Trappy Timber Problems!!

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icklemadame

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I have an utterly super hunting pony - lovely with the hounds, happy to lead hunt horses, goes at the front or the back, good with gates, loves jumping hedges etc etc, everything you want in a hunter, but she gets very sticky over what I think of as 'trappy' timber (in all its many guises - big rails with no ground line, or big tiger traps, little rails with awful drops, narrow stiles, jumps where you have to stop dead on landing or you can't see the landing) She bowls on into things at great speed and then panics at the last minute, and generally I end up head first in the jump or we end up see-sawing on top of it!! (she never ever stops until the very last second, or until she has taken her front feet off the floor, so I rarely get any warning!!) So..... any exercises/ideas for things that I can do at home to boost her confidence over these kind of obstacles? I'm trying to do lots of 'showjumping' type schooling over poles to boost her confidence jumping bigger uprights, which seems to be working, but was wondering if anyone had any weird and wacky ideas for how to make her panic less when its a slightly more unusual jump!! :) Thank you!! (also posted in new lounge) xx
 
the problem is we all tend to let hunters go into things at their own speed (i.e. hedges), but it does mean that their canter isn't always as balanced as it should be.

IMO you're doing exactly the right thing by going back to show jumps and things like that to build her confidence back up. But doing so also helps you to rebalance her canter and to help get her hocks under her for when the jumps aren't so forgiving as a hedge!

once you're getting better results in the school try a little hunter trial or two to make sure you've got it right! and Don't let yourself panic!
 
I figured I needed to go back to basics and get her balanced and confident over uprights, which is what I've been doing in the school and its definitely working, she's happily jumping round a 3ft course now without panicking, and I'm just gradually increasing the height until (hopefully) most rails will seem small to her!! She seems a lot lot happier working in a 'showjumping' canter instead of a hunting 'charge', so that's something I've learnt for next season!! It's also helping my nerves - I'm used to my other pony who would jump anything from anywhere and into anywhere, so to regularly be going clattering headfirst into solid timber had somewhat shaken me!! My problem is the 'trappy' stuff - not necessarily big but difficult, testing and uninviting - which is so hard to recreate at home!!! I guess just getting her confidence back up will help but was just wondering if anyone had any novel ideas for how to recreate awful trappy timber!!! :)
 
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