Nervous or excited?

JoBo

JoBo

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So be honest when your horse is ‘full of it’, ‘on their toes’, a bit hyper, whatever you want to call it does it make you nervous, a bit excited, neither?

I took Bodes out for a hack today (haven’t been out for a little while) and he was ‘full of it’. Nothing nasty at all, just power walking and when we went for a canter he shot of and was quite fast. But I just sat there and giggled to myself, I was actually really enjoying him being like that. Now I would never have been like that with my last horse (Otto), it would have made me nervous.

Obviously I realise there are different scales of horses being full of it.

So how do you feel, and what’s does your horse do when he/she is ‘full of it’?
 
Very Good question and I was trying to explain this the other day :-
When my horse Gulliver is being a tad naughty it used to make me laugh particularly if we were in the Arena and another horse jumped and he bucked because he wanted to have a go or if he was a little 'enthusiastic when we went for A CANTER WHEN WE WERE OUT ON A hack. (sorry about the capitals my cat just trod on the keyboard)

Now he has an injury and when we started our walking work he would go from a comatose plod into a squeak and bronc followed by a comatose walk again. He had me off twice when he coupled this with a preliminary spin. I lost my nerve and often rode him with dark glasses so noone could see me crying on my own horse.

Why did I lose my nerve ? Because if he was fit I would have either worked him for a while in Canter or even untacked him and chased him around to let some steam off if he was particularly bad. I couldnt do any of this and now he has gone back to walking in hand for 4 weeks and then I have to pluck up the courage to get back on.

Sorry this is a bit long but to end I think it depends how much you feel 'in control' of a situation.
 
If my TB gets on his toes I am frightened because he can be very unpredictable and starts spooking and backing up. He doesn't have much self-preservation and I figure if he's not bothered about looking after himself then he ain't gonna look after me!

On the other hand, the pony I ride at uni is on her toes, I love it! She's very honest and it's just a case of being faster and bouncing about and it's hilarious.

Artyannie, I know how you feel, I have lost confidence in my TB (luckily I share him with my dad) and there have been days when I get 10 mins down the road, can't cope and swap with my dad (he always walks with me in case I have problems) and walk home in tears. It's very demoralising sometimes.
 
I used to HATE it when Cat got like that. He could be v sharp & unpredictable sometimes, & had a v powerful spook. Just thinking about him snorting & blowing gives me the shivers, & that's from the safety of my chair...

So if I thought he was going to be like that, he'd get a good dose of Mr Lungeing Rein before I'd even think about getting on him.

But if he was bucking & full of himself jumping, I just used to laugh - prob cos it took him 10 or 15 mins to fire up, & by then it didn't seem so scarey as if he'd done it from the word go.
 
Sharpeness & unpredictable behaviour would make me nervous but being on their toes is ok. In my youngster it annoys me as I want him to be perfectly behaved all the time
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but when my pony bucks, prances, jogs etc I just laugh (I have owned her ten years and I know she would never intentionally hurt me).
Personally, I think it has alot to do with how much you trust your horse.
 
My lad has little self preservation so depending on the environment it can be quite scary. (by a ditch or road etc)

In general I find it irritating when the jogging and bucking starts!
 
I think there's a big difference between being on their toes in a funny way and in a scary way..if they are just full of beans its quite fun but if they are spooky and scary with it then it gets a bit too much!
 
I think it depends on how much you know and trust them. With my old horse I knew that whatever he did I could and had always coped with it, and so I normally used to humour him. It's very different with my new young horse, because I don't know him well enough yet to know what his reaction or behaviour is likely to be and so don't know if I can deal with it. Once I know him better I think it will be different.
 
When Amber is just on her toes, a bit sharp and spooky, and jogs a bit, I think it is funny, but when she was nappy and wierd in the autumn I began to get quite nervous. The old Appy made me laugh (when not in traffic) when she used to half pass down the road when she was on her toes.
 
Depends on the pony, the place and the time!

I like Ginga to be abit more up for it, he goes better and its funner, but Pip almost the whole time has plenty of energy. It does make me nervous at shows before dressage when they are up for it, as its always a worry as to weather we will make it round without a buck, rear canter in the wrong place or the like.
 
As a kid, I would have loved any fizzy horse & not been at all nervous.

Now? If it's a horse I knew (& therefore knew it's limits), I wouldn't be too worried, but an unknown horse would probably worry me as you don't know how far they're going to take it - i.e. turn themselves inside-out until you fall off!
 
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