exercise ideas needed....

[lukeylou]

decided to put some poles around the school today as my boy has a fear of them. i'm trying to get him used to them. managed to get him over a cross pole at the end of the session and he was a very good boy.

however, he is still quite reluctant to go near poles and needs quite a lot of coaxing. he doesnt just spook, he slams on the breaks runs backwards, the lot.

when he does jump, he jumps well but he has to have a good look first!

are there any exercises to help him man up? any advice at all would be great =]

 

[Alfie_Moo]

This may sound random but could you put a pole in his field or something just so he gets used to having it about. Maybe near where you put food down so that he go near it. Don't know if it works with horses but it is the sort of training method i use with my dogs if they are scared of anything.

 

[VioletStripe]

ditto, i think keep the poles around a lot. even when exercising and schooling, just ride near them, and only take him over if he's relaxed, but first just ride near them so he sees they're not a threat. also walk him over them in hand and give him lots of praise occasionally to get him used to picking up his feet. don't make him go over them if he's not happy to, otherwise he'll associate them with being unhappy! xx

 

[Quadro]

if u can put a pole in the gateway to his field so he has to step over it going into and out of the field, i do this with watertrays and i never have a problem when they meet them in the sj ring!!!

 

[Ziggy_]

Ditto the above. I would not do any sort of jumping at all, however tempting it may be, until he will tackle a single pole happily and confidently every single time. Slowly slowly build up to a line of poles and only then introduce tiny jumps. This will likely take a period of weeks or maybe months.