Can you traffic proof a horse again that had a bad experience?

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sz90168

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I have currently got a horse on trial for full loan however I have now found she is not very good on the roads if anything is fast moving or makes a sound when the roads are wet. She spun run around one occasion or on the verge. The owner has told me that she had two near misses on the horse that affected her confidence and that the mare has since not been hacked much. Since I have found out I have done some desentising work with her on the yard with my friends noisy land rover and getting cars to drive past her through puddles/revving engines and she has got much better with this. Is there anymore I can do at the yard? I am reluctant to take her out on the roads again unless in hand. I hacked her out with a traffic proof horse and it did not make much difference to her when the cars came past. I really like the horse but I want to be able to hack her out in future on my own if we ever have to move yards (where we are at the moment we do not have to hack on roads to access miles of off-road hacking). I also wonder if you can really cure a horse that has had a bad experience and make them reliable on the roads?

Any suggestions and experiences welcome.
 
If this is a potential loan rather than purchase and you have no plans to move yard I'd not be too worried in your current circs. The owner could take the horse back at any time and, similarly, you could simply return it if you moved.

That may sound harsh but, given that you have no security in keeping the horse, I'd make a decision based on if you want to take it on as it is for now. Longer term plans really only make sense with a bought animal.
 
My horse has a real fear of motorbikes. It helped massively when I deliberately swapped fields so he could be near the road and hear them go by. However, we still have issues hacking. Luckily, we don’t have many of them on our route. I had 4 come towards me a few weeks ago and I waved my arms around frantically and they were so good and stopped and turned off their engines. He was very upset walking past them though and tried to dive in the ditch because of fear. He was shaking. I don’t know if he will ever be ok with bikes.
 
All you can do is to continue the good work and when the longer daylight hours come take him out with at least one if not two very road safe horses with sensibl riders very early in the mornings to get used to the roads.
Some horses will cope with traffic etc and others sadly won't.
I used to ride my horse by himself through Central London and he did not care less about anything.
Best of luck and always wear Hi-Viz!
 
My cob had a fright with a lorry and a tractor last year, today he went past a hedge cutting tractor nice and calmly, we have just persevered and acted as if it is nothing is amiss, it can be done but guess it all depends on the individual horse.
 
My mare can/ is scared of large heavy goods vehicles passing .. there is nothing worse than that sinking feeling when you see or hear one coming your way, lol. OP keep doing what your doing but just stay as safe as you possibly can. I dont have the option, I must go on roads and therefore we will encounter large trucks ect so for me its about my mental attitude and how i can give my mare confidence even if inside i am thinking about how im a gona I would never let her know that, to her its all fine and dandy and happy happy .... The fact you lead it out in hand amazes me. I can never understand that logic and i would much rather be on top of something being silly than underneath it so hats off to you!
 
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