Spooky horse

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Stormi

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My horse is a 6 year old Thoroughbred. He is a very good horse but he can sometimes be a bit spooky. For example he wont hack alone, and he will be scared of things like water, different color of surfaces, scary jump fillers etc.. What i started thinking is to do more and more scary things to getting used to them. But what is the best approach? A nice, kind approach, praising him for every little success or play the strict role?

* when he finds something scary he stops and he starts going backwards. What should i do when he takes backwards steps?
 
I'd go for the gentler approach, and just take things easy, one step at a time. Maybe putting him on a calmer would soothe his nerves?
 
It's always a good idea to be gentle, but what you need is to get your horse to go forwards from your leg and be obedient to the aids. I find that a great deal of spookiness comes from horses not a. having confidence in their rider, and b. not being obedient to the leg.
 
Carry a schooling whip and use it to make sure he is off the leg,
I use Feedmark Steady up but straight magnesium is available from ebay. Make sure he is not getting any molasses or sugars.
Get a few lessons in a short timespan and make sure you make progress with flat-work, try a bit of variety, cross poles, grids, short hacks after schooling.
Hang things around the arena, have an assistant help you move things around.
Make him go forward, do not hesitate, go on on go on, tap tap tap [schooling whip].
Long reining is good, keep moving forward.
Try not to let him go back [yes] push on with legs and sometimes out hacking trotting will help, but best to go out in company if at all possible.
 
Last edited:
Thank you for your answers.

He is not the type of horse that will go mad, and he is very obedient to my aids, but since he was abused in the past he can be a bit spooky at different things. He does novice dressage and jumps around 90 cm at the moment. So it's time for us to overcome the ''scary stuff'' issue in order to move on:)

Thought that maybe everyday I could put something different in the arena and try to get passed it and also jumping fillers. Any ideas on what i can use?
 
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