Passive Leadership.....

[Jacquie]

Am I correct in thinking, this means a horse chooses to follow a less aggressive horse rather than the alpha of the herd?

If this is the case, what happens when the herd is threatened by a predator -wouldn't both horses instinctively look to the alpha for leadership, direction and safety? :rolleyes:

[Dales_Lover]

Oooh good question!!

Does anyone else find it hard to be the 'passive leader' when their horse is the alpha horse in the herd?

[Showjumper]

Mark Rashid explains Passive Horsemanship really well (this quote is from his website):
There are two types of leaders in a herd situation. The alpha, or lead horse that rules by dominance, and passive leaders that lead by example. The passive leaders are usually chosen by other members of the herd and are followed willingly, while alphas use force to declare their place in the herd.

Passive leaders are usually older horses somewhere in the middle of the herd's pecking order. They are quiet and consistent in their day-to-day behavior and don't appear to have much ambition to move up the "alpha" ladder. As a result, there appears to be no reason for them to use force to continually declare their position in the herd.

Alphas, on the other hand, are usually pretty far from being quiet and consistent in their behavior. They are often very pushy, sometimes going as far as using unprovoked attacks on subordinates for the simple reason of declaring their dominance. As a result of this behavior, the majority of the horses in the herd will actually avoid all contact with the alpha throughout the day.

The reason for this avoidance is that horses are designed to use the least amount of physical energy possible throughout their normal daily activities. A good example is a horse that spooks. A horse may jump at something that is unfamiliar, but he won't always run away from it. He will only run away if it is absolutely necessary. By doing this he is saving energy in case he really needs it. This is a "safety valve" that has helped the horse to survive for over 50 million years. By not using energy unnecessarily, they will be able to use the stored energy in case of a real emergency.

By following a passive leader who uses the least amount of energy throughout the day, (and that isn't constantly forcing the other horses to use theirs) the horses are not only able to stay quiet and content, but they are also helping to insure their own survival.

Passive leaders have "earned" that particular title with the other horses by showing them they can be dependable in their passive behavior from one day to the next. In other words, they lead by example, not by force.


As to your second question, if the horses are directly threatened by a predator, their survival instinct would likely take over and they would react with fight or flight. I don't think they would stand about wondering whether to copy the alpha or passive leader - they would just do whatever was necessary in the situation.

[Yann]

The quote says it all - the observed passive leader is a mid ranking horse in the herd, not the herd leader. It's the non threatening reliable horse that makes good decisions and is pleasant to be around.

In a horsemanship context my understanding is that it's about being quiet, consistent and reliable around your horse and continually making the right decisions and not resorting to force. It isn't about doing nothing and letting your horse get on with it though, more about thinking your way round problems and making it easy for the horse to get it right, rather than making them.

[Bay Mare]

I'm just reading the Mark Rashid books (after having them for an AGE) and like what I'm reading! I've just finished 'Horses Never Lie', it's a great book with lots of food for thought. I would recommend them to anyone who is interested in horses and especially to those of us who are interested in NH.

I'm not into Parelli anyway and lean more towards IH but Mark Rashid has definitely given me something to think about. I like how it's not just about US making the decisions and being the alpha but listening to your horse and allowing them to make decisions on occasions! I tried it with the Saff Monster this morning. Instead of telling her which way I wanted her to go down the (very muddy, very slippy) field I allowed her to show me her way. She didn't barge, she didn't walk ahead but she took me a much better, if slightly longer, way than I would have taken.

He has a great story about riding out to find a gelding that had escaped. His horse wanted to take one track but he insisted that they take another. If only he had listened to his horse in the first place they would have found the gelding sooner!

I also like the chapter about 'Finding the Try' which essentially means that we should listen to our horses and not just look for the big things like doing a good flying change or dropping into an outline but look for the small things that tell us that they are trying, it may be a softening in the jaw, it may be a small step back but these small steps are every bit as important as the bigger steps unfortunately we often miss them because we're looking for the bigger thing to happen!

Ok ... I'll shut up now :)

[Yann]

I allowed her to show me her way. She didn't barge, she didn't walk ahead but she took me a much better, if slightly longer, way than I would have taken.

We do that too:)

The bit about finding the try is very important, and it's something that's common to most 'NH' methods and clicker training too. It's how you teach something without having to go up 'phases of pressure'.

[Jacquie]

As far as I'm aware (please correct me if I'm wrong) there are both passive and alpha leaders in every herd, but when any herd is threatened by a preditor, ALL the horses instinctively depend on the alpha leader to guide them to safety - including passive leaders that only rank midway in the pecking order.

To me, this indicates that if your horse doesn't regard you as the 'alpha' then he wouldn't put his trust in your judgement as a leader. :rolleyes:

[hackedoff]

I dont think it really works like that at least not in my experience of herd- living horses over the past year (a year and I think I'm an expert, get me :p )
The herd leader decides who has access to which food source and breaks up disputes if they get out of hand, if the herd decide to move the HL goes first to take the first attack from a predator, the HL gets a free choice of partner and of friends and will 'vet' a newcomer ( some say that the reason a HL will drive away a newbie is to quarantine them and look for signs of disease). The HL's job is a tough one. The Passive Leader is the kind of brainy henchman :D all the horses know who flexes his/her muscle when the going gets tough but they look to the PL for 'bright ideas' and non-confrontational solutions. A PL will often greet a newcomer and introduce them to the herd slowly and tactfully, the judgement of a PL is always respected, even by the HL.
You are not bigger and stronger than your horse -he knows that already, but if you become a PL in his eyes he will respect your way of doing things.
Does that help?

[Bay Mare]

Love the description hackedoff :D

If I've read it right (and please correct me if I haven't!) then the Alpha leads by force and the other horses may follow the Alpha BUT it is because they are 'forced' to. To quote MR:

Up to that point I'd been under the impression that most horses within a herd looked up to the boss horses with a sort of awe or with undying respect. But as I watched the herd react to Otis and Captain, I got a whole different picture of how the horses looked at their leaders. It wasn't with awe or respect at all, but rather with mistrust and, in some cases, downright fear. In fact, the majority of the herd usually did everything they could to avoid any contact with the boss horses.

The Passive leader doesn't use force to get the other horses to follow him in fact doesn't 'ask' to be followed at all. The other horses CHOOSE to be with the Passive leader because of the way that he conducts himself.

Since that time I've had the opportunity to observe quite a few horses similar to Buck, who have the same demeanor and effect on horses in herds. Their quiet confidence and lack of force or aggression appears to be something that other horses look for and, when given the opportunity, actively seek out.

It seems to me that if we want to emulate horse behaviour during training, we must decide what type of horse we are trying to be like ...................

........... The choice is ultimately up to us. But I do have to wonder ... which one would our horses prefer?

[Showjumper]

hehe Bay Mare, have you read his other books? They are all fabulous although Horses Never Lie is my favourite :D

[Esther.D]

Just as another illustration from our ponies.......recently some mares have moved next door and Pablo (alpha leader) has lost all interest in his normal herd and leans over the fence chatting up the mares. He was very much an alpha leader, anyone who annoyed him, especially at feed time, got chased off with ears laid back. Now Rupert has taken the opportunity to take charge of the little herd of shetlands now that Pablo has 'abandoned' them for the mares. Rupert shares his feed with them and has never been seen to pull faces/boss them around, and yet he appears to fulfil exactly the same function in the herd as Pablo did, he moves them around, he stands guard over them and he keeps them all together, yet he does it all without throwing his weight around and never lays his ears back or chases them, they just seem to choose to follow him - a passive leader?

[Bay Mare]

I'm part way through 'A Good Horse Is Never A Bad Colour'. I've got the others (bought them all ages ago) but haven't had a chance to read them until now!

I love them, they're great books whether you're into NH or not :D

[Jacquie]

Wow, this is a really interesting and informative thread - thanks for all your replies.......

Quote Pat Parelli
If horses feel threatened in the wild, they'll herd up and protect each other. They look to the alpha, or strongest, most dominant horse to direct and protect them.

I look upon myself as TB's alpha not passive leader, he looks to me for leadership and puts his trust in my judgement 99% of the time. I believe we have a perfect partnership and this has been achieved by my being assertive (not aggressive) so in that respect my role differs from the alpha horse in a herd.

So, here comes another query..... :rolleyes:

If your in a passive leadership role, although you have a 'partnership' with your horse, he doesn't see you as his alpha - so would he still turn to you for direction and protection.

[hackedoff]

No he wouldnt Jacquie- I cannot protect him, he is bigger and stronger than me and I cannot direct him unless he allows me to for the same reasons. I can prove to him that my human brain allows me to come up with clever creative and non-confrontational solutions to problems we face together though if I take on the PL role.

[tazzle22]

I think it can be very hard to make a direct comparison as to where to place the human part of this relationship ..... be it AL or PL

It would be impossible for us to react like a true AL because we do not have the reactions, speed or power of a horse to defend or get away from any perceived threat (as can easily be demonstrated by a horse bolting !) .....
although it is perfectly possible for us to attain AL similarities in making life "uncomfortable" for a horse if it is not doing what we want...... and this includes even the "gentlest" of pressures such as touching a horse to ask it to move or shake a line to a halter to get its attention of it looks away.

If we have an AL relationship and something scary happens or horse unsure then IMO the AL type human will ... "ride the horse through it", "make him behave"....... the horse is not necessarily reassured but does "as its told".


If we have a PL relationship our horse might be reassured if we do not react to a scary situation because it "trusts" our judgement...


I think the human / equine relationship is not one of either/ or ..... but a mix of both .... just as one cannot use PURE positive reinforcement in "training".

We might have more of one than the other ..... but neither in isolation , we just can't !!!! ( well I just though of a situation where we could debate it where human dominates horse into submission by abuse of alpha position..... but that not leadership !!!)

With Taz I try to have the predominance of PL ... I like to think she will trust me to show her that something she finds scary is really ok ..... like a few weeks ago going over a railway crossing for first time. She stopped to look and didnt want to cross ..... so I got off and led her over it with only a slight hesitation on her part. After three times I got on and she went over no probs! .

for project I was doing I wanted to see if she would burst ballons so thought i might gradually introduce them from a distance and over several sessions get nearer. Burst the first one ( she has seen balloons before so could skip that part) about 10 feet away ...... she immediately wandered over to looksee :D ... even nosing them as I burst the next three..... so I attached the next one to a stick and put it by her feet, treating her every time her foot moved towards it, then pawed and burst it. She burst four. Total time ....... 10 mins ( and several of those was me chasing ballons blown away by the wind :D )

However ..... if a puma suddenly appeared from behind a hedge ...... mmmmmmmm I wonder ????? :eek:

mmmmm always an interesting discussion and a never ending one :D :D :D

[Bay Mare]

I, personally, would prefer to take on a predominantly PL role. That is one reason that Parelli doesn't do it for me even before I 'discovered' the MR philosophy I didn't feel comfortable with Parelli.

My rationale for this is that we are not in the wild and I couldn't take on the alpha role if a lion attacked anyway! I would prefer that my horse chose to put her trust in me and to follow me rather than me acting like an alpha and 'demanding' that she follow me.

One chapter in MR's book really struck me. It was about a woman who used 'NH' methods on her horse and who expected the horse to come to her BUT without her making any effort to go to the horse. As MR pointed out, why should the horse be the only one to put something into the exercise? I completely agree with that, why should I stand at the bottom of the field and expect her to come to me every time? Ok, sometimes it happens but not always. What I have found with Saffy is that if I move towards her then 9 times out of 10 she will come towards me too. If I just stand there and shout her she will sometimes come to me but more often than not look up, say 'hi' and then go back to grazing again :) I don't expect people in my other relationships to do all of the work so why should I expect it of my horse?

[Yann]

I think that's right, if you're truly taking an 'alpha' role with your horse then you will boss and apply pressure in every interaction with it. Whilst your horse may be quite content with the arrangement it might not necessarily think of you as a pleasant person to be with or to seek out. I also think it's true that most of what we do may well end up being somewhere between the two types, but as in most interactions with horses the attitude of the handler is all important as it will be carried forward unconciously into many of our actions and reactions. A horse handled in this way will look to you in a scary situation, it isn't necessary to be 'alpha' all the time for it to trust you or look to you as a safe place.

I know I've posted this before, but I found it very enlightening to read about Mark Rashid working with a bolshy youngster, he used pressure and release with the best of them, it's not about being soft, it's about being intelligent.

[Jacquie]

I think the majority of posts agree that in general us humans try to get an happy medium between being an AL and PL.

Before starting this thread, I classed myself as an alpha not passive leader. However, after reading all your brilliant posts I now realise I'm somewhere in between the two. While I use assertiveness and phases in TB's 'training' I've gained his trust and respect through love and leadership not by aggression or bullying.

At the end of the day, we all have one thing in common, we all want the best for our horses and by keeping it 'natural', whether it be as a PL, AL or P/AL we are all on the right track. ;)

[cvb]

there's been some discussion on this before. IMHO the "PL" is NOT mid-ranking, they are a genuine leader but there is tendency to define what a leader is in human terms so we miss this.

I also wanted to quote something Mark R said at a clinic earlier this year - that a horse is NEVER going to see me as another horse. From my notes Mark commented that the horse is NEVER going to see him as another horse, however he behaves. So what he does is not to behave "like a horse would", but he behaves "like a human trying to get a horse to do something".

So I think we have to take this into account in our "leadership" style but also accent that we don't necessarily have to have the physical attributes they might look for in a herd leader, as they KNOW we're humans not horses, and their experience leads them to expect us to handle certain situations better than them and hence they turn to us for leadership.