stevenson

Het geheimzinnige eiland, Jules Verne

Michael Strogoff, Jules Verne

Fiction, fantasy:

The Two Towers, J.R.R. Tolkien

The Return of the King, J.R.R. Tolkien

The Worm Ouroboros, E.R. Eddison

Het helse paradijs, Thea Beckmann

Kinderen van moeder aarde, Thea Beckmann

Piranesi, Susanna Clarke

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, Susanna Clarke

Black Leopard, Red Wolf, Marlon James

Beren and Luthien, J.R.R. Tolkien

The Fall of Gondolin, J.R.R. Tolkien

The Children’s Book, A.S. Byatt

Rivers of London, Ben Aaronovitch

The Story of Kullervo, J.R.R. Tolkien

Fiction, sci-fi:

Hyperion, Dan Simmons

The Three-Body Problem, Liu Cixin

The Testaments, Margaret Atwood

Caliban’s War, James S.A. Corey

Fiction, historic:

Lincoln in the Bardo, George Saunders

The Essex Serpent, Sarah Perry

Butcher’s Crossing, Jon Williams

The Last English King, Julian Rathbone

Parade’s End, Ford Maddox Ford

Heer Belisarius, Robert Graves

De naam van de roos, Umberto Eco

Fiction, anthologies:

Trigger Warning, Neil Gaiman

The Weird Tales of William Hope Hodgson, W.H. Hodgson

The Call of Cthulhu, H.P. Lovecraft

Norse Mythology, Neil Gaiman

Tales Before Tolkien, Douglas A. Anderson (ed.)

Fiction, Poetry:

Shelley, Shelley (too lazy to check for the editor, it’s not on the cover)

The War Poems of Wilfred Owen, Wilfred Owen

Fiction, Miscellaneous:

Overstory, Richard Powers

Frankissstein, Jeanette Winterson

How to be Both, Ali Smith

De Hills, Matias Faldbraken

[enbeemagical]

Any hc about our sparkly elf, Aaravos?

If not him, Runaan and Ethari?

OHHHH YES

OH YES INDEEDY

you see, I rp Aaravos, which means he likes to talk in my head even when I would rather he shut up so I can go to sleep. And he has Lots Of Opinions. Occasionally I learn things he’d rather I not know, and that’s where I build from.

okay! Headcanons!!

Due to his experiences, Aaravos doesn’t just hate Avizandum, he’s actually dracophobic. 

He’s aroallo-- aromantic and allosexual (pan, usually). (I’m not entirely certain if I show that well in my rp, since Aaravos is so different from me. We’re both arospec, so that probably helps, but he’s allo and I’m ace and the blog is SFW, so idk anything lmao)

Yeah, Aaravos is good at flirting, but it’s never anything serious, you know? Flirting =/= attraction, and in fact flirting = no attraction. He’ll flirt with anything and anyone, but when he flusters and doesn’t quite know what to say, when he cuts the nicknames and teasing? That’s when you know he’s fallen.

Nicknames are just how he talks. He doesn’t bother remembering names unless they’re important to him. He’s sort of like Diana Wynne Jones’s Chrestomanci/Christopher Chant in that, except instead of calling Mr. Baslam “Mr. Bislow” he’d call him “dark mage.” He’ll use nicknames anytime on anyone, but name-names are only for people he respects/cares about. So he might call the dragon king “Avizandum,” because as much as he hates him, Avizandum imprisoned him, and  Aaravos can’t help but respect the power it took to imprison him, an Archmage. (I still haven’t convinced him to call Amaya by her name, even though he says he respects her. Wait a sec--)

Revised nickname headcanon: He uses names when he feels close to someone. Not just respect, though that has something to do with it. Names aren’t something he takes lightly. 

Okay, this got long, so there are two dozen more headcanons under the cut. They’re just in the order I thought of them, so they kind of jump around a bit, sorry. Angst and fluff.

Aaravos is basically a faerie. Not fairy like Tinkerbell; faerie like the high fae, like Oberon, Titania, and Puck. He’s extremely powerful, ethereally beautiful (though not all fae are), and he’s very careful with his wording.

Either Aaravos can lie and simply doesn’t, or he cannot lie and doesn’t want that to be known. (I choose to ignore the option of “he was lying when he said he never lies” because that hurts my brain.) “I’m not lying. I never lie.” Never, not cannot, which. Details, details.

He was betrayed. He ended up in the mirror because he was betrayed. They drugged him to seal away his magic so Avizandum could imprison him. I have several scenes of this in my head, but @alls-fair-in-pride-and-prejudice and I are using this is TSATS so I don’t want to give too much more away.

Ziard was Aaravos’s apprentice. They were kind of like Halt and Will in Ranger’s Apprentice. Only they invented dark magic together and Halt and Will didn’t use magic.

Dark magic causes nightmares until you learn it, if you don’t have training. Aaravos’s nightmares? The other Startouch elves leaving.

He’s afraid of being alone. He used to like it, spending hours and days and weeks alone with his books quite happily. But after he literally could not interact with anyone for three hundred years, he’d break if he had to be alone again.

He actually did break during those centuries. Multiple times. Screaming, crying, throwing things, trying to break things, windows, the mirror, anything. Even himself.

They’re antlers, not horns. Horns are one point, you get one (1) set for life, like adult teeth. Antlers have branches, and you get a new set every year. Aaravos... has feelings about this. 

Startouch elves spoke like a Shakespeare play. This one’s kind of silly, and entirely based around the line, “Yes, it’s well appointed, but make no mistake, this has been my prison these past few centuries!” and me thinking that “well appointed” sounded very Shakespearean and he could just as well have said “Yes, it’s quite nice, but make no mistake” etcetera (and a bit that I keep wanting to write “thou” when writing him lately). Anyway. Moving on.

Aaravos is a good animal trainer. He’s got the patience for it, and he’s smart. He’s probably trained lots of animals, of many different species. Clicker training, probably; definitely primarily positive reinforcement.

The horse? Is not a horse. It’s a couch. (I only go in for this one because I love the image of Aaravos jumping around on his couch like a little kid, draping himself all over the room. Funnily enough, how he rides is entirely plausible, given that I’m not even drinking age and I can ride my horse very similarly to how Aaravos rides. He’s millennia older than me; he could absolutely ride like that.)

Aaravos killed Queen Aditi and Queen Luna Tenebris. That’s a big reason why he was imprisoned. Yeah, the dark magic was part of it, but Ziard lived 1,000 years ago and Aaravos was only imprisoned 300 years ago. Either he managed to evade the authorities for 700 years, or something else was the tipping point. Maybe a bit of both.

Aaravos has killed a lot of people, for various reasons. Sometimes for revenge (I’d like to think Aditi killed Ziard, which is why Aaravos went after her), sometimes just for being in his way (he discarded the poor Sunfire priest way too casually).

If he really cares about someone, he will kill for them? Die for them? Nah, not really, he’d have to be absolutely crazily stupid with love for that. Kill for them? Absolutely, any day.

Oh and he does the murderously protective thing where he’s like, “Oh, and if anyone hurts you do let me know. I will be happy to talk to them about that. 💖🔪😇 ”

He doesn’t like children. Like, there are a few he cares about, but by and large he’s like “children? ugh, no, yuck.”

He doesn’t fall in love easily, but when he does, he is in love. Period, fullstop.

For all his flirting and teasing, he knows how to respect no. I mean. Look at Xadia’s culture. Being queer is a total nonissue, women are actually treated as equal to men. Sure, it’s not perfect, but it’s hella better than here. Aaravos grew up in Xadia. He’s gonna respect people as people. Will he flirt insanely with everyone, whether they’re into him or not? Yeah. If he talks, he flirts. Will he make a move on someone who doesn’t want him to? No.

He loves cats. Need I say more?

He didn’t get any kind of trial, no chance to defend himself, to tell his side of the story. He was just betrayed and imprisoned.

Aaravos’s arrogance and vanity is a cover over some major self-esteem issues. Maybe he didn’t always have those, but during his imprisonment there were times he believed that he deserved it. That he was a monster, a soulless demon (like they said he was), and he didn’t deserve freedom. That he had no heart, that all he could do was hurt people, and anytime he tried to help he only ended up hurting more. Destruction and tragedy was all he could bring. He’d try not to believe that, forcing himself to remember good things he’d done, telling himself over and over again that he can help people he’s not a monster he’s not-- and he just. can’t. because he’s tried to help, yes, he saved Elarion and he killed for those he loved, but he killed, and not always to protect, and he even enjoyed it. He knows he’s done bad things, but he enjoyed them. Maybe he did deserve to be put in here, alone. Because if he deserved it, maybe when he’s suffered enough to atone he can be free, but if he was truly unjustly imprisoned then there will be no freedom. And this doesn’t make sense, and he knows it’s illogical, so he pulls on a mask of pride and confidence, hoping ‘fake it til you make it’ will work eventually, but underneath. Aaravos. Is. Broken.

Aaravos likes humans in general more than elves in general. They tend to be less judgey at him and they look up to him. Nice ego boost there, the admiration.

He also likes animals, especially now. They don’t judge him based on any criteria a human, elf, or dragon might use. They just care how he personally treats them specifically, and he’s good to them so they love him. They don’t ask anything more of him than that, no relentless demands on his time, and they can just happily coexist in companionable silence. Humans tend to be less good at that.

His favorite fiction books are romance novels. He does like the different ones, the cliche-benders that turn tropes on their heads, but sometimes there’s nothing like curling up with a cheesy, predictable, well-loved story and a cup of hot chocolate.

So, anon, this live up to your expectations?

[madrivervalleyicelandics]

Oh ho ho, we have fixed the problem! So, here is the video I was trying to upload.

A little “No Stirrup November” practice 🤓 What better way to spend a rainy November day? 🌧 Last year everyone looked like they were having so much fun with the @gaedingadressage “No Stirrup November” challenge, but I was 9 months pregnant so I couldn’t really participate 🙈 This year is another story! Bogi & I are having fun practicing some of the elements we’d like to include in our freestyle, like his new baby steps of half-pass, popping over some small jumps, and maybe even pulling the bridle off for some work in the neckrope!

I know some folks do this challenge bareback, but Bogi is only 7 and has a very sensitive back, so I don’t like to sit directly on him like that - even with a bareback pad. I prefer he have the panels of his custom saddle to distribute my weight, and I always warm him up with stirrups and keep the actual “no-stirrup” part of the practice to a minimum, warming him up with a light-seat.

As a child, my Hunter/jumper trainers drilled me with no-stirrups practice, especially posting and half-seat/two-point - with my heels down 😱 This creates nothing but a stiff, gripping leg, and it’s something I had to un-teach myself as an adult getting into classical dressage and more harmonious riding. Now, I let my leg drape and relax, and my horses are much happier for it!

Bogi is less “finished” than Vigri, who is twice his age, so of course I felt a little bummed at first that I already turned Viggo out for his break from training - he and I could have put together a much more technical freestyle! But then I realized that it’s okay - I figure Bogi and I may not be able to show anything super fancy, but we can show the basics we are working on now, and it’s okay that everything is a work in progress 🤓 Bogi is so smart and always tries his best, and we are having fun with this so that is what matters! ❤️

As usual all of this is trained via clicker training. Feel the need to include that at the end of every post Esp. If I’ve cut out the moments where I’m reinforcing, or if I’m performing longer behavior chains where you may not see the reinforcement for each component.

[bonnes-the-horse]

Positive Reinforcement/clicker training advice needed.

Okay, so what do I do when my horse decided that some things just aren't treat worthy? I just recently started doing clicker training/positive reinforcement only stuff with her as she generally responded super well to being taught stuff that way in the past so I decided to do it more, but she thinks some things dont deserve treats or she doesnt want them?

Like for going backwards she wants a treat, she doesn't like doing it, so she wants a treat afterwards, shes happy accepting treats most of the time when I try to teach her something new, but sometimes she just doesn't want them. When I do walk-canter transitions for example or haunches-in in, canter/semi pirouettes, shoulders in (only under rider, in hand she wants treats for that) she doesnt want them, but she really enjoys doing those so its fine, i guess? But for example her mane spray, she doesnt like it but she lets me do it so i wanna give her a treat after for standing still, but shes like NOPE and just ignores it, which she sometimes does with stuff that she doesnt feel too happy about but does anyways (vet stuff and farrier stuff too f.e. or cleaning nose/eyes) and i want praise her for it, but she doesnt like scratches either and while she responds to “good girl” and “good job” i feel like its not enough sometimes? But then for other things she doesnt like she basically demands a treat.

So im very confused and im not really sure what my question exactly is?

[lifeoflaverne]

So Laverne and I are a few days out from our first official training lesson with our new coach, and we have been having so much fun with our homework. I’ve been taking some video clips and I hope to share some updates as we progress, but I just wanted to share my initial thoughts on some of the differences I’m encountering between training a dog and training horses, which is what I do professionally (whereas Laverne is the first dog I have trained). I think as far as timing and a basic understanding of how clicker training works, dogs and horses are not much different, but when it comes to training finished behaviors that you could use in say, a dressage competition for horses or rally obedience competition for dogs (which is what Laverne and I are training for, it’s kind of like dressage for doggos 😝) I notice some major differences.

The biggest thing for me is the energy level that we are looking for in the animal. Horses tend not to learn or retain information when they are in any kind of heightened state of arousal, and tend to perform best when they are truly, truly relaxed. Even if we are asking them to run their fastest or jump their highest, they will do so BETTER when they are relaxed than when they are emotionally relaxed than when they are excited/stressed/anxious. So when I train horses, I spend an immense amount of time training for emotional control and impulse control. I get really, really good results this way and end up with robust, dependable behaviors even when in a stressful, unpredictable environment, because I have essentially put relaxation on cue and relaxation, for equines, is focus. Not so with doggos! With dogs, we work on an arousal curve - if they’re too hyped, they’re gonna be out of control, but if they’re too chill, they’re going to get bored and distracted and think about other things. So they key to focusing the dog actually lies in being able to kind of raise their arousal to the right level and then hold it there. This is soooo different from training horses and has required me to really shift the way I work with Laverne. But it’s a super fun challenge with a huge payoff in terms of how happy and focused it makes her!

Another big difference for me lies in reward delivery. With horses, I bring the reward to the horse and I train them to hold whatever position I marked them in until I arrive to give them the reward. I start out working next to them but training them that they don’t have to turn their head or reach their nose to me or anything to receive their reward. But ultimately I work up to being able to work at quite a distance from them, for longeing or Liberty purposes. So if I ask my horse to halt on the longeline, he will halt square and if I mark him he will stay in that square halt until I can make my way over to give him his reward. Which also ties into all that relaxation/impulse control training we do. With Laverne, I am learning to do this all differently. I am to give her the rewards close to my body, and she is allowed to break the position I marked her in to come up to get the reward in some cases. For example, if we are practicing our heel, and she has done good work but is still further away from my foot than I would like, I can mark her and then give her the treat right on top of my foot, so she has to come right in where I want her to get the food. I would neeeeever do this with a horse because I don’t want the horses chasing the food, as it raises their arousal - but with dogs that’s a good thing!

The third big difference is in putting complex behavior chains on one cue. For horses, by the time I am putting complex chains on a singular cue, I have already transferred their cues over to physical touch cues (the aids we use for riding). For Laverne, those will be vocal cues and hand gestures, so the mental process for ME is a bit different as I navigate how to organize what I want her to know and respond to. Right now, I am teaching her two behaviors called “left finish” and “right finish”, where she must go from sitting in front of me to circling around me to the right or to the left to finish in a sit at my left heel. So that breaks down into asking her to sit, hand-targeting her around my body in either direction, and then asking her to sit again at my heel. Ultimately we will put all of that on one vocal cue for left finish, and a different vocal cue for right finish. It’s a lot of fun, mental gymnastics for both of us and really rewarding!!

[freechoiceequestrian-blog]

Day One

So I’m not really expecting anyone to read this. This blog is just somewhere to put down my thoughts, and track my progress on this whole horse training journey thing. I don’t even know if what I’m doing can be called “training” yet, to be honest. Then again, every interaction with a horse teaches them something. I’d like to think that today, I taught Steve and Frodo that humans can be fun, and that not every interaction with a human involves them having to do something, or having something done to them. I guess I’d better sum up what I actually did.

So Hannah (my sister) and I went down to the paddock where Steve and Frodo, two small ponies, live. I took my clicker and a treat bag, but we didn’t have any halters for the ponies or other equipment.

I wasn’t entirely sure what I was going to be doing, as it was my first time meeting these ponies. I had been thinking a lot about two different training concepts: clicker training, and freedom-based training. I had only recently learned about freedom-based training from Elsa Sinclair at an Equidays demo. I had practiced basic clicker training before, and thought I would probably just be sticking with what I knew today. However, Steve and Frodo quickly made me realise that wasn’t going to be possible. As soon as Hannah and I entered their paddock, all they wanted to do was canter around, so I couldn’t even get close enough to attempt clicker training. 

We did make a mistake here that I didn’t realise until later; We were trying to encourage the ponies to come down to the bottom of the hill (the paddock was in a sort of valley), but I had forgotten that horses tend to feel safer when they are higher up, and don’t like to go down into valleys like that if they can avoid it because it makes it harder to see predators coming. That was a valuable lesson, as I realise now that I was trying to convince Steve and Frodo to behave in a way that was convenient to me as a human (to come down to where the ground was flatter and it was easier for me to stand), without taking into account how they, as horses, viewed the situation.

From the bottom of the valley, I tried to match their movements as Elsa Sinclair had demonstrated in her Equidays clinic. They wanted to run around, so I ran around too. It felt pointless at first, but after a while, I started to see the ponies taking an interest in me. A pattern started to appear in their behaviour. They would run from one side of the paddock to another, then stop and stare at me for a while, before running back across the paddock again. When they did this, I stopped and stared back at them, trying to show them through my body language that I was interested, but not threatening.

When they took their eyes off me and looked at something behind me (such as a car going past on the highway that they could see from the top of the hill), I would turn around and look at whatever it was they were interested in. Nearly every time, when I looked back, they would be looking at me again.

After repeating this process several times (and wearing myself out by running around on the side of a hill), I began slowly making my way towards Steve and Frodo while they were standing still and watching me. I watched their body language closely for any signs that they were uncomfortable with how close I was getting, as I didn’t want to frighten them and break the connection. 

They let me approach them, and we greeted each other in a way that was friendly, but not pushy. I breathed into their nostrils, and they matched that. Steve wanted to get to know me by nibbling at my face, which I let him do, but set boundaries by moving suddenly (tensing or doing a small jump on the spot) if he got a little too pushy or used his teeth. Frodo was more difficult to connect with. He showed less interest in me than Steve, and I needed to use stronger signals with him that he was pushing my boundaries a little too much.

Once we had greeted each other and spent some time simply sharing space, Hannah came up the hill to join the herd. This was one of the most interesting parts of the session for me. At first, Steve and Frodo didn’t show much interest in Hannah. She had been sitting at the bottom of the hill while I was running around and mirroring the ponies’ behaviour, so they hadn’t connected with her yet. When I approached Hannah and stood close to her, making it clear that we were friends, the ponies became less skeptical. I moved around behind Hannah so she was between myself and the ponies, so she was a part of our space rather than being outside of it.

Steve and Frodo were happy to engage with Hannah once I had convinced them to accept her. However, I feel like I had established myself as a leader more than she had, as they were more willing to follow me than Hannah. Although, Hannah seemed to connect far more with Frodo than with Steve, while I connected more with Steve than with Frodo. I’m not quite sure why this is, but I think it may have to do with Frodo being the more dominant of the two horses, and Hannah being the less dominant of the two humans.

Overall, the whole session went a lot better than I thought it would. When the ponies were running around at the top of the hill, I thought my first attempt at freedom-based training was just going to be running around until I got too tired, and then going home. I was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to convince Steve and Frodo to accept me into their herd, simply by listening to their language and understanding how I should behave in order to connect with them. I feel like I gained a better understanding of equine behaviour from that one hour of running around on a hill than I did from about a decade of traditional riding lessons.