How to encourage a young horse to jump.

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fifi-2013

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I have a recently broken pony, who is very easy to handle and ride in every way. However due to her being so laid back she doesn't seem to want to jump over any small jumps I put up, she will just go straight through them (with me riding her!). Does anyone have any tips to encourage her to pick up her feet??
 
Haha! I have a FiFi pony in for starting and selling.

Anyway, set up a loose jump in a chute. See what you have. Loose jumping done correctly is a great tool to see how they react and to give them confidence.

Terri
 
I agree loose jumping is a good idea, especially for younger ponies. Also maybe make sure that you aren't in any boots that protect the front of her legs. I find that doing raised trotting poles is good. I have never had a young horse but I my boy never jumped and I got him jumping by a mass load of trotting poles. Then you could try bounces? Are you cantering into the jump or trotting?
 
I'm interested to see the replies to this, my youngster will pick his feet up very carefully over poles but goes straight through if you raise them even slightly!
 
I started a young pony yesterday, in the hot weather;) he has done trotting poles for a while, most recently these were spaced at canter distance, once he was trotting over them the middle one was raised which he just knocked over so it was put as a small x, again he knocked it down.
I then got the rider to ask for him to canter away after he made his attempt to jump, this helped as he then came round thinking more forward popped the ground pole and then the x out of his stride cantering away afterwards. This was repeated a few times with plenty of praise and we finished on a nice note keeping it short and simple.
It was all done again today but he had learnt from yesterday and jumped really well, no more than yesterday except he did less polework to start and jumped a slightly bigger x pole. Tomorrow he will hack then the next day do a little more, I find they benefit from doing very little but frequent sessions to get them going, once they understand they drop back to twice a week, it helps to have someone on the ground to put jumps up, move the distances if required and to see what is happening so adjustments can be made.
I have started numerous ponies this way, some which seemed to have no idea, some which had loose jumped ok but found having a rider on more difficult, people spend hours schooling on the flat to teach the basics but jumping is often done once a week and they do not improve at the same rate.
A few quality jumps daily at the early stages will help them move on rather than a long session which is too much in one go and they end up tired or confused, keep things simple and correct, reward when they do well.
 
Jump solid fences, small logs etc.

I always start youngsters jumping over small log and fixed telegraph pole jumps.
Under 2ft so they can get themselves out of trouble, but they soon learn to respect the fences.
 
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