Starting a horse under saddle with Clicker training: 1. Targeting in protective contact

I start every horse with targeting in protective contact, even the very sweet and clicker savvy. It creates a clean starting point without too many assumptions. In this clip you can see that we go through the lesson really fast, because she already knows the stuff. But she is a new environment, new people, new treats, new variation soft clicker training.

We start by testing if she can eat the treats I am offering. I offer the treats she knows from home, hay pellets that are new and carrot slices. Only after testing if she is calm enough to eat and likes the treats, I start with clicker training.

We progress fast and I can quickly go in with her. In this lesson, we did targeting, offering the target at different locations (which we could do already because this lesson is not new to her) including lowering her head, dynamic food delivery (Backing) and Grown-ups are talking. I already focussed on Happy Faces. So basically we touched on all foundation lessons except Standing on a mat (which she also already knows).

If you doing this lesson with a horse that is new to clicker training, don’t expect such a quick progression. For her this was a refresher under new conditions.