Do some mares get the teenage hormone behaviour early? Like at 3yo instead of 5yo?

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maya2008

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In my experience so far, it’s been the winter before 5yo to the winter after, or the spring of their 5yo year to the autumn. But now we have a little 3yo mare who is showing identical behaviour to our actual ‘turning 5yo’ and it has reminded me of a Welsh A mare we had who stayed angelic at 5, but was interesting at 3. At the time I put the 3yo moments down to change of home, but current pony has been with us since 9 months old so definitely not that for her!

My adult mares are thoroughly fed up with the pair of them (one lost her temper and went for the 3yo - only succeeding in hurting herself in the process; another decided to quietly remove herself by breaking into the next door field and politely refusing to go back in 🤦‍♀️).

Sitting here seriously hoping this is it and we don’t have worse to come when she turns 5!!
 
I don't know. I always thought it was 2 year olds that were worst, followed by 'the Kevins' at about 7. Certainly my younger one was horrible at 2 but has become a little angel at 4, 5 in March. In fact I sometimes wonder if he's been swapped. I got the older one when he was just turning 4 and he was a delight until he was about 6 when he suddenly realised he had an opinion and had a few very minor and short lived strops. Mine are both geldings, maybe mares are different? Emotionally more advanced than boys perhaps?
 
When my mare was 3, I threatened to sell her. More than once. There were some complications, like her BOGOF foal, followed by the worst foal heat in the world (I lie...she wasn't even freakin 3; it was a couple weeks shy of her third birthday). When we weaned the foal, she was an absolute idiot for a couple months. I thought, if this scatty, ditzy horse who can't remember anything I've taught her from one day to the next is just what she's like, then I'm backing and selling ASAP.

She had another wee phase of stroppiness at 5, but that wasn't a big deal. Fixed when I got a saddle that fit, so there was that.

I keep her on Oestress, which has done wonders for managing her seasons. Didn't do shit for my old mare, who was a nightmare when in season until her late 20s, but seems to reduce Hermosa's hormonal lunatic behaviour. Had no bother with her this year. They are all different.
 
Our Ardennes mare completely lost her wits when she first came into season and was positively dangerous, a bit like a runaway train. We just handled her carefully and as little as possible during her seasons. After a few months of training she became able to hold it together even during these times but we were always a bit more careful as she was obviously a bit more wired (a three quarter of a ton of "war horse" charging through electric fences as if they were cobwebs is interesting). She did become a very reliable clever worker, just grin and bear it until things calm down.
 
maya2008 said:
My kids asked today if we couldn’t find the 3yo a new home! My reply was, ‘Who would take her?’ Only way out is through and all that.

Hopefully she’ll turn out to be as nice as Hermosa.
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Yeah, for sure. 3 was definitely her worst year.

I forgot about the bit where our then-YO turned another gelding out into the herd that consisted of 6-7 mares and one gelding who had been there for a while. The feng shui was good, despite some shifting in mare population, because livery yards.

But second gelding made everyone go mental. Hermosa fell madly in love with him, peeing so much that she got sores on her back legs, and a memorable low point was when I was trying to lead her away from her boyfriend, and she lost it, going straight up on her back legs, levitating, and another livery was just like, "Let her go! Just let her go!" And I was like "Oh, f&*&ck no, even if it kills me, because the LAST thing I want this 3yo learning is that she can rear and pull away!" So I held on for grim death, and got her where I wanted her to go, somehow.

She got a little more accepting of my goddess-like authority after that. Other owners who were a bit less assertive (stupid/ballsy) continued to have issues with that gelding, until the YO finally moved him into the gelding field.

She's got a lot more emotional control over her seasons as 6yo (Oestress probably helps), more so than my old mare ever did, but old mare was my hardcore fencewalker, so emotional control wasn't her thing anyway.

I'm glad I didn't sell her! I quite like having her around!
 
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