Advice and tips on working with my very nervous first horse? (Update #12: Great news at last!)

[JenEM]

My understanding is that the JC’s DNA program will tell you if the horse is who you think it might be–say you have a partial tattoo or papers went missing. TJC has been keeping DNA on file to verify breeding for a long time; my previous horse was an '03 and had DNA on file! Most TBs now should have DNA on file with TJC, submitted at the time of registration, regardless of whether they started or were tattoo’d. Same with the microchipping post 2017.

In your case, it might be worth checking for a microchip anyway. I’m not as up on AQHA and whether/when they use chips. USEF has been requiring them in hunters for a while now too. So if the horse does have one you might be able to find something out that way. Your vet should be able to check quickly and easily the next time you see them.

[Scribbler]

@hemitheconyxcaudicinctus

@Scribbler

If you need to restart yourself because of financial constraints then you could follow any of the colt starting books. It could be useful still to have a colt starter as a visiting instructor once a week. Do not take any advice from the person who told you not to let the mare look at things. If they are your current main instructor they are likely part of the problem.

Oh god no, my trainer would never, don’t worry - there are a couple of people at this barn who subscribe to training by force, one of whom even told me “don’t just let her spook at silly things, jerk the leadrope if she does, you need to tell her she can’t just do that” as though this sensitive horse in a new environment is CHOOSING to get startled.

Also she is 14 but I do not have exact DOB. Two vets have corroborated that she’s about that age (early teens) by looking at her teeth.

Ok I’m going to say she defeated her previous owners and was put out to pasture and then sold on.

So now you know that you have loud mouthed ignorant bullies in your barn, and you just smile and ignore them. There are a lot of folks who have adequate riding skills and years in the sport but about zero ground skills, no idea of training, and a kick them forward mindset. You have to figure out how to put a bubble around you and your horse so you don’t engage with these people or let them distract you from doing correct work. Sometimes these people are also aggressive a-holes who will want to start an argument other times they are just drive-by annoyances. Don’t ask them for advice or complain in their presence or invite them over your threshold.

It’s really easy as a newbie owner to think you have to be respectful of all the opinions of other longer term owners or even coaches. It’s easy to think you have to take it all into consideration and balance viewpoints

You don’t. I would say 85% of what you hear from other riders you can ignore (beyond factual statements like it started raining or the indoor arena is shut for harrowing or there’s a bear on the trail. And even there I’d always verify). Maybe up to 95%. I’d say 100% if you are on your own problem solving journey.

[BayBondGirl]

In reading your description of your mare, I was immediately reminded of an OTTB mare that @ sdequus on Instagram restarted and helped overcome major anxiety - it might be worth checking out her page and stuff on how she accomplished that. I know that she exclusively went back to walking on a long rein for ages and absolutely nothing else.

It does sound to me like your girl has some big holes in her confidence, experience and/or training, so it might be best to treat her like a brand new baby horse and introduce everything (and I do mean everything lol) as if it’s her first ever time. It will probably feel slow as molasses (I’m bringing along my own youngster for the first time so I get it) but in the long run it will help her develop confidence in both herself and you as her riding partner.

[Mander]

I only glazed through the responses here, so maybe this has already been touched on. My biggest recommendation for people learning to work with sensitive horses is to have a game plan for yourself. What are you going to do when you inevitably get made anxious by the way your horse is behaving?

For example, before I would get on an OTTB I had who was a nervous Nelly, I would always take a minute or two at the mounting block and do a few deep breaths (inhale for 4, hold for 4, exhale for 6). In the tack, when you notice any tension in yourself, breathwork can help, and make a big shrug and roll your shoulders up and back around to get some movement back in them. During walk breaks pull your legs out and away from the horse so you’re sitting deeper in the tack and then extend and relax them downwards, etc. You might find other things that work for you too!

Recognize that some days, you just might not be in the right headspace to do XYZ with your horse in a way that is constructive for them - that’s ok. Learn to recognize those signs early and do something else instead. A quiet 15 minute ride walking only will always be better than trying to force something just because that’s what your “plan” was and giving your horse a bad experience.

[Montanas_Girl]

@Scribbler

Ok I’m going to say she defeated her previous owners and was put out to pasture and then sold on.

Agreed. There’s almost always a reason a horse ends up in an auction/dealer barn. It’s likely this mare has been ridden but has never had any real, solid, foundational training.

Can you swing it financially to send her to a very good “colt starter” type trainer for 2-3 months? I think someone more experienced than you or your current trainer needs to go back to square one and establish basic ground and under saddle manners with this horse. The best trainers of this type excel at helping horses become confident, willing partners.

[hemitheconyxcaudicinctus]

@Montanas_Girl

Can you swing it financially to send her to a very good “colt starter” type trainer for 2-3 months? I think someone more experienced than you or your current trainer needs to go back to square one and establish basic ground and under saddle manners with this horse. The best trainers of this type excel at helping horses become confident, willing partners.

Unfortunately I definitely cannot. It’s all on us.

[hemitheconyxcaudicinctus]

Ohhh my god you have no idea. The person who told me to PUNISH her for spooking is extremely pushy despite only being a stablehand who no longer boards at the barn any more, and things hit the breaking point last week as a matter of fact. Her telling me how to do everything was rude and annoying but something I could tune out, but then she left a sign on my horse’s stall telling me, the owner, to blanket her at night. Again, annoying but I grit my teeth and bore it.

Well then I found out that she completely changed the brand and type of feed my horse was getting behind my back, without asking me or telling me beforehand, because she, one of several stablehands, made the executive decision that the feed I had specifically discussed with the vet and with the guy at the grain company extension service was ‘going right through her’. So I got up an hour early before work and headed down to the barn and had to tear this middle aged woman a new one to the extent of 'she is MY horse, I make that decision, that was a gross violation of boundaries and this animal has DIGESTIVE PROBLEMS, don’t you EVER get near her again" etc etc. She’s currently transitioning to the feed I and the barn manager said she was to be on; I have no doubt that this was a power game because when I said that I wanted her on Feed A as an instruction right when I first started boarding here this stablehand looks at me and goes “Welll, let’s just try her on Feed B for a month and then we’ll talk.” Like hello??? She does all kinds of crazy things like that but given that she texted a whole like paragraph apology to the barn owner and was clearly afraid of retribution I am HOPING she’ll leave me and my horse tf alone now.

[Scribbler]

@hemitheconyxcaudicinctus

@Montanas_Girl

Can you swing it financially to send her to a very good “colt starter” type trainer for 2-3 months? I think someone more experienced than you or your current trainer needs to go back to square one and establish basic ground and under saddle manners with this horse. The best trainers of this type excel at helping horses become confident, willing partners.

Unfortunately I definitely cannot. It’s all on us.

Then you need to look at colt starting and groundwork from the bottom up and also obstacle and inhand and liberty. You will find things she knows and also holes in her training. Use the time to develop a rapport with her. Also I would do a month of gastrogard unless she just scoped clean last week.

Make sure she gets lots of turnout and time to gallop around. Not just turnout in a tiny paddock. Make sure she is getting all her vitamins and minerals but don’t feed any extra grain. Good hay and a ration balancer or VMS in a small beet pulp mash.

Your goal is to build her confidence. So every exercise must start and end with that. It’s not to achieve a goal per se. For instance any fool can whip up a horse to prance over a tarp. But the real goal is to use the tarp experience to show the horse they can trust your leadership and you are alert to their needs and feelings.

[hemitheconyxcaudicinctus]

Yeah, I’ve definitely been very mindful of this and where I’m at with my emotional state because I don’t want to get frustrated with her because while I’m not the explosive type I still think she can probably sense it when I get annoyed. Interestingly I always thought I was too anxious/nervous to deal with an anxious/nervous horse but I don’t really feel that much anxiety around her, if anything I think it gives me a degree of empathy for her. I’ve been keeping our rides very short and sweet and being sure to end with something I know she can do well so that we end on a positive note.

[Scribbler]

@hemitheconyxcaudicinctus

Yeah, I’ve definitely been very mindful of this and where I’m at with my emotional state because I don’t want to get frustrated with her because while I’m not the explosive type I still think she can probably sense it when I get annoyed. Interestingly I always thought I was too anxious/nervous to deal with an anxious/nervous horse but I don’t really feel that much anxiety around her, if anything I think it gives me a degree of empathy for her. I’ve been keeping our rides very short and sweet and being sure to end with something I know she can do well so that we end on a positive note.

There is no room for annoyance with a horse that is having emotional problems. They can’t help it and they can’t behave even if they want to.

[hemitheconyxcaudicinctus]

She actually just finished a month of gastrogard! As for turnout she has a really good roomy paddock (part of why I chose this barn was because she has enough room to fully gallop a stretch instead of just trotting little circles) and spends the day outside and comes in at night to sleep.

Do you have any recs for colt starting/groundwork books? I’ve been looking at them but I don’t know which ones do and don’t use aversive/“forcing” methods.

[BLBGP]

You said you tried her multiple times. Was she like this when you tried her? If not, what changed besides location? Is she now in a stall vs a field? Did her feed change? Anything else?

[Scribbler]

I don’t have any book recommendations but I’m sure others will. Maybe start a new topic asking this question?

[hemitheconyxcaudicinctus]

On the ground she wasn’t like this at all. She had a very forward walk and was ‘looky’ when I tried her on both times, but it wasn’t a dealbreaker to me because she was very sensible about a lot of things other horses would be spooked by (I was lucky in that multiple things happened on my test rides - blankets in piles on the ground, heavy rain on a tin roof, birds flying right past her face, dogs barking, construction noises, etc) and had a great trot/great action and was very gentle and friendly - super easy to bridle, great about her feet, very interested in what we were doing, etc. To her credit she’s not all holes in her training, she was outstanding for the vet enough that the vet commented on it, as have her current farrier and current vet.

She was actually kept in a stall all day without turnout at the sales barn. She was on a Nutrena 12% pellet which I believe was their economy line because when I asked the guy on the phone he said he didn’t know the brand name and that in the feed catalog it was literally just ‘Nutrena 12% pellet’. I am now transitioning her to ETEC Fibermax, which I had been under the impression she was getting the whole time, from Omolene 200 of all things, which the stablehand changed her to behind my back. It’s also much colder here and there’s a lot more snow. I don’t know how often she would have been test ridden at the sales barn because she wasn’t there very long - I’d been looking for a horse for months so I was looking at pages for new arrivals daily etc. She was there maybe 2wks at the most. I suspect she probably also gets more hay here.

[Scribbler]

@hemitheconyxcaudicinctus

On the ground she wasn’t like this at all. She had a very forward walk and was ‘looky’ when I tried her on both times, but it wasn’t a dealbreaker to me because she was very sensible about a lot of things other horses would be spooked by (I was lucky in that multiple things happened on my test rides - blankets in piles on the ground, heavy rain on a tin roof, birds flying right past her face, dogs barking, construction noises, etc) and had a great trot/great action and was very gentle and friendly - super easy to bridle, great about her feet, very interested in what we were doing, etc. To her credit she’s not all holes in her training, she was outstanding for the vet enough that the vet commented on it, as have her current farrier and current vet.

She was actually kept in a stall all day without turnout at the sales barn. She was on a Nutrena 12% pellet which I believe was their economy line because when I asked the guy on the phone he said he didn’t know the brand name and that in the feed catalog it was literally just ‘Nutrena 12% pellet’. I am now transitioning her to ETEC Fibermax, which I had been under the impression she was getting the whole time, from Omolene 200 of all things, which the stablehand changed her to behind my back. It’s also much colder here and there’s a lot more snow. I don’t know how often she would have been test ridden at the sales barn because she wasn’t there very long - I’d been looking for a horse for months so I was looking at pages for new arrivals daily etc. She was there maybe 2wks at the most. I suspect she probably also gets more hay here.

Snow makes many horses more energetic and it means the outside world looks different every day.

Crunch the numbers on her feed and make sure the minerals are right, especially magnesium. Free choice hay. Low carb feed.

[hemitheconyxcaudicinctus]

Thank you so much for the rec! Reading all this (thank you to everyone for the in depth replies) I think I’m definitely going to take our groundwork back several steps and just act as though the assumption is that she doesn’t know anything. She’s definitely very smart and willing to learn (figured out target training in 2 sessions!) so we have that going for us, and the fact that I am there to work with her daily.

[Cortana]

I haven’t read everything but wanted to say thank you for loving this horse. It sounds like you are doing your very best to help her cope and calm down.

A couple suggestions, outside of a correct training routine and adequate turnout, hand walking can be magic. It will help your mare to bond, trust, and be at ease while taking some of the pressure off (standing still, mounting, working, etc). If possible, grooming (if she enjoys being touched) and tacking up in stall can help anxiety and reduce the busyness of aisles and anticipation of going out.

If appropriate, trying a calming supplement can be incorporated. My mare does well with Happ E Mare but didn’t respond to others aside from Equine Elixirs (discontinued due to cost but it was fabulous!)

Wishing you the very best and hope to see lots of good updates here.

[hemitheconyxcaudicinctus]

Thank you :’^) She’s a very good girl and I’m so lucky to have her even if she’s not perfect. I’ve spent the majority of my life wanting a horse more than anything in the world, so even just having a horse at all is such a massive, life-changing privilege it’s hard to believe it’s real sometimes. Ultimately I’m trying to do what I can because even though a lot of the things about the situation aren’t ideal at all and she’s not exactly what it said on the label… she’s my horse and I’m responsible for her and horses that get sent back to sales barns usually go right to auction and I didn’t want her to have the trauma of another relocation on top of that.

Re: walking her: I hand graze her sometimes which she enjoys (she is very very food motivated) and lately our new thing is to walk her on the racetrack when the harness racers aren’t training. She’s a little nervous about it but I let her stop and look and sniff things accordingly. I’m hoping that this isn’t stressing her further but she seems eager to walk along and look at things so I think it’s enriching her as opposed to overwhelming her. I don’t know if it’s just her interest in the area inside of the loop or if it’s maybe long-awakened OTTB memories if she is indeed OTT and just had a tattoo done poorly or didn’t get raced, but she’s very passionate about being on the inside of the track, which I find interesting.

[Posting_Trot]

I think the biggest thing that any new horse owner realizes is that, even if they’ve ridden lesson horses for a while, when you have your own horse you have to build a relationship with the horse both in and out of the saddle.

With a new-ish, nervous horse, one thing that can really help settle them is routine. Treating them the same way at the same time every day, at least for a couple of months, so that you become 100% predictable to the horse, can be really helpful. Of course you don’t want to bore yourself or your horse to death, but you want to be consistent in how you treat the horse, what behaviors you reward, the cues you use in your riding, how you warm them up, etc. Calm and consistent. Give the horse a reason to trust you. Trust won’t make a nervous horse into a mellow, blissed out animal, but it will lessen the reactivity.

After you feel like you’ve built more trust, you can begin to challenge the horse more, and introduce new things. But it’s important to go slow initially and try to read the horse.

In terms of improving the horse’s balance and coordination, working over ground poles (ether under saddle or in hand) is great. You could look at Jec Ballou’s book, 55 Corrective Exercises for Horses.

Good luck, and enjoy your horse!

[2DogsFarm]

@hemitheconyxcaudicinctus

assumption is that she doesn’t know anything.

Bingo!
Understand she really doesn’t know anything, meaning no idea of how YOUR TRAINING WORKS.
There was a post on another thread re: Dressage that is applicable to your situation:

ETA:
Do yourself & your mare a favor & stop conjecturing on her past.
Whatever happened it is PAST, cannot get changed & unless you can find a former owner will remain a mystery that should not affect how you work with her.
Keep acting as if she knows nothing, fuggedabout what may or may not have occurred at a racetrack & go forward 1 step at a time.