AGray825
Well-Known Member
I'm sure you're probably all sick of hearing about my youngster problems, but we're back at it again
For those who might not know the history, brief summary:
Big black beauty of a horse, bought at 15 mo, should have been 16hh is now 17.1hh (ish) at 6 yo. Broke pedal bone just as he turned 4 and just after initial backing had started. Had a year to recover (with rehab involved so groundwork and long lining during that time after soundness returned). Attempted backing, went slowly but well for three weeks, then horse flipped out, bronked, lost confidence. Gave him winter off and in April he was sent away to be professionally backed.
And here we are. And perhaps this is partially my fault, but the woman I sent him to did an amazing job with him. But she also taught him how to jump. Now all he's interested in is jumping and I'm not a good enough jumper to do that with him (as he's a talented but not 'safe' jumper if you know what I mean). Also the vet already told me that he won't find longevity in jumping because the pedal bone fracture was quite severe and arthritis could set in quickly.
So as he's come back home my plan has been to progress his flatwork and pop a few crosspoles every now and then for variety.
And he was happy with that for about two weeks (the honeymoon period I guess) and now for the last three weeks he's been a complete tw*t in virtually all aspects of life.
He won't stay in a field, has learnt how to pull up the top gate handles and then jumps the lower electric fence. I stopped scratching him in the field and went to walk away and he turned his hind end to kick because that wasn't what he wanted. He's back to his old bronking ways whenever I'm doing something he doesn't want to do (flatwork for example... I hadn't even started trotting properly the last time and he got arsey with me.... so it's not like I'm even given chance to make it more 'exciting' for him)
I had the woman who backed him back over last night and he was just as arsey with her, gave some almighty bucks and was generally reluctant to listen at all.
I'm currently sitting these temper tantrums okay, but this just isn't fun in any way and he just doesn't seem to be improving. Is this behaviour to have been expected or is there something else going on? He's not showing pain anywhere but I suppose you never know....
I have a dressage instructor coming to have a look at him and see if she can give me some tip and lessons to make flatwork more interesting for him, as really dressage/flatwork should be his main form of exercise given his previous injury!
All in all I'm just feeling like a bit of a failure with him but I don't know what to do about it! Any advice would be very warmly received!
For those who might not know the history, brief summary:
Big black beauty of a horse, bought at 15 mo, should have been 16hh is now 17.1hh (ish) at 6 yo. Broke pedal bone just as he turned 4 and just after initial backing had started. Had a year to recover (with rehab involved so groundwork and long lining during that time after soundness returned). Attempted backing, went slowly but well for three weeks, then horse flipped out, bronked, lost confidence. Gave him winter off and in April he was sent away to be professionally backed.
And here we are. And perhaps this is partially my fault, but the woman I sent him to did an amazing job with him. But she also taught him how to jump. Now all he's interested in is jumping and I'm not a good enough jumper to do that with him (as he's a talented but not 'safe' jumper if you know what I mean). Also the vet already told me that he won't find longevity in jumping because the pedal bone fracture was quite severe and arthritis could set in quickly.
So as he's come back home my plan has been to progress his flatwork and pop a few crosspoles every now and then for variety.
And he was happy with that for about two weeks (the honeymoon period I guess) and now for the last three weeks he's been a complete tw*t in virtually all aspects of life.
He won't stay in a field, has learnt how to pull up the top gate handles and then jumps the lower electric fence. I stopped scratching him in the field and went to walk away and he turned his hind end to kick because that wasn't what he wanted. He's back to his old bronking ways whenever I'm doing something he doesn't want to do (flatwork for example... I hadn't even started trotting properly the last time and he got arsey with me.... so it's not like I'm even given chance to make it more 'exciting' for him)
I had the woman who backed him back over last night and he was just as arsey with her, gave some almighty bucks and was generally reluctant to listen at all.
I'm currently sitting these temper tantrums okay, but this just isn't fun in any way and he just doesn't seem to be improving. Is this behaviour to have been expected or is there something else going on? He's not showing pain anywhere but I suppose you never know....
I have a dressage instructor coming to have a look at him and see if she can give me some tip and lessons to make flatwork more interesting for him, as really dressage/flatwork should be his main form of exercise given his previous injury!
All in all I'm just feeling like a bit of a failure with him but I don't know what to do about it! Any advice would be very warmly received!