A Gift to the Horse World

As promised in my last article, "Can You Judge a Horse by It's Coat?" I would like to introduce you to Linda Tellington-Jones and tell you what she looks for in a horse's coat.

Linda Tellington-Jones has been developing her training system for over two decades. She has worked with many different breeds and riding disciplines. In the middle of the 1960s, she began experimenting with massage and physical therapy for horses. In the late 1970s she spent four years training in the Feldenkrais Method of bodywork for humans and almost immediately saw that the methods could be applied to horses as well.

When Linda looks at a horse's coat, she looks at the hairs on the horse's face. She is looking for swirls, or cowlicks. A horse with one swirl centered in the forehead is supposedly predisposed to being dependable and trustworthy. A horse with two or more swirls on the face is supposedly predisposed to erratic, sometimes explosive behavior. I challenge you to put her theory to the test with the horses you come in contact with.

One horse I am working with has two swirls on his head. This horse was working well, with no reason to think he was dangerous. He did tend to "run hot and cold" meaning he would be very high strung on some days and almost lethargic on others. On a day he was acting very calm, his rider (a skilled and experienced rider) mounted him and he exploded into a bucking fit, breaking her collar bone and two ribs. Coincidence?

The art of studying swirls on a horse's head, and over his entire body is an ancient one. In Marguerite Henry's King of the Wind the horseboy/slave Agba repeatedly laments over the swirls on the neck of his favorite charge. The opening setting of the book is 200 years ago in Africa and the swirls, called "wheat ears" were a sure sign of ill fortune. The story is of the famous Godolphin Arabian, one of the founding sires of Thoroughbred breed. Indeed, this great horse had many misfortunes before laying his claim to fame and immortality.

Linda Tellington-Jones is best known for her massage and physical therapy methods known as TTouches and her TTeam (Tellington Touch Equine Awareness Method) training methods. TTouch is a series of small circular movements using specific parts of the hand on various parts of the horse's body. TTeam work is a method of changing behavior and influencing a horse's personality without force. She uses consistent cues and special ground exercises. One of her key philosophies is "treat your horse the way you like to be treated."

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