Lunging nightmare

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Mollysmum

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I’ve had my 6 year old horse for 10 months and he came from a dealer with no history known. Good to hack out and school but a nightmare to lunge. He will rear and bolt around the school and I just cannot keep a hold on him. I have had an experienced horse trainer who had some success but when I try it’s as described above. I don’t know whether to persist or give up lunging. He is very dangerous in this situation and I feel threatened. I do wear hat , gloves and body protection at all times. Feed wise he is just on a small amount of chop and balancer. During winter months he is out for at least 7 hours and stabled at night. In summer he is out 24/7. Thoughts please….
 
I just wouldn't lunge him, especially if he is fine to ride. He was probably not taught to lunge correctly, instead just chased around in circles, which is what has given lunging a bad name. A horse taught to lunge correctly is moved all around the school, in straight lines and circles of various sizes. What he is doing has no benefit so I really wouldn't bother.
 
The first time in picked up a lunge whip when I took on my littlest cob she bolted in panic around the arena. The pony can lunge but even 6 years down the line I won't pick up a whip and she'll shoot off sharply if she's worried.

So we don't lunge!

I suspect she's been through travellers at somepoint (offloaded to hack by a caravan site once and she was very worried). No idea what went on but whips and lunge ropes are stressful.
 
Something has scared him in the past and I think I would want to
work through that just to make him a more confident horse.

I would do some thing along these lines, maybe just starting with 5 or 10 mins when you have time.

First I would make sure it’s not the whip, so very gently use a normal whip to rub him, when - in his time - he is ok with that, use a schooling whip to rub him.

Then I would walk him in a circle, maybe stopping every quarter to give him a rub (with a whip??) or ask him to back up. Slowly over a period of days/weeks/months I would walk him on a circle with more length of lead rope or trot slowly introducing the whip.

I am sure you get the idea. It’s more about teaching him confidence in you, the whip and your world as lunging - and needs to be done at his pace.

A dressage rider called Jenku did a video on how to lunge, he is a clicker trainer (and Grand Prix rider I think) which may inspire.
 
I think if you ca. Then you should try to train your horse to lunge.
Lunging can be really useful to horse and rider.
For example
if the rider is injured or ill
if the horse has an injury ie. Bite or other wound on the back or saddle area.
If the horse needs to be kept fit and the owner is short on time
It is great for voice training
If the horse is fresh

I think it's important that we give our horses a basic education. While we all want to be able to keep our horses forever, sometimes things don't work out that way. A well educated horse is morelikley to get a good home compared to one who acts like a kite!

I would (ONLY IF YOU ARE CONFIDENT TO DO SO) start off leading your horse around the arena. Use your voice to ask for halts and walking on.
Few months of this, building up to moving a few steps away.
Just work on it for 5 minutes everytime you come back from riding.
I didn't know how to eat with knife and fork... until I was taught.
Good luck, get help if you need it and have fun.
 
Where in the process does it all go wrong? When you send him out on the line or when the gear comes out? I'd approach by introducing some in hand work, maybe outside the school and see how that went.
 
From your description if you want to be able to eventually lunge this horse in a calm, sensible & safe manner then the best thing to do would be to get a professional involved who is prepared to work as slowly as the horse requires and to teach you as well as the horse (as no point them being able to do things if they’re not also helping get you into a position where you’ll eventually be able to do them too) to help work through what it is about lunging that your horse finds so stressful (probably hasn’t been taught how and just thinks is supposed to run from lunge whip) and then start again from a place your horse is comfortable with (which may literally be being led in walk around the arena) and gradually build towards actual lunging.
 
I also had a pony who was terrified of the lunge whip but ok without. She had definitely been harshly handled at some point. Worth trying without the whip?
 
I don't lunge mine unless I have to because I don't think it's particularly good for them to work on a circle a lot.

If you want the horse to learn to lunge though, I'd start with the ground work. I use a rope head collar because it does give more control and I find easier if they switch directions but otherwise a proper lunging cavesson is good. And you need a good, long lead rope.

I would spend a few weeks doing basic groundwork - walk, halt, back up, turn on the forehand, some steps over, some steps asking for the front end to move over, getting the shoulders off the track etc. Just getting the horse to properly respect your asking him to move his body, and properly aware of how to place his shoulders and quarters when asked.

I would work doing something like shoulder-in down the long side, break and walk straight on the short side, shoulder in on the long side, break on the short. Something where the horse is in listening mode, brain engaged and not just reacting.

Then I'd incorporate doing small circles on the lead rein in each corner. Once the horse is comfortable with those circles, I'd push them out a bit and get a bit more confident with that, and then start to ask for more than one loop. I'd use those circles to start lunging.

I would only trot once the horse is really settled and established in walk, and then I'd be asking for one loop of trot, back to walk for a loop, nice and settled, back onto the track.

Once you have walk, trot, walk, halt transitions really nicely in place on a small circle on the long lead, I'd switch out for the lunge line and keep the activities the same, and work up to larger circles where you would be effectively lunging. And only once I could vary the pace in trot and have that really established, would I ask for canter.

I'm not an expert but I do like producing my own horses and starting them myself, and this is what works for me.
 
I think lunging is a good tool to have in your tool kit for various reasons. The principles are an important part of groundwork IMHO.

Can you have the professional back to help teach you to lunge your horse. Every horse is different and learning the body language that works for your horse is half the battle (how firm or gentle you need to be). I'm not sure how experienced you are so sorry if I'm not giving credit for your knowledge, but lunging (well) isn't as easy as people believe it to me.

In the mean time can you pop in the school after you have ridden for a few minutes and walk him around on the lunge line (using as a lead rope) gradually getting further away from him but keeping him on the outside track rather than on a circle. keep your energy low and breathing calm and just pootle round. Once he is calm doing this with you 4 or 5 feet away ask him for a small circle round you in a corner and then straight along the side again. Again keeping everything calm and rewarding the calm behaviour.
 
Depends what happens, are you using a lunge cavesson or bridle? Personally, I'm of the thought, if they don't need to then I wouldn't pressure into it. What are they scared of? Rope, whip, or just bombing off?

My youngster will lunge lovely but won't long rein and that's fine, we work in hand with the reins and bridle. It stems from him being put to a buggy as a yearling by travellers and having reins/whip thrown at him to make him go. He thinks he's to pull/cart off with you if you long rein him. It's something we will work on in the future but not at the moment to muddy the waters.
 
My PB Welsh is bolshy and a very slow hard work in progress and his go to is to pull away at any opportunity. I do a combination of groundwork, liberty and lunging before any riding and I have to rope off a section of the arena to do this so he can’t just pull away. I use jump wings and a wide electric tape to do this. Tape has to be quite high at eye-level and despite being an absolute rhino he has never gone through it. At the moment there is no way I could get straight on him without some groundwork first. In a smaller area he can’t get away as easily and I can usually hang on so he doesn’t usually try.
 
You don't say anything about the fitness level of this horse or what work he's in currently.

Lunging WILL be uncomfortable for horses who are stiff and not supple enough to bend themselves around the circle; and I think this will explain the behaviour. Put simply, your horse is physically not able to do what you are asking of him; and the more you are "asking", the more he's "saying" loud and clear, that he cannot. Please do not label him as "naughty" because of the behaviour he is exhibiting, as he is very likely in pain because of this and is trying to physically get away from the situation.

For this reason I would strongly suggest you cease with the lunging. It isn't helping your horse, and you are getting frustrated. Not a good mixture at the best of times, and it isn't going to get any better.

That said, lunging actually can provide an excellent way of working a horse out and also for you to see how they are moving; but they need to be supple enough to be able to bend into the circle.

What I would suggest is that you get a physio out and get your horse checked over thoroughly. Also get the saddle checked, as well as teeth. Then I'd adopt the excellent suggestions given by "LadyGascoyne" further up in this thread; you need to start from a basic level and work-up as the horse gets more supple. Also, as respectfully as possible, I'd suggest you get a professional to help you with lunging - it isn't an easy skill IMO and is something that we could all do with some help with.
 
You sound frightened, so you need to hand this over to a pro as a frightened handler is just going to causes more issues. Unfortunately, there are more than a few young horses ruined by people who dont know what they are doing, and then it has to be unpicked by someone who does know what they are doing and it can take a while and needs the right person. I saw an awful video a couple of weeks ago of a friend well on the way to ruining a very nice young pony with a combination of crappy over handling when the pony was younger, huge amounts of basic education missed out, and not having the experience to know that they were most of the issue. Its easy done, even by fairly competent people. Starting young horses is a skill. This one was more than likely started quickly and badly and with more work put into ridden work to get the horse going well under saddle to sell ASAP.

Get a pro in, and that doesnt mean a pro who comes and lunges and manages the issue. You need a pro who can see straight away what the issue is and work on it. Its very rarely just about one thing with a young horse like this. There will be multiple issues that need working on. Papering over the cracks will work with a competent pro, but it will all fall apart again when you take over the handling as youve found out. A pro wont fix the issue unless the root cause is fixed and you get involved with the retraining.

Or if that all sounds like nonsense and the horse is a saint in every other way, then I just wouldnt lunge. I like lunging, its a good skill to have, but if an otherwise saintly horse violently objects youve either got a soundness issue or a mental issue that might never be fixable.
 
What tack are you using

You need a lunging cavesson with side rings to clip the rein onto to give more control and stabilise the headgear In place

I lunge all ours at least once a week, it's most fabulous tool, it can take a while to get them interested, competent and to actually enjoy lunging, I generally lunge over trotting poles or smallish jump to encourage them to kind of take over by becoming enthusiastic and lunging themselves

If you don't have much experience try asking someone who breaks horses and is competent at lunging to have a look.

Its the first thing we teach a breaker, until lunging is established nothing else is done, there is a modern trend to skip that process.

I do think you need have your brain in gear. I just keep up the lunging til in time we get walk to canter etc so it's a great tool for a quick workout and keeping the fitness

On rare occasions I have threaded the line through the bit like a curb, clipped o to the opposite bit ring so if the horse tries to break away it puts itself onto the bit and soon learns not to do that by its own actions
 
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