Cinch Magazine- Your Online Equestrian Source

The Belly Button Rule
J.L. Orchard, Cinch Magazine




Horses, like humans, have a natural response system encoded into their memory, its called instinctive reflexes. It's what causes you to flinch when you touch a hot stovetop. And it’s what makes this particular exercise so effective for your horse.


Some people will leap off a cliff to keep their personal bubble from being popped. Others are more passive but still space oriented enough to step out of traffic. When it comes to personal space, horses and humans can usually agree … don't burst my bubble. So what does the belly button approach do?


The belly button approach is designed as an uncomplicated, quick way to teach your horse to yield to you on the ground. The belly button approach taps into the horse's natural instinct to avoid collision. If you take advantage of this instinctive behavior, with the help of mild pressure, you can encourage your horse to move out of your way, whenever, by yourself, and without the assistance of artificial aids.


Here's where the crazy name, the belly button approach, comes from. You are going to take the dorsal line of your body that reaches in a vertical run from your toes, through your belly button, to the peak of your forehead. Stand face forward in front of your horse with this dorsal line directly centre of your horse's head. No timid side stance or hippie wiggle posture. Stand straight and forward.


This method is all about posture. Your horse must know that you're looking at him. If you don’t come off imposing or obtrusive your horse will be unresponsive. Once you have your posture mastered, walk towards your horse's nose. If the horse hesitates, keep walking. Don't be shy to nudge your body into the horse's face. Few horses won't back out of a situation like this. Be aware though if you have an aggressive or easily startled horse. For an aggressive horse you may want to avoid this move altogether until you've worked the kinks out of his behavior. For a shy or skittish animal, don't force as much.


Slowly encourage them to back out of your way. Once you've convinced your horse to back away, lay off. Step to his side, scratch his neck and offer him a treat. He needs to know that what he did, backing out of your way when you walked head on towards him, was correct. Otherwise he'll remember the experience as being an uncomfortable moment where he responded wholly by instinct. Go through this exercise a few times a day and when he backs up step to his side and reward him.


Pressure is the most effective way to work a horse through the belly button approach. After all, you don't want to walk into his face whenever you ask him to reverse. When you do this exercise, place your index finger or thumb in the centre of his chest and press lightly, just enough for him to feel your hand there. Then, while you say "back," give the hand pressure and walk towards your horse's head. (It's good to have one hand out to the side to give your horse a broader view of where you stand.) Your horse will learn to relate the voice command and chest pressure with the trainer's invasive action.


When these three cues are repeated in unison your horse will learn, overtime, to give the correct response to any individual cue. Peel away the cues one at a time, give two cues for your horse to back up, then give one cue, either voice or finger pressure. If your horse gives the correct response every time when given either the pressure or voice cue, you have succeeded in teaching your horse to reverse via the belly button approach. I can't stress enough the need for reward and how vital it is that you introduce the vocal and pressure commands early on.


Overtime horses can become passive to the invasive approach of their trainers and choose not to respond. Many green horses will try to scoot away when a rider lowers onto their back. You're invading their personal space. While the young horse learns to accept its rider, some horses learn to ignore the belly button approach. But when they know reward follows a proper given response to the pressure or vocal command they will perform. The belly button approach is effective from almost any angle of the horse to train them to reverse, sidestep, shift the forelegs, or shift the hind legs. But remember, for the belly button approach to work, your horse needs to be able to either see or feel you during the entire approach, otherwise, you're not much of a space invader.


The horse's natural tendency is to lean into pressure. The belly button approach asks them to back out of the way without the use of forced pressure giving them no reason to lean against your weight. The belly button approach is a great trick for both you and your horse to become experts at. It does not rely on bodily force but on psychological instinct, an instinct that both horses and people share. Whenever you need your horse to step aside, you'll be glad that it only takes a touch.

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