Typical horse behaviour?

[I don’t like mondays]

Looking for a pony for my daughter. She’s had confidence issues before (gave up at one point) but slowly rebuilt her confidence. Friend of a friend has a pony LWVTB. Wasn’t what we ideally wanted (it’s green) but was told had calm temperament so thought it was worth a look (because she’d have help and lessons). We tried the pony twice and she was a bit behind the leg (fine), on second viewing then when they catered she tanked off, then when my daughter slightly lost balance pony did several big bucks (head down) until my daughter was ejected. Daughter had quite a nasty fall and got whiplash. We’re walking away because I feel tanking is one thing (they can all do that), but getting the rider off by doing several bucks isn’t great IMO. The owner said “that’s just horses” and an unconnected friend also said “oh these things happen, that’s just horses”. This got me thinking, what behaviour do you think is “just horses” and what is an issue? This pony isn’t for us but I also wonder if we’ll find something forgiving for a rider with confidence issues? Don’t worry we won’t be viewing any green or young now

For me “just horses” is the odd spook (cat jumping out, plastic bag), being more forward in a new place, an occasional tank off/extra speedy when fresh/spring grass but eventually stopping, the odd excited buck as a one off (nothing too big), bit of napping (without a proper rear)
Thanks

 

[milliepops]

Pain and medical probs aside, any behaviour can be *just horses* , that's the thing IMO - when you look at what they do in the field, pretty much all of them do weird things, even the quiet oldies can have a funny five minutes.

However, modifying that behaviour through training is where you can transform *just horses* into a horse that knows how you want it to behave or react when there's a human involved. that's a continuum from the "only just started learning" to the "very established"

Where the acceptable balance is, depends on the rider in question, their ability/willingness to put up with *just horses* and their ability & willingness to continue pushing the horse towards the established end.

it sounds like you need the very established end of that, where the *just horses* is turned down and the training turned up to the max.
I agree that you probably ought to be looking at older ponies who have been there and done it as their previous jockeys are likely to have done the legwork for you on that.

FWIW i do think there are some people who are sort of oblivious to the fact that you can improve a horse's behaviour a lot... people who accept their horse barging into them etc, but that's still a horse on that continuum and the owner has just accepted it staying where it is!

 

[I don’t like mondays]

Pain and medical probs aside, any behaviour can be *just horses* , that's the thing IMO - when you look at what they do in the field, pretty much all of them do weird things, even the quiet oldies can have a funny five minutes.

However, modifying that behaviour through training is where you can transform *just horses* into a horse that knows how you want it to behave or react when there's a human involved. that's a continuum from the "only just started learning" to the "very established"

Where the acceptable balance is, depends on the rider in question, their ability/willingness to put up with *just horses* and their ability & willingness to continue pushing the horse towards the established end.

it sounds like you need the very established end of that, where the *just horses* is turned down and the training turned up to the max.
I agree that you probably ought to be looking at older ponies who have been there and done it as their previous jockeys are likely to have done the legwork for you on that.

FWIW i do think there are some people who are sort of oblivious to the fact that you can improve a horse's behaviour a lot... people who accept their horse barging into them etc, but that's still a horse on that continuum and the owner has just accepted it staying where it is!

Thanks Millie, what you’ve said makes a lot of sense. My daughter could work through a bit of napping but big bucks with tanking off are a no-no and I think a pony could learn that’s the way to get her off and things would only get worse.
I need to find another oldie (my other daughters pony is in his 20’s, he has his moments but they are short lived)

 

[milliepops]

yeah, something older, or at least something with a track record of being reliable and sensible