Napping horse in the school

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jemmasmartie

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Help needed.
I am an instructer and have a client that has been having a few issues with her mare. I have been teaching her for about 4 months and to start with she was great, a little bit green and rider was fairly unconfident but as time has gone on the rider has grown heaps in confidence and is really starting to ride the mare properly.
however the horse started napping in the school, she would start by drifting onto the outside track and squashing the riders leg against the fence of the school, this then turned into planting her self into the corners and refusing to move at all, we tried turning her on the spot, asking her to walk backwards, turning her nose to the fence, kicking her and even smacking her on the bum but nothing is working, as time goes on she has been very inconsistent, some times she can go beautifully and have a great lesson her both jumping and flat work, how ever completely out of the blue she will start doing this napping and just completely switches off, you can see in her eyes that she just shuts down.
owner has had tack, and teeth checked and back and physio, she has also been turned away for a few weeks to see if this helped, as well as not going in the school for a few weeks, but every thing we have tried is not making a difference.
is it time to move on and sell this stroppy mare as owner wants to have fun and enjoy her horse not battle and be in floods of tears or loose her confidence again?
 
How often is she getting ridden in the school? mine used to nap in the school sometimes untill I realised he was getting bored. Gone from schooling 3 days a week to 1 and we get more results from a single decent session that more several that bore him and no more napping.
 
She goes in there to school
Once maybe twice at the most the rest of the time it's hacking and when we do go
In the school
We try to keep it fun for her with jumping, no hard schooling routines
 
Does she do the same with you, if my clients are having issues they cannot deal with the next thing to do is get on yourself and see if it is something you can ride through, if you can you can then give the owner some more ideas to use.
 
Working through a similar problem with my young mare at the moment. Have tried the standard response(s) and they don't seem to work on her unfortunately!! At the moment I am using someone on the ground with a lunge whip - she moves forward straight away with just a flick and I have now got her moving forward nicely without help a few times (just a person on standby in case). I also have to ride her very lightly - the harder I use my leg the more she dries up but if I ride her with a light leg and seat I can usually get her forward again. I don't ride if I am in a bad mood as I have got really cross with her a couple of times and it never ends well!! I have also put her on regumate to see if that helps.

Had physio/saddle checked etc although not had a full vet assessment yet as she is very keen to go forward on her terms and she only really does it at certain points in the arena so I am 99% sure it is nappiness/her throwing her weight around. If I can't sort it out then I will probably ask a pro to come and try and then worry/have a full vet check if that doesn't work!!

I think boredom is probably an issue for my mare however during the winter I do ride in the school a lot as I work full-time and ride under the lights. I also need to box up to hack so basically if she is going to work out for me she needs to be able to cope. I vary things as much as possible and am hoping that now spring is here and we can ride in the field/get out after work she will be better. I have taken her to a local indoor as precursor to doing a test on her and she was fab - really forward going but not silly.

Anyway good luck - other than this I really like my little mare so I am really hoping I can get it sorted.
 
A Grand Prix trainer that I have lessons with regularly told me when my horse stops dead (sometimes even from a canter!) to pull him around on a very tight circle when he does it, and to keep circling tightly, she said the horse won't like it. Then ask again for them to go forward - they will go forward (to avoid going round in circles!!) It worked for a few weeks, then he got tired of it, and was happy just going round in circles! cheeky boy. If I ride with the whip he doesn't nap at all (but he's very anxious to ride if I carry a whip).
My latest solution is a light tap of the end of the reins on his shoulder - he then moves forward immediately.

What DIDN'T work:
1) kicking (he would nap even worse and threaten to buck me off
2) asking nicely - he'd just take the mick even more
3) waiting - he'd stand there all day very happily!!

A Dutch rider was teaching me recently - and we found that keeping the horse going very strongly forward kept his concentration, and made it mentally stimulating - he didn't nap even once! It was a major breakthrough!
I need to mix it up as well, to keep his mind occupied. Too many circles = napping. So, intensive forward riding, coupled with lots of variety, and the occasional tap with reins if needed.
 
I feel for you and your client---have a pony that will simply plant, and start going backwards and bucking when asked to go forwards. Back etc. etc. all checked fine, and pony is plenty forward-going when he wants to be.

Similar to Andiamo's experiences, I find that if I get him going really forward right away---generally by bombing round the school in canter a few times---he's much much better. However, getting that initial canter tends to require a little fight, with a certain amount of pony club kicks and increasingly large bucks, which isn't really satisfactory for either of us. Current MO is to get him moving, have a very short productive session, and then stop.

I find schooling on hacks much more productive, and have found that he gets anxious initially when asked to canter. If I accept, however, that his first few attempts are going to involve a lot of running in trot, and just remain calm and ask again, then the transitions rapidly improve with much less stress. Now, the trick is going to be transferring that calmness into the school: I think his napping might be anxiety as much as boredom. I don't think there's an easy answer to this one!
 
Thanks for all your advice but we have tried all of these solutions , I have got on her and she does the same with who ever is on board, we've tried circles, the nice kind approach, the horrible methods, I honestly think
We have tried it all just can't thi k
Why she is doing it there seems to be no real reason. Sessions are fun, different, no real pressure , you name it we have done it. The client has had the horse 18 months and she never used to do it untill about 4 months ago and now it's getting beyond a joke
 
If this is all relatively recent, which it sounds like it is, I would be taking the horse to the vets for a loss of performance work up - you need a day (they start with the obvious from the history they take, then work through the less obvious from the feet upwards!).
 
My horse napped in the school pretty badly but at Bell Equine, after having her hocks blocked (and thus diagnosing a 9yo mare with spavin), she didn't nap in their school at all...
She has since returned to napping despite Tildren infusions and steroid injections, but we are working on that! (I think she objects to sand school surface especially if a bit deep, as she's not a problem on grass).
I think what I'm getting at is, horses always have a reason - working out why is the harder part.
 
Andiamo said:
A Grand Prix trainer that I have lessons with regularly told me when my horse stops dead (sometimes even from a canter!) to pull him around on a very tight circle when he does it, and to keep circling tightly, she said the horse won't like it. Then ask again for them to go forward - they will go forward (to avoid going round in circles!!) It worked for a few weeks, then he got tired of it, and was happy just going round in circles! cheeky boy. If I ride with the whip he doesn't nap at all (but he's very anxious to ride if I carry a whip).
My latest solution is a light tap of the end of the reins on his shoulder - he then moves forward immediately.

What DIDN'T work:
1) kicking (he would nap even worse and threaten to buck me off
2) asking nicely - he'd just take the mick even more
3) waiting - he'd stand there all day very happily!!

QUOTE]

Sounds like my girl - she's been planting in the school. I had been battling it (and failing) just using legs and whip. I recently had the circling technique suggested to me so am trying that - I truly hope that we can get through it because it's really starting to get to me now.
At leat with the circling I can stay calm and controlled. When I was using legs and whip we'd just both end up getting angry and wound up (and no further forward).
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