Anyone ever had a youngster who was awful with fillers, but turned out to be a showjumper?

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Charla

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My rising 5 year old hasn’t done loads of jump training yet, but has a nice, clean jump on her and is comfortable jumping crosses and small straights. So fillers were slowly introduced to her, at the side of the jumps with a wide gap in the middle. And she threw an absolute tantrum. She is not nervous, she has lunged over these on the ground happily, goes straight up to them inhand. Ask her to jump them under saddle and it’s a very different story. I don’t think I expected such a negative reaction! How would you work on this? And has anyone ever had any success stories of horses who didn’t show the most promising attitude, but ended up good BS competition horses?
 
I would work alongside a good riding instructor / rider who can ride the horse a bit and also teach you.

Continue to lunge over fillers and introduce pole work with the fillers at the side.

You could try taking a lead from someone a bit like you would Xc.

If it’s just a confidence thing should get over it quite quickly. Keep everything mega low until they have the idea!
 
Careful horses are often worried about fillers at first because they will want to give them a look and jump with plenty of clearance so I never introduce them until they are confident jumping higher and wider than the fillers will be and mine would be doing plenty of gridwork with fillers at the side/ under one part before being asked to jump a single fence with a filler under it.
There is no reason to think she will not make a jumper but you need to ensure she is not overfaced at this stage.
 
If it makes you feel any better, the horse I have currently, was a complete and utter pro from day 1 with showjumps. Not a backward spooky thought with any type of filler.

He had done about 5 months under saddle and was confidently jumping 90cm when we first took him Xc schooling. Completely expecting him to be as equally straightforward at that. He went very green at the fences but what concerned me the most was his reaction to a ditch.

To say he was a complete and utter pleb about it is an understatement. It took a good 30 mins to get him over a small one, 15 mins of that was with a 4* rider on his back and 15 mins trying a variety of tactics from the ground.

At this time I was anticipating this horse not to have what it took to be an eventer.

I invested some time in ditch training and a month later he was so blasé about them he was barely bothering to even jump them. Never had an issue since and a year later is schooling over all sorts of ditch combos without a blink and is well on track for a new money 2* this summer
 
I have a spooky/nosey pony who is cautious about fillers, especially the standing type, and especially animal shaped ones :eek: Maybe he thinks they are real.

The rest of the time he is quite blasé about brightly coloured showjumps and hanging fillers.

I keep hoping he will grow out of it.

Fiona
 
She wasn't a youngster but I had a late teens connemara mare as a teenager who'd never jumped before and she was a nightmare with fillers for about 6 months solid. Refusing to go anywhere, huge snorting leaps, panicking, but she would jump on the lunge.

She turned into a really useful unaffiliated jumping horse who only got stopped because of her age, and never had a problem with fillers again.

What worked was just doing again and again and again! Only a single fence as she'd freak if was hidden in a grid or similar, and putting a pole over and a back pole so it wasnt just the filler as a focus.
 
ihatework said:
I would work alongside a good riding instructor / rider who can ride the horse a bit and also teach you.

Continue to lunge over fillers and introduce pole work with the fillers at the side.

You could try taking a lead from someone a bit like you would Xc.

If it’s just a confidence thing should get over it quite quickly. Keep everything mega low until they have the idea!
Click to expand...

I am working with a 1* rider, who schools her for me and has now started fillers. The mare is very smart and knows exactly how to get a rider off if she doesn’t want to do it.
Tried again today, after initially dumping the rider, repetition worked and she eventually got bored and didn’t even over jump them. The problem is, each day she acts as though they are a huge deal from the start again.
 
be positive said:
Careful horses are often worried about fillers at first because they will want to give them a look and jump with plenty of clearance so I never introduce them until they are confident jumping higher and wider than the fillers will be and mine would be doing plenty of gridwork with fillers at the side/ under one part before being asked to jump a single fence with a filler under it.
There is no reason to think she will not make a jumper but you need to ensure she is not overfaced at this stage.
Click to expand...

This is interesting, thank you.
 
My mare was very spooky with fillers and had a lightening quick stop and spin in her early days jumping. She was also an incredibly careful mare. I spent hours making and finding anything and everything that could be incorporated into a jump but always keeping them tiny and worked on building her confidence. It took a couple of years before she became completely reliable but she then was super consistent competing successfully.
 
We took on a pony (not a youngster) who was really wary of fillers, ditches etc. I don't think she had done much jumping at all. It just took some time and patience and she turned into a fabulous jumper. She is now outgrown and has gone on to a new home where she has affiliated and is doing well BS.
 
I wouldn't say mine is a proper showjumper by any stretch, but age 6 we would have a battle to do a trot pole or cross pole. I thought fillers or water were out the question. Age 10 he will pop round a 70-85 course with fillers without any stops. It's taken patience, a lot of patience! Get an instructor who is firm but understands horse psychology. Don't ever let the horse 'win' when being evasive but don't get angry and stressy. Correct and represent them quickly, firmly and calmly. Don't allow big circles and run ups for correction. If the horse backs up, let it (mine could go a good 10m before he gave up on that trick). Make jumps easy so they walk over if needed. Hunting also helped us both get braver (bloodhounding).

That said, he can still be a prat about trot poles 🤣
 
Yes, me.

He's rising 7 now but was backed very late (5 and a half!) and early last year we got eliminated more times than I can count. He used to either run out or just refuse to jump any scary fillers or bright colours even at 80cm.

I basically went on a filler spookbusting approach and started putting up a tiny filler every day - bright cavaletti lying flat, loads of cheap plastic tablecloths in new patterns, plastic feed buckets, beach towels, flower pots, fake flowers, buckets inside feed sacks, yoga mats, cones....anything I could find was put out and we would either jump it once or twice from a trot or I'd finish up schooling and lunge him over a tiny filler.

Literally they were small enough that he could walk over them but the only option was to go over. On the odd occasion that he still managed to run out he got stopped, one smack with the crop, and then represented calmly as if nothing had happened. Did this for probably two months around August to October or so, and it improved dramatically.

He does still have to be ridden in quite a committed way to spooky fences but he's just moved up to 1m and is jumping confidently, and will be in the 1.10m to 1.20m by the end of the year. He will still look on occasion but it doesn't have that same stopping feel, just wavering and testing my commitment. I have faith that within a year or so he will be going even better.

I am told that his sire is exactly the same and was very spooky and difficult to jump until about the 1.20 or 1.30m classes, and that a few of his siblings display similar behaviour. The sire is now a top horse who has won all kinds of titles in the 1.60 classes so I think there is definitely hope!
 
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