My horse is frightened of nothing!

Pearlsasinger

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We have been hacking for each of the 3 days this weekend. We have met and passed without turning a hair; tractors, bouncy castle with about 20 screaming children, vehicles with rattly trailers, buses, noisy motorbikes and almost silent cycles, sheep running at us, mares and foals running away from us, wheelie-bins and skips full of rubbish, water pouring out of walls and down roads, all manner of DIYers, barking dogs and even the driven cob pulling 2 different vehicles, which turns her companion to a gibbering wreck.
So what on earth was it that made her stop on yesterday's hack with her head sky high, looking fearfully at a garden hedge, and then when asked to go on, turn round, in front of a car?
Sister persuaded her mare to ignore the large bum which was blocking her way and gave us a lead. My mare immediately settled and neither sis nor I could see anything at all which might have scared her.
We would be grateful for any ideas.
 

MrsMozart

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She's a mare - you need ask :cool::rolleyes:

:D


Tigs used to have a thing about Daffodils, especially loan ones, and big stones - a stone wall was them all ganging up on her and had to be treated with great fear!
 
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The racehorses are 99% bombproof - anything go past at what ever speed in any direction and they don't turn a hair. But what has appeared in the field that we pass on route to the gallops? Cows! Yup! For the last 2 days we have had napping, spinning, spooking, shooting past, snorting sideways past, refusing point blank to move and even getting off to be lead past! Now any other day they wouldn't bother about cows, and they never have in the past but these ones are black AND white all at the same time and that is clearly super scary!
 

Pearlsasinger

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She's a mare - you need ask :cool::rolleyes:

:D


Tigs used to have a thing about Daffodils, especially loan ones, and big stones - a stone wall was them all ganging up on her and had to be treated with great fear!

Sister's horse had leaped across the road a few minutes before our incident when she spotted a heap of bricks still concreted together, hiding behind a metal gate. My mare just looked at her and carried on.

She obviously decided that you had become just a little to relaxed and weren't nearly on your toes enough !

I think you might be right. She is teaching a friend to ride and always asks a little bit more of her than the last time.
 

Holly Hocks

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The racehorses are 99% bombproof - anything go past at what ever speed in any direction and they don't turn a hair. But what has appeared in the field that we pass on route to the gallops? Cows! Yup! For the last 2 days we have had napping, spinning, spooking, shooting past, snorting sideways past, refusing point blank to move and even getting off to be lead past! Now any other day they wouldn't bother about cows, and they never have in the past but these ones are black AND white all at the same time and that is clearly super scary!

My ex-racer reacted in the same way when the cows were put out last week - cue snorting, head at an abnormal height. But it didn't help that a lot of the cows were young and curious and kept running alongside the hedge then popping their heads over at various intervals. Still, on the positive side, at least the nappy mare went forwards, even if it was rather quicker that I would have liked!
 

Littlelegs

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Either someone/something hidden behind it so she couldn't make out what it was. Or a funny smell like a fire she couldn't see.
 

Pearlsasinger

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Well, littlelegs, that's what we thought but there was no-one and absolutely nothing, no washing, fire, animals or people visible. It's a mystery - especially as she is absolutely bombproof under most circumstances. She has never spooked like that in the 18 months that I've had her.
 

Littlelegs

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Smells the only thing I can think of, a tiny garden fire too faint for you to smell or last smoulders off a bbq. Saying that, mine sounds similar to yours, never bats an eyelid. But on the approach to one particular bridlepath there's a hill up to a mway bridge that she really doesn't like, goes past fine alone but I can tell it makes her nervous. Fine once on the bridge & never been fussed approaching mway bridges anywhere else, even when the traffics loud & hidden from sight. Visibly relaxes when about 3/4 up & I've been & looked on foot too to no avail.
 

xxMozlarxx

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Could the house have a cat scarer or similar? The frequency can really hurt their ears, my boy totally freaked the first time he heard one, I had no idea what the problem was, but I'm half deaf! :)
 

Pearlsasinger

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Could the house have a cat scarer or similar? The frequency can really hurt their ears, my boy totally freaked the first time he heard one, I had no idea what the problem was, but I'm half deaf! :)

That IS a distinct possibility. It certainly makes more sense than anything else we thought of.

I did like the 'ghost' idea, though, patterdale.

I shall make enquiries, as I know that house's next-door neighbour quite well.

Horses are quite amazing, aren't they? The things you think will worry them, they sail past without a care, then something that you haven't even noticed sends them into a panic.
 

Pearlsasinger

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The racehorses are 99% bombproof - anything go past at what ever speed in any direction and they don't turn a hair. But what has appeared in the field that we pass on route to the gallops? Cows! Yup! For the last 2 days we have had napping, spinning, spooking, shooting past, snorting sideways past, refusing point blank to move and even getting off to be lead past! Now any other day they wouldn't bother about cows, and they never have in the past but these ones are black AND white all at the same time and that is clearly super scary!

My ex-racer reacted in the same way when the cows were put out last week - cue snorting, head at an abnormal height. But it didn't help that a lot of the cows were young and curious and kept running alongside the hedge then popping their heads over at various intervals. Still, on the positive side, at least the nappy mare went forwards, even if it was rather quicker that I would have liked!

Our 'bombproof' R&D cob was most disconcerted when a garden bench appeared at the side of one of our regular bridleways. She wasn't impressed by the big stones that appeared at the end of it either!
But then she was once chased down a housing estate road by a hydrangea head!
 

JenHunt

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Ron has no issues with anything at all that we pass on the road.... ever. But he properly cacked himself the other day at a field roller that had been parked in a hedge back! :eek: took me a full 5 minutes to stop laughing at him and make him walk past it. He snorted, threatened to run away, backed up, farted, then finally walked past it like it wasn't there.
 

WandaMare

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My horse is pretty good with most stuff but the one thing which totally freaks her is a human being bending down! She will cause all sorts of mayhem until I have to ask some unsuspecting gardner or somebody if they could just stand up while we pass.......once she realises it is a person everything is fine again, mad old mare :D
 
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