Advice on behalf of a friend...

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Maia

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My friend has a homebred 4 year old mare that she broke alongside her instructor last August. She spent a couple of months really going well, hacking out confidently alone and in company and she did a few inhand shows with her. Around October time she started to struggle with the nights closing in (and she felt it was unfair on the horse to do schooling in the school) so she did 1 20min session in the school in just walk and trot a week and hacked out both days at the weekend. The mare started to become overly forward hacking and seemed in a hurry to get home, ignoring any aids to chill and relax and kept evading with her head and going through her right shoulder and in the school started putting her back up, ears back and swishing her tail when asked to trot and it resulted in her bucking my friend of in the school when she insisted she trotted. My friend immediately had everything checked for pain and other than a little stiffness down one side of her back and poll could find nothing wrong. She had the vet give her a once over, check her teeth, scan her legs for soft tissue problems, check eyesight, hearing, back (again!) and she had her hormone levels tested - all came back as normal and she got a second opinion on the teeth from a specialist equine dentist. She even got a new saddle as she was worried her wintec wasn't quite right and the saddle has said new saddle fits like it was made for this mare so she felt that it was most likely a case of the mare needing either 6 days a week of cracking on with her or a break until she had lighter evenings and could be more consistent.

She turned her away end of October and the mare has been an absolute poppet (infact she has always been lovely generally) and as she had last week off she had everything checked again about two weeks ago and started some lunging and longreining again about 10 days ago. The mare had been going really, really nicely showing no signs of resistance, pain or bad attitude so on Monday night I came up so we could see what she was like undersaddle. She was a little tense and was a little "mareish" but didn't do anything wrong and walked around on the lunge quite sweetly but did swish her tail and drop her ears back when my friend put her legs on. We did the same last night but my friend was reluctant to trot her as she was worried she might bronc again so tonight I went up and rode her for her.

Sure enough she was very reluctant to trot and got quite stroppy with with whenever I put my legs on and I think given half a chance would have had a broncing fit. (I might add she shows none of this behaviour on the lunge and longreins) I got off on a positive note after just walking round quietly but I told my friend that I wouldn't get back on her until she was going forward off the leg without resistance as I cannot afford to come off someone elses horse and injure myself and my friend said she understood this but asked me what to do now.

We spent a good 20mins poking the horses back quite firmly and had no response but as soon as we bounced up and down next to her she threatened us with her teeth and put her ears back. If I quietly slid my friend on we had no response so I think it is very much an "I don't want to" attitude rather than an "it hurts" one. I suggested she send the mare up to her instructors for a couple of weeks but this mare gets terribly stressed if she moves and my friend is concerned this may make the problem worse and she may still come home and "try it on". I am fairly sure that with a confident, firm rider that will just leg her on through the strop she will realise that its not acceptable within a few sessions so I suggested that she asks instructor to come up and ride her at the yard say Thursday and Friday evening and then come up Sat and Sunday aswell when friend can get on under instructors guidance, possibly even hacking out on the Sunday. What do you think or does it sound like we are missing something?

Sorry for the essay
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cookies and chocolate for anyone who made it to the end and has the kindness to reply
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i would get a good mctimoney chiropractor to look at her. a similar mare i had in to sort out years ago turned out to have a major problem which manifested itself, apparently, as a pain "like a red-hot poker being jabbed up its bum". it was fine for a bit at walk, then bronc'd like a pro till it dropped the rider. no-one ever managed to stay on it, including me...
the problem finally got sorted out and it was fine from then on, easy for anyone to ride.
i would also try a totally different saddle, one that a sensitive horse is known to be fine in, just in case.
best of luck!
 
She's been seen by a Mctimoney Chiro with a brilliant rep locally who is the only one our vets will use. Vet has also done a thorough examination of her back and can't find any problems.
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This was done both back in October and a fortnight ago and the mctimoney chiro said they would struggle to find any fault with her back on his recent visit.

She was in a wintec but when she started misbehaving back in October my friend invested in a saddle company saddle (on the advice of both vet, chiro and instructor as they are meant to be the most "forgiving") and she has had it fitted by a SC fitter and checked by an independant fitter and chiro both in Oct and about over the last fortnight and other than a slight tweak since the mare has changed shape a little it was agreed that it was a really well fitting saddle so I can't see that is the issue either.
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I know your friend had her hormone levels checked previously, but could she be getting hormonal with spring being round thge corner? I know a few mares that will squeal and even kick the riders foot when the leg is used due to internal pain. Often seems to be worse in trot than n walk or canter (or maybe kicking the riders foot is easier in trot
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) Once they go onto regumate they are back to normal.

Or, she could just be taking advantage - particularly as no-one seems to have pushed on through the resistances and made her work. They learn pretty quickly that threats of bucking have the desired effect (i.e stop work). I would try her with a confident rider that is not frightened of her and is used to youngsters. These are the only things I can think of as you have pretty much thought of everything.
 
No, that was actually my thinking but I'd hate to crack down hard with her if there was something else we were missing. If she was mine I'd probably risk coming off (its always more forgiveable when its your own horse that injuries you) and boot her on, giving her a good crack on the arse if she bronced and tried to get out of it. But its not my horse, I'm not prepared to get hurt and I'd hate to give my friend advice such as this if she hadn't ruled out everything else first - she's already spent a small fortune making sure she's had everything she can think of checked for pain as this is "her baby" (she lost the mother last year) so I really don't trust my own judgement on this one
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Would it be worth suggesting a hormone supplement of some decription do you think? Friend had her bloods re-done when the vet was up at the start of the month and nothing was unusual but I wonder whether she is is an oversensitive mare?
 
I think your idea of getting the instructor down to ride is the best one. Get someone on board who can really ride her through it - it does sound as if everything has been checked, and you may be being a little too sensitive about it all. Sounds as if she needs telling what to do for a change rather than asking....?
 
i think your right if they done all cheacks and no problems there then its acting like a young horse as they do ive backed many that ive had this problems ive had a few where they wont move a anywhere before
 
This might sound a little silly...but does the mare understand what a leg aid means? Sometimes we misunderstand a horse which wants to go forward and happens to oblige, for one which is obeying a leg aid.
And if the mare is in season, or sensitive, sometimes using too strong a leg aid can make them breath-hold and stop.
I'd go back to the lunge, re-teach her to go forward from gentle leg aids (use the lunge whip to send her forwards initially) then get after her for not obeying.
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This is the thing - she is 100% on the lunge, very quick off the voice aids, listens etc and I think part of the sucess here is that when she was first being taught to lunge and sillyness or naughiness just rested in her being sent forward - she could buck all she liked but she had to go forwards so now she is as sweet as anything to lunge. Equally on the lunge she is fine to groom on her sides and you can ask her to go "over" just by pushing quite hard where the leg would go - she doesn't do anything threatening and just moves. If she's being bone idle and won't move then you simply "poke" her side and she'll move, again without any reaction except to do as she's told.

I think I'll tell friend to do another week on the longreins and lunge, with a saddle on rather than just the roller (she lunges fine in the saddle, stirrups up or down but friend hasn't done it everytime mainly due to convenience) and ask instructor to come up and ride her a few times. If its more than just a youngster strop I'm fairly sure we'll find out soon enough but I'd hate to tell friend to get her to get someone to ride her through it if there was something we were missing.
 
Get a good professional rider to come and sit on the horse a few times and see if, with a rider who can stick on through a few problems, the horse begins to relax and resist less. If she gets worse with stronger, possibly better riding there's probably a physical problem (in which case I'd recommend Sue Dyson to be the one to find it), if she gets better its just a case of the rider learning what she needs to do to get the same results - hard work but it can be done.
 
It might be worth getting her scanned to rule out an ovarian problem. The fact she strops when ridden but not when being lunged/longlined would suggest a pain issue.

Otherwise I would take her back to the beginning and re-do the basics. Trying to force her through this 'issue' - whether it's pain related OR due to 'forgetfulness' - could make her seriously resistant. She's only a baby - and youngsters don't normally decide 'I don't want to' without a good reason!
 
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