How to keep confident on a horse that bucks...

[brighteyes]

I know when mine is likely to throw a buck and I raise one rein, shove my lower leg forward, sit up and SHOUT! A loud 'Oy' usually catches his attention long enough to interrupt the process.

If you know when it is likely to happen you can be a little step ahead if you keep your wits about you. So long as it is an expression of happiness, I'd accept she's going to try. If it starts to get out of hand and becomes a delberate attempt to dislodge you, it's up to you to decide who is going to change!

On a gadget note, I thought Richard Maxwell used something on buckers which only came into operation at a critical moment and was pretty dissuasive? Anyone remember it? Don't think it was the wip wop thingy, more along the lines or a rein attached somewhere....

 

[brighteyes]

And yes to all that as well. Sounds like you have had plenty of experience trying and testing!

 

[dieseldog]

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She only gets a small scoop of basic horse/pony nuts with a small handful of staypower mix for dinner and just a handful of nuts for breakfast...

dont feel shes overfed, especially for her workload. The person at the feed store was shocked when i said how little she is fed lol

shes a very good doer and even has her grazing muzzle on every other day to keep her weight down

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Maybe that's enough to send her over the edge. If you are struggling with her weight and put a grazing muzzle on her why are you feeding her hard food? Whats staypower mix?

My horse is 17.1 warmblood and he gets no hard food at all, he competes BSJA and hunts, some horses just don't need hard food. He can also squeal and buck when he has too much energy.