Monty Roberts (an owners perspective) also in Comps

Is it not possible that a combination of the the pigs and the small size of the trailer is responsible? ie that he was unnerved by the situation and now doesn't feel comfortable in the smaller space? Do you travel him with/without partition?

eta interesting point Auslander
 
May 2011 when the pigs came into the picture. These are the ones I showed him. http://sphotos-d.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/550657_3833338962732_1935290167_n.jpg

This is Bailey in the trailer watching the pigs from afar and trembling. http://sphotos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc7/428567_3833204439369_862463186_n.jpg

Next time you want to educate your horse peeps and show him something new, don't!

Me and my boy http://sphotos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/181948_1773211660837_5191898_n.jpg - I love the innocence of this photo.

http://sphotos-b.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/406355_4175383233625_869624488_n.jpg outside said trailer
 
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Personally I don't get the ignoring any history - the horse a trainer is dealing with is the sum total of his history and his genes. In a few short minutes no-one can possibly see all that a horse is, nor his responses to different forms of pressure etc, however good they are. I did dog behaviour work and when looking at a problem it is important to take as full a history as possible. No, of course you can't turn the clock back but you can get an understanding of how the animal came to be like he is - and what is causing the problem. That informs how you treat and overcome the problem - is it fear, lack of proper training, lack of communication, lack of respect, what?
Applecart please look into reinforcement training (think clicker training without the clicker). If your horse does have bad associations from SOMETHING that happened, with you, your trailer, your loading technique etc. it can enable you to overcome them and replace them with good ones. It isn't magic, it wouldn't wow an audience but it is the scientifically proven means of learning in every animal. Whatever they do that gets a pleasant reinforcer they are likely to do again. Simple as - and then shaping that response so it gets better and more what you want it to be.
 
Could it be that the low height of your trailer hadn't bothered your horse, until he was scared by the pigs and that day he either threw his head up and bumped it frightening him further or just felt really claustrophobic? Now the low height is a factor as he has had a bad experience.......

Maybe maybe not. But you have nothing to lose and everything to gain by trying to load him in a different trailer. Borrow one for a try, those Richardson boxes aren't the most inviting, try him in an equitrek or bateson and see if he is any better. If not then you have proved yourself right. If he is better then at least you know and can set about working on a solution.

There are options other than an Ifor and a 4x4. My double Bateson is about 900kg, so would be a little heavy for your car but they do a single, or you could upgrade your car to something a bit meatier that still has decent fuel economy, or you could sell your trailer, swap your car for something tiny with amazing fuel economy and rent a 3.5t box when you want to go out.

Surely it is better to have a few outings with a happy horse, than no outings or unhappy outings that might be ruined if the horse doesn't load.

I know you don't want it to be your trailer that is the problem but it sounds like it could at least be a contributory factor.
 
Equilibrium Ireland said:
Yeah nice catch Auslander.

Terri
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We've already thought of this. Vet check in Oct last year said he is 100% sound, the ligament is as good as it will ever be. We did a bute trial and the loading made no difference. If it was his leg and his suspensory he wouldn't be being placed on almost every outing. We did wonder if it was the vibrations that were making his arthris worse but its made no difference and pain has been ruled out as definetely not being a contributing factor.

But thanks for thinking of it. We've done everything humanly possible and bute trial, paintwork smell, check floor for problems, checked brakes in case they were coming on causing a rocking movement, driving (same driver all the time, different tow car but fine for 9 months), shavings on floor, whether he has a net or not, reiki, horse behaviourist, etc, etc.
 
Kat said:
Bateson Derby, unladen weight 675kg, internal height 2.14m (7ft headroom)

How would that be?
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It wasn't around in 1997, when we looked and I think my trailer is 7ft " height wise anyway. Will check on that.
 
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remembered pain might be as much as an issue as what is going on currently though.

Perhaps at that time he started to lift his head more to balance and found he couldn't.
 
applecart14 said:
We've already thought of this. Vet check in Oct last year said he is 100% sound, the ligament is as good as it will ever be. We did a bute trial and the loading made no difference. If it was his leg and his suspensory he wouldn't be being placed on almost every outing. We did wonder if it was the vibrations that were making his arthris worse but its made no difference and pain has been ruled out as definetely not being a contributing factor.

But thanks for thinking of it. We've done everything humanly possible and bute trial, paintwork smell, check floor for problems, checked brakes in case they were coming on causing a rocking movement, driving (same driver all the time, different tow car but fine for 9 months), shavings on floor, whether he has a net or not, reiki, horse behaviourist, etc, etc.
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I didn't mean that it was still hurting him - more that it was related to remembered discomfort. They're funny devils, horses. Alf has been treated with nothing but kindness since he came to the UK as a 4 yr old, but he is still headshy and nervous of new people touching him. The only time he was ever treated badly was when he was broken - and although we dont know what exactly happened, he still bears the scars round his head. Hes been loved and cherished for the last 11 years, but he still remembers what happened to him as a baby,, and his first reaction to someone new is fear.
 
Kat said:
g
Maybe maybe not. But you have nothing to lose and everything to gain by trying to load him in a different trailer. Borrow one for a try, those Richardson boxes aren't the most inviting, try him in an equitrek or bateson and see if he is any better.
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Yes I can borrow a trailer, but the whole point is the horse isn't consistent. He will go in sometimes, and other times won't go in for two hours. Yesterday he loaded in under a minute before the demo. Last week five mins, the week before 20 mins, the week before that ten minutes. Before that not at all, etc, etc. Something in his head changed that day he saw the pigs. You can see him staring at the pigs in the photo. Four hours hiding behind a trailer and creeping around to sneek a peek at five minute intervals for four hours is telling me that was what started the ball rolling.

He did go in a trailer belonging to someone whose horse is a nightmare to load to give it a lead. It took about four mins to get him in. But doesn't prove anything really.

If I try my friends trailer today I doubt he will go in unless he has been starved, and even if he does, he probably wont the next time. But I will try.
 
Wheels said:
Applecart it really doesn't matter now whether it was the pigs or not, if your horses ears touch the ceiling of the trailer it is too small and your horse could really actually injure himself quite badly. I personally would rather go out less to free up a bit of money so that I could buy something suitable than risk my horse being hurt.
That is all....
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There is no trailer that will not risk injury to a horse of that size who chooses to rear in it. In fact I think that it may even be safer to travel the horse with a ceiling low enough for him to know that it is not a possibilty for him to rear. Rather than being high enough above him for him not to realise it is there, rear and smash into it. Most horses 17 hands and over which travel in lorries will have their ears somewhere close enough to the ceiling to smash their heads into it if they chuck it upwards for some reason.

p.s. I also had a horse who had what seemed to be a primeval fear of pigs, it does happen.
 
applecart14 said:
It wasn't around in 1997, when we looked and I think my trailer is 7ft " height wise anyway. Will check on that.
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There have been lots of new lightweight trailers made since then, so try loading him in someone else's taller trailer and see if it makes a difference.

The Derby probably isn't high enough, but Bateson do two bigger trailers the Deauville is 7ft3" headroom and under 900kg, then the Ascot is higher again and under 1000kg. Both are common enough trailers that you could probably borrow one to try loading him in, and you wouldn't need a massively bigger car.

If you find that he loads better in a roomier trailer then it would be worth doing some research into what is available now.
 
I had a horse who loaded into a small trailer with no trouble for a couple years and then one day, she refused and overnight, she became a problem loader. I surmised that she must have gotten claustrophobic by getting a fright and getting "bigger," as some here have suggested, or something must have happened, but I will never know exactly what. Anyway, I was able to sell that trailer and buy a taller one, which turned out to be rather fortuitous as I got a bigger horse about six months later who would not have fit in the little trailer anyway.

I can see both sides of knowing the animal's full history or not. There is a lot to be said for just dealing with the horse in front of you. The owner will give you a history which emphasises the things that are important to them, but my experience is that when horsepeople are interpreting behaviour, there is a lot of conjecture. If you ask ten different people to explain why a horse is behaving in a certain way, you'll get ten answers. I remember once commenting to a fellow livery, after sharing the arena with them, that the horse looked a wee bit tense (I'd been giving it wide berth as it looked to me like it would bog off across the arena at any second) and the livery answered, "oh no, she's not tense at all; just excited."

In this case, it seems as if the owner felt the pigs were important and felt dismissed and saddened because the trainer didn't seem that interested in it. The trainer, I imagine, looks at a fearful horse and to an extent, it doesn't matter what caused the horse to fear trailers, they'll deal with it the same way. I think the importance of acknowledging the cause, or the owner's perceived cause anyway, is to help the owner feel involved in the process. I get the sense from Applecart that she felt a bit dismissed and irrelevant when Kelly and Monty didn't seem to think her interpretation of Bailey's fear was very important.
 
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Lightweight high roofed trailers do exist. I have one with 7'10" headroom and it weighs in at 760kg unladen. Keep an eye open on sales sites as they are out there. Mine is a Henra Cayenne.
 
A spectator's perspective...

PLEASE don't take this the wrong way and with all due respect (I hate that saying :rolleyes:), I wish you all the best with your boy and I am sure you will get there!

However, having been to a demonstration myself recently, I, and I should imagine quite a high percentage of the other 300 people that were there, didn't part with our £25 - £35, to watch somebody get a free training session with their horse delivered by Monty Roberts - this would cost said person a small fortune. We paid it to watch Monty and Kelly demonstrate their skills and techniques on horses that they had barely met before in the hope that we might be able to educate ourselves on better ways of dealing with and understanding our horses.

When you offer your horse for use in a demonstration, then, really, I don't think you can expect an awful lot more than for him (/her) to be used in a demonstration ;)
 
Sorry cptrayes but who mentioned rearing? Op said her horse travels fine in the trailer but won't load consistently.

We are talking here about a horse banging his head if he just stands taller for a minute or goes over a bump in the road.
 
Have you looked at the cheval liberte trailers? They are lighter than Richardsons I think and maybe taller.I have one to tow with a saloon car and it seems pretty decent.Its a single one that I bought from new.
 
Whether or not you use positive or negative reinforcement, you will still find yourself dealing with the horse in front of you. Discussing the horse's traumatic event with pigs for half an hour will make the owner feel better and that they have a good explanation as to why they haven't been able to solve the problem. They might even think you are a lovely empathic person and that you're worth every penny. But then, there you are, facing a horse that, for whatever reason, won't load consistently. Is it because he got scared of pigs and associates it with the trailer? Maybe, but you can't do anything about that, telling him soothingly that there are no pigs isn't going to help... So you will do what you always do. Set the horse up to succeed (which might involve offering a larger space, particularly at first in the training stage), then you pick up your treat bag, lead rope, Dually, or magic wand and you get on with the job at hand.
That's what I think is meant about not needing to know all the history, in most cases it is of very little help in dealing with the horse that you have in front of you. In fact, for most horse trainers, they often have no way of knowing the history, but they're able to help the horse anyway, so it's obviously not that important.
This is not the same as dealing with "vices" of course, in which case the reason is everything.
 
I have had a difficult loader on a weekend course with Kelly.
I recommend you do this. It is usually free if you provide the horse. You will get shown more,however unless you pay as one her students,you will not fully participate. My daughter and I learnt a great deal from this weekend,and I highly recommend it. We also had a follow up session with Sandra, one of Kelly's associates.
We had quite a few holes picked in our horsebox,BUT they were all things I was aware of,and wAs in process of having changed. This included a new ramp.
I do think their points on safety or/and things from a horses perspective were and are valid.
Our mare still does not load that well,and she will need a session with Sandra again at some point to reinforce lessons. However,she is out on loan and at the moment does not need to load to go anywhere,anyway.
My feelings are she disliked standing herringbone,as she had previously travelled fine in our 3.5t rear facing box. She would only travel facing to the right,which was slightly backwards, in the herringbone box.
I had to change my horsebox recently, as our new lad was too tall to comfortably fit in my old one with 7'2" headroom. He went in and traveled perfectly well, he is a seasoned traveller,but I didn't want to risk him putting himself off by hitting his head.
Yes,I lost money,and had to get an Older vehicle,but I did not want to,long term,take the chance of a future problem. Would rather avoid it happening.
New box is forward facing,I personally would not have a herringbone box again if I can avoid one.
Do consider borrowing a friends one that has more headroom,and several times if possible,to give you an idea to see if it contributing to the problem,or not.
The pigs may or may not have been a factor,to you horse. They clearly are to you,and it can be very hard,sometimes,to stop our concerns transmitting to the horse.
I hope you get a resolution as I know how frustrating a problem loader is. Also,easier said than done i know,but positivity " the horse is loading first time today" does help!
Good luck.
 
I think you need to forget about the pigs frankly.

I haven't read their books so I can't recommend them but I can say there is a comprehensive loading section in Richard Maxwell's train your young horse and I would recommend you read that. Using a pressure halter to load horses is not rocket science nor is it some big magical mystical thing you need hours to learn. It's the most simple thing and makes complete sense once you understand it however it has changed my life so dramatically with horses I can say if you learn it, you will load your horse into anything with no drama and no upsetting the horse.

It sounds like Kelly has actually shown you all the techniques you need to know and maybe you just expected it to be more dramatic than it was.

The key now is repetition. Get him in the trailer 50 times a day for a week then keep repeating it regularly to reinforce the positive experience. Do not use treats or "starvation" use the pressure halter and a good bond with your horse. Don't start a battle you can't finish, so make sure you always have plenty of time to follow through.
 
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Wheels said:
Applecart it really doesn't matter now whether it was the pigs or not, if your horses ears touch the ceiling of the trailer it is too small and your horse could really actually injure himself quite badly. I personally would rather go out less to free up a bit of money so that I could buy something suitable than risk my horse being hurt.
That is all....
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I agree with this completely. It would only take him to throw his head up to bang his poll

Could you hire a 3.5t box for a day see how he fits in that and how he loads? IF he fits better and is happy to go in then maybe hire a box for future trips
 
Can I just say also that "RA" stands for Recommended Associate and it means that the person has done lots and lots of hours of study and training under Kelly's tutelage and they are approved by Intelligent Horsemanship to represent the organisation.
 
FfionWinnie said:
I think you need to forget about the pigs frankly.

I haven't read their books so I can't recommend them but I can say there is a comprehensive loading section in Richard Maxwell's train your young horse and I would recommend you read that. Using a pressure halter to load horses is not rocket science nor is it some big magical mystical thing you need hours to learn. It's the most simple thing and makes complete sense once you understand it however it has changed my life so dramatically with horses I can say if you learn it, you will load your horse into anything with no drama and no upsetting the horse.
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Aye.... I forgot to add in my last post that if you're thinking of pigs every time you try to load the horse, that anxiety will be transmitted to the horse. He might not be thinking of pigs, but if he knows you're anxious about the whole trailer thing me might say, "Hmmm... she's worried... maybe going into this rattling metal box is really a bad idea!"
 
webble said:
I agree with this completely. It would only take him to throw his head up to bang his poll

Could you hire a 3.5t box for a day see how he fits in that and how he loads? IF he fits better and is happy to go in then maybe hire a box for future trips
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I actually don't agree with this at all. All it would take for any horse would be for it to rear up and crack its head on any transport. Horses aren't stupid, they know where the ceiling is, a relaxed horse won't randomly throw its head up, the key here is getting it relaxed.
 
Cant comment on the actual experience you had at the demo, and I'm glad you've managed to take some positives away from it, if not all of it.

however, just a couple of things i thought about while reading this thread:

1. there has been quite a bit of research into loading horses backwards, I dont know the inside set up of your trailer, but if you have a front ramp, and large enough space inside you could try this... it is supposed to be that a horse can feel the ramp height increasing, but can also see the roof, and they fear banging their head (which is why you see a lot of horses plant on the ramp with their head right up in the air, or they run backwards, so by loading them in reverse, they lose this fear as its not as 'visible' to them (I did my dissertation at uni on this with interesting results - as an example of 2 of the horses i used my mare who would load blindfolded on her own, had a higher heart rate loading backwards compared to forwards, another 'bad' loader who would take a long time to load, had a lower heart rate when loaded backwards compared to forwards). Now i know you dont think its related to your trailers height, however, could he be making a connection between feeling trapped in the small trailer space, and having no escape from the pigs?

2.
applecart14 said:
If I try my friends trailer today I doubt he will go in unless he has been starved, and even if he does, he probably wont the next time. But I will try.
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If you approach loading him with this mind set, you're setting yourself up for failure... do you have someone on the yard who is confident and competent enough to try loading him for you? I just wonder how much you are (understandably) projecting onto him making him more nervous about the whole thing?


I'm no expert, and these are just my musings, so understand if you think its total tosh!

ETA: I know heartrate isnt always an indicator of stress... but the bad loader was definitely happier when loading backwards as he went on almost straight away...
 
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cptrayes said:
There is no trailer that will not risk injury to a horse of that size who chooses to rear in it. In fact I think that it may even be safer to travel the horse with a ceiling low enough for him to know that it is not a possibilty for him to rear. Rather than being high enough above him for him not to realise it is there, rear and smash into it. Most horses 17 hands and over which travel in lorries will have their ears somewhere close enough to the ceiling to smash their heads into it if they chuck it upwards for some reason.

p.s. I also had a horse who had what seemed to be a primeval fear of pigs, it does happen.
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That's really weird, Dad just said that horses of his height will have their ears close to or touching the ceiling. My trailer is easily 7ft high.

How strange that Dad and you should say the same sentence in the last hour.

Hedwards yes good points, but had other people load him and its made no difference. It took a group of about six to load him when I got knocked out and carted off to hospital in October!

Yes the horses loading backwards definetely feel more comfortable as the research done into it has been quite extensive. If I were to buy a new box I would definetely take that into consideration.
 
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FfionWinnie said:
I actually don't agree with this at all. All it would take for any horse would be for it to rear up and crack its head on any transport. Horses aren't stupid, they know where the ceiling is, a relaxed horse won't randomly throw its head up, the key here is getting it relaxed.
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I was thinking more if he has a hay net the way they pull the hay out and the head moves up, there needs to be space for that. I was wondering if that had been an issue
 
yeah, thats more what I was thinking, general eating/balancing not any OTT movements just what a normal horse would do in transit.
 
Kat said:
The Derby probably isn't high enough, but Bateson do two bigger trailers the Deauville is 7ft3" headroom and under 900kg, then the Ascot is higher again and under 1000kg. Both are common enough trailers that you could probably borrow one to try loading him in, and you wouldn't need a massively bigger car.
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I don't want a massively bigger car. I plan on keeping mine. Its doing 44.4mpg towing and 44.9mpg not towing, and 55mpg on long journeys. The insurance is under £300 and it flew through the MOT. I don't want another car thank you very much, its out of the question as is a horse box. A 900KG and 1000KG trailer is out of the question, I would be nearly over the limit without taking into account equipment.

The point which I am desperately trying to put across is that height/banging head and other trailer related problems are irrelevant. THe horse has been fine in the same trailer for 7.5 years. Fine to load, fine to travel. Is still fine to travel, not a murmur out of him. The trailer has not suddenly shrunk, or the horse has not developed a massive growth spurt.
 
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