This is almost too easy
Mar 09 2010
NOTE: I apologize for this morning’s technical difficulties. I still do not know WHY they happened, nor does my web host. I complained at 7 AM and my complaint was routed to the wrong department, which my web host admits to as their error. They fixed it very quickly when I called again. Linda Parelli does NOT have the power to take this blog down. If my web hosts were wimps, it would have gone down three years ago. In the event that they do ever get scared off of hosting the blog, there are many “free speech” web hosts including offshore ones to help me out. The blog is backed up in full daily and there will NEVER be ANY way to make it disappear forever.
Deal.
Now, again, this is a video of Linda Parelli working with a horse. Which I am now going to leave up for at least one extra day just on the off chance that some asshat disciple of hers hacked me! I will note that this is also a horse who is blind in one eye.
Heck, where do I even begin? Her body’s in the wrong place most of the time. Why the fuck is she turning her back to the horse like that? And the ducking thing? If she had a longe whip and an actual longe line she wouldn’t have a horse nearly on top of her. Why do these morons do all those constant rollbacks on the longe line? Let the poor horse go forward for a while and maybe it wouldn’t be so pissed off and confused. Why is the longe line LYING on the ground like that? That is an accident waiting to happen! Why are you flapping your elbows like a brain damaged chicken, you twit?
“Humane Horseman of the Year” – sorry, HSUS, that was a HUGE fail. HUGE. This is nothing more than someone really fucking up a horse to the point where someone competent is going to have one hell of a time ever fixing it.
Shit, I could do a whole blog on the plague that is Parelli. It just never ends.
Linda, you suck. Seriously, seriously, seriously suck. You trying to teach other people about good horsemanship is like Tiger Woods trying to teach other people about monogamy.
It just popped into my head that someone could have taken video of me longeing the VLC in public recently. And you know what, I’d be perfectly fine if that video showed up on the Internet. You would have seen a calm, well behaved young horse longeing quietly in a very crowded warm-up ring. A time or two he got distracted by all the activity and stopped. I just gave him the noise – you know the noise, the you’re-doing-something-wrong noise – stepped meaningfully toward his hip and he got going again.
Oh, wait, that’s why my horse likes me…
Really, Linda, it is not that damn hard to longe without pissing off and confusing the horse. Did you need some lessons? Come on by, maybe I can help you and Pat out with it! 
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UGH I HATE THIS SITE!!!! Sorry, not the Fugs, the actual site it takes me ten minutes to wade into it, it sticks, it freezes up on me and it is just a useless bloody piece of *%$£&, it truly is!!
OK, sorry about that, the flipping site just kicked me off again then said the site was suspended (and me thinking, OK…..Cathy didn’t actually say anything controversial yesterday!) then it made me log in again…….
Right, rants over I promise.
I saw this woman on YouTube yesterday, but I just could not be bothered to comment, so many people already were, and from ages ago, not just after the post yesterday!
Maybe, just maybe, at long long last, this will show people what a truly awful cow she is.
That poor, poor horse, so confused.
Cathy, a horse does not have to like you to respect you, I have retrained horses that really did not like me much and could not wait to be rehomed, but I did not confuse them like that moron is confusing that horse, and they learned, and then they were free to go off into the world, having found someone that not only did not confuse them, but that they really liked!
It’s the same with kids, not every one of your class is going to like you. So long as it does not become hatred, you can still teach and they can still learn.
That woman has zilch ability to teach anything.
Ducklings, raised by her, would drown!
LOL it wasn’t you, we really were having tech problems…fixed now though.
And I agree, a horse doesn’t have to like you to respect you but have you ever noticed that when they respect you, they usually like you? I have!
If the site is always slow to load for you, you need to update your bookmark. My old bookmark was taking “forever” because it was pulling up the old fugly site from August before transferring to: http://www.fuglyblog.com
My brain is bleeding a little so bear with me. It looked to me like the horse hadn’t acclimated to the blind eye (I’m assuming it was a pretty recent develompent from other posts) and the owner was having a herd time with the horse running him/her over. They called Parelli in who, I think, is just too old at this point to be dealing with horses of this nature (I do not intend to offend, but she was having a time holding the lunge line and not tripping over it), and who I dont think grasps the whole situation. Her Idea is to stop the horse from looking around and rushing forward at any cost, but if you get a glance at the owners you can tell they werent expecting this. They signed up for the lady in the videos who is soft spoken and never yanks or slaps her horses then this old lady showed up and starts pulling and shouting commands at them to go by the tree while she deals with this….Its quite commical! Several times I was waiting for the lunge lines to trip her up and the whole ass over tea kettle to come to fruition…but the arm flapping duck managed to stay on her feet, Dang!
“Several times I was waiting for the lunge lines to trip her up and the whole ass over tea kettle to come to fruition…but the arm flapping duck managed to stay on her feet, Dang!”
ROTFL…thanks for making me LOL after such an annoying morning!
Any time…..I used to work at a tack shop that would rent training videos (that no one ever actually rented) but I would take them home and watch because I couldnt afford cable and some of them where useful and some where just plain entertaining….I sat through all of hers and they are very misleading for “Newbies” and I watched alot of people get into her meathod and quickly drop alot of money into it and get out of it. You can sell a magic overnight fix faster than you can sell time and effort.
And as my gramma always said if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, and dangles around on the end of a lunge line like an injured duck…..
Whew…..I thought you were gone forever….I even blogged about Fugly Horse of the Day being shut down this morning on my blog, I was so upset. Glad you are back!!!
ROTFL, you guys, you all jump to conclusions that there is some grand conspiracy. No one has the power to “shut me down” short of shooting me, which may be tried at some point but hey, then I’ll REALLY be famous and someone will probably even have a memorial polo tournament in my honor which would be awesome.
Linda has issued a statement, with a note from the owner too:
http://www.parellinaturalhorsetraining.com/A-statement-from-Linda-Parelli
Still looks like confusing and beating a half blind horse to me, but there you go.
You know, their defense would be so much stronger if they actually showed new video footage of the horse and how much better he is now b/c of this so called training. You’d think it wouldn’t be that awfully hard to do since they’ve got the owner writing on their behalf. I guess we’re just all supposed to take their word for it, though, instead of believing what we’ve all seen with our own eyes.
Bingo! Let’s see the improvement!
Sheesh. That poor horse probably went to kill long ago.
fhotd: “Sheesh. That poor horse probably went to kill long ago.”
So now the owner, a person you have never met, is automatically a bold-faced liar who did an about face and sent his horse to slaughter after first rescuing it from being euthanized, and then spending thousands of dollars (courses at the Parelli centers don’t come cheap) on training.
Yes, that makes sense. Of course it does.
I would look forward to the time when the inevitable new video of Barney *does* surface, but of course it will just be some other calm bay horse that the Parellis ruthlessly forced to have its eye removed so that it could act as a stand-in for poor, “slaughtered” Barney.
*rolls eyes*
I hadn’t read that the owner made those remarks when I wrote that. Now that I know the horse is still around, I feel very sorry for him as he must be amazingly messed up after years of that kind of training.
No, I will never agree with you that there is any value whatsoever in what Linda was doing. There isn’t any. And I just wish if she was going to do that crap, she’d stay far away from Thoroughbreds, who are sensitive and not mean enough to retaliate. I’d like to see Linda do that crap to an Appy. My money’d be on the Appy.
“I hadn’t read that the owner made those remarks when I wrote that.”
Okay, that’s a relief. I’ve gotta say, that comment really shocked me.
“Now that I know the horse is still around, I feel very sorry for him…”
That is, of course, your prerogative. In my opinion, spending time feeling sorry for a horse who was successfully rescued from death, rehabbed, and has a secure future as his owner’s “rock steady mount in sport psychology clinics” and “trusted partner on trail rides both alone and ponying [the owner's] two young sons” seems like a very odd use of emotional energy, for you, of all people.
“And I just wish if she was going to do that crap, she’d stay far away from Thoroughbreds, who are sensitive and not mean enough to retaliate.”
This is a very interesting statement to make about a horse who was there because he repeatedly charged the owner. I’ve been charged by horses on a handful of occasions during the past 25 years. All but one case involved stallions (spoiled by handling by a succession of clueless college students) at the university where I got my degree. The other was at an Arabian show barn– the type of place where real abuse takes place– where I worked for three months before I realized that I had to get out if I wanted to keep my sanity and self-respect intact.
In my opinion, in terms of dangerous behavior, charging is only one level below rearing and striking, biting with intent to maim (as opposed to nipping), and kicking with intent to hit the target (as opposed to kicking in a person’s general direction with no intent to make contact). And I couldn’t care less what breed of horse is the one doing the charging.
“I’d like to see Linda do that crap to an Appy. My money’d be on the Appy.
As I would have thought you would be aware, between them, Pat and Linda have personally handled over ten thousand horses. A significant percentage of those have been previously labeled “dangerous”, and an even larger percentage have been previously labeled “problem horses”. These horses have included Appaloosas, Andalusians, Arabians, draft breeds, quarter horses, paints, mustangs, warmbloods, gaited horses, stallions of all breeds, and others of all descriptions.
During that time, neither of them have been savaged by angry horses intent on revenge. Amazing, isn’t it?
If you can find the vast repository of people, among all these thousands of owners, who must logically be upset because their horses became fearful, aggressive, or even failed to make significant forward progress in their training after being handled by the Parellis, then more power to you.
If you can’t, I’ll just point you to the thousands, Paul H. included, who have nothing but praise for the progress they and their horses have been able to make using Parelli methods.
Most horses do not savage people no matter WHAT people do to them. That is a poor way to “prove” that Pat and Linda are not abusive. Whether you call this abuse or not, I think it’s terrible and totally INEFFECTIVE horse training.
And are you really challenging me to find equine victims of the actual Parellis’ hands on training? ‘Cause I’m pretty sure that would look like a class-action suit against Toyota. If you really want me to take up that cause, hey, I’ll be happy to add a “click here if you got a horse who was mentally messed up for life by the Parellis.”
You know, now that I think of it, they claim to have a thousand horses at any given time and I do not believe I have ever seen someone post anywhere that they got a horse from the Parellis. Hmmm.
Bah. She can release all the PR pap she wants to about what she was intending to do, but it’s still clear on the video that she was failing at it miserably. If she just owned up and said, “I’m sorry, I made mistakes while I was working with that horse but I have learned from them and am a better horse person for it,” everyone would respect her more. But God forbid she lose any business!
This is the part that really gets up my nose:
“All he could think about was running away but this was our chance to change his dangerous habits and give him the confidence in the leadership of a human. We had to get through to him so he could successfully and safely interact with other horses and humans, and I had to increase the intensity until it matched the intensity of his fear, which was dangerously high. ”
To me, the LAST thing you want to do with a prey animal that’s scared is get more intense. That’s like throwing gasoline on a fire and expecting to put it out. With a horse that’s so spooked its brain has turned off, your first priority is getting that flight instinct turned off and the brain back on. And you don’t get that by smacking the horse in the face. With a horse that’s deliberately disobedient, you start by teaching it to respect your space in an environment with no distractions, and graduate until you could get it to respect you when firecrackers are going off under its feet. Hey, it works for police horses! This is so typical to me of the half-baked Parelli theory – take a basic concept, apply it poorly and dress it up in flowery mystical rhetoric and ritual until it’s completely freaking useless.
I leased a QH who was parelli’d for several months, and while I have a lot of respect for properly applied NH techniques, I have none for the showmanship and marketing crap spewed by the Parellis. It’s like a freaking cult, and people don’t seem able to take the good stuff or what works for their horses and denounce the really bad stuff(like riding with no helmet!). I attended a level 1 clinic, and that was the last time I ever had anything to do with Parelli. The instructor was trying to get a 2 year old filly to yield her hind end. How did he do this? When she was confused about what he was asking by waving the whip at her butt and simply stood still, he hit her hard enough to rais welts, and then chased her in a circle for a minute STILL HITTING HER. The filly was so scared of him after that that she shied whenever she saw him come near her. Such a great trainer. I walked out of the clinic, I was so disgusted.
“On this particular day, it was windy and Barney was terribly spooked. He could not focus on his owner and in fact his behavior was becoming dangerous because he had no awareness for personal space and would run right over you. He also was not fond of humans, and his past ownership experiences had been tough.”
Um, then maybe you should be working with him in a ROUNDPEN or in an ARENA. Not in an open field with lots of other horses.
“. All he could think about was running away but this was our chance to change his dangerous habits and give him the confidence in the leadership of a human. ”
That horse does not seem to be trying to run away to me. He at one point just stands there because he’s confused and she still is shaking the lead which seems like a cue to move away from her. He doesn’t know what she’s asking him.
“That horse does not seem to be trying to run away to me. He at one point just stands there because he’s confused and she still is shaking the lead which seems like a cue to move away from her. He doesn’t know what she’s asking him.”
Couldn’t agree more. I only watched about a minute of the video because by then I was thinking “WTF is she trying to get him to do?” He went backwards – punished, forwards – punished, sideways- punished. At one point she was yanking on his mouth and twirling the line at his butt. Quite frankly I’m surprised he didn’t go straight up in the air since that was the only direction left open to him. I’m by no means an experienced horse person, but the most valuable lesson I have learned is that flailing around like a chicken and asking a million things at once is a good example of what not to do while longeing. All it will get you is out of breath and a grumpy horse. Or worse.
EXACTLY!
A round pen would be the safest place for horse and handler to address these issues not an open paddock with trees, horses, film crews.
DIGNITY! Aargh! How blind must some of these Parelli disciples be! That condescending little vid just makes me want to slap her even more.
It just goes to show the huge gap between “talking the talk” and “walking the walk”. True Horsemanship is not about deciding your methods are the best and applying them to every situation regardless of how inappropriate they may be. True Horsemanship is the ability to be flexible, open and ready to learn from every horse and situation you come across.
And her claim of wind is total BS. Look at the video again; look for his well-brushed tail to be blown around: nope. Look for dust blowing from the dirt he kicks up: nope. Look for the trees moving: nope.
Poor, one-eyed Barney. He was trying to do what she wanted, but she never gave him a clue. My definition of “natural horsemanship” is “training using the horse’s point of view.”
FAIL, Linda P. Big time.
Ruthie
“Um, then maybe you should be working with him in a ROUNDPEN or in an ARENA. Not in an open field with lots of other horses.”
THANK YOU.
What is so difficult or evil about a roundpen? I hate this crap, it’s misleading and can be dangerous. I have seen MORE Parelli disciples who can’t ride (oh, I’m sorry – aren’t ready to ride) their horses than with ANY OTHER “guru”. Go to a real trainer and take lessons. Put those silly toys away – put the horse in a ROUNDPEN and get to work. Sigh…… I’m done now.
Boy.. Didn’t that sounded sincere. Just needed to whip up a video real quick (off a cell phone) to COA. Now, there’s some deep thought.
If that Dip thinks the horse was that dangerous, she needs to spend a little more time out of the office and at a race track.
Here come the carrot chains.
Directly from that letter:
“We needed to teach him to move away from the human when asked using the “Driving Game†to move his front end over, but he was so upset he could not yield. All he could think about was running away but this was our chance to change his dangerous habits and give him the confidence in the leadership of a human….
I have heard accusations that this will make a horse head shy, but the opposite is true. Horses are head shy because they fear the human or because people hit them to punish them. This horse was not afraid of humans, but he didn’t believe in them either. He was respectful in very limited circumstances but as soon as he got worried, he was a force to be reckoned with. Barney was very spooky and dangerous to ride, his history with humans was not positive.”
Hmmm…
Uhh, I messed up the formatting somewhere. Only parts of it were supposed to be bold. Oh well.
I really don’t think that horse is appreciative of her “horsemanship”, I do use some of it on the ground, as in asking the horse to yield its hindquarters and trailering. Otherwise, I prefer my horse to LUNGE without whipping in confused because they think they have done something wrong, I use Side-Reins on my OTTB (I know I’m so bad!) because I want him to figure out how to carry himself without me having to constantly use all my aids. Just a few times doing this and my OTTB is very respectful and is learning shoulder-in with just slightly over 30 days with me, nothing mean, nothing inhumane just simple side reins put on low, light lungeing twice a week for 5 mins a side and then me giving constant never chaning aids so he understands.
I emailed Cathy and I totally agree, my trainer is a million times better than this hack and would have yanked me off my horse and probably beat me with the carrot stick!
Longtime reader, first time poster…
I guess I’m writing somewhat out of desperation. I turned to Parelli several years ago because it seemed accessible to me (a relative novice rider but owner of 2 “retired” horses at the time – given to me instead of the auction…both of whom died comfortably in their 30′s after several years of relaxation and love). I wish it were easier to find people who are wiling to work with adults who did not grow up with horses..I feel like I missed out on some of the learning that people assume I should have as an adult. I am very very willing to learn, and I would like to ask the community = what are the resources that I should be learning from? I appreciated the Parelli stuff because they had demonstrations and step by step instructions on how to perform certain tasks…which is helpful if, like me, you tend to either misinterpret or read in to a horse’s behavior.
I just want to be good to my horses, confident in what I’m doing, and for goodness sake – do things around animals without getting hurt!
You should be learning from a competent riding instructor/trainer. Now, finding one IS a challenge, but if you ask at your local tack shop, I will bet they know of a good beginner adult instructor in your area. I would be less worried about the particular style and type or specialty of riding than just someone who is known to be GOOD with adult amateurs and who has lesson horses for you to practice on.
The American Riding Instructors Association has a list of certified instructors by state at:
http://www.riding-instructor.com/instructors/
Even if there is not a certified instructor very close to you, one of the instructors in your state may be able to recommend someone for you.
I recommend the United States Pony Club manuals for good basic horsecare and safety info. Heck, I’d been riding since second grade and was in high school by the time I discovered them, and they still helped fill in gaps I didn’t even know I had.
Me too!
When I was in Pony Club (Sixties) we still used the old British Horse Society pony club manual. I still have mine from that era along with a couple of later editions. The Brits have no peer in horse management IMHO. I still have the directions on how to make a massager out of baling twine! Oddities from the really old PC manual include pros and cons of straight-stall keeping vs “loose box” keeping, a really cool set of ways to tie a horse safely, and wonderful diagrams of clip/trim jobs all oriented toward hunting and driving.
When my stepdaughter married a titled Brit whose family was all hunting-mad (even the MIL was an officer of one of the oldest foxhunts in Britain) I sent her off to her new life with the latest edition of the PC manual and instructions to read it so she knew what the dinner table conversations would be all about. The thank-you gift she sent back to me was a stock pin from the oldest London habit-maker.
I used to know how to make a wisp. Have completely forgotten. Would love to get my hands on one of those OLD BHS pony club manuals.
I think I left mine in England :/
Try Amazon. I just got a load of 1950s Pony Club annuals for a song. They might have manuals too.
Agree with fhotd about finding a good instructor. And for learning about horses in general, esp body language, try to find a breeding farm or other farm that let’s horses out in herd groups and just go WATCH. I grew up with broodmares, foals, youngsters. Male, female. Old, immature, healthy, ill. You learn lots. Watch and watch and watch. If you can’t tell where a horse’s brain is, no amount of flapping is going to help you train it. And if you can’t tell what a horse is *about* to do, you can’t help it do something else. Plus: once you’ve seen an older mare reprimand a youngster, you understand that it is fast and furious, and then it’s over. No guilt, no anger. Then you will understand that you too can be that mare.
I am also an adult more-or-less beginner, and I am currently reading the D-level Pony Club manual. Definitely recommended, and not even that expensive. I also have their guide to conformation. I’ve learned so much from these two books I was thinking about purchasing the Pony Club’s guide to ground training and longeing, but now I think a better use of my money would be to MAIL ONE TO THAT PARELLI WOMAN! Gah!!
I can’t even figure out what she was trying to do! Poor horse….just kept looking like,”Why do you keep yanking on that rope!?”
You know what I hate most about Parelli? I have a few boarders with “Parelli” trained horses that I use occasionally for lessons. And guess what? They can’t lunge. I can’t put any of the “Parelli” horses in a lunge line lesson because there owners skipped that part of their training. Awesome.
That is a shame. One of the best ways to help balance is lunging a horse and rider.
We have a H/Jr trainer who lunges students over 2.9ft jumps on the lunge while holding their hands behind them the entire lesson. That’s balance.
2’9, wow. I did used to get longed over little 18 inchers with my arms out to the side and stuff and it does wonders for your balance, but I’m a chicken about height!
Well wasn’t that a real talented and educated savage attack on a horse. She should go back to the round pen with him and start over, or just leave him be. He’s probably just fine how he is.
I guess this is why she is among the roster of training stars on Really Frickin Dumb TV (RFD-TV), home of the incredibly stupid, misguided and verrrrrrry expensive trainer wannabees and their soulfully sincere groupies.
This is DISGUSTING!! I’ve never been a fan of Parelli and the whole “carrot stick” crap. Um, it’s an orange whip, lets pay 10x what it’s worth since it’s called a carrot stick. The horse didn’t seen that bad to me – he wasn’t purposefully running her over and most times stood there confused until she’s beat on him with that rope. I find myself wishing he did run her over. What a HORRIBLE way to teach someone to bond and help a horse.
Best. Post. Ever. Besides the post about Linda Parelli and her reasons for not wearing a helmet. That was a good one too. I hope some folks who have get to sucked into the Parelli pile of crap read this before it is too late.
Agreed. Short and Sweet – couldn’t have said it better.
I can’t watch the video. Or even read all the comments.
But horses like people who are calm, dominant and consistent. Period.
I just have to comment. Although I do feel she was alittle over aggressive it is easy to see the horse was not paying any attention to her and was trying to run her over. That is why she was flapping her arms. As for the lounging thing that someone mentioned, I am wondering if you know how to lounge a horse that has parelli training or if the owners have even trained their horses how to lounge. I have used parelli techniques, most of which are the exact same as other well known natural horseman trainers and my horses all lounge easily and respond very well to light cues. So do not bash Parelli things when you may not have a full understanding of it and when it is almost identical to other forms of training, just some of the things are given different names like lounging which would be called the circling game. I am not trying to say that what she is doing is right because yes she does seem to be too harsh on the horse, but when done correctly Parelli, or Clinton Anderson ect. can be very beneficial.
You know what? If the horse isn’t paying attention to her and is trying to run her over, flapping her arms is a really stupid way to try and stop him. And what she is doing here is confusing as hell to him. If he backs off, you release the pressure. You don’t keep at the horse when he gives you your space. You let him relax once he gives what you want so that he knows that he’s done right. I’ve dealt with horses who had zero concept of personal space, and if any of them deliberately ran at me, my first reaction is a slash with the whip across the chest and a step to the side to bring them around to a stop safely, then making them back out of my space. Not doing the chicken dance and tying to “lounge” them on a 14 foot circle.
The circling game is a really stupid idea for any horse that doesn’t respect your space, because you are just too close with too little control. In a round pen or on a regular longe line in a proper caveson or bridle setup you have way more time to react and a safer distance if the horse kicks out or bolts. You’d want to first work on yield to pressure to teach the horse to move when you ask and teach them to get out of your space at a standstill, then start working with them when they are moving. She’s also dealing here *by her own admission* with a horse in an environment where he is already het up and spooked, which does nothing to encourage obedience. She does nothing to lower the fear level or de-spook the horse to let his brain engage, which would be the sensible thing…instead she ramps up the pressure, with predictable results! That shows a huge lack of common sense to me.
And it’s longeing or lunging, not lounging. Please, people!!!!
I agree! I recently got a horse (16hh Arabian gelding, yes a true 16hh, he is a beast!) who is almost 9, never started under saddle, all he had was ‘parelli’ basics. SO here I end up with a big horse, who circles me on a lead rope, wants to continually switch directions when on a lunge line, and has zero respect for my space. I’ve had him for a little over 2 months, he now lunges, I only had to use a stud chain on him 2 days to get him to respect the halter pressure, and I’ve had about 10 rides on him and is coming along great.. None of which entailed me waving my arms, constantly making him do rollbacks or using a carrot stick! Ugh, man was it annoying to have a horse that did not know the difference between a lead rope and lunge line, though he seems much better with clear boundaries and structure now.
They’re like children – the way to go is clear boundaries and consistent answers!
There is also the point to be made that all “natural” horsemanship really only works with people who are calm and relaxed-in that video you can tell she is annoyed, which is not helping the situation. Furthermore, as several other people have pointed out-there was no stop point for that horse. He tried a variety of things and she didn’t release on any of them-this is not the kind of behavior that makes a horse *want* to have a person in charge of them.
Also, at roughly the 4:30, I think she says “good boy” but does anyone know why? All I could see was the horse trying things it had tried before to no avail.
“it is easy to see the horse was not paying any attention to her and was trying to run her over.”
I do not see that at all. I NEVER see him moving aggressively. He might not have been paying attention to her in the first ten seconds, but after that he was. He tried over and over to do something to make her stop shanking, hitting him with the lead, and slapping his half-blind face. Nothing he offered worked. Nothing.
If you can’t see that, you haven’t observed enough. I’m not snarking at you. Lack of experience is not lack of intelligence. The best thing you can do for yourself and your horse is to watch horses interact with each other and with humans, and figure out how they communicate. That’s how I learned to “speak horse.”
Ruthie
But ..why do you have to ‘do’ anyone?? I do not understand why you’d have to pick a person and follow him as a leader, especially parelli, who is doing this for attention even more than for horses. I’m sorry but i just can’t get my head around it. I think that we have MANY good horsepeople and natural horsemanship is great, and of course learning from other people is a good thing but i find it easier to learn things from horses( or people who are not chasing the attention and money)
and about the video! It was SCHOKING! i was holding my head and just trying to understand what the hell is wrong with this woman.I thought the horse was really behaving as good as he could while yanking him in his HEAD! you should NEVER!!! NEVER hit a horse to his head.. painful video, soooo disapointed.
My first horse was blind in one eye and he didn’t have a problem longeing at all. The only thing I did differently was talk to him more when his blind eye was on the inside of the circle. That little pony will be okay as long as you don’t chase him around and smack him in the face. The wiggle wiggle wiggle pop method is best left to the dance floor at cousin Jethro’s wedding.
My 1/2 blind CBER horse longed fine.
I work with horses in harness. Technically, they are “blind” to me out of both eyes when I lunge with tack on since they have blinkers on their bridles (yes lunging off the halter not the bit). They do fine BECAUSE the contact and communication are consistent. All that “popping and dropping” of the line would not fly at all in my world.
I can’t see the video….
…I clicked on the reply link from Linda and searched here. I will continue to search. If anyone has a link, PLEASE repost.
OMG, So glad it was technical difficulties. Was afraid I’d been thrown off. Me being paranoid. I love your blog, check in every morning with my coffee.
This is the best post ever. The trainer who first taught me how to longe always insisted there be a purpose. She caught me one day just letting the horse go round and round without side reins or a plan and gave me the lecture. I have no idea what Linda Parelli was trying to accomplish. Go get a whip and keep him moving forward. I agree with your comment, “Why the constant rollbacks?” I have a good friend who is really into Clinton Anderson and his 14 ft line and sending the horse back and forth. My 3 yro warmblood needs to be out 30 feet to maintain his big stride. And the rollbacks are hard on his joints. (At least that’s what I think) I’ve stopped trying to explain.
Thank you for your posts and always telling it like it is!
Has anybody seen this petition against the Parellis? http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/natural-horsemanship-horse-abuse
I went ahead and signed it.
I have only met a handful of people that do Parelli, but the ones that I have met are all inflexible. One girl was very skilled and had well mannered horses. She was a total snob though, and no training method was any good in her opinion.
Another was a crazy lady who tried to “help” me teach my young gelding to pick up his feet. My gelding had just learned to pick up his feet, and I was still working on getting him to keep them. She came along one day when I was working on his feet, and offered to show me how she got horses to pick up their feet. I like learning other peoples methods, so I agreed to let her show me how she did things. She kept grabbing his chestnuts to get him to pick up his feet. He got very pissy, but she ignored his body language and kept at it. He ended up kicking at her. I thought it was pretty funny at how oblivious she was to how angry she was making him. I have used the “squeeze the chestnuts” method on other horses with good results though, it just really ticked off my gelding. He learned to hold up his feet quite well without the help of any Parelli method.
I have met a couple of other Parelli-ites, and I just haven’t been impressed with them.
If Parelli is so sure of her ability, why doesn’t she get on here and debate FHOTD! If she can’t stand the heat, get out of the fire! Or stand up for what she thinks is correct! At this point my money is on FUGS!
Oh, seriously. I keep waiting for one of these people to sue me so that I can debate them!
I literally salivate thinking about deposing someone like Linda Parelli or Randy Byers or someone with a HYPP positive stallion. I’ve attended many trials but I can’t say a word because I’m not a lawyer – I can only give the lawyer my notes about what I think is going on, what the jury is reacting to, and what I think they should ask. But if someone sued ME, I could argue MYSELF!
I got deposed once as an expert witness on a horse case many years ago, and I loved every second of it. I thought the other attorney was going to cry. I was having a BLAST and the court reporter was trying not to snicker. Case settled in our favor.
Um Cathy IMHO its about past time for YOU to go to law school. There are very few animal law attorneys and even fewer animal law attorneys with any gonads (esp. in Oregon). Think about it. Lewis & Clark law school would be a really good place to start. You would have a waiting list for clients that would start growing the day you walk through those doors.
As a more or less active participant in the law biz I have actually talked to some of the Oregon idiotards who call themselves equine law specialists. Two words: Oh puhleeeeeeze. Not a compliment.
Please consider giving them some serious competition!
No, I have worked with lawyers for enough years to not see any great benefit to being an attorney as opposed to a paralegal. You get 10x the stress and work 7 days a week instead of 5 for only 2x the money in most cases. But there have definitely been times in trial I wanted to just get up and take on the jerk on the other side MYSELF!
I just had a new boarder bring her horse into my barn. She got him for free because the previous owners have to move and can’t keep him. One of the first things the new owner was worried about was that the horse had been “Parelli trained” and she did not know anything about what type of training it was and how to keep up with it so as not to confuse or distress the horse. I told her not to bother worrying about it, she doesn’t need to play games with her horse or sit on couch and eat popcorn with it! Although he is a cute little horse, and even excusing some misbehavior as nerves at being in a new place, he was decidedly rude and disrespectful to his handler. Nothing dangerous, just no boundries and lack of respect. We will help this owner re-start the horse so he becomes the respectful and trusted companion she is looking for.
BTW, this is the first time I have watched Linda P work with a horse and I think I will use this video clip to show my daughter (who would like to train horses) all the things NOT to do!
They understand neither respect nor boundaries. They seem to equate being respected with being feared, and boundaries (in relationships) with physical distances. They should look the words up in the dictionary.
Ruthie
hmm.. was she trying to teach this horse to lounge? ..i have two three year old fillies that i taught to lounge in about……five minutes!..qietly calmly without all the shank snapping, hand waving and weirdness..the horse just looks totally confused….. i generally use the “pie method IE” control the head and either use your hand or lounge whip ( never touching the horse with it) start close and work them out as their comfort level increases..never have had these kind of issues!..poor buggar….
Off Topic:
Hi everybody – I am the artist who made the painting of Hercules that got featured last week, and I just want to thank you all for the overwhelmingly positive reviews! I’m still just an art student, so making my art public is still very new to me.
I just wanted to note for everyone that asked that I should have prints and t-shirts ready by the end of the week, and half of all of the proceeds will be donated to SCR and Hercules.
I also have made a second painting of Herc (he’s very photogenic!) and thanks to a bunch of suggestions, I’m auctioning this one off. You can find it here. Same donation applies, of course – I’m really glad that I can help through my art, ‘cuz I don’t have much cash to donate. Plus – I won’t lie – it’s nice to find out that people like what I create. Maybe I’m not doomed to be a starving artist after all!
…But these are all about Hercules, so he gets half. It’s only right.
On Topic!
I’ve seen Natural Horsemanship do really good things in the right hands, so I can’t slam it. But what’s going on in that clip makes no sense to me whatsoever. Isn’t the point of any sort of training, for any kind of animal, to be consistent? I have no idea what she’s punishing/releasing for, and I’m guessing the horse doesn’t either.
I’ve never read up much on Parelli, though, so maybe it’s one of their “games”? But what it’s supposed to accomplish, I have no idea.
You are wonderful and your work is too! I wish this were not a really bad $$$ month for me or the one on auction now would be relocating to my office!! Great news about T shirts and prints. Keep on painting!
My horse would have stomped her into the ground after about 10 seconds of that crap. He hates stupid people.
I read the “explaination” on the Parelli site. I still don’t buy it. Heck if I’m watching and can’t figure out what she wants, the horse sure can’t figure it out! why did she say “good boy” and then shank him again? I couldn’t figure out what he supposedly did right, but then she whacked him again so maybe she said it by mistake?
She said it was a windy day and the horse was distracted. Well why not teach him the new thing in a calm environment, like an indoor arena with no distractions, and THEN ask him for it in a more distracting/spook-producing environment? It’s counterproductive to try to teach a horse something new when he’s scared/distracted like that. You teach it in a quiet place, and then ask for it in more challenging places. I can’t learn a new thing well when I’m scared or distracted, either.
If anyone EVER tried doing that with my horse, I’d have to jerk them around. If I didn’t let him stomp them into the ground first. I’d never tolerate anyone abusing and confusing my horse like that.
The owner’s letter in support of Parelli techniques indicates that the horse spent the first 11 years of it’s life in “an upper level fox-hunting barn”. ELEVEN YEARS!!! Oh. Mother. Of. God.
This whole sequence of damage control speaks for itself. BWAAAAAAHAHAHA!
Gawd that poor horse. He is wondering what happened to all the sane people, and what he did to get sold to this twit.
I’ve seen this type of thing before (head-scratching). Someone pulls a horse totally out of it’s discipline/environment and it’s off to the 3-Strikes world. You’ve got to wonder what their thinking. Common sense says this isn’t such a good idea.
I think the entire sense of those supporting Linda on her website is summed in one post: “I’m a LAWYER, and you people are just JEALOUS.”
I don’t think I’ve heard anything that juvenile since 8th grade.
This probably won’t get posted, but I don’t think i’ve read more juvenile comments than in THIS thread. I’m not a parelli fan, but my gosh people, it seems everyone’s jumped on the ‘bash the trainer ‘ bandwagon.
And if you look up the thread a little, the owner of this site wishes she were a lawyer as well.
LOL! I said I wished I’d get to argue in court against some of these knotheads. I do not wish I were a lawyer, nor do I wish I was Linda Parelli. ROTFL!
That would be like, my Hell. I will die and be Linda Parelli. ROTFL.
“Humane Horseman of the Year†– sorry, HSUS, that was a HUGE fail. HUGE. This is nothing more than someone really fucking up a horse to the point where someone competent is going to have one hell of a time ever fixing it.
HSUS is a fail in itself IMHO, so of course if they vote Parelli as the “Humane Horseman of the Year” its probably because they made some big donation or something.
What is she even doing in this video? I don’t think the horse is trying to purposely run her over, he looks like he is reacting to something and then reacting again to what LP is doing to him.
What a kook.
We have a blind pony, she lunges on a line, has wonderfull manners, and is safe for the kids to plod around on. All you have to do is talk te her so she knows whet is going on.
My boss thinks parelli in hilarious. We were laughing at how she gets on the end of the rope, and prances around, like a horse to “help” people.
We came to the conclusion that at night we bet pat flaps a rope at her and chases her around with a carrot stick as a part on foreplay.
*spews diet dr. pepper*
Oh now that was just gross! Did you really need to go there?!
*finding a happy place now*
She’s not trying to longe, she’s butchering the teach the horse to back up maneuver. Badly. Holy crap. Maybe she planned to teach him to longe after she wacked him around awhile. She wouldn’t need to worry about the horse’s reaction, I’d have already smacked the crap out of her for that behavior. He backs up, she hits him or jerks him around harder. He tries something else, yank. He stands still, yank. He lets her walk up to him, smack. Way to fail at your own method. (Which I actually learned before Parelli existed.) And then she leads him off while flapping her arms like a chicken. Okey Dokey. Don’t worry, at that point he totally didn’t want to be anywhere near you lady.
The horse doesn’t look distracted, he looks confused. Mainly because the idiot training him is confusing, and yanking him around for no reason. If you yank him around for every movement he makes, and nothing he does gets relief from the negative pressure (yeah, I said it Parelli) THEN THE METHOD IS JUST CALLED HORSE SMACKING FOR FUN, as the only thing the horse learns is not to get caught next time.
I’m sorry I’ve never heard ANY trainer say “do jumping jacks or whatever works”. Okay, I have heard a trainer say that… at the flippin’ gym. There is nothing natural about the Parelli system. All a horse needs is someone who has a slight clue, and consistency. Consistency goes a LONG way, wish the natural horsemanship folks would understand that.
I’ve been around horses for most of my 65 years and have never seen anyone “train” a horse like Pat. She needs a good bitch slap!!!
OOPS Pat might not need the bitch slap………old age does things to your thought processes
First off I would like to say I really love this blog and agree with 99.9% of every post. I was a “Parelli freak” for a little while, now I just try to learn from every one I can. I know exactly what Linda was trying to accomplish.. I have seen it before on this really old Ray Hunt video I have (well close anyway, the horse wasn’t on a line so he broke through the fence, I think the horse is safer on a line personally). Yes, Linda was being firm.. maybe harsh.. but unless you have really had to deal with a horse that is extremely dangerous, you might not understand. I also dealt with a horse that had similar issues.. The problem with a horse like that is it will get distracted, look at something else and shoulder into you.. then at the same time if you give it too much line it could either turn and run for it, pulling the line out of your hand, or charge directly at you. The horse I was working with, would rear up at me, try to stomp me into the ground and bite me.. I have dealt with this situation only once, and I had to be extremely firm.. more firm than I would ever be with a young horse or a fearful horse, or any other horse. This horse was not afraid of people, he just didn’t like them. I know once a horse sees you as a leader this situation will not occur again, as long as you keep up the leader position. Note I said leader, not abusive.
I could be wrong, I was not there, it just looks like the same dangerous situation I was in that one time.. I would have to see what happened before to know for sure.. You always should ask as nice as possible, but as firm as necessary.. Oh, and I thought she was out of position a few times, but I am not perfect either and would hate for people to judge me that harshly, especially if they do not know all the circumstances..
“Yes, Linda was being firm.. maybe harsh.. but unless you have really had to deal with a horse that is extremely dangerous, you might not understand. ”
That was not an extremely dangerous horse, that was a confused and agitated horse.
Right? Have these people ever met dangerous?
I doubt it. A truly dangerous horse would have come at her and taken her out.
Too right! A truly dangerous horse would hav had its ears pinned back, teeth bared, neck snaked, been radiating fury and malice — absolutely none of which applies to that poor worried confused horse.
The problem with this video in my opinion isn’t the physical stress on the horse, but the psychological. There is no consistency of release of pressure. That is a big problem. Don’t even talk to me about training dangerous horses: for years one of my duties at the show/breeding farm where I worked was to round up the three-year olds and get them broke. Most of these horses were not even halter broke- they were as feral as can be. I have certainly been much harsher that Linda is in this video because, hey.. I hate getting trampled. However, it becomes abusive when there is no right answer on the horse’s end.
I am an adult amateur dressage rider. I do natural horsemanship. I have a kick butt trainer. Even my CRAPPY trainer was better than LP.
The issue isn’t her “position”. The issue is that the horse has NO freaking clue what she wants and she just keeps smacking him (pretty hard from the sound on the video) over and over again. There was no reward. Not even once.
If she wanted him to back up when he backed up she’d stop wiggling around. If I want to teach my horse to back up every time I fart then when he backs up there needs to be a reward. She wanted him to back up when she wiggled the rope. If he backed up and I got after him that’s telling him he did the wrong thing. And you DO NOT just sit there and repeatedly whack them. That accomplishes nothing but venting your human frustration.
If the horse had BITTEN her then yes, give him a good pop in the face so he doesn’t bite. He’s not trying to attack her or run her over – if I was that horse (I’d be like Ginger in Black Beauty) I would have done a heck of a lot more than turn my shoulder towards her and look around.
She gets double points for the stupidity of advertising this abortion of training technique.
“but unless you have really had to deal with a horse that is extremely dangerous, you might not understand.”
This is what’s so frustrating– most of us HAVE dealt with horses just like that! We KNOW that the horses invade your space, shoulder into you, turn their head to bolt, rear and strike out, turn their butts to you, etc. WE GET IT! We’ve all been there. We also know how to fix it with much simpler and more effective methods that the horses actually understand and respect, and without making ourselves look like dumbasses!
I hate when Parelli people say “if you only understood what that horse was doing and knew how Parelli works” as if the rest of us have only had to work with the quiet, easy, sweetheart horses, like we would just be totally mindblown at having to interract with a horse that does naughty, violent things. Hate to disappoint, but yeah, we’ve all been there. The only reason you might assume we haven’t, is because OUR methods actually fixed the problem the first time and now our naughty horses ARE nice and sweet!
Amen to your entire post!
Horsegal, please go watch the video again. Just forget who you are watching. Pay attention to what happens when the horse moves away from her, and she moves into HIS space and slaps his head. He moves away from her (isn’t that wahat she wanted?) and she PURSUES him to slap him again, and again, and again. At the end of this clip, the horse is standing still, if stiffly, and she goes TO HIM and slaps him more.
The punishment when the horse turns his head to the left is appalling — the horse is BLIND on his left side, he has to turn his head to see wtf is going on with the other upset horse. He’s a PREY animal. I’m sure if one really could speak horse, we’d learn that this horse considers Linda a predator. Her frustration and anger are obvious — and unprofessional.
Nothing good was accomplished here. This horse never did anything “dangerous” enough to merit the extended maltreatment.
Linda was being firm.. maybe harsh.. but unless you have really had to deal with a horse that is extremely dangerous, you might not understand.
The horse in the video was, on a scale of 1-10, maybe a 4 in terms of danger. He was willing to listen, he backed off, he responded to her extremely ill-chosen communications. If you cannot work with a horse like him calmly and consistently, you have no business working with any horse – none of his behaviour was anywhere out of the ordinary.
I also dealt with a horse that had similar issues.. The problem with a horse like that is it will get distracted, look at something else and shoulder into you.. then at the same time if you give it too much line it could either turn and run for it, pulling the line out of your hand, or charge directly at you.
If you have a horse like that, _teach it to lunge_. What you describe is perfectly normal behaviour for a horse that’s not been introduced to lungeing properly – lots and lots of youngsters behave like this, and while it *is* dangerous, it can be fixed relatively easily by a skilled handler.
The problem is that she wasn’t teaching the horse anything other than that people are unreasonable.
The horse I was working with, would rear up at me, try to stomp me into the ground and bite me.. I have dealt with this situation only once, and I had to be extremely firm.. more firm than I would ever be with a young horse or a fearful horse, or any other horse. This horse was not afraid of people, he just didn’t like them.
What you describe is a different situation – but there was no disrespectful behaviour visible in the video at all. Well, not on the side of the horse.
I know once a horse sees you as a leader this situation will not occur again, as long as you keep up the leader position
Exactly. And in the video, she isn’t doing any of that. Her body language is confrontational; she tells the horse to stop by jerking on the line and seems to expect him to move in response to her ‘stop’ signal; she does not invite him on the circle, she does not, in short, _lead_.
If that had been my horse I would have thrown her out seconds into the video, for being an insensitive jerk. I’m willing to bet that the horse would have been perfectly well-behaved if someone with a clue had attempted to lunge him.
If a horse comes into the circle and crowds you, a simple trick is to walk him around the outside track for a moment, then step back a little, and move towards the middle of the circle – it’s much easier than trying to send the horse out. Just don’t make the circle so small that the horse feels uncomfortable – he needs an opportunity to move forward.
This is heartbreaking to watch. That horse is so confused. At the end he’s licking/chewing trying to figure out how to get it to stop, and he can’t.
Two words for this:
EPIC FAIL
That is all.
Well the only good thing about this is it makes me feel like a pro. (Which I am not.) This is a perfect example of a stubborn human sticking by all guns to whatever he or she thinks needs to be done, and damning the horse in the process. Which is don’t number one when it comes to horse training. This horse is obviously really trying, and she just keeps smacking it and jerking its head around. And not in a helpful way. In a frustrated human smacking up on the horse kind of way. Sad.
I have a mare who is COMPLETELY blind, and I taught her to longe properly years after she lost her sight, and our training sessions never even came close to what Linda Parelli is doing here.
LMAO at this! I bet she was wishing she had one of Clinton Anderson’s stiff rope halters!
When I saw the video I saw a very confused horse. I don’t think LP achieved anything with him. A couple of years ago I was given an oppurtunity to have my mare go to a clinic free of charge. So off we went. Her “hour” with the NH trainer was cut short. About 15 minutes into it I walked into the round pen got my mare and walked out. Told the clinician that he was undoing all my work and I was not going to stand by and let that happen. Not to mention my mare was completely frightened and confused about what he was asking her to do which was free lunge in the round pen. She wasn’t doing it right but because she wasn’t carrying her head to the inside so it was wrong. (She was holding it straight.. not looking outside.) My mare is well behaved, respects you on the ground and in the saddle. Another thing I saw this NH trainer do was he would wiggle the lead line to get the horse to back up without saying anything and then got angry when said horse didn’t back up right then and there so he popped the horse. And remember asking myself, “how does the horse know what to do if you don’t tell them?” I can ask my mare out in the field to “back” and she will. I don’t need to “wiggle” or “flap”. I taught her by saying “back” and applying pressure until she shifted her weight backwards release repeated until she took that first step and release. It took maybe 5 minutes and she was calm and never got anxious or confused. I don’t understand LP. Or the carrot stick… although I did buy a pretty blue lunge whip that was just a few bucks more than the standard black one!
Ok, confession time… I have a hankering for a pink dressage whip…. dont’d tell – they do not take me seriously enough as it is. I have resisted so far. I already own enough pink stuff…. ok maybe too much pink stuff. I do not shank my horse like a madwoman though.
Linda can try to cover her butt by saying we only saw a little clip of a problem horse, and that is not her usual methods. I beg to differ! One of the main problems ( there are many) with PP is that a person can attend their clinics ( or anyone else’s for that matter) and come home thinking they can get the same results, instantly. ( IMO, I would NOT want to come home and be like them myself.) I had a nice older couple come look at a pony I had for sale for their grandchild. The pony was nice, easy to lunge, just a nice pony. They asked to lead her so I gave them the lead rope. They started to lunge her. I told them to wait, I’d get them a lunge line. Oh no, they wanted to lunge her with a 5 foot lead rope. To get the pony to move, they ran at her flapping their arms, of course she dived away, hitting the end of the lead rope. They proceeded to jerk her around with one hand and flap their arm around with the other. Poor pony was leaping and rearing to get away. I told them to stop, she knew how to lunge very nicely, I would get the lunge line and show them. They were making my nice pony look like a rodeo bronc. Oh no, they had attended a clinic and were “training” her for me, like I should be glad they were helping me! Just as the pony moved ahead a few steps, they sit back and practically jerk her off her front feet and they wanted her to face them. I told them that I DO NOT train my horses to face me because I might want to have them change gait, turn around, whatever, not just stop and face me. They were ruining all the work I’d put into her. They could have cared less. Chase till she trotted forward, then jerk her 90 degrees to to inside. And what where they wanting her to do? These are their actual words….”We want her to stop and face us WHEN WE LOOK AT HER HIND LEGS.” They were so proud that she was “getting it” so quickly. They weren’t training her anything. She just was leaping and jerking around so much she might have accidently stopped a time or two when they looked at her hind legs. That was it, end of jerking my pony around. I ended up selling the pony to a nice “true horseman” family for their little girl. You know the type, the type that come with their trailer, load up the pony easily, how how to naturally move around and handle a horse, quiet and slow and with horse confidence building skills. Never again will allow any PP follow to handle one of my horses – horses that I have spent hundred of quiet patience hours training to have them ruin in 5 minutes!
It was CLEAR exactly where these people got their “training” – the same wiggle wiggle, flap flap, chase, jerk while having no consistancy of their body language. It annoyed the heck out of me to have these people come into my barn, basicly tell me that I was doing everything all wrong because I didn’t play the 7 games with my horses. Hummm…lady, I don’t NEED to play games. I train them, the horse learned it, and does exactly as asked and I didn’t have to wiggle wiggle flap flap,whack in the head, whack in the head. I assume the pony they did eventually buy has long ago been sold because the grand child got tired of playing game and not being able to actually RIDE it and have fun. Tisk Tisk Tisk.
Linda needs a good bitch slap! I’m 65 years old + have never seen this kind of “training”
I’m old school about teaching personal space. I have a large, neglected and most likely beaten TB cross who was petrified of the mounting block. (Old owner’s husband was about 300 pounds…doesn’t take much to know where that fear came from.) Every time I asked him to stand by the block, he’d bowl me over without even thinking. Same thing happened when we introduced the clippers. So, if he wouldn’t stand quietly, I’d clock him once in the chest with a crop or dressage whip every time he moved toward me without my permission. Worked WONDERS. This horse now lets anyone mount him and he stands very quietly in the crossties and he never comes into my space unless I invite him.
I’ve seen this kind of training before…it usually proceeds, “You have GOT to see this IDIOT on YouTube!”
We have a lady in the neighborhood who is an avid PP follower. And of course, she does the waggle-waggle-in-the-face-with-the-big-snap-on-her-ead-rope game whenever she wanted her horse to back up. Every times she wants it to back up, not just a get out of my space move, which I think is stupid too. We pointed it out to her what when the judge asks you to back up your horses, the last thing you want your horse to to is fling it’s head in the air, invert it’s neck, hollow it’s back, and move it’s legs out of unison (you want the diagonal pairs of legs to move together, at least I do). She didn’t have much of an answer to that. Then, she insisted that her horse be kept “natural”, which of course means no shoes on feet that were alarmingly worn short. Of course, it gimping along slowly on gravel until it was stone bruised, then abcessed.
*sigh*
Well that’s another blog. I like barefoot too, for horses who can handle it. Not all horses can. I don’t know why it’s such a black and white thing.
I just don’t get how that is teaching a horse to back up. Can’t.Wrap.My.Brain.Around.It. So am I doing it wrong by giving my horse a little pressure and saying “back”? I mean, he backs up, but he isn’t getting popped in the face, doesn’t look confused, and doesn’t throw his head up or try to plow over me. What am I doing wrong? Why doesn’t he do it the Parelli way?
Gosh I don’t know but the VLC backs up the same way! We must BOTH be doing it wrong!
Main Entry: 1dope
Pronunciation: \ˈdÅp\
Function: noun
Etymology: Dutch doop sauce, from dopen to dip; akin to Old English dyppan to dip
Date: 1786
1 a : a thick liquid or pasty preparation b : a preparation for giving a desired quality to a substance or surface
2 : absorbent or adsorbent material used in various manufacturing processes (as the making of dynamite)
3 a (1) : an illicit, habit-forming, or narcotic drug; especially : marijuana (2) : a preparation given to a racehorse to help or hinder its performance b chiefly Southern : a cola drink c : a stupid person
4 : information especially from a reliable source
5: Doing Our Parelli Exercise – see 3c a stupid person
OMG is all I can say. I couldn’t even make it through half the video…
Parelli training is DANGEROUS. Learning how to train a horse correctly (and I stress the word correctly) does not happen over night, does not happen by watching videos and does not happen on your own. (well maybe for some blessed few). It takes years of just being around horses to even being to consider yourself a horse person. If you cannot afford the correct training and refuse to work with a trainer that is decent/legit – you don’t deserve the animal.
What the flying fark?!?!?
That’s not training, that’s flat-out abuse! If anyone ever tried to do that to one of my horses they’d be picking their teeth out of their esophagus.
I read her reply and the letter from the horse’s owner. Apparently she is still full of herself and he is still as brainwashed as the day he took that poor horse to her clinic. Why can’t she just admit she effed up with that horse? We’ve all done it! I can’t think of one person who has made the right decision every time they were handling a horse, and if you try to show me one I will show you a liar. It’s human nature. We screw up sometimes. Where we learn is when we admit our mistakes and try to do better next time which is a concept that is apparently out of this self-serving cow’s grasp. For her to still stand by her actions is incomprehensible to me. She is the Bill Clinton of the horse world. “Read my lips, I did not have sexual relations with that woman…” change to “Read my lips. I did not confuse and mishandle that half-blind horse…” Geesh lady, get a clue! Even Clinton eventually ‘fessed up!
I have absolutely no respect for those snake-oil selling Parellis, and after this I think I loath them to the point I would rather take a bath with my toaster than ever use any of their “Natural Horse-Man-Shit” techniques on my horses. And for the owner of that poor horse still supporting her- he needs to admit it was a mistake sending him there and God forbid maybe he should have given the horse a little more time to acclimate to the blind eye.
We have had 2 half blind horses in our barn. One came to us just after losing an eye to an accident, one lost all sight in one eye to moonblindness that had been untreated by the previous owner. The first was an Endurance horse, Polish Arabian and a little nutty. The other was a 1/2 Arab 1/2 Appy and was mainly used as a child’s mount. Both horses took a lot of time to adjust. One was able to go back to being a trail horse with no retraining at all, the other became a nice kid’s lesson horse with minimal retraining. No snake oil, no carrot sticks, no shanking them and smacking them in the face. Just plenty of time to adjust and good, consistent handling that we give all horses in our barn.
This isn’t brain surgery Parelli people- pull your collective heads out of your asses, quit lining this arrogant, self-serving sow’s pockets in search of a quick fix (because you will never get it with her), and take the time to learn how to handle horses the real way- from a reputable trainer that turns out safe, sane horses that behave the way you would like yours to!
This pisses me off so much to watch it, that there is nothing else I can say.
I could not continue to watch Linda torment this horse. Crime that people pay her and her husband to teach them how to handle horses.
I agree with all who are outraged over this so called horsemanship
Holy Jesus in a sidecar–what a complete and utter dimwit; she shouldn’t even own a freaking ant farm. She and her husband are definitely perfect for eachother—a match made in hell.
I didnt try very hard, but I half-heartedly dug around for more video on LP hoping to find more stuff that fit along with this disaster. I dint find anything besides her cantering around an arena full of people, helmetless and bareback in a halter (whee!!! Linda you are an ah-MAY-zing trainer to be able to do that!), and another of her in a similar arena dismounting off the back of her horse and sticking her face in his tail (again, genius, yet more or less benign).
I believe that there is zero excuse for anyone doing what she is doing to this poor animal in the posted video, but is there other evidence out there of her using this level of aggressive methods? Is it always this harsh, or did she just get caught once with her pants down?
Again, totally NOT excusing the behavior, just wondering as I have been out of the “biz” for a while so haven’t personally come face to face with any of these Parellites.
I wondered when this video would show up here! I saw it on a British message board (trotonline) a week or so ago and actually thought at first that they must have gotten it from here – I know how you feel about the Parellis Fugs
. Anyway, I didn’t bother watching it again as I’m fairly sure that in the week or so since I last watched it I haven’t experienced the sort of extreme brain trauma that would allow me to understand what LP was trying to achieve. As others here, and on trotonline when I orignally saw it, have said, she is not giving the poor horse any clear message and her use of ‘pressure and release’ (or whatever it is called in Parelli land) is completely f*cked up, meaning that the poor horse learns a great big nothing from the experience. I don’t frankly care how bolshy or ‘dangerous’ the horse was being prior to this clip – Linda’s methods still don’t make sense from where I’m stood.
The amazing irony of the video though is that she, one of the ‘big names’ behind the PP brand, is giving those people who practise Parelli methods successfully a bad name!! How f*cked up is that? I don’t do Parelli myself but I have a good friend who has used it with her Arab gelding since he was a yearling, and a better mannered horse I am yet to meet. He is not only ace to handle, but he has done XC, show jumping, dressage and Le Trec quite happily and competently. Not to a high level, but then his owner is only in it for the fun and isn’t especially competitive. Parelli hasn’t done him any harm at all – maybe it’s the fact that my friend doesn’t act as though Parelli is god, and happily mixes methods – she has used clicker training a lot with him in the past, and is now having lessons with a BHS instructor (that’s British Horse Society for anyone who doesn’t know, so fairly traditional I suppose) as well as adding her own common sense into the mix. So, Parelli does not simply equal a f*cked up horse, but like any other method it needs to be applied correctly and with common sense. Unfortunately, here we have what might be termed a perfect example of how to f*ck up a horse as performed by Mrs Moustache herself. It’s a funny old world. And that’s me done. Amen.
I’ve been reading this blog for a year or so now, but havn’t commented until now. I don’t really have any constructive comments on the Parelli video- I’m at least as confused as the poor horse is- but I AM really, really glad you’re back online. I’m researching horse ownership and all it will entail and I’ve learned a lot from your blog, so thanks!
Thank you and I’m glad you enjoy it!
I was wondering if that technical glitch today was somehow Dena related (running and ducking). Then I realized she’s busy with her own problems. When to schedule the next tack sale.
Just one question. You think her supporters would buy tack from her? OK – I’ll stop.
Hahahahahah–NO. Good one, though. She wishes she were capable of hacking, and promotes herself as such (among other things) but “kissing up to people and hoping they will do her dirty work for her” does not constitute some genius hacker.
Can’t wait for April 9th….
Okay, honestly….. WTF!!!!!!! I was a human watching that display and was confused about what was going on, as a horse and especially a blind one I can just imagine how incredible confusing that had to be for the horse. Like seriously what was she trying to get the horse to do. I understand if the horse is running you over but slapping the lunge rope into it’s face, then giving it the signal to lunge in a cirlce even though you aren’t even in the right position to be lunging and then going around slapping it in different places and then hitting it in the head or whatever was going on there with your hand……. just doesn’t make any sense as to how that’s going to keep an already frightened horse from not running you over. And if you know it’s windy out that day why oh why would you deal with that horse on a bad day as it. Besides if all the horse is doing is not respecting you space then I really don’t see how any of that is going to fix it.
That was just hard to watch…….. can we say animal abuse!!!! I just hope that horse doesn’t kill someone know that it’s scared like that iwth all the wonderful parrelli tricks they did with it.
This is a quote taken DIRECTLY from the parelli home page
“Results One of the magical results of the Parelli method is that your horse becomes willing to do what you ask, and your horse problems are solved naturally and without force or punishment”
I see force and punishment. I don’t see a willing horse nor do I see any “magical” results.
I was thinking about this… I think she’s afraid of this horse. I think her fear overtook her and she was acting on it, not thinking, not looking for cues from the horse (and not giving any).
She was very clearly out of her depth, whatever her “official response” is to the video.
That is exactly what I was thinking. She’s going to smack him around before he can do anything to her. Hopefully, his owner is working more calmly with him at home.
I know this is off topic, but I just saw that good ole Ernie Paragallo has been convicted of animal abuse for starving his horses. Sentince is up to two years and $30,000 dollars.
http://msn.foxsports.com/horseracing/story/Prominent-horse-breeder-Ernie-Paragallo-convicted-of-animal-cruelty-031010
Hope tthat works, if not it is on the foxsports.com page.
Should have gotten a lot more in my opinion…..
Excellent! I hope he actually serves it!
The fine seems low though. It has to cost more in rehab costs!
WTF.
I will never get where people think Parelli methods are the correct and best way to work with horses.
Seriously. The poor horse is confused. He has no clue what she’s asking him to do. I don’t even know what she’s asking him to do. If I were the horse in question, I’d turn around and give her a swift kick in the face.
I believe in groundwork, I really do. A little goes a long way, and I’ve seen 15 mintues of very simple ground work do wonders for horses.
But it’s always calm, firm and direct. Their bullshit is really making it all more complicated and silly than it has to be. You don’t need fancy ‘carrot sticks’ its a freaking whip. You don’t need plastic bags and beach balls. You need to just get to the fucking point and work on whatever it is the horse needs work on instead of beating around the bush. That video is just retarded. If she wants the horse to move forward, then she should ASK the horse to move forward. I know 10 year olds who can figure that much out.
All Linda is doing is teaching the horse to dislike lunging thanks to the bad experience. Ten bucks says my freaking cat could get that horse to move forward better than she can.
Well, my trainer is very NH based, and, in fact really likes Parelli. Having said that, I think this LP clip is dreadful and not helping anything. It makes me wonder if LP has spent too much time with fancy show horses and not enough time helping rehab rescue horses. When a horse loses its sight in one eye, the adjustment can be traumatic. Both half blind horses I’ve lived with had to turn their heads completely around to even see. Still, they adjusted VERY well. One is still here and I worked with him today before posting, to see if I could make a more educated reply.
On the ground, he tends to be quite “dead†on his blind side. He knows I’m there, but just kind of ignores me. He’s fine and peppy under saddle, but on the ground, he runs into me on that side occasionally and has to turn around to figure out what I’m asking of him. I don’t mind that at all. He’s recently half blind and we’re still figuring things out. The fact that he lets us ride him is extraordinary, but we made the decision to keep riding since he likes it so much. A year from now, if he’s still running into me, we’re going to have a problem. That is why I’m doing his rehab to learn how to cope now, so we’re not still dealing with this years from now.
The other half blind guy we used to have (RIP) had been with his injury so long, he didn’t run into anything anymore unless you took him to a brand new place. He was very careful of people.
This LP horse sounds like he might still be adjusting to his partial blindness. Imagine a prey animal losing part of the senses to warn it of impending danger. Scary. I don’t know that it matters that the animal was skittish or abused before losing part of its sight. You still have to start at square one when an animal loses sight in an eye. It has to go through rehab, just as a person would. We can’t expect our horses to just get over something like that. Though I do think they adjust better than people would in most situations.
I couldn’t see the video but I didn’t have to. I know what she does. I saw her on RFDTV torment a gray mare a couple years ago. The mare was completely stressed because LP kept swinging that rope at her and never rewarded her for anything. The mare did not understand what she was supposed to do and LP never helped her understand. At one point she even laughed and made fun of the mare for being “stupid.” She never saw the mare figure out something in frustration that many horses wouldn’t have. She was never rewarded. It was horrible to watch and I am sure this video is worse.
I have worked extensively with LInda Tellington-Jones. She is an exceptionally brilliant horsewoman. The parellis are mere cartoons compared to her and her amazing methods. You don’t hear much about her because she has not done any national advertising for years. We have close to 2000 practitioners around the world. She has written a bunch of books and produced over a dozen videos mostly on horses but also on dogs and cats. I have worked with Linda T-J for 20 years and have NEVER seen her get angry at a horse. She doesn’t shake things, doesn’t yell, doesn’t chase a horse. Her method does not use a round pen. Linda T-J does not get flustered or frustrated. If things don’t go well with a horse she merely pauses and reaches into her depth of knowledge, sees the horse with love and tries another exercise. The method is completely non-confrontational But the results are amazing and often very quick. I try very hard to be like Linda T-J but so often fall short.
Her methods are VERY user friendly, never put you in a dangerous place. Her TTEAM and TTouch are such quiet methods people are surprised they work if all they are familiar with is the RFD cowboys. I worked with a new person and her horse yesterday and this woman was so impressed that I never got after her horse, but quietly worked to find the problem. The mare was a bit shut down because of NH training that she had never been really engaged when this very nice and knowledgeable owner worked with her. It didn’t take long for her to get very interested in what I was doing. Her owner had never seen her so engaged before.
If you are looking for another way of working with horses, Try TTEAM and TTouch. The equipment is inexpensive as are the books and videos. It has been around for over 30 years. Much of the work is based on the Feldenkrais Method of Awareness Through Movement which is a type of physical therapy for people. Go to http://www.TTOUCH.com. I’m in VA my website is: http://www.theexcellenthorse.com
“At one point she even laughed and made fun of the mare for being “stupid.—
I have always thought that people who believe horses are stupid really are just idiots themselves. ‘Stupid’ horses are the ones who are really just smart enough to fool their masters. I believe horses are intelligent. Not on a human level, certainly, but they are intelligent. Some more so than others, but they are not at all stupid. I never underestimate their intelligence either.
My previous trainer (who I didn’t leave because she was a bad trainer, she was excellent, the barn she worked for was crap and she moved a little farther than I could drive) thought horses were stupid; and in fact at first thought the horse I was leasing back then was stupid. I knew better, and in the end that horse changed her opinion on horses’ intelligence entirely. And I’m so glad he did — she was too good of a horsewoman to go around thinking that way of the horses she worked with and trained.
I have met a few horses that I *would* consider ‘stupid’…perfectly willing and often very sweet animals who just seem to take longer than average to get their minds around a new maneuver. (For some reason, they tend to be Paints. Do Paint breeders BREED for fewer brain cells). Equine intelligence varies a lot. Ponies tend to be smarter…which is one reason why ponies can be harder to handle. They are *definitely* smart enough to work out how to get out of work.
There is NOTHING that equals TTEAM and TTouch. All those guys who are supposedly listening to horses are deaf and speak pidgin equine in comparison.
Seriously. I had handled horses for decades, trained professionally (and successfully) — TTEAM revolutionized everything.
Here’s the thing about LTJ’s methods: If you do it right, it’s like magic. If you do it half-assed, it still works better than anything else you’ve ever tried.
Linda T-J is awesome! Once my youngster was solid on all the basics (lead, tie, pick up feet, load, trailer, bathe, clip, longe, wear tack, walk in the woods with older horses) he was still too young to ride, so I tried a few of her ground exercises just for something creative to do with him. Not only were her ideas fun for me and my youngster, we became real buddies with respect and trust for each other in a quiet, low-key sort of way. The nice thing about her exercises is, you can make a few mistakes but as long as you keep things calm, there’s nothing there that creates a stressful or dangerous situation–all the exercises include several ways “out” (for the horse as well as the handler) that still promote success and lead back to the exercise in a different way.
This is a little off topic, but when I was about 13, my dog jumped the fence and got hit by a car. Paralyzed in the back legs, but the spine wasn’t broken, because there was voluntary nerve response when pricked on her paws.
I had just started doing TTOUCH from her video I had borrowed from the library, and I truly believe the use of TTOUCH massage is what helped Roxanne to regain full use of her back legs in 2 weeks, without seeing a vet. (I know, but I was a kid and we were dead broke.. I shouldn’t have had a dog that I couldn’t afford, but I NEEDED a dog the way I needed air.)
I had actually forgotten all about it, until I put TTOUCH together with Tellington, then the light bulb went off.. OH!! TELLINGTON TOUCH!!! I remember that!!
WOW! this is why many people trying to learn to be good horseman are confused. This is a disgrace the way Linda P. is treating this horse and the method in which she is trying to use! Now I see why i retrain or fix sooooo many So called Parelli trained horses. Linda there are much better way to teach a young horse or confused horse to lounge!
Blind in one eye is no excuse I do them. with that issue you even have to be more understanding.
linda P go to http://www.listentoyourhorse.com
Wow. I just watched it again, and I would not let that woman anywhere near my horse.
I am still unclear on what she was trying to get the horse to do. Stand? Back? What? She mostly just seems pissed that he’s looking elsewhere. If the horse is standing quietly and not crowding, who gives a shit what he’s looking at? And all that NAGGING! I’ve only had my horse for a little over a year, and even I understand that nagging does nothing. If the horse is as “dangerous” as she says, get after him once and mean it! My gelding spent the first 6 months or so I had him spooking into me and he knocked me over 3 times. The third time (last June) I finally got my nerve up and convinced him I was going to kill him (which consisted of backing him up and screaming at him). You know what? He has spooked in place or away from me since that day. And overall, he is much calmer and less likely to spook in general. Horses aren’t stupid.
And she looks even more uncoordinated than I am, which is quite a feat.
“My gelding spent the first 6 months or so I had him spooking into me and he knocked me over 3 times. The third time (last June) I finally got my nerve up and convinced him I was going to kill him (which consisted of backing him up and screaming at him). You know what? He has spooked in place or away from me since that day.”
Amazing how that works, isn’t it? Someone realized YOU were more scary than the silly thing he was spooking at.
Congratulations. You understand horses better than Linda Parelli, already!
While I have met my fair share of nutty NH followers, I do know a barn who starts their babies using NH and they turn out amazing. I was leasing/semi-working at Silverhorne Sporthorses when they first bought two NH/Parelli trainers in for some of their horses. The stallion at the barn, Sir Caletto, had several foals that needed to be prepped and started for the IHF (most of these horses went out to pasture after the show, so they got some baby time afterwards). I was a bit skeptical when I saw that Parelli trainers were coming in, but these two, Don and Rachel Jessop, I grew fond of. The horses seemed quite happy and willing to go out and work, and there wasn’t any crazy tricks with carrot sticks.
The thing I remember most was this one nutty gelding at the barn for training. He was afraid of fly spray, so when he was out in pasture, his owner would chase him with a pressurized fly spray hose. When he came to the barn, you couldn’t even go near him with any sort of spray bottle. The trainers had a little session showing us how to work with him, slow and steady, moving the bottle towards him and back in sweeping motions. When he stood still or seemed to relax, he was rewarded, but he was never forced into accepting the spray. The barn owner was concerned that the gelding would only behave for the trainers, so they invited her to try spraying him…and after a brief second of nervousness, he relaxed and stood still.
I’ve always been wary of hunter barns, because I’ve seen too many yank on their horse’s mouth and back them across the arena for no apparent reason. Although Silverhorne’s more of a breeding barn, they had a vast majority of hunter horses who were happy and calm and loved dressage work. The stallion was the quietest thing as well; he fell asleep in the crossties when there were mares in heat across the way! I was thirteen at the time and though I only groomed/bathed him once, he was a perfect gentleman both times. I’ve told myself I’m going to get back to jumping one day, just so I have an excuse to get a Caletto baby.
I now understand why the lady I ride for (tune up a young hunter mare she bought and threw out to pasture) is such a wuss. She *sings* to her screw-ball appy gelding (he promotes that negative view of the breed) to get him to calm down on the trail (I was terribly embarrassed, almost as much as I was by the old man we met on the trail who called the gelding ‘one of those indi’n pintos’.)
The mare I ride hates loading in the trailer- I didn’t know why, her old owner (who was
had no trouble with this. Then we went to go try and load her for a schooling show at the end of the summer. Oh my goodness. With a carrot stick (why? why? why?) in one hand, the lead in the other, the lady tried to coax her into the trailer. When that didn’t work she held a small tub of grain and an apple in front to get the pony on. She was appalled when I suggested a friend (who grew up riding feisty Shetlands) and I put a lead behind her (this worked by the way.)
I have sung on young OTTB’s to distract them from spooky stuff, particularly during the first rides out in the open. But an Appy is just going to laugh at you and walk your knee into the nearest tree.
And I am a huge devotee of the old fashioned butt rope for recalcitrant trailer-loaders. I’ll be damned if I’m going to screw around for 45 minutes when all it takes is 2 people and a butt rope and the horse is in the trailer in 30 seconds flat.
I think singing or talking softly to a horse is okay. I used to do that when I was trying to settle my hot mare. I would say in a soft singing voice, “Sllllooooowwwww” and wouldn’t you know it, she would slow down.
So I am wondering, how can we find out the number and nature of lawsuits filed against the Parellis, and other BNT’s for that matter, by injured customers (as an exercise in reality checking/accountability)? If that info is available, it might be fun to keep a scoreboard online somewhere.
If you ever hear of such a suit, let me know. I’ll pop the popcorn and meet you outside the courtroom!
Natural Horsemanship trainer sustains $1.2 million verdict (not Parelli):
http://tinyurl.com/yljndrb
After watching that poor horse in the video and then reading the non-sense explanation of the behavior by Parelli, I did my own experiment in my arena tonight with one of my TBs. Keep in mind I hardly ever do ground work with my horse. He knows how to lunge, but is lazy and it pains us to work in the arena.
First, my TB has been out of work for a few weeks due to a foot injury. As a result he is a little feisty. To add to the mix, I brought out a horse eating foil helium balloon and planted it in the middle of the arena. The horse was both hot and spooked. He managed to lunge in both directions, change directions, stop, face me, and back up. I never had to punish or confuse him with the rope, hit him with the snap, or chase him around with my arms flapping in the air.
At the end of the lesson (about 20 minutes later) I was rubbing the scary horse-eating balloon all over my horse’s body as he licked and chewed; his lip was quivering in the fashion that shows he loves his new massage implement.
I wish that horse in the video could be rescued from that person. Poor thing! You don’t have to torture your horse to get it to accept what you want. Respect is the key.
No longer willing to lurk, I simply MUST comment on this video–but, first, a word about our “sponsor”: Thank you very much, Fugs, for offering not only the information but the forum to discuss viewed material.
This NH stuff is rather perplexing; after all, who would NOT want to teach a horse in a respectful, gentle, “natural” fashion? This business of training via videos and expensive equipment (read: gimmicks) is anything but, IMHO. No one horse is exactly like another; how can one training method fit all? All too often, “noobs” don’t begin to understand just how much work it takes to care for a horse, much less train one; that’s okay, initially–they are new, after all.
A little (OK, a LOT) of common sense would go a far piece to helping new owners buy/train/maintain quality horses. I put the main fault at the feet of the owners: what did they do to research their purchase? Investigate the seller/BO/ trainer/vet? Just because they say they’re good/reputable doesn’t mean they are, right?? The time for talking to experts and reading books/DVDs/etc. is BEFORE the horse arrives. There have to be shelves full of material aimed directly at the new horse owner/rider with lists of questions/concerns that need to be addressed before the decision is “yes”. Spend ACTUAL time at a barn, around horses, ask permission to talk with folks–most likely, you’ll be inundated with information rather than ignored outright–manners count, remember.
It’s true, I don’t know the particulars of this horse/situation, etc. as I wasn’t there. I WILL tell you, though, that if anyone treated ANY horse (much less MINE!!) in such an abusive manner within my sight/hearing, there would be hell to pay. These Parelli folks may be making money hand over fist (hoof?) but does that make them right?? Just consider the sheer arrogance of posting such a video as a positive aid; THEY made the video and THEY posted it so THEY must support its content. Can you imagine the outcry if a shelter employee did this to a dog in public?! Money doesn’t excuse poor ability and, to my mind, outright abuse of this horse. Shame on THEM!
Another question: is there something wrong with US that we cannot discern useful v. damaging methods? Seriously.
Something on a lighter note: someone posted this at the end of their post elsewhere in the ether and I’m sharing it with you because couldn’t we all use a smile?? “I’m so busy……I don’t know if I just found a new rope or lost my horse!”
i keep going back to watch this video because it truly fasciantes me….for someone who claims natural horsemanship blah blah blah..there was certainly nothing natural about that crappy little scene….take note that the entire time that this so called “horse whisperer” was doing her thing the horses ears were up and forward…..like he was trying to understand what the hell she was asking him to do…at no time did he make any type of aggressive move toward her….what i see is a horse with one blind eye trying to compensate for his lack of sight..ie: turning to see her and what the hell it is she wants…..it seems he may be a bit insecure and was looking for some sort of sympathy and reassurance….instead he got a wack in the head and flapping arms…something that obviously disconcerted him even more……she is lucky that he did not get entirely pissed of and truly did charge her….maybe lounging a one eyed horse is not the right thing to do, i would put him in a round pen and try to work with verbal commands myself..and for gods sake certainly afford him some level of sympathy and compassion….after all he is missing an eye!
I’m another “lurker” posting for the first time, lol. . .
Saying that the Parelli video was taking out of context as a defense for the behavior shown is utterly stupid. I don’t CARE what occurred before or after the behavior show in the clip. What was shown was abusive, stupid, and counterproductive. Period. There was NO indication during the video that the horse was misbehaving or was dangerous in any way (no rearing, biting, kicking out, bolting–unless he was smacked in the face–or running anyone over, which is the original claim of what she was trying to ‘fix’).
Another defense I read somewhere was that she didn’t have the proper equipment with her (read: stupid carrot stick) and was doing the best with what she had. Well, call me crazy, but usually if I don’t have the equipment I need and something is REALLY, REALLY not working, I go and get what I need. Otherwise you are wasting your time and probably doing damage too. (Not that I am in any way convinced that an orange dressage whip would have magically solved this scenario.) The video was painful to watch all the way through and all I could think of was that it looked like Parelli was having a temper tantrum. I have seen people loose their temper with horses and that is exactly what it looks like. The horse had no clue what she was trying to do and I didn’t either, and I’m human. I agree with whoever said that it appeared she was afraid of the horse as well–that is likely where this behavior came from. She was frustrated and afraid, so she used physical punishment.
I don’t think training expertise is required to say that this method is a giant FAIL.
Yay, the blog is back!
I’ve never seen any video of this Parelli stuff before. Good gravy, people pay money for this? I’m in the wrong business! Snake oil salesman and horse whispers are still in business, and business is good apparently. Everyone else has said it already, but I cannot tell what the hell Linda dear is trying to get the horse to do. At the end, is she slapping him to punish or praise? She flips the lead at the horse, then yanks it to her, then hits it…. If that was my horse I’d have put a stop to that shit right away.
I can honestly say that every kid in my 4-H club, and their younger siblings can longe a horse better than this. But wait, she’s not longing? Really? I have no idea what she’s trying to accomplish except ruining the horse.
Now I can think of a few horses I’ve gotten that really didn’t respect humans or their body space, and were quite dangerous until they were taught to, and I think if she’d been working them this video would be a lot shorter. *flip lead at face* *then yank horse towards you* *then hit horse* *Horse runs into Linda* *Horse hits back* *Linda hits ground*
I had pony that went blind in one eye due to injury, and a horse that lost almost all his sight between cataracts and injury, and we never had any trouble with them once they’d adjusted. The pony had been the world’s brattiest and boldest pony, but became very timid when she couldn’t see one side, but I’d stop and reassure her when she’d have panic attacks. She adjusted pretty well in a couple days. She kept poking her blind eye into stuff afterwards, so we left a fly mask on her so she could feel when she was about to knock into something.
The one that was almost completely blind in his old age would put his head up high and twist it sideways at you, but that’s cause it was the only way he could see you. He lunged and rode just fine. He’d bend around weird to look at me if he was unsure from my cues what I wanted when longing, but I could tell he was just trying to tell what the heck I was asking. He learned quickly the words for all sorts of terrain and obstacles so I could warn him of what his feet were about to encounter, and he trusted me when I said, “not scary” if something rustled in the bushes. I can imagine how confused and frightened he’d have been if I’d been yanking him around and acting like that Parelli twit.
Geez, I keep hearing about how crazy Parelli is, but I’ve never seen video like this to prove it….
One writer here mentioned that Linda P was doing something that Ray Hunt had done?
WHAT? WHAAAAT????
There is nothing in this video that relates to anything Ray Hunt has ever done or taught. I have watched and ridden with Ray since the early 1980′s. Ray had impeccable timing, deep understanding and always had a clear release or out for the horse. And I NEVER saw him raise his voice, lose his temper or lose respect for the horse. If you were a person – well, that might not apply.
Regardless of what Linda says, look at what she DOES. No words are necessary when you are seeing a prime example of a confused horse who has no out or way to release pressure and a pissed-off and exhausted “trainer” who is always in the wrong place, doing the wrong thing. THERE IS NOTHING RIGHT IN THIS VIDEO. Unfortunately, from what I have seen over the years, Pat and LInda both have exceedingly poor timing, except to when to put out that next $$$ video.
It is disgusting that the Parellis made millions on the backs of truly great horsemen such as Tom Dorrance and Ray Hunt.
That is a good natured horse. I know a lot of horses who would pound someone in to a pulp if they started snapping on their nose like that. And y’know what? If that was a video of some nobody trainer popping the lead rope as hard as they could, on a horse that wasn’t visibly misbehaving, the equine world would be up in arms. But because it’s a parelli, it’s ok? And the hitting him with it. That’s ridiculous.
Well that appeared to completely confuse that poor horse. Great way to teach people hatred. Her moves looked more like something Linda performs with Pat in Private with leather etc. Between consenting adults – ok but to abuse an animal like that is plain sick.
The best horse people I’ve knows are the ones who move slow and think like horses. The horses get it.
Some horses are stupid, I met one that was. Good thing too because I was 15, knew everything about horses and was going to ‘train’ this very green 5 year old. I made some mighty mistakes there but because she was sweet and not very bright I got away with it without getting killed or ruining her. I learnt a lot. The most important thing being that I didn’t know it all. I would get so frustrated (in part trying parrelli techniques, which bemused her) and she would stand there and look at me, just as I was about to really loose it she would lick me or something equally goofy and I would realise that she wasn’t stubborn or nasty, she just didn’t understand. I needed to break it down more and be clearer. Later I got on a VERY bright 10yo fully trained arab mare and realised that if I had tried anything like what I did with the greeny I would have been killed.
Even with the dense greeny who put up with buckets of water over her head (bath time), clumsy ‘desensitising training’ with balls, balloons and umbrellas and my attempts to fulfil my dreams of being a vaulter…(read standing on her back and cartwheeling off, I know I shouldn’t be hear without serious injury) would have had something more serious to say about being hit and flapped at like that video shows than that poor half blind, aparently abused, 16hh horse in the vid. I think the main thing would have been ‘f*** this I am OUT of here’ and if I hadn’t let her go away from me she would have gone through me.
Edit to add – anyone offering a ‘sure’ way to make your horse perfectly, guarunteed safe to be arround (sans hat) is setting themselves up for a lawsiut as far as I can see. Parelli trained my horse and said it was safe, it tripped, now I’m in a wheelchair………
First time poster. I think its really sad that the video of the woman flapping and yanking – and I have never seen anyone longe a horse like that – garners over 500 comments, while some of the tragic posts with neglected and abused animals have far fewer. She doesn’t deserve the attention or publicity. I feel very sorry for the half-blind horse who’s owner subjected him to that. He doesn’t deserve what looks to be a sweet, but confused (no small wonder) horse.
To the many who said she kept punishing the horse and there was never any reward/release—well, I spied a couple. At 0:16 and 0:41 there WERE releases. Both times, the horse was crowding her space (due to lack of any other clue for what else he was supposed to do) and she STEPPED BACK. Yay, Linda! Way to teach the horse to respect your space by rewarding him for being a space invader! God knows, there were no other rewards in among all the random punishment.
LOL good point, good eye.
farbeit for me to defend her…I think the worst thing PARELLI did was marry that lady and ler her star wearing his pants…however: They are not attempting to Longe…they are trying to get the horse to back from the ‘wiggle’ and stay facing her and stay focused on her… She is about at confident with her body position as a submissive wetting cocker spaniel so it won’t work. It also seemed her “wiggle’ was actually PULLING the horse forward instead of causing the backwards motion it is intended to have.
I had the pleasure of seeing Pat Parelli when he was younger and not married to her. He actually had some very good ideas and I saw him ride a horse the barn owner had given up upon…. Then……he got out of control, and started missing the point….mostly he got married and apparantly can’t see the forest for the Skeeze .
I actually do believe that like longing…the ‘seven games’ can be used so poorly as to be worse than NOT doing them. I think this is the perfect example of that. I do also think you can work on those games (as a person with some common sense) and get good results…
I don’t know how anyone sees her work and thinks anything other than HUH?
DAMN. Miss a day, miss a lot….
I don’t have time to read the 500+ comments, but…. WHO does this? What experienced horseperson DOES this?
I could only get thru about 30 seconds or so.
1. Why is the insecure, learning-how-to-compensate horse not in a round pen, or at least some kind of ring???
2. Why is LP yankyankyanking? What is she trying to accomplish? It’s not clear to the viewer, it’s most definitely not clear to the poor horse!
3. If any instructor I’ve ever had caught me doing that, I’d be laughed and teased to Kingdom Come.
4. Just…. WTF?!!?!?!!??
5. Please tell me what’s humane here. I can’t find it. All she’s doing is yanking a horse around like some moron redneck bent on sheer domination.
PARELLI = MASSIVELY EPIC FAIL
It’s disgusting how they dupe the newbies. TALK ABOUT SNAKE OIL!
The main problem is not at all the horse getting into her space – it’s that he’s not paying any attention to her AT ALL. The horse must be a lot smarter than we all think
.
She even said “good boy” when he was still staring off in the distance! OMG! And what’s with all of her backing up?!?!?!!! Send the horse out and get him moving, for christ’s sake. It would have taken half the time and been twice as effective as all the “wiggle wiggle thump” in the world.
I think all she accomplished with this was to make that horse (more?) headshy, and to respect a human even less. There was no work in that lesson for that horse – only frustration. And in the end, sure, he was out at the end of the line (partially), but where was he looking? What was he listening to? Don’t think for a second he wouldn’t have mowed her over if something spooked him – he was still not at all aware of her space, he was just aware of the length of that lead rope.
OK I got more to say now that i’ve peeked some more.
Why does the horse have a saddle on?
Why doesn’t she actually LUNGE the horse instead of whip/yank it on the end of a lead rope like the aforementioned redneck? Like, take it to a round pen/lungeing ring and get the kinks out, then help the (gorgeous) horse sloooowly sort things out while regaining confidence?
God this is STUPID.
The Parelli’s are to horse training as Ebonics is to the english language.
Their only success is with changing the names of everything in the training process to make themselves look smart. I had the opportunity to go see them Oct 08 (client gave free tickets, so why not), I had only heard of them until this time. It was probably the single most frustrating weekend of my life. They talked in their own language but everything they were doing I knew by another name. No instruction was given all of Saturday and Sunday until 3:30pm (ended at 5). The whole weekend was a total show off and pushing the idea that if you spend all you money on this crap someday you might could do this with your horse. At 3:30pm Pat started to trailer load a “problem horse” but turned off his mic and played music the whole hour that he was “fixing” this horse, only to recap for 2 minutes after he was finished with the horse (way to educate man). Linda in her presentation stopped midway through because her horse wanted a belly scratch, and proceded
Sorry about that my stupid mouse stopped clicking then clicked send.
But to continue…
Linda said that if her horse wasn’t having a good day that she would just go pick another (sure that is great if you have a 1,000 horses).
I then stood in line to ask Pat a question. The girl before me asked how many horses they had, He said over 1,000 (wow why do you need 1,000 and how do you make a connection with 1,000 daily like they preach). I asked about behaviors you can’t constantly control and correct. About my mare that paws when tied only when you are not around (there are alot of behaviors you can’t constantly correct because the horse is on its own and it’s my favorite question to ask “professionals”) He couldn’t tell me anything but that he ties his horses 10 hours everyday. It whole program totally pissed me off and I just wanted to scream/preach in the corner (like those that tell us the world is ending) at all the people dropping $1000- $2000 for these secret packages that will totally change their lives to just go home and spend there money on real life lessons instead of DVDs.
But I do have to thank Pat and Linda for all the business they send me after these people have spent 6 months being wishy-washy and stupid and have messed up their horses after attending one of their very instructional weekends.
How the hell do you keep up on hoof care, etc. for 1,000 horses and where do they live?
I don’t believe any of this.
I don’t know either but it is what he told that kid, he said he had them all over the county. Maybe all the carrot stick sales go to horse care.
They don’t actually send me clients, there are just a lot of people in Texas who do try and follow him and his program and end up having so many problems that they finally decide to get outside help after they’ve made a royal mess of everything.
country not county
I think I do have to agree, there are some that really aren’t the brightest crayons in the box…I just can’t bring myself to think of them as ‘stupid’. Just less intelligent. Maybe it’s naive and silly of me, but it’s how I’ve always felt.
But I had to reply and say I know what you mean about ponies — I am currently leasing a large pony gelding that is just smart as a whip. When he doesn’t want to work, it’s major attitude. I’m getting pretty good at sitting bucks I have to say! But it’s getting much better and when he DOES work, he’s amazing, it’s just a matter of not allowing him to take advantage of you.
Before I met my new trainer and him I never really worked with ponies. But, being on the short side, they actually fit my height well. I was way overhorsed-looking on my 16.2hh Hanoverian I leased before Jack. I’ve learned a lot about the ‘ponytude’ many have, and how clever they are. At first I was a bit irritated by his antics, but now I’m honestly glad he is how he is — I’d be bored if he didn’t give a hard time now and then. My trainer said yesterday she can’t understand how I love him during those moments, haha!
So here is the “big picture” Linda claims we missed. Let’s hope embedding works in the comments.
FYI: The horse was MILDLY nervous til YOU guys started flipping the goddamn rope in his face! You CREATED the whole issue in the first place.
STAY AWAY FROM THOROUGHBREDS. Please!
That’s not quite as bad as the other one, since the horse does get a few releases, but it’s still pretty painful to watch. He’s holding a freaking lunge whip – wouldn’t it get the idea across much better to lightly tap the horse on the chest with it?
Why don’t they ask the horse to back up in a normal way? I don’t understand why wiggling like an idiot is superior to the usual way of training a horse to back up. OMG. Plus you have a longe whip in the other hand. It would be much better to use that to back the horse up then the lead rope. I’d love to see these Parelli “trained” horses attempt competing in a Showmanship class.
LP laughs when the guy gets the rope caught around his neck saying it happens to her too. Hmm…maybe one of the vicitms of the wiggle, wiggle, bump will bolt at an opportune time.
Dear god. That horse is almost an exact replica of a horse I once owned, same missing eye and everything. *prays its not my old horse*
I left on vacation once and sh*t a brick when I found out another boarder had taken out my horse and attempted to do this with my LEAD SHANK while I was away – again, with my ONE EYED HORSE. I chewed her out since horse was terrified and head shy when I returned, not to mention I NEVER gave her permission to handle horse; she eventually got booted from the barn. What on earth inclined her to “fix” my perfectly schooled fourth level horse and former GP jumper? I can’t stand this crap. *headdesk*
Colorado is home base for this craziness so I see this all the time almost every trainer is “Parellified” here. I am so lucky to get a lot of horses that flunk the program (eye roll). I will tell you they are usually the worst behaved horses I would rather deal with a feral yearling then an improperly trained horse that runs you over any moment it can.
Pat came to his success in quarter horse country, not that quarter horses are stupid they just seem to take a lot more abuse then some other breeds. He would last about ten minutes in a thoughbred farm or warmblood farm those horses would eat them for lunch. You start slapping on these guys they can do some serious damage. Wonder why they try to discredit dressage so much? It is because most of the english riding worlds hates their method. If it is really a good system we would have used it like we do TTouch. Back in the 90′s Linda was part of the Olympic dressage team coaching. Wonder why we have never used parelli?
I did not read all of the comments so I apologize if someone came to this conclusion and I am just repeating. The horse “looking at the trees” looks more like me as the horse trying to pay attention to the idiot with its good eye. Maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about but with only one good eye, the horse would have to turn its head to at least try to see what the hell she wants because obviously there’s no clear verbal communication. Or it’s possibly trying to see when the longe line is going to smack it in the face again.
He’s been my theory with longing, and it has worked for me. Before I ever get on their back, they learn clear verbal commands from the ground while walking on a lead. When we start moving forward, I click or say walk. When we stop I say whoa. When I put them on a longe line, I say whoa and they stand there. When I put space between us and say walk, they walk and we progress from there. It’s also nice having brakes before they’re ever ridden.
Sorry, Here’s my theory, not he’s. No way in hell I took a parelli theory and made much of it beyond hogwash.
Okay. So this is the 50 bazillionth comment. I still have to say it. Wiggling the lead rope to get the horse to back up may be the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen — but the owner of the horse (the guy in the second clip) does a much better job of body language — release and reward than LP did. And he managed to communicate to the horse (and to me) what he was trying to do — which she totally failed at. How sad is that?
http://www.rusty-horse.com/content/view/26/1/
This little site gives a nice simple little demo of why not to shank a horse and a much better way to back them up.
On the Parelli blog which is raging on, someone has finally told us where the original video is, you know – the one with the wind, the dangerous barging horse, the love and language and releases that were all cut out of our present version.
It is gone – cut from the original DVD and replaced. I can only hope with something better for the sake of the horses of the many people who follow and emulate the Parellis.
Ok, I haven’t read the comments yet, and I don’t post often, but seriously – WTF??
If I actually had a horse, I wouldn’t let her feed it carrots without heavy supervision after seeing that! What was she trying to teach the horse?! I assume that it was to keep his attention on the person handling him. I’m not positive though. What I saw was a lot of unnecessary and hard jerking at his face, and swatting him with the end of the lead (I think I’m as confused as he was as to why). And swatting his head/neck! What he was learning seemed to be to dance around until he is *behind* the person to make the yanking/swatting stop. To back away from a person who is approaching him. To turn his head away from hands/people. All of which will make him easier to catch, halter/bridle, lead, and generally handle, right? AND he’s blind in one eye?! OF COURSE he’s going to be more vigilant about checking sounds out – especially on his blind side. Why can’t he keep tabs on his surroundings as long as he’s doing what he’s asked and giving his handler most of his attetion? Now he’s going to be nervous about sounds he isn’t supposed to look at to identify as well as his handler popping him around and not asking him for anything clearly.
Poor horse.
I just saw the video (better late than never, I guess). Atrocious. A horse that is blind in one eye is NOT wanting to face and look forward, because that specific focus takes addition effort that is wasted when there is only one functioning eye. Why doesn’t LP know that?
I only got through about half of the video, because I’ve seen the Parellis in action. The horse owner may have a bit of trouble lungeing her horse next time out, since LP spent so much time and effort teaching it to NOT lunge anymore. Why do so many people think they’re so humane? (Linda is truly a nice person–I’ve met her–but she’s misguided by Pat’s “Natural Horsemanship” teaching. The only one out there worse than him is Clinton Anderson. Why is it the worse their purported “natural” skill is, the more popular they become?
If ANYONE ever treated any of my horses like Linda Parelli did…those persons would not be walking away from my property in one piece….whatever happened to love, patience and respect for our equine friends?
That poor horse has no idea what the fuck she is asking of it! I feel terrible for him. I have used Parelli techniques in the past with a friend’s gelding. But I only use some of them, and only the ones that make sense to me. He actually enjoys some of the games, and my relationship with him is great. But I would never do the things I saw Linda doing in that video. Oh my god.
I was pretty shocked to see all of this petty talk about 1. a video that is 5 years old and 2. YOU WEREN’T THERE!
You CAN’T judge a horse or person by a video. You may think you know what was happening but you simply weren’t there. I’ve had horses all my life- the good, the bad and the really ugly. If you think this video is abuse then you do not know ANYTHING about the horse world that still exists today. The worldwide horse industry is so much better for having natural horsemanship come to the front of training methods.
Do you really think the Parelli’s would be world wide or go over by invitation of the Queen of England or get treated like a celebrity by millions of people if it wasn’t a good program? I don’t hear of Lyons, Hunt, Anderson, Cox, or Irwin doing anything like that!
I am not a Parelli professional or employee. You see, it really doesn’t matter as life it too short to waste any more time on CLOSED MINDED individuals that you are.
Kuddos to the Parelli’s and natural horsemanship in place of how 90% of how YOU PEOPLE treat a horse with fear, force and intimidation.
Well la-ti-da. I guess you told everyone on this board what’s what. The funny thing is that you did not take common sense into consideration. You know, the element that is lacking from the Parelli method. My first reaction to learning about Parelli was that if anyone cared at all about the horse they were riding they listen to what the horse is telling them and pay attention to the behaviors. That is part of being an effective rider and/or trainer, and not a revolutionary idea that should launch a bazillion dollar marketing campaign. It’s not that difficult and not necessarily about having a better relationship with the horse. It’s a training tool. If I am asking a horse to do something and he doesn’t do it, I will ask louder once or twice. If he still doesn’t do it I start to wonder if he is confused, in pain or being obstinate. I have one or two strides to make this call before I start dealing with negative reinforcement and conditioning behaviors.
This concept needs to be taught by a qualified trainer in the discipline specific setting in order to convey a clear effective message to the student. One size fits most training DVDs don’t do that and at best the student has to rely on their best guess as to the effectiveness of the technique. This is the main reason that the phrase, “a Parelli trained horse…” evokes eye rolls and sighs to anyone who knows anything about training horses. We’ve all seen too many confused and neurotic horses as a result of this “natural” training method.
Sure, there are good and bad training techniques in every discipline – including the Parelli method. It is what it is, and it doesn’t make the Parelli’s look any better when videos like this surface for you to go on a diatribe about the abusive training methods in the horse industry. The best we can do is take the good from each and throw out the bad and eventually we should have more good training methods than bad.
With or without the volume on in this video, I see a woman who seemingly doesn’t know what she is doing. She is not confident in her actions and she is sending mixed messages to the already confused horse. Clear, concise training messages will get the job done. What she is doing is making a horse who is already visually impaired (and likely a bit spooky as a result) even more head shy and nervous with her wiggle-wiggle-bump crap. Why not use her voice more? When people and animals loose one sense, the others become more important for them to interpret their environment. I would think that using her voice as a training tool would be very effective with this horse. Then again, I am not Linda Parelli. This is a training video for the Parelli system and therefore should be wide open to scrutiny – with or without context. She is a representative and spokeswoman for her product and therefore should live the message she is selling. I can make the choice whether or not to buy her product based on what I see. Personally, I think I will pass.
…and because I can’t resist:
“how 90% of how YOU PEOPLE treat a horse with fear, force and intimidation.”
Really? YOU know how I treat my horses? Don’t make assumptions or be defensive. It makes YOU seem rather closed minded.
I’m by no means a fan of Linda… but I must say… If THAT’s ABUSE in AnyOne’s Eyes??? Then 99% of us horse owners are abusing, is it head shying a horse, Yes! Has she ran out of patience, Yes! Is she doing things wrong, Yes! Abuse, HELL NO! pleeeeease… I know there are times when I’m whooped tired I’m not perfect on my stance and actions… Like I said, I’m not a fan… but I will say this.. the woman does NOT abuse horses. Come the fuck on! Ya’ll are looking like just bad if you state that! is abuse. If that’s abuse to you… Go give “kissys” to your horse, and lose more respect from your horse.
Okay, how about instead of the word ‘abuse’ we use the words ‘cruel, unfeeling, badly timed, amateurish’ – would that be better?
As a trainer with such a large following, she should be held to a higher standard.
JustFedUpWithParellites…
I didn’t throw the word “abuse” out there… others did… and I pointed out that the word “abuse” is way over dramatic
as far as the word trainer… you say she’s a trainer… not me. I say she’s marketing tools to fools.
Tools For Fools… my next topic!
a·buse   /v. əˈbyuz; n. əˈbyus/ Show Spelled [v. uh-byooz; n. uh-byoos] Show IPA verb,a·bused, a·bus·ing, noun
–verb (used with object)
1.to use wrongly or improperly; misuse: to abuse one’s authority.
2.to treat in a harmful, injurious, or offensive way: to abuse a horse; to abuse one’s eyesight.
3.to speak insultingly, harshly, and unjustly to or about; revile; malign.
–noun
6.wrong or improper use; misuse: the abuse of privileges.
7.harshly or coarsely insulting language: The officer heaped abuse on his men.
8.bad or improper treatment; maltreatment: The child was subjected to cruel abuse.
9.a corrupt or improper practice or custom
It did look like abuse to me, although of course you can find far worse examples, and it depends on your perception of the term.
Seeing the video including the one that went before it, and thinking of the wide spread influence of the Parellis, made me imagine an army of newbies out there in the paddock, randomly clunking their shanks on their horses chins, slapping their heads with the hands, anytime they get pissed off or nervous, because they copy what they saw in the video and mistook for legitimate pressure and teaching. I understand that this portion of the training video was removed, and I am glad of that. Horses thank you .
What happens with a good horse trainer can look very tough a times, but could easily cross the line into abuse in wrong hands without the timing, fairness, clarity, releases etc. The horse needs an out.
What a nice horse Barney looks to be, he really handled himself pretty well considering. He sure seemed to be trying to figure out what was wanted of him, too bad it kept changing. I am glad that his owner is riding him and enjoying him again, as claimed , since having been used as a foxhunter for 11 years, he likely has had alot of great riding exposure and experience to share. Shame on them for ditching him when he lost an eye.
So let me break down to you “my” way of thinking…
This is Not how I would have handled this situation… But!
To me… abuse it was Not.. There IS a fine line between abuse and respect when working with horses.
People lose respect from their horse, they get scared or hurt… they think the horse is crazy and go ask for help.
If this bothers any of you so much then start Addressing the REAL problem!! and it’s not the Parelli’s!! Ask yourself… WHO keeps the Parelli’s in business???
Because even I run across this all the time…. and it’s annoying as hell… Novice Horse Owner buys Dominate, Dangerous, or Spooky as Hell Horse.. the equation equals DISASTER.
PEOPLE are the ones who go out and buy a damn horse that is WAY over their Heads and experience.
And some horses are very disrespectful and more of a forceful technique IS needed for the safety of a novice person.
If people would start paying for an experienced person to do buying consultation… and not buy a horse because “it’s pretty!” ” i’ve always wanted a OTTB!” ” then they wouldn’t have this problem to begin with! And then there wouldn’t be such a large market to turn Novice people into Professional Trainers! Which is 99% of the time impossible!
The fine line…. You can Not take the dominant personality Out of a horse, unless you present dominance over them, as seen in the video. You can NOT take “fear” out of people… and you can’t cover it up from the horse! Especially a horse that is “tapped in” and feeds on it! And I think she stayed within the lines to “try” and guarantee the safety of the dumbass who bought a horse he obviously can not handle. Hell.. he’s standing in a far more dangerous location than she was.. he’s an blatant idiot who doesn’t get out of the way, she had to tell him TWICE!
Annnd That’s! what annoys me more than any Parelli mishap. Some dumbass buying a horse they have Noo business owning or working with. Or even worse, a parent who buys the WRONG horse for their kid, just because of the look, bloodline, experience. An experienced horse can still be the WRONG horse for a Novice person or kid.
However, the Parelli’s Haaaave found a way to “Market” the “Novice Horse Owner fix your Problem Horse Yourself”
Marketing Tools for Fools is bullshit and wrong!
That’s like advertising a “water pump” to a flood victim, and they receive a bucket in the mail.
I went onto address it more… http://horsecommonsense.blogspot.com/
Holy lord luv a fuckin duck!!! I’ve ‘heard’ of the Pafrelli people but never felt it worht my time to even check them out. Now i am glad i didn;t, I couldn;t even watch the whole video, what a moron. If ANYBODY is stupid enough to give this woman money to learn how to train, they are retarded. I am sure that that horse probably even knew how to lunge, but not with that nitwit flailing away at her. Unbefuckinleivable.
I just want to say one thing: The Parellis did NOT invent Natural Horsemanship.
Should I repeat it? I just finally saw this video– been busy with rl this week.
The Parellis did NOT invent natural horsemanship. Her Majesty is an avid horsewoman and invites many different trainers from around the world. You can indeed make judgments about a horse or horseman by watching a video. They may be imperfect, but it’s a vast improvement from using text or still pictures. The horse industry is truly vastly improved thanks to a resurgence of natural horsemanship methods.
The Parellis did not… oh never mind. Some people just won’t listen. You can shake your little lead rope, flip your stick around, and flap your arms, and they’ll ignore you every time.
All snark aside, I really should pull out a video camera and have my son tape me this spring when I reteach his mare to lunge (She’s a nightmare, despite being an angel at everything else). I really like a method I learned from watching Buck Branaman at a clinic, and I’d like to try it out on her. Maybe I should tape my experience, and show it around?
Got2Bkidding
Uhm . . . “Natural horsemanship” or not — fear, force, and intimidation is what LP is doing here.
Horse started out okay, by the end he is clearly more upset than he was to start with. Hitting horse in the face and shanking (jerking on the leadrope) IS using pain, force and intimidation — which is made especially bad because the horse has No Idea what she wants him to do.
Nice horse — he deserves better. There are much kinder and easier methods to teach a horse to back up or stay out of your space. I’ve seen them and used them myself.
Don’t understand what the five years old video has to do with it. Five years ago stupid training methods were okay? Maybe Linda is better now?
Sorry you drank the kool-aid.
Just got the chance to watch the whole thing (originally had just seen the beginning, but the beginning was enough…).
Maybe this is just from me coming from a completely different horse world – carriage driving…. in a busy urban area (Philly) – but that part where she’s like “The LAST thing you want to do is stop and look at what he’s looking at.” – That seems nuts / dangerous to me! I realize that most horses only ever do stuff in an arena, but still! When something has your horse’s attention other than his job, it’s a good idea to find out what it is (so you can prepare for or -better yet — PREEMPT his response to it and get him refocused on the task at hand. Maybe it IS just some other horse running around that he’d rather be with, and he needs to get back to work and not be distracted. But maybe it’s a backhoe lumbering toward you and you might want to be ready for another response!
It seems to me that if you’re working in partnership with your horse, perhaps knowing what has your horse’s attention (to better be able to tell your horse to KNOCK IT OFF and get back to work) might be a good idea.
Just speaking as someone who works full time with horses and it behooves me to know whether or not my horse is relaxed and focused on his job, or worried about that cement mixer up ahead, or the bus coming up from behind, or wants to go climb on the sidewalk to go eat that tourist’s soft pretzels, or wants to turn down that street instead of going straight because he sees one of his friends. My horse’s response helps me better help him navigate the city.
I have been reading on the new Parelli Statement blog. http://parellihorsemanship.wordpress.com/2010/03/11/a-statement-from-linda-parelli/
I never actually thought it was a cult previously, but wow. Some of these people are completely insane and star-struck.
It has probably been said, but the Savvy club costs $20 (basic), $50 (silver), $99 (gold) + s&h to join. If I had been spending $105 a month with them I would probably be hesitant to admit that perhaps they are not gods.
There is never a reason to continually keep smacking a horse in the head to get it to move away from you. Is this was they teach, I thought it was BS before and now it is just another bullet. I think she has a lead deficiency, if you know what I am saying.
I would be confused too if I were that horse! let’s put it this way. she is whipping him with the end of the rope, telling him “go forward, walk” then yanking the rope down saying “stop, come in.” what exactly does she want from him???
when I went out this morning and lunged by horse, he was being lazy and stopping and trying to come into the circle. that, my dear Linda Parelli, is why saddleries sell these amazing things called lunge whips. He knows that if he isn’t doing the right thing that I’ll flick it at his bottom, so just by having it in my hand where he can see it, he’ll behave. I don’t even need to unfurl it half the time!
and the other great invention is called a lunge rope. it’s nice and long so the horse can get a decent 20m circle going. that way he won’t walk all over you and stumble on his own legs from being in a tiny tight circle. gee, all this modern technology, it’s amazing isn’t it?
Wow, so I’ve been reading the blog for a little while, and I always wondered why you didn’t write more about the value of natural horsemanship. I am very disappointed that you, and many others on this blog, think of natural horsemanship in such a negative way.
I agree with a majority of the people on here that this video is not a good example of what natural horsemanship should look like, but I believe that not ALL natural horsemanship is bad. I can see the reasons behind what Linda’s trying to do, though I don’t agree with it and I know I would have done it differently.
I’ve been doing Parelli for nine years now and I really enjoy the program. There are a lot of things that I don’t like about the program though: the marketing approach, the inexperienced idiots who practice it, and Parelli’s ego, but overall, the methods really do help you bond with your horse if used correctly.
I think that part of the reason that Parelli ends up with such a bad reputation is because of the idiots who practice it. Any training method in the wrong hands can ruin a horse. In order to do Parelli you have to have TIMING, PATIENCE, and HORSE SENSE which I’d say about 60% of the horse owner population is lacking and they would ruin a horse no matter what training method they used. They shouldn’t even be allowed NEAR a horse for that matter.
What people who are horse savvy should do is take from a huge variety of training methods and use what works best for them and their horse. All clinicians try to cater to everyone, not just Parelli, but that’s just not possible. So use what works, ignore what doesn’t.
Another hot topic is Parelli is always trying to sell his products. I don’t think this is unique to Parelli, a large majority of clinicians do it. I don’t actually own any Parelli equipment because half of its stupid and unnessecary and the other half is too expensive. I do have a generic “carrot stick” bought at the local feed store for $15 and a rope halter from a local halter maker.
One thing I enjoy are the levels and tests because I’m the kind of person that needs a goal to work towards, such as the level assessments and going to shows, etc.
I just wanted to give you a link about a what a really good relationship based on trust and respect with a horse looks like, achieved with Parelli training. I don’t think you have to do Parellit to achieve this relationship but it can be one tool out of many. I don’t think that the owner is abusing, forcing, hurting, or being otherwise mean to this horse. I used to have a VHS that was made in the late 90s that was AMAZING and I wish I could send it to you to watch, but I loaned it out and never got it back.
http://www.youtube.com/user/ParelliTube?utm_source=Parelli+Natural+Horsemanship+List&utm_campaign=fec4e1d882-NonMember_March19_3_19_2010&utm_medium=email#p/u/2/pbKP3-x_uzI
PS: Anticipating some responses: throwing the bouncy ball at a horse is not being mean! The horse is not scared or angry, it’s just okay with it. Laying on a horse is not mean either. If your horse did not want you doing that, you probably wouldn’t be alive to tell the tale… Ifthe horse didn’t like anything this person was doing, I would guarantee that the horse would be out of there and the owner would probably be injured…
@thedrafthorse I grew up in Philly too, and used to hang out with the carriage horses around Independence Mall, that wreck of a so called stables outside Fairmount Park prominently featured in one of the Animal Cops Philadelphia episodes (it was WORSE then what you saw, anyone who happened to catch it but I didn;t care there were HORSES there), a little cubby hole of one near Dr Marsh vet hospital on Erie Ave (they had mostly ponies) and I only went out of my first boyfriend because he had a horse (at Western Wrangler Stables by Strawberry Mansion Bridge which I believe was torn down for town houses when they were “revitalizing” the area.
I just had to mention it, because I’m feeling a tad homesick, and seeing someone from Philly posting here (especially since I have been reading EVERY post on the blog for the last week plus) made my day a little bit brighter.
I confess, I am NOT a horseman in any way but my dreams. My riding experience is extremely minuscule, but I am as horse crazy now as I was when I was 3 and told my mother I wanted a pony for Christmas, (she finally stopped asking me what I wanted when I was 28 and I told her Mom, I have asked you for the same thing for the last 25 years, and that still hasn’t changed).
Still I studied horses. That seems trite, but to know me, you have to understand what I mean by study. My mother brought home a betta fish, and I was online for more then 24 hours straight STUDYING betta care, breeding, upkeep, history, development.. I have gone so far as to become a champion betta breeder, as well as an apprentice judge.
I have studied horses with the same intensity my whole life. And I know nothing compared to most if not all of the readers of this blog. I admit this. (I also tend to ramble, and admit that as well).
I DO know, however, what I saw in both the clips.
Why repeat what everyone said. I watched the clip sound off, several times, looking for what I MISSED, I mean, I haven’t seen the OTHER Parelli in action myself.
I had already seen Pat working with Cesar Milan, and I was less then impressed, but maybe there was more, I mean after all the focus was on Cesar, right?
Maybe there was something that I missed in the clips…
After watching the second clip, I went BACK and watched the first clip. I even read Linda’s statement.
I still see NOTHING positive in her handling of this horse.
My impression as a noob is one of horror and disgust. Never have I seen a horse get yanked yanked clanked, spanked like that. I can’t help but to wonder how there are people that do not see that as abusive. There is no respect, there is no understanding and there is no communication from her to the horse.
None.
I watched that horse get BEATEN by someone angry upset and frustrated. Body language is telling and when you watch with the sound off, you can clearly read what her body is saying. You can read what the horse is saying, he’s confused, scared and frustrated.
That isn’t natural horsemanship… Even “I” know that natural horsemanship, whatever you want to call it is about communication and there was none from Linda to the horse, though he clearly spoke to her.
One thing I did see… They effectively taught the horse to back away from someone approaching them. AND they did it in two minutes re: the second clip.