Hard/no mouth horse

[Khalea]

Hey all. As my horse is out of work for a looong time due to tendon injury, I started riding BO’s horse. He has a hard mouth, carries head high, and is tense and stiff. I worked on relaxing him and getting him to work through his body correctly, and we got to the point where he does relax and would even go long and low. We didn’t canter. But yesterday, I tried to canter on a small circle, and he was listening and good, and all of the sudden, he spooks/goes very sharp to the right, I manage to sit back, he jumps and goes full speed, I slow him down and then he starts jumping and freaking out at full speed again, and just before we hit the fence, he goes left and I’m on the ground. And he just stopped. So he didn’t want to get his energy out, he wanted to get rid of me. BO says it is my fault and my reins were to long (they were at some point), but I was out of balance multiple times, holding on for my dear life. He is ridden in a snaffle bit. Do you think I should give up riding him? Or continue and try to work on softening him and make him supple, and only lunging in canter and maybe canter in a round pen/on the lunge line?

 

[paddi22]

Cantering on a small circle is extremely tough for a horse, much harder than you probably think, . if any horse is carrying its high and is tense and stiff, I wouldn't introduced canter at all until the horse is supple and relaxed in trot all the time. the main worry is there is a tweak or pain somewhere causing the stiffness and tensions. have you had the horse checked out by a physio?
I get project horses in to retrain all the time who have issues like your horse. I take them out of the arena, get them balanced, relaxed and working properly over their back on hacks and in straight lines. do you have a good instructor who can guide you through improving a horse like this, it's very tough to do if you haven't done it before.

 

[Bob notacob]

OMG youve stolen my horse.............Long and low is the way forward .ps he likes brayburn apples. lol

 

[oldie48]

Agree with paddi55 and would add doing anything on a small circle is hard for a horse that is stiff. Although in theory it's great to be able to work a horse in a long and low frame, that can also be very difficult and I've had quite well schooled horses that can only do that at the end of a session, not at the beginning until they have become more supple. I'd get the horse checked over and then work with asking the horse to stretch and flex in walk, keep your circles at 20m in trot and introduce smaller circles and serpentines as he becomes more supple and keep your sessions short. I used to do a short hack as a warm up and then go into the school for 10 mins. By all means do a little canter work but if he's head is stuck in the air, I wouldn't try any circles. fwiw, most of my older stiffer horses (all well schooled and in regular work) benefitted from doing some canter work before we did the trot work as it helped to loosen them up.