fools_ gold
Well-Known Member
Ok this could be a long one, and also hard to put down into words...
Have had my boy for about 6 months now, his general temperament is very sweet, absolutely loves cuddles attention, being groomed etc.
He is a complete pansy and can be very spooky and sensetive but you kind of get the feeling there is a brave soul in there somewhere trying to get out!
He's 6 years old warmblood, and very green.
He was quite poor when I got him, and moved him to a yard with very restricted turn out.
Things started off ok, did lots of ground work to get to know him, started riding him, first few times I got on he was fine, third or fourth time, he freaked out and ditched me at the mounting block.
Then continued to get worse at the mounting block, we managed to get him better, long suffering boyfriend with polo to distract and he will stand quite well - most of the time.
He always felt very on edge when being ridden though - you know that feeling like any second you are going to get an explosion! Would be a bit spooky but once you had shown him something, he was ok.
I put that on edge feeling down to being young, WB, too much energy not enough turnout. Just figured I would take things slow, and in time he would get better.
We moved house, and I had to put him on full livery with exercise for a while as we were renovating our house and land and I didn't feel I would have enough time for him. The lady looking after him mostly lunged/ long reined and built up his strength, he was turned out all day and stabled at night. He is looking good and has put on condition. I went up a few times to ride him, and he was even more on edge than usual. Last time I went to ride him put tack on and took him down to the school, got in there and all of a sudden he started bronking like he had never had a saddle on in his life. I hadn't even attempted to get on him at that point.
I did get on him eventually, and he did a half hearted bronk, but stopped when I shouted at him. We just had a walk around that day and we was his usual self, on his tippy toes but very responsive and trying to please.
On Sunday we moved him home, he has 24/7 turnout, very chilled quiet atmosphere. Him and my new horse settled straight away. I tried to ride him last night, and he was being silly at the mounting block, but finally stood still to let me get on by myself - which is only about the second time he has done that. Got on, stood still, walked a couple of steps felt a bit on edge so I made him stand for a little longer gave him a stroke, talked to him, let him get settled, then asked him to walk on, took all of 2 steps and full on bronced, slamming me on the floor, landed on my coccyx, hit my head, thought I had broken my arm... OUCH!!!!!!
Today I am feeling very sorry for myself, massive bruise on my arm and bum and a bit of a headache! Don't really want to get back on him as feel I could really get hurt.
I initially put his behaviour down to being a bit of a sensitive/ green horse or maybe trying it on to see what he could get away with. But I am now thinking that he has pain as he has got progressively worse.
The other thing I noticed which I also put down to him being a big pansy, is that when he travels in a horse box he can't find his sea legs with his back legs - he is really stompy. When I first bought him I had lady transport him, I didn't travel with her, but asked her how he was and she said he was perfect, travelled really well. When I moved him from that yard, I travelled with the horse transporter and he was pretty much like a drunken sailor the whole way, and recently we brought him on a 5 minute journey round to ours on nearly entirely straight roads and he was the same. Not sure if this is related but thought it's worth mentioning.
It's probably worth mentioning that he wasn't like this when I tried him, he seemed pretty straight forward. Tried him in the school, out on a hack, went for a nice canter, he was awesome. Haven't managed more then walk and trot since I got him, and only ridden out a handful of times as don't feel safe.
He was 2 stage vetted and passed fine.
Have any of you had a similar experience? What was the problem?
Thank you so much if you have made it this far, I hope that was clear enough, it's quite hard to write everything down in a logical way!
Pretty sure the only way to move forward is to have him fully checked out by the vet, but just wanted to see if anyone else could give me the benefit of their experience! Just want to do the best by my boy!
Have had my boy for about 6 months now, his general temperament is very sweet, absolutely loves cuddles attention, being groomed etc.
He is a complete pansy and can be very spooky and sensetive but you kind of get the feeling there is a brave soul in there somewhere trying to get out!
He's 6 years old warmblood, and very green.
He was quite poor when I got him, and moved him to a yard with very restricted turn out.
Things started off ok, did lots of ground work to get to know him, started riding him, first few times I got on he was fine, third or fourth time, he freaked out and ditched me at the mounting block.
Then continued to get worse at the mounting block, we managed to get him better, long suffering boyfriend with polo to distract and he will stand quite well - most of the time.
He always felt very on edge when being ridden though - you know that feeling like any second you are going to get an explosion! Would be a bit spooky but once you had shown him something, he was ok.
I put that on edge feeling down to being young, WB, too much energy not enough turnout. Just figured I would take things slow, and in time he would get better.
We moved house, and I had to put him on full livery with exercise for a while as we were renovating our house and land and I didn't feel I would have enough time for him. The lady looking after him mostly lunged/ long reined and built up his strength, he was turned out all day and stabled at night. He is looking good and has put on condition. I went up a few times to ride him, and he was even more on edge than usual. Last time I went to ride him put tack on and took him down to the school, got in there and all of a sudden he started bronking like he had never had a saddle on in his life. I hadn't even attempted to get on him at that point.
I did get on him eventually, and he did a half hearted bronk, but stopped when I shouted at him. We just had a walk around that day and we was his usual self, on his tippy toes but very responsive and trying to please.
On Sunday we moved him home, he has 24/7 turnout, very chilled quiet atmosphere. Him and my new horse settled straight away. I tried to ride him last night, and he was being silly at the mounting block, but finally stood still to let me get on by myself - which is only about the second time he has done that. Got on, stood still, walked a couple of steps felt a bit on edge so I made him stand for a little longer gave him a stroke, talked to him, let him get settled, then asked him to walk on, took all of 2 steps and full on bronced, slamming me on the floor, landed on my coccyx, hit my head, thought I had broken my arm... OUCH!!!!!!
Today I am feeling very sorry for myself, massive bruise on my arm and bum and a bit of a headache! Don't really want to get back on him as feel I could really get hurt.
I initially put his behaviour down to being a bit of a sensitive/ green horse or maybe trying it on to see what he could get away with. But I am now thinking that he has pain as he has got progressively worse.
The other thing I noticed which I also put down to him being a big pansy, is that when he travels in a horse box he can't find his sea legs with his back legs - he is really stompy. When I first bought him I had lady transport him, I didn't travel with her, but asked her how he was and she said he was perfect, travelled really well. When I moved him from that yard, I travelled with the horse transporter and he was pretty much like a drunken sailor the whole way, and recently we brought him on a 5 minute journey round to ours on nearly entirely straight roads and he was the same. Not sure if this is related but thought it's worth mentioning.
It's probably worth mentioning that he wasn't like this when I tried him, he seemed pretty straight forward. Tried him in the school, out on a hack, went for a nice canter, he was awesome. Haven't managed more then walk and trot since I got him, and only ridden out a handful of times as don't feel safe.
He was 2 stage vetted and passed fine.
Have any of you had a similar experience? What was the problem?
Thank you so much if you have made it this far, I hope that was clear enough, it's quite hard to write everything down in a logical way!
Pretty sure the only way to move forward is to have him fully checked out by the vet, but just wanted to see if anyone else could give me the benefit of their experience! Just want to do the best by my boy!