Horse swings bum out into road when hacking

[Scot123]

Hi. At the moment we've got through the napping phase and new phase is looking/spooking at things in the verge! So recent rides have been spent travelling forwards with nose to kerb and bum to road which is obviously not at all safe.

I have made the mistake of trying to guide horse to the verge using left rein and right leg but that just resulted in us moving along in a sort of U shape! I've now been reading that perhaps leg yielding would help - so right leg on, and contact on right rein to bring head slightly towards the road?

Is this what you'd recommend please and if so could you give me a dummies introduction to it?

Horse knows from the ground to move away from pressure and if riding down the middle of the road with no distractions we can more or less leg yield one way and then the other - but riding close to the edge of the road in a straight line is proving difficult. Grateful for advice

 

[Leandy]

Improving lateral work will help yes, both leg yield and shoulder in so you can control the hindquarters better. Do think about the mechanics involved in your rein aids though. You mention using the left rein. If you pull the left rein, the head will go left and the quarters will go right, and vice versa. If you are trying to take the quarters left, you need to be positioning the head to the right, either slightly for the leg yield or more so for the shoulder in. So you get the feel for how that works, it will help you to practice some turn on the forehand to get the hand/leg coordination.

Under pressure on the road though if he is swinging into the traffic, you may find it works to bring his head right and then neck rein him left whilst pushing quarters over with your right leg. You may find it is effective to cross your right hand over the withers to do this. Absolutely not correct for schooling purposes so not a great habit but it can be helpful at times of stress!

 

[Scot123]

Thanks Leandy. I think I was in a bit of panic mode when I was trying to use the left rein! Thinking about it rationally I can see it was wrong - but with cars etccoming behind us, some of my rational thinking went out the window!

So basically I'd be looking for a slight bend in the shoulders to the right whilst using my right leg to push the quarters to the left? Would you usually apply even pressure or short pushes with the leg?

Also (sorry for all the questions, but I do appreciate the advice) when you say neck rein to the left - would that be by bringing my right rein up against the neck?

As soon as the weather improves then I'll get out on a nice quiet bit of road so I can hopefully practise without the added pressure of vehicles

 

[Pearlsacarolsinger]

Sometimes, opening the left rein will invite the horse to step to the left just enough to avoid a problem and give you a chance to reposition the horse. It sounds as if some schooling in a quiet place would be useful.

 

[Scot123]

Thank you. Yes, we would very much benefit from a bit of schooling practise! Sadly our usual instructor who comes to us is in a higher Tier Level and not able to travel. We'd previously been focussing on getting forward momentum due to some napping issues - these issues now solved so we're onto the next thing to work on