Do nervous people make nervous horses?

ycbm

ycbm

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I've had a very interesting experience recently. I have a clingy, needy and over-reactive horse, who I've managed to train to seem pretty normal. But I broke my wrist three months ago and had to be very cautious around him in case he jumped at something and hurt me. His behaviour got more and more jumpy, until I got my confidence in my wrist back and he came back to 'normal' (which clearly isn't normal for him unless he's with a confident handler). It wasn't to do with not working, because he's still laid off with a healing sarcoid on the girth. To outsiders, I would probably have looked like a perfectly competent/confident handler, but he knew I wasn't. I find it very interesting, as my other horse and pony never changed.
 
Yes they do. If the horse tends to the bolshy rude direction instead they turn into a borderline dangerous nightmare too! They pick up on us so much, mine change depending on how I am so much its scary sometimes.
 
I think some horses are very senestive to changes in their handlers / riders and others are either less senestive or don't let it trouble them .
I have one who I simply won't try to work on the flat if I am down or not myself he's very reactive .
And I also think it's interesting that many horses will jump for technically awful riders but stop for neat well trained riders who are more nervous .
 
100% yes, seen it many, many times where horses have been handled/ridden by nervous folk and been labelled as spooky, bolshy, strong etc to be passed onto a confident rider and the horse changes completely to a quiet well mannered horse.
 
Not necessarily- it depends on the horse. A friend of mine is incredibly nervous but she sensibly bought a wonderful rock of a cob and they are perfectly suited. Her confidence is slowly building thanks to the horse who really does seem to look after her.
 
I think some of them react to nerves and some don't. Not dissimilar to how some are always perfectly mannered, and some will exploit any perceived weakness (physical or otherwise) in the rider to their advantage. I can think of 2 horses at the RS I rode at who fit each of these types.
 
Definitely.

I often wonder where one of mine would be now if he was initially bought as a youngster by a less confident more faffy person.
 
peanut said:
Not necessarily- it depends on the horse. A friend of mine is incredibly nervous but she sensibly bought a wonderful rock of a cob and they are perfectly suited. Her confidence is slowly building thanks to the horse who really does seem to look after her.
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The OP means if the horse was naturally nervous, does a nervous person make it much worse i think. Your friend bought sensibly and hopefully her confident horse will make her a confident horse-woman :D
 
Pretty much any horse sooner or later I think- just some nervy ones it would just take them to be looked at where the rock solid ones it takes a few years and a few bad experiences!
 
peanut said:
Not necessarily- it depends on the horse. A friend of mine is incredibly nervous but she sensibly bought a wonderful rock of a cob and they are perfectly suited. Her confidence is slowly building thanks to the horse who really does seem to look after her.
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Yes of course. I have three. Only one changed.

The interesting thing to me is that before I broke my wrist I would have been happy to sell him as easy to handle by almost anyone. I wouldn't now I know how quickly he can change.
 
For a horse of a slightly anxious disposition then yes a nervy rider can be a disaster.

A few years back I bought a super little cob X type as a project to sell. He was with a windy middle aged lady and was on the verge of a nervous breakdown!! There was nothing wrong with this little fella, he was a complete dude, with the right rider completely sane and easy and fun.

When I went to sell him it was an interesting exercise! He naturally fell into that windy middle aged RC rider market - but even if they were perfectly capable riders he would pick up on their anxiety and get tight and spooky. I changed tactic on marketing and he went to a horizontal young teenager!!
 
To a certain extent. My boy is supremely confident in 'his' environment - out hacking, in the field, on the yard, in the school (alone or with company in all these circumstances) but take him somewhere in the trailer (again alone or with company) and he turns into a clingy, needy, jumpy, neurotic screwball. This doesn't bother me so I never change the way I am around him I just laugh at him but it doesn't help him to calm down!

However, when I first had him, his strength scared me a bit and it took me a while to get used to him. I knew I couldn't let it change the way I rode him and I tried to be relaxed but I'm sure I wasn't! At first he was very tense and bouncy especially if he knew a canter was coming but as soon as I realised no matter how much he pulled he didn't go any faster if I let go, I relaxed, he did too. He's now the most chilled horse ever, never pulls and will quite happily walk in places we often canter until he's told he can go - and if he isn't told, he doesn't go.
 
it can also work the other way, i knew of a horse that was very quiet and the owner rode her in spurs and i used to see her out hacking and the horse looked a complete plod. the riding school i worked at part time bought her as she was so quiet and sensible....we used her as lead horse for a week to make sure she was ok and she changed and was a fab forward going ride and in fact a bit too good for our novice riders. she was saved for the more advanced riders and was never a plod but was ultra safe and sensible.. i think her owner must have been horizontal and maybe the horse was bored being on her own and once she was with the other horses she perked up...
 
It does also depend on the horse.
I had a lovely traditional Welsh Section D Cob which I could put anyone on and let them go for a nice long hack.
She would always bring them back completely happy as she was 100% and I mean 100%.
 
My horse is very nervous/spooky and I find it very difficult to get anything out of him when the sheep are nestled under the tree line which runs along the ménage fence. I might as well be on another planet. But I am not a nervous rider, far from it, I feel that I have quite an average level of confidence, he doesn't scare me very easily.

On a rating, if I said '1' was very confident and '10' was super nervous, I would say I was on '2' on a daily basis and maybe on '3' or '4' at competitions but that's more to do with having some nasty falls at comps in the past.
 
I've recently run some "experiments" that tell me without doubt that my horse reacts to my nerves and I feel guilty. If I stay calm and loose, he is happy and easy- if I get tense and grabby at the reins he gets joggy and hollow almost immediately. I have to approach everything as if I do not expect a problem and 9 times out of 10 I won't get one.
 
I find it helps to think about transfer of energy, rather than nerves. You can "gee up" a more stolid animal by upping your energy, either on the ground on ridden and steady a more reactive animal by decreasing your own energy.
 
skint1 said:
I've recently run some "experiments" that tell me without doubt that my horse reacts to my nerves and I feel guilty. If I stay calm and loose, he is happy and easy- if I get tense and grabby at the reins he gets joggy and hollow almost immediately. I have to approach everything as if I do not expect a problem and 9 times out of 10 I won't get one.
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Don't feel guilty! Only a really good owner would do what you've done with him. Well done :)
 
I remember an old fashioned saying that "fear runs down the reins". True then, true now.

Horses IMO take their confidence from the rider and if the rider is nervous then so will the horse be.

Another saying which used to be bandied about the hunting field far more than it is now, was (if coming into a big scarey fence) to "throw your heart over first and follow it like B'ggery".

Says it all!
 
Thank you :) I'm doing my best to re-programme myself. I don't always succeed. Tractors and large vehicles worry me- and thus him. I really like the "transfer of energy" visualisation- that is exactly true.
 
This thread strikes a chord with me. My first horse very much looked to people to give him confidence and direction, and could on occasion be a bit scary if it wasn't forthcoming. My current horse, who I have had since a month after he was first sat on as a 3yo, is totally different. He is extremely comfortable in his own skin and would have to be handled and ridden all day every day by someone filled with overwhelming terror before it would get to him in the slightest.
 
I've seen this happen a few times too. I've also seen my horse the most scared she's ever been (ditched me and galloped home on a gravel track, jumped a 5 bar gate, fell over and got up to carry on galloping, all with a tendon injury... never ever behaved like this before or since!) out on a hack with a very nervous rider. Although I wasn't nervous, my friend and her horse really were, and I'm completely confident my little one picked up on this and would not have behaved the way she did if our company would have been more confident. Not that I hold it against my friend, luckily everyone including pony was fine and I really sympathise with nerves!
 
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