Tag horses

Finding the try with horses and other animals

Nancy Crowe
Four attentive horses
A thoroughbred, two Haflingers and a mustang walk into a bar … and chances are, Emmie (second from right) would get everyone home safely.

Reading the second, revised and updated edition of Mark Rashid’s Horses Never Lie: The Heart of Passive Leadership immediately brought Emmie to mind. This unassuming Haflinger stepped up — as she does for so many other duties as a therapy horse — as herd matriarch after the much-loved Lola passed three years ago. I’ve had the pleasure of working with Emmie and many of her herd mates for several years as an animal communicator and Let Animals Lead® animal Reiki practitioner.

Though she has her moments, Emmie is not one to nip, kick, shove, or use other aggressive tactics. Leading by example and not force is what makes her effective. Once I watched her stand quietly with Geronimo (at far right in the photo) after Geronimo’s behavior got him grounded, so to speak. I didn’t get the feeling Emmie was conveying either reproach or sympathy. Just standing nose to nose with him in the pasture helped him calm down and see how not to mess up.

Rashid, over years working at a ranch, discovered that mimicking just this sort of lead horse helped the humans gain the horses’ trust. “A horse that is extremely dependable and confident, one that the vast majority of horses will not only willingly choose to follow, but that they actually seek out,” he wrote in the introduction.

Key to this leadership is “finding the try,” which Rashid discovered as a youth working for an unnamed “old man” who turned out to be one of his greatest (human) teachers. After Rashid repeatedly tried and failed to teach a horse to back up, the old man taught him to notice the subtle ways the horse was actually trying to do what he wanted, and to respond in kind.

“There was a little brace here, a little give there, a slight jiggle of the bit, a tipping of her nose, a little bending at the poll — all within a few seconds,” Rashid recalled. Responding to these with released pressure, a pet on the neck or even just a pause led to more tries, and soon the horse was backing up with ease.

Fight with a horse and the horse will fight back, the old man advised, but “even during those fights, the horse is still trying to figure out what you want. The sad part is, because you’re so busy fighting with them, you’ll never feel those tries.”

It made me wonder how many times I’ve failed to notice someone trying to meet me halfway. Any of us can get so caught up in our own efforts that we don’t see how the other person, or animal, is actually trying to work with us.

It’s worth pausing and getting quiet enough to listen to the subtleties.

In his second-edition notes, Rashid wrote: “In the years since writing this book, and in particular this chapter, I have come to understand that a horse’s ‘try’ is very often even smaller than what I understood it to be back then!”

Speaking up for neglected horses

Nancy Crowe 1 Comment
malnourished horse
This is one of sixteen malnourished, neglected horses taken from a northeast Indiana farm last winter. (Photo courtesy Friends of Ferdinand)

Sixteen horses — first 10, then another six — were rescued from a Wells County, Indiana property in January 2018. All were malnourished, and some had untreated infections and injuries.

A few, including two of the six horses I worked with, did not survive. Others returned to their previous owners or found new ones, but faced a long and difficult healing process.

The case was all the more disturbing because the person responsible was known and trusted by area horse owners and rescuers. Yet, according to the conversations that followed, there were previous signs that all was not well.

What can we pull from this to create a better outcome the next time something doesn’t seem quite right, but we don’t know what to ask or how to help? How can we get better at spotting signs of animal abuse and neglect, speaking up, listening, and following through?

As I write this, winter is coming. That’s when many of these heartbreaking situations come to light, and when it’s difficult to respond.

I’m not a veterinarian, horse handler, or law enforcement officer. My job with horses is to listen to them, and to the people who love and care for them, and offer a calm presence that allows healing. But as a journalist of many years, I also wanted to offer some quality information that might prove useful to those of us in northeast Indiana and beyond. Here’s what I found.

• These two articles were both sparked by the Wells County case: When to Speak Up: Red Flags & Warning Signs for Reporting Abuse in Horse Nation; and If you see something, say something by Carleigh Fedorka, a horse handler and postdoctoral researcher who was part of the same network as the neglected horses’ owner.

• Another, Neglected, abused and abandoned horses: How to help in Equus Magazine, was written earlier but includes helpful information on staying on the right side of the law in these situations.

• Also of note: Friends of Ferdinand, which played a key role in the rescue of the horses in the above case, received a Standing Ovation by Ovation Riding in 2018. This story talks about how other rescue organizations stepped in to help.

Creating a better world for horses (and everyone else) does, in fact, take all of us.

Showing up in 2020

Nancy Crowe
horses-on-a-grass-field-under-a-cloudy-sky-Photo by Anastasia Shuraeva from Pexels
Photo by Anastasia Shuraeva from Pixels

A sad stillness enveloped the barn and pastures at Summit Equestrian Center on a damp, fall-is-coming morning a week after Whinnie died three years ago. The animals were grieving, and as I arrived for my weekly animal Reiki rounds, so was I. In fact, I feared my own sadness would taint the energy I wanted to share with them.

Whinnie, Summit’s thriving-with-disabilities spokeshorse, was a dwarf miniature horse with a giant presence. That presence was glaringly absent now.

All of the animals had taken turns visiting with her before she passed. They knew she had been struggling. When animals grieve, whether for a human or another animal, it’s not that they don’t understand what’s going on. They probably understand it better than the humans do, and feel the loss and disorientation all the more acutely.

On that morning a week later, no other humans were about, but three horses waited by the fence. They felt not only the loss of Whinnie, but the sadness of the other animals and humans who’d known her. 

I wasn’t sure anything I could offer at that moment would help. In the face of suffering, injustice, and anger, it’s easy to feel that whatever we bring to the table will not be enough.

However, surrendering the outcome is essential when sharing Reiki energy with animals or communicating with them. So with a brief prayer, I set an intention for the animals’ highest good and put it in God’s hands.

Rain began to fall, and without thinking I put my umbrella up. Startled, all three horses pulled back.

I folded the umbrella and stashed it away. I started to castigate myself for not remembering that I actually knew better than to unfurl an umbrella near a horse. 

But they were still there and so was I. “Sorry, guys.” 

They relaxed, and I shared Reiki energy with them and with the other horses, ponies, and donkey who stood, still and mindful, in the pasture.

I offered a variation on the earth and sky meditation my animal Reiki teacher, Kathleen Prasad, taught. This meditation gently taps into both the grounding power of the earth and the divine expanse of the sky. I reminded the crew that support is always available, no matter where we are or what is happening.

A chilly breeze cut through my jacket as we finished up. The perfectionist in me still wondered if I’d done enough.

Then Boo, a beautiful 14-year-old black cat with white whiskers and a delicate white star on her chest, strolled up. She usually hid out in the barn. Now here she was, meowing and rubbing against my legs.

Boo at Summit Equestrian Center. (Photo by Nancy Crowe)

Boo had been dropped off a couple of years earlier. Though initially terrified of people, she became “selectively social,” as executive director Allison Wheaton put it.

Being well-trained by cats, I know when one is demanding food, a lap, an opened door, a quick head rub, or the ever-popular skritch above the tail. Today, Boo wanted healing energy: Come on, let’s see what you’ve got.

I sat on a bench in the garden while Boo continued to wind around me, occasionally putting her front paws on my knee but never quite taking the leap into my lap. As she took in the energy, she kept up a running commentary of meows and purrs. This, I felt her tell me, was just what she needed. Of course, it was just what I needed, too.

One of Whinnie’s most important lessons was that it doesn’t matter what you can’t do or don’t have. If you show up with an open heart and put what you do have out there, chances are it will be exactly what is needed.

Even today, when COVID-19, violence, and division send us scrambling for an adequate response, we can bring our imperfect offerings.

We are here. We can offer more than we think. We can do this.