Home arena spooking, what are your tactics ?

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castella

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Our yard outdoor arena is about as spooky as you can get with one end having a spooky judges hut complete with loads of other distractions behind it, my new girl hates it and will spook nearly everytime going past, rearing, spinning, rushing, gawping the lot.

How do you deal with it, do you make your horse face up to it ?, avoid it ?, gradually go closer and closer ? I have tried facing up to it and that doesn't work, so now we side up to it slowly normally in shoulder in past it but she will still have me from time to time. Sometimes it feels like its back to square one everytime we go in there, and she isn't scared as she isn't bothered by anything out hacking its all just work evasion as until she came to me she had been allowed to take the mickey.

We are supposed to be doing an intro test in there in 2 weeks trotting straight down the centre line to it and there is no way in hell we are going to manage it :-(
 
One of my horses is very sharp, and he used to ALWAYS be a nightmare going down one of the long sides of the outdoor school because that's where some of the jump stands/filler/poles/bright blue barrels got stored. It was an utter nightmare because you couldn't do decent flat work anywhere near there, or try and turn into a jump from that side as he would be dancing about sideways at them...he would leap to the side, up in the air, or stop dead - nearly having me off a good many times!

In the end, we started leading him in hand up and down past them about three or four times before getting on...and then the first two or three times walking past (whilst warming up), do some shoulder in whilst going past, to keep his mind engaged and to stop him gawping at the TERRIFYING equipment! haha. It seemed to do the trick...
 
It depends what their reaction is...

Fig wants to rush by, head in the air going a million miles an hour. So I stop, pat, ask him to come round, pat, and move on. The moment he rushes or gawps, we stop, pat, ask for round and then move on.

I keep it black and white and set the boundaries in place, so I shape his tension and work with him rather than against him.

It is important to be consistent in these situations; always try and keep YOUR reaction the same. Ignore the wrong reaction, but praise the right reaction.
 
Thankyou so much for your replies, they have given me some good ideas, I can lead her up to the hut and have a faff about, I can even use the decking at the front as a mounting block and give her a treat there. Then once going instead of concentrating on getting past I can stop her when misbehaving and get her to be soft before moving off again, fantastic !
 
Are you allowed to lunge/long rein out there at all? I find that my sharp and spooky boy is much better in the outdoor school at my yard having been lunged out there regularly for a few months, and on the ground I can find it easier to keep him moving forward as I'm not nervous or anticipating anything explosive.

Fantastic advice from all the other posters, I will also be reading this with interest as my horse sounds rather similar!
 
mine is also a nightmare in our school - especially when it's windy.....worst still, on windy days the farmers wife tends to put her washing out (which he can see from the school) so we end up running the gauntlet every time we pass that side!!

I was getting really frustrated by it but after a few lessons, we have worked more on controlling / varying the speed of each gait / lots of half halts etc and he's starting to spook less.

At the end of the day, he's quite sharp and unless I have his mind engaged he will look for every opportunity to get away or spook so i need to keep one step ahead and give him something to think about.... although he is genuinely scared of the washing ;)
 
My mare finds our school very scary. I find keeping her occupied constantly in our schooling helps and doing a lot of groundwork in there x
 
I've tried different tactics depending on how big the reaction. Fallen tree in one end of the school because of the storms resulted in loose schooling, feeding next to it, progressed to lunging next to it them riding. Anything else (jumps up for example) I start away from and move gradually closer leg yielding towards or shoulder in once listening
 
I know exactly how you feel. There is one end of the arena where my mare almost constantly spooks (my other mare also finds it spooky but not as extreme) although some days are worse than others and i have tried many tactics. I think it very much depends on the horse - with my mare the absolute best tactic for me is to ride past or towards the spooky object a couple of times and allow her to put her head up, but most importantly to push my hands forward toward her mouth and stay very relaxed in my body. This takes a bit of a nerve because she can spook and spin but i find if i do this a couple of times the spooky corner becomes much less of an issue and i can then ride normally for the rest of the session. I watched a very interesting video about spooking where it said that it was best to make sure the horse would yield away from your leg and practice this all the way round on a circle until you go past the spooky object and then you give the horse a rest from working (i.e. walk normally). The horse then begins to associate the spooky place with a good feeling and becomes more relaxed. The video also said the relaxation of the rider was very important as it is very easy to start to anticipate if you have a spooky horse - i know i am very guilty of this and I kind of formed my tactic above from watching this video.
 
mine always has a side/corner where he spooks and has quite successfully decked me a few times. I find the best way is to walk the perimeter on him which involves the spooking points but keeping him really focused and into the bridle with lots of leg on ready to catch him! Then once we conquer it in walk move onto trot and then onto canter! I made the error of literally switching off for a split second the other week in canter and he caught me out!
 
Thank everyone, some great tips, I didn't ride this morning due to the horrible weather so instead we spent some time in the arena at the spooky end feeding her carrots to see if it may help and operation spooky tactics starts tomorrow morning in my lesson :-)
 
There's a good article in Horse and Rider magazine this month which has a section on a horse which is spooky in the school. It sounds a bit odd but they advise they give is if they are spooking at something, just stop and stand there letting them look at the object of terror until they actually get bored, drop their head or lick and chew, then quietly move on. Do this every time they spook until you can get around the school. It might take 15 minutes to do one circuit but it gives them time to process things and make their own decision that it's fine rather than being hurried past it.

My mare is very spooky in our school as we have hedges on one side with a garden centre on the other side of the hedge. This provides us with lots of lovely things to spook at from people in the garden centre being glimpsed through the hedge, birds in the hedge and killer cats that like to rustle about and leap out or jump on the fence. I was a bit sceptical about this approach as I thought it meant a lot of hanging around but it actually worked with Rose. She normally freaks at the cats sitting on the fence but by just stopping to let her stare, meant that she got no reaction from me and she realised that it was no big deal and walked past fine on the next circuit. She normally spooks in quite a violent fashion and has had me off a few times, but this way meant that neither of us got excited and she calmed down very quickly and I actually got some sense and good work out of her!
 
Why is that odd? The solution to anxiety is rarely more anxiety. The catch can be the transition into doing the same 'on the fly' - this is the underlying process behind the spook busting threads PS started - but it's a safe starting point.

I think people avoid going that route because they feel it's 'wimpy' but you have to remember the point is to solve the problem not to prove a point. If the horse is tense because of freshness, inappropriate feeding etc then obviously that needs addressing too.
 
another idea thankyou ! I guess its similar to a previous comment to stop and soften them before moving off again over the page, Ive been concentrating on getting her past via shoulder in etc but will now stop instead and hope she bores herself into not being bothered anymore lol !!!
 
TarrSteps said:
Why is that odd? The solution to anxiety is rarely more anxiety. The catch can be the transition into doing the same 'on the fly' - this is the underlying process behind the spook busting threads PS started - but it's a safe starting point.

I think people avoid going that route because they feel it's 'wimpy' but you have to remember the point is to solve the problem not to prove a point. If the horse is tense because of freshness, inappropriate feeding etc then obviously that needs addressing too.
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I said 'odd' mostly because the usual tactic is to still try and go past something but maybe using something like shoulder in, or getting gradually closer, rather than just stopping and looking at it for as long as it takes. I suppose we usually try to get past without stopping as it might not be practical to employ the stop and stare tactic in all situations, such as at a competition or on the road. It's been a bit of a revelation for me I have to say as I used to do the 'get by in any fashion possible' but this is much better - for me anyway.
 
It's a bit of a 'more haste, less speed' situation, too. I agree there are situations where you have to get by at all costs but, like everything else, training is about breaking skills down into component parts and schooling for the correct response then building.

This sort of spooking is interesting as it does fall into the whole 'off the leg, soft neck' (or my favorite mantra 'Calm, forward, straight.') because it's an opportunity to perfect those component parts. But preserving with force when the horse is anxious and/or unclear runs the risk of teaching the horse the opposite lessons.
 
The baby does it, telling him off makes him tense and more inclined to spook, in his case it's best to distract him with something else. I'm getting to the stage where I can pretty much pre-empt when he's going to do it, and then I ask for a transition or something he finds really hard, like a small circle or a collected (I say collected, it's really just a slow) trot.
 
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