Horse won't jump in show arena

Red-1 said:
I think the answer is in the original post. You say he is a late maturer and not naturally forward. I think this *could* lead to thinking he has a physical issue. I would obviously check that out.

The forwardness never seems to have been established in any situation. You say that even in a good lesson he takes some work to keep him going. To me this is a red flag, once my horses are set going they keep self motivated. I would have a look at Andrew McLean, he is a master at establishing horses who keep forward without nagging. He has a web site.

I would not move any further forward until that basic thing has been established. Then I would tackle the tanking at fences, as this is not under your control either. He is a master at that too.

I can see why the issue at shows has occurred, most young horses shrink a bit when first going to shows, and when your horse did shrink with being scared/overawed whatever you want to call it, he was kicked, hit and growled at. This has not made him feel less scared/overawed at all, instead it has made him more so. The arena has become a place where even his rider turns against him.

If this were my horse then I would work at walk in an arena, and establish that I don't use my legs to keep him going, instead he keeps forward of my leg. I would use the resource mentioned to achieve this. Then move to trot, canter etc. Then sort out the tanking. Then go to a show, and go into the arena intending to just walk/ trot round with him providing activity. With mine I hired it at the close of a show, so the BS Fox horses finished and then as soon as the prize giving was over mine went in and did some flat work in a jumping style.

When you feel ready to go and jump I would choose a tiny clear round, where you can again establish forwardness at walk/trot then trot the course. I bet if you have an absence of kicking, hitting and growling it won't be long before he offers a canter.

I would expect some reversion to "go-slow" but then I would go back and re-establish the basics.

I do know how frustrating it is when a horse offers no go, my last horse Jay was shut down and initially only offered the bare minimum or tank, but I also know how rewarding it is when you unlock the mind and have a horse offering energy and fun.
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Thank you for this. Appreciate it.
 
Do you have young horse classes? Anything that would be sympathetic to a "difficult" horse, where you could re-present to a fence at a lower height etc?

Mind you, I know someone who ended up selling their "born to jump" horse as he was so difficult in the arena. His new owner has stopped all jumping and is concentrating on dressage at the moment. But this horse (also 6) is a very difficult and suspicious character.
 
I have one who sounds as complicated as yours jumping-wise....when he was younger he was terrified of showjumps, but I pressed on, and eventually got him jumping really well and very confidently at home. I took real baby steps with the basics, had leads off other confident horses, took him to all sorts of places, clinics, environments. Interspersed with this I did a fair amount of xc, which he has always loved and been a complete machine at.

I got him to the point where half the time he would be a dream in the ring at shows, and the other half he would do exactly as yours does, just canter to the bottom of the first fence and refuse to take off. And like yours, he would be absolutely fine in the warmup beforehand.

The last such complete shutdown in the ring was earlier this summer and I decided to quit trying and stick to dressage competitions from now on. He has PSSM and I genuinely believe he was finding certain arenas stressful, his muscles were tensing up and then going into a sort of spasm and meaning that he literally couldn't jump without an awful lot of effort (and like yours he would easily clear them if he did decide to push himself over). You could feel the canter almost seize up when it happened, like suddenly trying to move the horse through porridge.

If I'm really honest he did do the same thing in other environments too sometimes, but without the pressure of the bell you just keep working them until you have a canter you can jump from, you don't present them at a fence while you've got shuffle canter so don't notice it as much.

Anyway, experiences like that were stressful for him and stressful for me, so I quit doing it. I had given it a fair go at trying to resolve his anxiety, but I couldn't continue forever, so as talented as he is it just wasn't going to work out.

We jump for fun only now and he's much happier with that situation.
 
I had a 7 year old WB mare that was just like your boy.

I sold her to a hunting home and bought myself a horse that enjoyed showjumping - we are both now much happier :-)
 
Casey76 said:
Do you have young horse classes? Anything that would be sympathetic to a "difficult" horse, where you could re-present to a fence at a lower height etc?

Mind you, I know someone who ended up selling their "born to jump" horse as he was so difficult in the arena. His new owner has stopped all jumping and is concentrating on dressage at the moment. But this horse (also 6) is a very difficult and suspicious character.
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I have found a show this weekend that may just allow it, so I am taking both my boys to it and if necessary will get a friend on the going showjumper and I ride my youngster and get him to play chase me over the fences.
 
DabDab said:
I have one who sounds as complicated as yours jumping-wise....when he was younger he was terrified of showjumps, but I pressed on, and eventually got him jumping really well and very confidently at home. I took real baby steps with the basics, had leads off other confident horses, took him to all sorts of places, clinics, environments. Interspersed with this I did a fair amount of xc, which he has always loved and been a complete machine at.

I got him to the point where half the time he would be a dream in the ring at shows, and the other half he would do exactly as yours does, just canter to the bottom of the first fence and refuse to take off. And like yours, he would be absolutely fine in the warmup beforehand.

The last such complete shutdown in the ring was earlier this summer and I decided to quit trying and stick to dressage competitions from now on. He has PSSM and I genuinely believe he was finding certain arenas stressful, his muscles were tensing up and then going into a sort of spasm and meaning that he literally couldn't jump without an awful lot of effort (and like yours he would easily clear them if he did decide to push himself over). You could feel the canter almost seize up when it happened, like suddenly trying to move the horse through porridge.

If I'm really honest he did do the same thing in other environments too sometimes, but without the pressure of the bell you just keep working them until you have a canter you can jump from, you don't present them at a fence while you've got shuffle canter so don't notice it as much.

Anyway, experiences like that were stressful for him and stressful for me, so I quit doing it. I had given it a fair go at trying to resolve his anxiety, but I couldn't continue forever, so as talented as he is it just wasn't going to work out.

We jump for fun only now and he's much happier with that situation.
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This sounds like you are talking about Uri (my horse)
 
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