Trailer Training (or Re-Training) Using Positive Reinforcement

Expecting a horse to get into a small box, often with another horse in very close proximity is a BIG ask!   Traditional methods often use negative reinforcement or punishment to coerce the animals into the trailer.  This often works at home where the horse is comfortable, but once out in a novel environment, once they are tired, once something excites them… many horses won’t go back into the trailer. 

When we use punishment or negative reinforcement to get the horses to load, they are choosing to load in order to avoid us annoying, hurting, or scaring them.  Using positive reinforcement teaches the horses to be optimistic about loading! They learn to look forward to the chance to load with curiosity and enthusiasm! 

There are videos showing the skills at the end of this post.

3 Foundation Skills for Trailer Training

Station

What Is It?

Stationing teaches a horse to offer to step up onto things. There are three components to Stationing. Get on, Stay on, Get off. 

Why Teach It?

Trailers will either involve a ramp or stepping up into the trailer itself.  Teaching horses to confidently and happily step onto surfaces is a big part of the problem many people have with trying to load a horse. We can take that right out of the equation!

How Do We Teach It?

This is started away from the trailer. You can use a tarp or a mat at first, or build a platform out of wood. Be careful that it is strong enough to hold a horse and is non-slip.  Bigger is better at first, although horses can be taught to station on very small things. But start big and work your way down if that is a goal. 

Treats in hand, show your horse what you have. Place some treats on the platform.  You can use a clicker and mark whenever your horse pays attention to the platform. If you mark (click the clicker), you owe your horse a treat, regardless of what else they do.

Use your body and your stash of treats to lure your horse over teh platform.  This is where bigger (not taller) is better.  As soon as your horse lifts a hoof even thinking about stepping up, click and treat. The treats can still come on the platform to build value.   

Repeat, repeat, repeat. Advance criteria slowly and play in many very short sessions. Your horse will soon look forward to seeing the platform. Change it up. Use many different things. I like to use logs and stumps on trails!

Nose Target

What Is It?

We teach horses to touch an object with their nose. I cut a dressage whip down, punched a hole in a foam dog ball, and crazy glued the whip into the ball.  

Why Teach It?

Using a nose target, we can ask our hose to move forward into the trailer, or anywhere for that matter. It’s a great way to direct horses without pulling on their face or driving from behind.  

Horses learn to love their nose targets and are excited to move towards them.

How Do We Teach It?

This is started away from the trailer. Notice a trend? Everything is taught away from the trailer so we can bring the optimism and enthusiasm from these training games to the trailer itself.

Gert your treats and clicker ready.  Yes you need treats, no you don’t need a clicker. Some people make a special noise with their mouth or whistle.  It should be a sound you only make when training with treats, not a phrase you say often like “Good Horsey”.

Hide the target behind your back. When your horse is paying attention to you, bring the target out from behind your back.  If your horse is confident and inquisitive, they will likely sniff the target. Click adn treat.  Put the target behind your back again. Repeat many many times, gradually adding distance adn getting your horse to follow you. 

If your horse is too worried to sniff the target, simply click and treat for glancing at it or for flicking an ear at it.  You can even cheat by dipping it in apple sauce to start 😉 

Back Up

What Is It?

Our horse learns to back up on a verbal or tactile cue.

Why Teach It?

We will use a back up to help our horse get out of a trailer. Don’t worry, if you would rather and you have space, you can also turn your horse around and ask them to walk out. 

We will use this for when their front feet are in or on the ramp, but they aren’t ready to go all 4 feet in. If you are using a straight haul, this will help them build confidence to back out, but also to back out slowly and with control. 

How Do We Teach It?

Other people very likely have a better way of teaching this. If you are one of those people, shoot me a message and I will happily update my post =)  Plus.. I realized today that Benji doesn’t actually know how to back up on cue… and I’d love a fun way of teaching him! 

In the past, we moved the lead rope in an annoying way until our horse backed up and then we stopped being annoying. Don’t do that =) There are better ways to train than by annoying our horses. 

Lightly press on your horse’s chest. When they shift weight back or take a single step, click and treat.  Repeat, repeat, repeat.  Again, teach this away from the trailer. 

When this is easy, Add the word FIRST, then touch your horse. “Back” then touch, horse will back up.  Click and treat. If you can be good with your timing, your horse will anticipate and learn to move on the verbal cue. 

You’ve done your homework! Your horse happily steps up ont things, follows a nose target, and backs up on cue.  Yay!  Almost there. 

Many horses become anxious just being near a trailer, anticipating being made to go in. For all horses, but especially if this is your horse, practice all three skills NEAR but not using the trailer for a few sessions.  Next, practice using the trailer! 

Step 1 is just one foot on the ramp, then back up and repeat. Two feet on the ramp, etc. Don’t ruin all of your good trainign so far by askign too much too fast. Your horse will tell you when they are ready to fully get in the trailer. 

Working in the trailer!

What next?

I will keep building on this until Benji is happily walking into the trailer and eating hay inside.  If you have a keen, confident horse, this might go super fast and you can possibly even skip steps.  Be careful to listen to your horse. If they take more than 3 seconds to respond to a cue, you are moving too fast.  Great skills are built upon solid foundations. 

Zephyr, my 2 year old was happliy walking in on his second session. He is working on duration now and we are practicing backing out one step at a time. Back, step, click and treat. I am building a pattern now that will prevent the problem of bilting back out of the trailer as soon as the bum bar is undone.  

Stay tuned for more horsie training and riding adventures!