Imprinting and Early Learning for The Newborn Foal (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780983462576)

IMPRINT & EARLY LEARNING FOR THE NEWBORN FOAL offers an easy-to-follow, step-by-step approach to handling and training newborn foals, as well as numerous techniques and exercises that aid the foal in halter training and later in performing riding maneuvers. Imprinting can be defined as a learning process occurring soon after birth in which a behavior pattern is established. The newborn foal is imprinted to follow and bond with whatever large object looms above it at the time of birth. Dr. Miller's methods lay the foundation for teaching a horse most of what it will need to know to serve as a useful animal for the rest of its life. Early training can, in an amazingly brief period of time, assure an ideal relationship between horse and human, with the horse bonded and submissive to the human. In addition, the horse will be desensitized to the everyday frightening stimuli that typically elicit a flight reaction in the young horse, and which account for the frequent injuries that afflict horses and the people who work with them. The book includes nineteen chapters beginning with initial imprinting training, then following with subsequent sessions, halter training, performance basics, response reinforcement, problem prevention, and sections on racehorses, mules, and brood mares.