Alicia Mitchell AANHCP Certified Practitioner Natural Hoof Care for the South East of England. Tel: 07912601604

 My experience with natural horsemanship started off when I was very young. I spent most of my childhood at the local BHS riding stables but most of my time was spent talking to the ponies.

I did have ponies, many of whom came from the meat markets of Devon and Cornwall. My step mother would buy them to sell on. I did alot of the horsemanship and training though I didn't realise it at the time.
I would walk around those markets looking at those displaced faces and "tune in" feeling my way. Sometimes it was just too overwhelming and I'd shut off and be unable to speak with anyone.
These experiences, and later on playing tag with my step mothers rescued arab stallion (which I later discovered as Join-Up) set the scene for my horsemanship education and lifelong relationship with the horse.

Aswel as adhering to the AANHCP trimming guidelines I approach my work is as follows:
 It is my aim to work at the horses pace. If they need more time to get to know me and build trust then that is what I will do. I believe that if you invest time at the beginning your save hours in the end plus it's safer. I don't believe in controlling the horse in the conventional sense. However horses instinctivley understand Alfa and Beta behaviour. As a trimmer I am asking them to do something. This is an Alfa position. To me the horse is the client. I want them to be happy with the job and the service they recieve.

Whilst in the USA in 2000 I volunteered at Return to Freedom American Wild Horse and Burro Sanctuary not far from Monty Roberts ranch in California.
At the sanctuary I whitnessed the energy/ atmosphere surrounding totally unhandled horses for the first time. From this meeting I bacame very aware the of stress we put on our domestic horses through by simply not understanding their perspective and their emotional and social needs.

We ask them to do things they don't understand and for reasons they can not comprehend. Since then I have worked to make the relationships I have with both my own horses and my clients horses as light and as straight forward as possible. I am firm but kind. I aim to be clear and easy to understand. I want them to like me.

In 2006 I was lucky enough to cross paths with Suntui, one of only a handful of Epona Approved Instructors here in the UK.
Epona Equine Facilitated Experiental Learning is a unique theraputic approach that was founded by Kathlene Barry Ingram and Linda Kohanov in the USA in the 90's.

What makes his form of communication so different is that it offers a whole new level of information that nearly all horsmanship "training" methods fail to recognise. By using the sensations we experience in our bodies ( fear, tension, joy, disassociation) as information we can better understand what exactly the horse is reacting to when in our presence. Horses communicate and suss a situation through feel so by listening to our own inner dialogue communication between horse and human can take on a new level if finesse.
They can even help us discover things we didn't know we were feeling!

Suntui and Kathlene have been working tirelessly establishing the most fantastic organisation: IFEAL The International Foundation of Equine Assisted Learning.

You can find out more about equine facilitated learning including clinics, training and information on the organisation by visiting their website www.ifeal.me