Curing a door kicker?

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Hi all, (first post in here :)) has anyone ever successfully cured a door kicker? We have one, a 5 year old, who came to the yard already kicking the door. She bangs incessantly while she's waiting for her feed. Her banging doesn't speed up her feed, she gets fed when its her turn there are others before her.

We could try putting a full grill on her stable door but I'd prefer if she wasn't behind bars all the time.

Also I'd prefer a solution other than feeding her first because that's not always possible

Any tried and trusted remedies?

Coffee and aspirin for reading!
 
Does she get fed when/shortly after kicking the door? If so, it doesn't matter that kicking doesn't speed things up...ultimately, in her head, kicking results in food.

If you haven't already I'd try making a point of only feeding when it's clear she has stopped kicking - reward her for not kicking and waiting patiently, not inadvertently rewarding her for kicking. She'll soon cotton on. The only thing you have to make sure is that everyone knows the rules - no point bothering if others are likely to reward her with food/treats when she kicks.
 
Carpet on the door so no noise or what we did with one really bad one was the door was opened and the chain put across. Result = silence and end of kicking!
 
Make it so the horse cannot get to the door to kick it, assuming stable is big enough to do this, once its not been able to get to the door for a few days then it will forget the habit x

If it does it for atttention, ignore it until he/shes quiet then give lots of fuss x

Feed outside the stable x
 
I've used a couple of methods. Had a new mare with a history of door kicking who nearly demolished her stable while waiting for her feed. While making feeds up,the banging started so I stopped and put her back in the field with no evening feed. She was so shocked she didn't do it again, ever.
A food loving cob used to bang at tea time, so everytime his foot hit the door, I stopped making the feed, went over and asked him to back up away from the door. Repeated this every single time he banged, even when carrying the feed, bowl was put down, left and cob was asked to back up again. When feed arrived he was asked to back up in order to receive the food.
By the second evening, he'd worked out the association ;-

kicking= food delay.

Standing quietly=food.
 
I have used the following twice with success

Basically as I bring feed to give him, I call 'name' tea time. As well as making lots of visits and noise into the feed room without giving feed

It seems they learn that me calling tea time is the 'trigger', not me coming in and out of the feed room
 
Horse across from mine on yard is a door kicker- took away the door and left him with a chain and he started on the water and feed troughs. Really irritating- owner resorted to putting rubber on inside of door and putting an ikea quilt between the door and the rubber covering. Horse in question kicks for attention not for food- its hard to put a stop to it with a busy yard where people walk up and down the barn constantly. Have also heard of people using a water gun to squirt water at door kickers- not sure if it works or not!
 
You can get something called a "Quit Kick". It is a water filled box secured to the front of the stable. When the horse kicks the device squirts water straight up. This usually hits them in the face and they stop fairly quickly. It also has the advantage that they don't associate a human with it.

There are a couple of problems with it though. Some learn to kick the door with an extended foreleg so the spray doesn't get them and you're back to square 1. The other problem is that if you are doing yard feeds in a hurry and lean over the door to drop the feed in rather than opening the door you can shake the door enough to triggr the spray which promptly shoots straight up your front and turns you into the yard version of a wet t shirt entrant. (Personal experience here - not that I'm bitter or anything!)

The other method I've seen used - although I'm not sure I'd advocate it other than in really extreme circumstances - is to put a strand of battery powered electric tape on the inside of the door. If he gets close enough to kick it will shock him. Its effective...
 
Prepare the food prior to the horse being brought in, and put it outside the stable with a towel over it (or just around the corner).

Put horse in the stable, give horse food - no kicking.
 
The correct way to elmininate a behaviour (any behaviour ;)) is to work out what's rewarding the horse for doing it, and remove this. At the same time work out what behaviour you want instead, and train it.

I would guess - and it's hard to be perfectly accurate without seeing the situation - that the reward, in the horse's mind, is that this behaviour brings food. It doesn't always bring food, and sometimes the food comes faster than other times, but when he does it, the food will arrive. No point punishing the door kicking, because you can't do it every single time the horse kicks, and if they get to kick even once, the behaviour is right back where it started.

So you need to make sure that the behaviour is never ever ever rewarded. You need a bit of time to set this up ;) Get horse's bucket and stand in sight. As long as horse is kicking, don't move. As soon as horse stops kicking, move towards them with bucket.

You can make this process even faster and more effective by enlisting someone to stand next to the horse while you're doing this, with a few slivers of cut up carrots. When the horse is not kicking, they say "good boy" and offer a piece of carrot. When the horse is kicking, they do nothing.

This way, you're removing the horse's reason for kicking, as well as giving them a reason for not kicking ;)

There's another thread going on at the moment about science and horses - this is behavioural science, works in all species and you just need to follow the rules :)
 
Water spray :) I hate being pressured by a horse and feeling like I have to feed them when they want it! Water spray is effective, painless and shocks them out of it
 
My little mare used to be a terrible doorkicker. Had her shoes taken off and she never did it again...naughty girl must have been hitting the toe of her shoe very accurately, without shoes she obviously wasn't as keen :D
 
The pony in the stable next to mine was basically a spoiled brat and used to kick his door continuously even after I'd fed him if he thought mine was getting more attention. One day I snapped - I was wearing steel toecap boots and the stable doors were steel too, and I kicked hell out of it and screamed abuse at him. He cowered in the back corner and looked totally shocked. Never kicked the damn door again though!
 
My back lady went on a behaviour course, she was told, when they kick, give them an empty bucket. Feed them when they're not expecting it - empty bucket if they kick when they are expecting it.
 
Mollie never used to kick her door, but on the yard she's now on there are several door-kickers (one very persistant). Within days of arriving on the yard, Mollie started doing it too. :(
 
run some electric fence wire/cord across the inside of the door where he will touch it while kicking. Turn on and stand back. I did this with a chronic DK, he stopped. :)
 
each to their own, but i personally dont like the water spray in the face (reagrdless of human or machine doing it).

I have successfully cured horses of kicking by simply ignoring them. However they are QH, whom i have found to be quite intelligent.
 
Cedars said:
My back lady went on a behaviour course, she was told, when they kick, give them an empty bucket. Feed them when they're not expecting it - empty bucket if they kick when they are expecting it.
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ooh, cedars, I like the psychology of this :D I want a door kicker now, just to pay them back with empty buckets... really mess with their heads :D:D
 
How do I get that signature pic?

Blinking door kickers....

Don't feed. Ignore. Kicking stops. Feed. Horse thinks for a bit... No more kicking.
 
FionaM12 said:
Mollie never used to kick her door, but on the yard she's now on there are several door-kickers (one very persistant). Within days of arriving on the yard, Mollie started doing it too. :(
Click to expand...

Big Fuzzy has never done it - within 5 days of Giant Fuzzy arriving, she copied him :mad:
He bangs for england - or did - I got lovely livery to take him to the top fields so I cant see him :) He still does it whilst being tacked up, groomed etc when brought down to the yard tho but I have plans to stop this.............

Am a firm believer in the electric fencer for old codgers like GF
BF has got a door chain - stopped banging the day it went up :D
 
Lots of interesting suggestions, but if I can be so rude as to hi jack the thread just a tiny bit, what would you all do with a constant door kicker? I mean one who will bash away at the door all through the day, is kept in during the day because if he's in at night he completely breaks the door down! If he's left out he'll kick the gates until they break and he can come into the American barn again. This horse will kick all day long, with hay etc, and even if there's no one in sight. Owner can't afford a quit kick so any suggestions please? He's actually injuring his shoulder on the side he kicks from so owner is desperate to stop him. Carpet made no difference, ignoring him makes no difference, he doesn't get fuss or attention for kicking because he's very territorial over his stable door so no one but owner can get near. Very complicated horse with a history of abuse in his past.

Any suggestions gratefully received, and apologies again OP for hi jacking your thread. :o
 
Kicking door = no feed.... silence for a period more than a few seconds = feed.

This worked with my youngster. It took a looooooooong time the first night for him to shut up, but it got shorter and shorter and eventually he worked out that if he kicked the door he didn't get fed, but that when he was quiet he got his food straight away.
 
bikerchickone said:
Lots of interesting suggestions, but if I can be so rude as to hi jack the thread just a tiny bit, what would you all do with a constant door kicker? I mean one who will bash away at the door all through the day, is kept in during the day because if he's in at night he completely breaks the door down! If he's left out he'll kick the gates until they break and he can come into the American barn again. This horse will kick all day long, with hay etc, and even if there's no one in sight. Owner can't afford a quit kick so any suggestions please? He's actually injuring his shoulder on the side he kicks from so owner is desperate to stop him. Carpet made no difference, ignoring him makes no difference, he doesn't get fuss or attention for kicking because he's very territorial over his stable door so no one but owner can get near. Very complicated horse with a history of abuse in his past.

Any suggestions gratefully received, and apologies again OP for hi jacking your thread. :o
Click to expand...

In this case I would give up, let him live out and have him in a field with post and electric rather than post and rail. A friend of mine had a similar problem and this was the only thing that worked in the end.
 
I am the (unfortunate?!) owner of a constant door kicker. he will kick for attention even when i'm standing right in front of him. I can't see him ever stopping this its just a bad habit, however I have the inside of my stable door completely covered. First there is a layer of rubber, with a thick dog bed on top and heavy duty carpet screwed over the lot. He still kicks it, but not for as long because there is hardly any noise. Its giving protection to his hooves and also my head!!

(I couldn't help but laugh at him getting frustrated about there being no noise the first time he came in after we kick proofed the door hehe!)
Good Luck!
 
A lady at a yard that I was on had her cob's door cut in half and the the bottom half replaced with thick rubber matting that moved when the horse kicked it. Horse doesn't even try now. I was really impressed with this.
 
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