Teaching voice commands for

pattymac

New Member
different gaits?? Now I know horse people who teach their horses voice commands for walk trot canter etc. Any dog people ever try this? I was watching some canine dressage and kinda thought it would be cool. :msncool:
 

tx_cowgirl

Honored Member
Staff member
I've never been a fan of that with horses. I've always taught my horses to speed up or slow down with extremely light changes in posture, pressure, etc. All I have to do to speed up my horses is lean forward a teeny bit and squeeze with my legs a hair harder than enough to hold on. To slow down, I'll sit deeper in the saddle just a bit, and to stop I'll sit deep and rotate my tailbone just slightly. They are also trained on vocal commands--a smooch to speed up, an "easy" to slow down, and a "ho/whoa" to stop. The vocals are used on the ground for lunging, etc, but I don't teach actual gait commands. Just a personal preference.

Anywho, as dogs go, I teach mine just, "hurry" and "easy." You could probably easily teach gaits though. Seems like the easiest way to start would just be on-leash. "Walk" and off you go, speed up just a bit with a vocal command, and so on.
 
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