Rearing Youngster

Hmmm if that was my horse I'd send it away for someone else to bring on! Would rather pay someone else than get myself injured, but thats just me.

All the best OP hope you resolve the matter!

And please dont use draw reins
 
lots of work teaching her to just stand still calmly, both under the saddle and in hand should help the situation too if she gets fidgety, anxious when being asked to be still.
 
Thank you everyone, you all have extremely good advise and experience. Today I took her up the school and my friend who is a very good rider/competer rode her. It was reassuring to see but dissapointly she did go up with her. It was completely out of the blue so she had no time to react until landing where she turned her sharply. I have a new riding instructor coming up tomorrow so I'm looking forward to having her advice but after that I think I'll take the majority opinion and take her right back to in hand work. I'm considering a pasoa for lunging and walking her out in hand. Thank you all.
 
Dry Rot said:
I'm on here to learn so hope others don't mind my asking a question! (I'm a bit bruised and battered from a doggy forum, so be gentle!).

When an animal is in a situation it doesn't like, it will sometimes try escape behaviour that it has been programmed to follow by instinct. (e.g. scared = flight). If that works, it will repeat it. Intentionally or otherwise, that is something we all make use of in training. Set the scene for the animal to follow a certain piece of behaviour and make sure it "wins" or is rewarded, right?

I am wondering where this horse is in the social hierarchy within the herd? Has it used rearing as a means of defence/escape, even in play? I know my two 2yo colts play all the time, lots of mini rearing and feigned biting without actually harming each other. The reason I ask is because of the advice to turn away which certainly sounds sensible. With maturity comes security. Is that what happens?
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I certainly think so. It's a very old fashioned way of thinking to most people. Everyone is in a rush to produce the next prodigy but horses are not on the same agenda. The horsemen and women of old would bring a horse in to back at three, turn away until four and do a couple of things, turn away again for winter and increase the ask at five.

With maturity comes, better growth, stronger joints, more developed muscles ON those STRONGER bones and all the angles have closed a bit and they are no longer bum-high or long-backed etc etc and a better mind as the growing pains have stopped and teeth have stopped hurting etc etc....

I often wonder if the incidences of kissing spines and navicular that have increased are due to bad shoeing and saddling... or is it because we're starting horses younger and younger.

The fact is, those with a peaceloving nature get pushed on and on until breakdown through physical complications, and there's those that are more mentally stimulated break down due to the sheer mental pressure exerted upon their being.

I don't know. Someone somewhere always has an answer to everything but my answer is to wait and see. Turn away and maybe those aches and pains causing the rider the upset might just go away. If they learned to evade a pain when young, if there is no pain when older, what will there be to evade?
 
Please don't walk her out in hand.

I would say (not having read the whole post), that she is lacking in confidence. Do you ride out with a competent babysitter - one who has experience with young horses?

Presumably your not doing much with her in terms of the amount of work and ridden time?

How long ago did you buy her?
 
siennamum said:
I think rearing is no different to a horse than head tossing, bucking or any other form of behaviour. It takes some effort and some horses find it easier than others, depending upon conformation. My gelding rears everywhere, in his stable, in the field, on the yard and at any point when he wants to make an objection.

In a behavioural or training sense, rearing is particularly difficult to handle because when the horses head comes up the rider becomes passive. The horse has an instantaneous release of pressure. that's why I think you have to be very careful about really backing off when a horse is being nappy, inadvertently you cane be reinforcing the behaviour. ideally you never get to that point, but if you do you need lightning quick reflexes and a bit of nerve I think.

I also think that the older horse is just a reflection of what the younger horse learned. if you train a young horse to be bold, & to be submissive to the rider, it will be more confident all it's life. They learn nothing in the field IMO.
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Wow, that makes sooo much sense! Especially about rearing basically being the evasion the horse finds easiest - mine has always reared as his 'go to'. He is ridiculously short backed for his size too - so maybe has the conformation for it. He has never lacked boldness or confidence, but perhaps we need to work on submissiveness!

OP - nothing useful really to add except personally, I think draw reins would make it worse. I like the idea of long reining out on roads, if you are confident long reining. Good luck, and stay safe!
 
tallyho! said:
I certainly think so. It's a very old fashioned way of thinking to most people. Everyone is in a rush to produce the next prodigy but horses are not on the same agenda. The horsemen and women of old would bring a horse in to back at three, turn away until four and do a couple of things, turn away again for winter and increase the ask at five.

With maturity comes, better growth, stronger joints, more developed muscles ON those STRONGER bones and all the angles have closed a bit and they are no longer bum-high or long-backed etc etc and a better mind as the growing pains have stopped and teeth have stopped hurting etc etc....

I often wonder if the incidences of kissing spines and navicular that have increased are due to bad shoeing and saddling... or is it because we're starting horses younger and younger.

The fact is, those with a peaceloving nature get pushed on and on until breakdown through physical complications, and there's those that are more mentally stimulated break down due to the sheer mental pressure exerted upon their being.

I don't know. Someone somewhere always has an answer to everything but my answer is to wait and see. Turn away and maybe those aches and pains causing the rider the upset might just go away. If they learned to evade a pain when young, if there is no pain when older, what will there be to evade?
Click to expand...

Couldn't agree more. It takes us several years to break ponies here! A young animal's brain is not capable of learning some things until it has matured and other things are learnt very rapidly at a "critical period" during development (think foal learning after being born, standing, finding the udder, etc. all in minutes), i.e. when they would naturally learn that behaviour in the wild. I used those periods when training my own dogs with quite dramatic results which I have on video. The danger is that learning can be so rapid that they inadvertently learn the wrong things which have to be unlearnt in training! I find this sort of thing totally fascinating.
 
I'm also curious as to why walking out in hand is considered a bad idea.

My youngster, who I've already posted about in this thread, sounds very similar. I walk him out in hand, these days just in a headcollar as he's actually 100x more relaxed without any gubbins on (at the worst I was leading him out in a snaffle bridle with longe line attached as he would rear and get away from me when he got upset). I think it's done him the world of good. We started slowly, sometimes just getting 100 yards off the yard. Even now the farthest we go is about 30 mins round trip and I always try to do a loop vs out and back, even if it's just round one field. It has taken an age but he's now comfortable doing this. Once I could lead him out a reasonable distance in hand I started hacking with a foot soldier. Again, it's taken several months but last night we managed to make it off the yard property to the nearby woodlands. It's about 45 mins total in walk and not really that far in distance (less than 2 miles) but it's been a huge deal for my boy as he doesn't like being enclosed by trees, which is a slight problem as all my hacking has trees somewhere. I've just built it up progressively, adding a couple of metres on a good day and on bad days calling it a day before he gets upset, or getting off and leading him if needs be.

I've also taken him out of a bit and am riding him bitless, which has reduced his tension yet again (and I'm not heavy handed nor do I rely on the reins ordinarily).

We'll probably do another month of regular riding, a mix of hacking and schooling. No more than 45 min hacks and 30 mins schooling. One day a week might be in-hand work, just playing with poles or cones or walking over tarp and stuff. Once the nights start to draw in he'll have an easier life. I won't turn him away over winter fully as I think he needs the regular mental stimulation, but he'll do a lot less and the weather will likely mean he has a few breaks of a week or a two at a time.

He'll be 6 before I start asking anything more than this of him, and even then it will be a slow process and I don't expect we'll be able to start doing any kind of distance work out hacking or anything more than short bursts of schooling until he's nearer to 7. He's just not mentally ready yet.
 
Thank you BayLady.
You've all helped me realise I was asking far to much for her.
I will work her in hand but the only issue I could see in it is the location. I will obviously avoid the common because if she goes up and gets free then I'm pretty much one horse down if she gets away up there, it's huge!
 
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