Tuesday Training Tip Number 1. How to keep your horse from pawing when tied.

    A habit that I have observed among many horses is the tendency to paw while tied up.  This is bad for a number of reasons.
#1.  This leaves holes by the tie rails that make the ground uneven and annoying to work on.  Especially if you need level ground for putting polo wraps on and such.
#2.  It is dangerous to the people around the horse.  If the horse is pawing constantly it is more likely to step on someones foot, or smack you in the face while picking out feet or putting on boots.
#3.  It can make other horses in the area hyper.
#4.  Its just straight up annoying to have a horse pawing while you are trying to groom it and tack it up.

    I have found a fairly effective way to stop the habit of pawing.  As always, this works best if you implement it at the beginning before your horse has developed the habit over a period of time.

   What do I do?  Every time your horse paws make a small jump or startling gesture towards the horse and make a loud noise.  (Your loud noise could be yelling "Hey!" or "Stop!".  Clapping your hands works as well.)  Make sure that you don't startle your horse too much, this could cause it to pull back which is not good.  Also, make sure you are out of kicking range when you do this.  Startling a horse while you are in kicking range is ALWAYS an awful idea.   As time goes on you can just use the loud noise when your horse paws.  This can be used if you are a distance away from your horse thus enforcing obedience wether you are right next to the horse or not.

    Why does this work?   Unless the horse is exceptionally angry they are usually pawing when they are bored or impatient and aren't really paying attention to you.  By jumping and making a loud noise you bring the horses attention back to you abruptly.  This startles them out of the behavior, stopping it for the moment.  Then the horse is paying attention to you, and probably won't be pawing.  When you use this method over an extended period of time the horse eventually learns that as long as he is paying attention to you, things are fairly predictable.   He also learns, that when he takes his attention off of you and starts pawing, things become unpredictable and a little uncomfortable.  Thus, this is an effective way to gently teach your horse that it is better to stand still and calm instead of pawing.  This stops the behavior in the moment, and eliminates the behavior in the long run.