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Shortly after bringing home a puppy named Stella, speech-language pathologist Christina Hunger recognized that her new dog exhibited similar communication skills to non-verbal children at her clinic. These clients often use Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) devices, which are tablets or laptops that display a variety of icons that play a recording of the corresponding word when pressed. She wondered if she could train Stella to use AAC devices, but knew that pressing small icons on a tablet screen would prove difficult for a dog.
Instead, Hunger found recordable buttons that Stella could push with her nose or paw, and gave her three words to start: “outside,” “play,” and “water.” Stella quickly learned to use the buttons, and in the years since, her vocabulary has increased to 45 words and counting. She can string together words to clearly communicate her needs and even participates in short conversations, a development that surprised Hunger and gave rise to a viral movement of pet owners using buttons to allow their animals to “speak.”
A quick internet search reveals a wide array of animals using buttons and other AAC devices to communicate, including cats, birds, pigs, guinea pigs, large reptiles, and in at least one case, a domesticated skunk. All of these animals share a few important traits, but most notable is a size that makes it easy for them to press the buttons or interact with an electronic tablet.
But would it be possible to use AAC devices with a larger animal, such as a horse? That’s exactly what Carmen Mercer wanted to find out.
Mercer’s horse, Lira, is a 16-year-old American Bashkir Curly. Prior to introducing buttons, Mercer and Lira had worked on target training, and Lira showed a keen interest in touching any new object presented to her. They added AAC to their training in 2021, using recordable buttons mounted to a board in Lira’s run-in shed.
Her first word? “Scritches.”
She now has over twenty buttons and uses almost all of them in context, pressing them with her nose when she has something to say.
“The first moment of spontaneous communication came one day when I didn’t put on her fly mask, because it was going to be a windy, rainy day,” Mercer says. “After I gave her some scritches and went to the shed to get her hay net for refilling, she pushed ‘mask,’ totally unprompted. She doesn’t love her fly mask—after wearing it, she asks ‘mask, all done, scritches’—but she does love routine!”
Lira has also been known to create her own combinations when she doesn’t have the perfect word for what she wants. “She has referred to her chest by pushing ‘belly neck.’ She was so happy when I finally figured out where she wanted to be scratched!”
Inspired by the improved communication she now enjoys with Lira, Mercer started a Facebook group to help other equestrians interested in using AAC* with their equine companions. One member of the group, Kim Sullivan, shared the progress she has made with her 1 ½-year-old donkey gelding, Sunny. After six months, he has picked up “brush,” “scritches,” “treats,” “all done,” “hoof,” and “more.”
“His favorite word seems to be brush,” Sullivan says. “He often asks to be brushed after he eats.”
She has also noticed that improved communication has also led to improved ground manners.
“I’ve noticed that Sunny is less grabby for treats,” she explains. After she hands out a round of treats to Sunny and the other donkeys, she tells him that the treats are all done. Sunny will press the “all done” button and walk away.
One of Mercer’s main goals in teaching Lira to use buttons was to give her the ability to express pain and discomfort. After a farrier trimmed her a bit too severely, Lira became lame. “When I asked if she wanted to push a button (without any other leading words), she commented, ‘ouch, yes.’ I talked to her farrier, who was very willing to take a more conservative approach going forward.”
Those skeptical of the idea of “talking” animals often point to the infamous case of Clever Hans, a horse whose owner claimed he could perform simple arithmetic. In 1907, psychologist Oskar Pfungst determined that Clever Hans was less proficient at math than it might appear, but very proficient at reading the subtle and subconscious body language of his human handler.
But Stella the dog certainly wasn’t the first animal to exhibit the desire and ability to communicate in distinctly human ways. Koko the gorilla and Kanzi the chimpanzee are two famous examples. The talking pets movement has prompted researchers at the Comparative Cognition Lab at UC San Diego to begin a study that aims to use “a rigorous scientific approach to determine whether, and if so, how and how much non-humans are able to express themselves in language-like ways.”
“Some people don’t believe animals can use language,” Mercer says. “Perhaps they can’t in the same way humans do, but I am convinced they have more thoughts and opinions than they are able to express with their body language alone. Why not give them the option?”
At the very least, introducing AAC buttons to your horse can be a fun and interesting way to add enrichment to their routine. Here are some tips to get started:
- You can buy recordable buttons from Hunger for Words (started by Christina Hunger), Talking Tiles, or Learning Resources. FluentPet is another brand popular with small animal owners, but the buttons may be too small for horses to use.
- When you mount your buttons, make sure they are removable so you can change batteries as needed. Both Mercer and Sullivan mounted their buttons with strong Velcro, or some buttons can be mounted using screws. Mount your buttons where they will be protected from inclement weather such as rain or snow.
- Some people like to add images or icons to the buttons or paint shapes using colors that horses can easily see (like yellow and cyan). It’s unknown whether horses can learn to recognize these identifiers, but it can certainly help handlers keep track of which buttons correspond to which word.
- Make sure your horses have easy access to the buttons. Lira has 24/7 access to her buttons in her run-in shed, and Sunny’s buttons are hung on the feed room door.
- Start with words that you already use frequently, such as water, food, hay, etc. You can start teaching your horse words even before you get your buttons set up. Start with single words and wait to string words together until your horse is regularly using buttons on their own.
- Introduce new buttons by pressing the button, repeating the word yourself, and modeling the associated word in context. For example, when teaching your horse “brush,” you might use the button before starting to groom your horse. Hunger recommends modeling a word approximately five times every time you use it.
- If your horse uses a button, respond with the associated action even if it was an accident. For example, if they press “water,” you could offer them a drink from their trough. Horses often explore their surroundings by touch and may press a button before they fully understand the purpose or the word itself. Responding to the word will help reinforce the use of the button and demonstrate what the word means.
- Be patient! Depending on past training and your horse’s unique personality, they may quickly learn how to use the buttons, or it may take some time. Some horses might not be inclined to use them at all, and button use should never be forced.
- When using the buttons to ask your horse a question or give a command, make sure to give them ample time to process requests. With dogs, Hunger recommends waiting at least 30 seconds before repeating the request/command. If they still don’t respond or react after an additional 30 seconds, use the button a third time, then continue with modeling the associated word.
- Be mindful of and respond to your horse’s body language. By responding to their non-verbal communication, you show your horse that they can trust you to listen to what they’re trying to communicate, which makes them more likely to explore other means of communication. You can also use these moments as opportunities to model button use by observing what your horse is communicating, using the button to confirm you understand, then modeling the desired behavior.
- As you add more buttons to your horse’s vocabulary, try not to rearrange the order or placement of buttons, if possible. Rearranging or moving buttons can cause confusion and frustration for your horse.
For more information about using talking buttons, you can read Christina Hunger’s book How Stella Learned to Talk: The Groundbreaking Story of the World’s First Talking Dog. She is also on Instagram @hunger4words) and Facebook. Follow Cameron Mercer and Lira on Instagram (@liralearns) or join her Facebook group (Words With Horses), or email her with questions at wordswithhorses@gmail.com. You can also learn more about Kim Sullivan and Sunny on their Facebook page, Lewis the Donkey and Friends.
* Mercer notes that when looking for information about using buttons with animals, some resources use the acronym AIC (Augmentative Interspecies Communication)
