Ideas for training the traumatised, reactive horse…

[maya2008]

Daughter was exhausted from riding 3 ponies per day so insisted her brother take over today. On he got, one 30min hack with walk, first go at rising trot, steering and stopping. She likes half halts we discovered, and he puts her to sleep so much there was a fair amount of kicking!

 

[maya2008]

New reins - turns out I should have stuck with my gut feeling and got a smaller size first. Soooo scary, despite being the same pattern as the old ones! Folded the ends over and tied them up, then they were smaller so acceptable. They were still long enough for my son to get going though, so he worked on a really long lead rein, getting her listening to him and not me. Took the lead off up the drive so they could go solo - she was hesitant but she did it!

 

[Wishfilly]

Sounds like she is doing amazingly!

 

[maya2008]

Sounds like she is doing amazingly!

Thank you, I was literally bursting with pride yesterday - such a clever, brave girl!

 

[maya2008]

So today I popped my son on, got her moving and off we went. I carried the lead rein all the way round but didn’t actually need it! First off road hack with a rider, including tractors in fields, cows, discussions about which bit of the path was safe and walking through puddles.

 

[maya2008]

I probably won’t update much for a while now - putting miles on a just backed horse is just more of the same after all.

I will say though, that she is rapidly turning into everything I hoped she would be. Hack no.2 off lead today - she was as reliable and responsive as you could ever wish for. Not bad for £100 - she definitely hasn’t cost in the last year what it would cost me now to buy what she has become!