Coloured Australian Pony Stud

In the past thirty years there has been an explosion in horse training methods that claim to be "natural" by using the inate behaviours of horses to train them.  There are a plethora of these approaches around, some of the most famous being the Parelli "Natural Horse-Man-Ship", Monty Roberts "John Up" as well as others such as John Lyons, Ga Wa Ni Pony boy who use variations on the same theme.

Whilst the actual techniques used by these methods vary quite considerably what they are all based on is an assumption that the behaviours that horses express in their relationships with each other can be adapted or mimicked by human trainers to elicit desired responses from their horses.  Underlying this belief is a scientifically untested assumption that horses view humans as simply another horse (albeit a strange looking one) and subsequently read and understand human signals in the same terms and frame of reference as they would if relating to a conspecific (another horse).  From where comes the concept of "natural" , that what the horse is being asked to do and how it is being asked is "natural" to the horse's inate abilities, including the ability to acquire new behaviours.  And somehow, training them using this approach is more humane than other approaches.  While past techniques could be extremely brutal and with our awareness of animal welfare issues today, can never be justified, it is possible to use these "natural" techniques in ways that are just as frightening, confusing and ultimately abusive as the old "breakers' of yore.

The question I have about all of these methods is, fundamentally, what is "natural' about a horse voluntarily spending time with another species that might eat it (us)?  Secondly, what is "natural' about a human sitting on a horse's back- in wild sitations, the only time anything would be on a horse's back would be if that thing was trying to eat it. 

Thirdly, what is natural about halters, bits, saddles, whips, roundyards, stables, floats, saddles, jumping logs, etc etc?  Absolutely nada.

A "natural' horse is one living with its mates, able to choose what it eats, where it goes, who it spends its time with, who it mates with, how fast it runs, for how long etc.  Just about everything else is not 'natural' and we are kidding ourselves if we think our horse would rather spend time doing the pointless things we ask them to do instead of loafing about in a paddock under the shade of a tree with a belly full of grass and a mate to help keep the flies away.