The first thing I learnt about horses was that I wasn’t going to stop learning about them. I spent most of my youth as close to horses as I could be, so when I wasn’t at the yard I was to be found reading about them, drawing them and of course, talking about them! I got involved with competing through the Pony Club (Forth Valley) and was inspired to learn more about horse behaviour and training after reading about classical riding and the then ‘new’ natural horsemanship trainers in the horse magazines.

Search for new learning took me to university in Aberystwyth and an equine science degree. There I learned that not all the answers are actually available and that I’d have to question things for myself and learn how to test ideas in order to form my own opinion. This meant that my twenties came with a whole load of trial and error learning! I’d find out about some training method or other, try it, sometimes with consequences I’d rather not inflict on horses again, and essentially learn from a whole pile of mistakes!

In order to make sense of what I was exploring I went back into education, this time an MSc in Companion Animal Behaviour Counselling at the University of Southampton. A truly life enhancing experience as the course covered a broad base of topics, from experimental psychology to animal welfare science. Really understanding how horses function, at all levels, makes it possible to understand why problems arise and to go about tackling an individual’s problem humanely without becoming method bound.

These days I spend most of my week working with horse owners who are seeking knowledge in order to improve their own horsemanship skills and resolve a great variety of training and behavioural problems. I like to provide the most accurate information I can on all aspects of horse behaviour so others can make informed decisions too, enhancing their own horsemanship journey.