Donkeys and Humans

Natural Horsemanship with Donkeys Focus: Animal Assisted Activities, Education and Therapy

Anahid Klotz

• Publisher: Books on Demand
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN:
  9783734789779
• eBook ISBN:
  9783739255040
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Scienze sociali
• Subtopic: Sociologia

DONKEYS AND HUMANS describes natural communication between humans and donkeys and provides numerous possibilities of including donkeys in leisure activities, education and therapy. Part One of the book discusses how to plan and structure the training for donkeys as well as donkey handlers, and presents detailed theoretical knowledge and practical examples. This training programme is supported by a great variety of pictures and also includes all basic exercises of Natural Horsemanship. Natural Horsemanship adapted to donkeys demands respectful and harmonious communication with the sensitive and intelligent donkeys and is fundamental to Part Two of the book which explores the manifold possibilities of including educated donkeys in experiential leisure activities, animal assisted education and animal assisted therapy. Appropriate example structures and a catalogue of exercises help to develop more than just "education through cuddling". The chapters are designed clearly and understandably and include extensive illustration. The book is aimed at donkey handlers, donkey friends, horse handlers, entrepreneurs interested in animal assisted leisure activities, teachers, psychologists and specialised therapists. Target groups for animal assisted therapy include children and young people attending kindergartens, elementary schools, regular schools or schools for special needs, i.e. those for multiply disabled, learning disabled or young people in difficult phases. Innumerable possibilities for clients with psychosomatic or psychological disorders are also mentioned. Another important target group is the growing number of elderly people who often suffer from dementia or other disorders associated with older age. A further chapter discusses involving donkeys successfully in personality training programmes.

Part 1 – Natural Horsemanship with Donkeys

An introduction to the system of natural communication with a donkey

Keeping donkeys involves a lot of responsibility. It starts with providing an environment that is appropriate for the animals. There is extensive literature available on this subject² and becoming a member of associations or interest groups can also help keep donkey handlers informed about both theory and practice. However, it is important to be very selective about the information that is offered. Not everything that is recommended or even required by official authorities is correct and species-appropriate for donkeys. If we want to include donkeys in our lives, work with them, and be active with them, then we need expert knowledge about them. This refers both to their health and physiological needs and to their behaviour. Since the beginning of the domestication of donkeys about 6500 years ago, this expert knowledge has constantly grown. If we want to communicate with donkeys and if we would like to have these intelligent animals as partners, we have to learn their language system. Donkeys can use this language system perfectly, at the latest when they are weaned from their mothers, and they never lose it. It is a highly developed and finely tuned system which we humans will never be able to learn completely. We can try to learn techniques, principles and rules, i.e. as many elements of their communication system as possible, so that the donkeys can understand us in a natural way. But what does a “natural way” mean?

Let us look at the opposite, i.e. the “artificial way”. Pets, and domestic animals³ of all types - for the production of meat, animal products (e.g. wool, milk, eggs) and animal by-products (e.g. for medical purposes and cosmetics), and animals used for work and transport, are kept under artificial conditions both in regard to their physical needs and their natural behaviour. For example, many horses used for leisure activities⁴, mountain rescue dogs, free-range poultry, honey bees, racing camels, hunting dogs and horses used for moving timber often live under good or very good conditions. In some countries animals living in zoos or caravan animals are reasonably well-kept. Some pets live under good conditions although the estimated number of unreported cases of abuse is especially high for pets and shows an increasing tendency. This abuse can be fully intended or occur because of a lack of knowledge about the animal. Animals used for industrial farming, such as pigs, cattle, poultry, fish in aquaculture, reptiles for the leather industry, or animals in fur farms, are in the worst situation. An extreme example of such abuse is the force feeding of geese to make their livers fat. If an animal is kept under conditions that are not appropriate for its species for a longer time, its behaviour will become increasingly disturbed. This may be irrelevant for the handlers who use their animals for industrial farming if the animal product itself is not affected in any way. Luxury high heels made of python leather – the python’s soul is irrelevant (although one may very well ask whether a python has a soul or not). An animal in a caravan has to use all its strength to transport the load. Its mental condition matters little. When the animals are tied together and forced with sticks to move forward, the individual animal has no chance to show its needs.

There are completely different requirements placed on those of us who would like our donkeys to accept us as partners. Partnership between humans and donkeys is very demanding for us and our animals. It requires physical, mental and psychological fitness on both sides. We can promote this fitness by using, as far as possible, a language that the donkeys understand. Through this communication we can increase the mental interaction between them and us. This is fun for everyone, offers new impetus and makes the partnership richer. We want to elicit as much as possible the many wonderful qualities of the domestic animal “Donkey”, and at the same time make sure that he enjoys himself. We can “use” donkeys as leisure partners and as animals supporting pedagogy and therapy to everyone’s mutual enjoyment.

Do donkeys want this at all? Yes, they do! They have a lot of extra physical and mental energy, energy that they would need if they lived in the wild. This dormant energy can be used in a meaningful way for their new tasks.

In any interaction with animals we have to ask ourselves this question: How much of our interaction reflects the real situation and how much do we interpret animal behaviour? For example, we come to the stable and the donkey stays where he is. We can interpret this as follows: “The donkey is upset and is ignoring me because I didn’t give him any treats yesterday”. But the real situation could also be the following: The donkey has just spent a quarter of an hour lying in the sand and is continuing his usual resting period in a standing position.

The donkey-human communication system seen from the perspective of natural horsemanship is a question of attitude. It is a philosophical attitude which one has, likes, with which one wants to live, and cannot imgine how it could be otherwise.

Modern natural horsemanship was developed by Pat Parelli and his friends, mainly in the USA and Australia in the 1980s. On the basis of his detailed and finely tuned system, which can also be called “learning to speak horse language”, various new forms of horsemanship developed that were often combined with other methods. Pat Parelli says that natural horsemanship is not something that he has created but that it is already so old that it appears new to us. It is certainly not the reinvention of the wheel but it is a newly developed wonderfully effective means of making the wheel...

Table of contents

• Contents
• Foreword to the Second Edition
• Part 1 – Natural Horsemanship with Donkeys
• An introduction to the system of natural communication with a donkey
• Some differences between donkeys and horses
• Motivation
• The evolution of donkeys and their social interaction in the wild
• Significant results of behavioural research on wild donkeys
• Typical behavioural patterns and mood signals of the donkey
• How well do we know our herd?
• Is every donkey suitable for natural horsemanship?
• An introduction to the practice of natural partnership with donkeys
• The Seven Communication Games
• Advanced stages
• Summary of Part One
• List of Exercises – Basics of Natural Horsemanship with Donkeys
• Part Two – Animal assisted activities, education and therapy with donkeys
• Why choose animals to support leisure activities, education and therapy?
• The therapy donkey
• The donkey handler
• The therapist
• Limitations of donkey assisted interventions
• Foreword to the following sections
• Animal assisted activities with donkeys
• Donkey assisted education
• Donkey assisted therapy
• Appendix
• Summary
• Index
• Copyright