Naughty 4 year old stage?

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Gracie21

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Please help me get through it! :(:o

Back & saddle were checked last month, he's teething but health wise all is fine. No changes to feed, routine etc.

1) Napping out on hacks-Had me off on the main road twice in 5 minutes (had my BP on so no harm done, just sore)
2) Started to be a pain to load. Took us 2 hours coming back from a show.
3) Gone totally backwards in the school. Will nap if I don't keep him busy, unbalanced and too busy looking everywhere else. He has been working quite sweetly up until now.

Our school is rubbish and spooky so to get any decent session in we have to load and go 10 minutes up the road...not easy when you have a pony that can be tricky to load (especially coming home!)

I've stopped hacking (I'm normally on my own, company are away at equifest)
In the school I've been lunging for 5 mins then doing loads of serpentines, poles, 5m, 10m, 20m circles, transitions, changing of rein for 20mins to try and keep him occupied.
Reiterating in hand stuff-Backing up, walking on, voice commands etc.
Loading him 2/3 times a week to feed him dinner or go for a short, really slow drive. Once he's loaded he travels very quietly.

What else can I do? Feel pretty deflated, not sure how to move forwards (literally!) He's been going so so so well and I'm gutted he's hit this stage!

I'm waiting to hear back from my instructor, hopefully can get to her yard for a lesson at the end of the week.

What do I do with him tonight? Will he get bored if I school him again or will he be okay if I keep it short and varied?

Any advice very much welcomed.

Rocky roads on offer!
 
Not got any answers but mine has gone exactly the same,know how you feel,took mine to a show yesterday just to try and give him something to think about. will read answers with interest!
 
How long has he been in work/broken? May just need turning out for few months/winter and then start again. When some of my youngsters have gone off the boil I have turned them away and brought them back in again after a "holiday" and all worked out :)
 
My 4 year old started napping when out on his own, un-nerved me as he's usually so good. I know it's easy to say but not hacking him is not doing you or him any favours. He needs to learn. I did not feel confident with my boy, so paid a local professional rider to hack him out on his own for half an hour every day. She charged me a tenner a day,(usually she was out for more than 1/2 hour!) but it is the best money I have spent! He and I are now hacking out on our own, if he does have a wobble I am confident to correct it. I am sure that he will get over this, they really test the boundaries at this age!
 
Oh dear, what is it they say about youngsters and steps back? I think this sort of thing has to be expected from time to time.

My very first job would be to get him working in some form or other in your arena at home. Use the great opportunity you have of a spooky arena to teach him he can look after himself and there's nothing to really be scared of. Lead him up to and around all spooky areas and show him it's not that scary after all. You can then loose school, lunge, long rein and ride in there as well as having a safe place to teach new things.

Next then is the loading, my 4 yr old recently decided he didn't want to load after always loading well, I had hoped the more we went out the better he would get but he actually got worse so it needed nipping in the bud. I parked the trailer in the school for a week so we could practise loading safely, only took 2 days to really instill the lesson and he's been fine since.

The hacking, well it does just sound very babyish on his part. What we're the circumstances behind your falls? Did he nap and then buck or rear?
 
I'd be thinking give a few weeks off as well, depending how how long he's been in work.

Sometimes a short break can work wonders.
 
OOOO the website froze didn't realise this posted! :D


ThoroughbredStar said:
How long has he been in work/broken? May just need turning out for few months/winter and then start again. When some of my youngsters have gone off the boil I have turned them away and brought them back in again after a "holiday" and all worked out :)
Click to expand...

He was broken in September, turned away beginning of December until late March. Don't want to have to turn him away again already?! :(

Debbien-I hacked him out in company the next day and he was awful but settled by the end of the ride. I was thinking about taking him out tonight mum mum on the ground holding him on a lead rein? I would try out again on my own but we're on a main road, it's simply not sensible :(
 
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Wheels said:
Oh dear, what is it they say about youngsters and steps back? I think this sort of thing has to be expected from time to time.

My very first job would be to get him working in some form or other in your arena at home. Use the great opportunity you have of a spooky arena to teach him he can look after himself and there's nothing to really be scared of. Lead him up to and around all spooky areas and show him it's not that scary after all. You can then loose school, lunge, long rein and ride in there as well as having a safe place to teach new things.

Next then is the loading, my 4 yr old recently decided he didn't want to load after always loading well, I had hoped the more we went out the better he would get but he actually got worse so it needed nipping in the bud. I parked the trailer in the school for a week so we could practise loading safely, only took 2 days to really instill the lesson and he's been fine since.

The hacking, well it does just sound very babyish on his part. What we're the circumstances behind your falls? Did he nap and then buck or rear?
Click to expand...

Thank you for this :)

I lunge, long rein and ride in the school. The sand is really deep with lining coming up so we do our best, he does struggle.
Unfortunately we can't park the lorry in the school as it's really deep sand and the lorry would get stuck! We do practise in the closed yard though. Did you load him, then unload and load him straight away again?
Yes, very naughty baby sort of behaviour. He napped and bunny-hopped then slipped on the road, scared himself, shot forwards and dropped his shoulder. I think he had scared himself when he slipped and he didn't actually intend to get me off.. The second time he was going backwards as fast as he possibly could, slipped down a hill then spun and I came off the side :(
 
Mine has just started playing up too. I'm turning him away for winter now, he's growing like a weed and has made such good progress this year that I don't want to undo all my hard work battling with him.
 
I absolutely agree that it is not safe to get into a situation on the main road. It is a really good idea to have someone with you when you hack out tonight...make sure it is someone horsy and confident, and I would take the lead rein but not use it unless totally unavoidable. Good luck!
 
Actually I didn't pressure him to load at all, day one I led him all around the car and trailer, led him over the ramp but not up it, let him have a really good sniff and paw if he wanted to then I stood at the bottom of the ramp and lunged him so he was stepping up and over the ramp side to side. He was allowed to stop on the ramp for a rest but not anywhere else. Day 2 we did the same but more lunging than leading, eventually he got the idea that the trailer was the resting place and he took himself in.

He backed out almost immediately so we went again until he got the idea that standing in the trailer was the easiest thing to do.

Day three I closed the bars and gave him a brush, day 4 the ramp went up, day 5 we went for a lesson and he loaded perfectly at both ends.

As far as the napping goes, is it only on the way out? Can you lead part of the way and then ride part? Can you find a hacking partner?
 
Wheels said:
Actually I didn't pressure him to load at all, day one I led him all around the car and trailer, led him over the ramp but not up it, let him have a really good sniff and paw if he wanted to then I stood at the bottom of the ramp and lunged him so he was stepping up and over the ramp side to side. He was allowed to stop on the ramp for a rest but not anywhere else. Day 2 we did the same but more lunging than leading, eventually he got the idea that the trailer was the resting place and he took himself in.

He backed out almost immediately so we went again until he got the idea that standing in the trailer was the easiest thing to do.

Day three I closed the bars and gave him a brush, day 4 the ramp went up, day 5 we went for a lesson and he loaded perfectly at both ends.

As far as the napping goes, is it only on the way out? Can you lead part of the way and then ride part? Can you find a hacking partner?
Click to expand...

Ah I see, how clever :) I think our ramp is possibly too steep to do that with?

Yes, only on the way out. I was thinking about leading him but then thought maybe that's teaching him that he's getting his own way? Hacking partners are away at big horse show as I said in first post :)
 
I don't think at 4 he is really learning about getting his own way, he is telling you he is unhappy about going it alone, you can gradually decrease the time you are on the ground.

Hard for me to say if your ramp is too steep but is it wide enough to be able to lunge a very small circle so he goes on and off near the bottom but goes further up in the middle?
 
Hmm well mine has gone a similar way except I could kick myself that I didn't notice the subtle signs he was showing before it all went wrong. Cue me getting quiet impressively dumped at two little shows I took him to (the first purely for a look/experience). He then totally flipped out when being saddled one day even though a couple of day prior my instructor rode him and he was ok, although she felt he was not 100% happy. His problem looks to be the saddle. He is very wide and, although I had a wide saddle, it was ok in front but seemingly not actually wide enough down his spine.
He had physio - he said he was very sore all down is back. A couple of months before he was fine. He's then had some sort of reiki/re-balancing guy (I have no clue IF what he dos work but hey!).He seems improved, more relaxed and we are working back again on lungeing and getting his confidence back. don' know when I will put a saddle on him again or get on board but, like you mine was going well and I was hacking him alone but he started being a bit nappy/unwilling to go out and had started resenting the girth when he'd been fine before. I thought he was just being 'awkward' but no, he was hurting.

I would lunge him with your instructor - a fresh set of eyes an look at how he moves, does he relax or is he tense? I would suspect there is some discomfort somewhere to be honest probably back related from the behaviour you describe.
 
Thank you ladyt25. His back was done 3 weeks ago and his saddle was checked and adjusted as well :)
blitznbobs-I was thinking that but the area he naps is on the busy main road!

I Tacked him up last night and led him down the main road, keeping well at his shoulder making him march on. He did try to stop a couple of times but soon settled into what I was expecting of him. We turned off the main road, walked for another 200m then I got on. He tried to nap when I got on but I managed to get him to walk forwards. He was perfect the rest of the hack HOW TYPICAL!
 
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