Hi there,
I’ve always appreciated the insights of the COTH community over the years, and am really hopeful to get your input on this situation that has myself (owner), as well as current and former trainers completely baffled. Sorry for the short novel that follows:
Here’s the situation: 7-year-old warmblood gelding that I imported as a 4-year-old. Brought him along myself (I have 20 years of riding and competition experience) along with help from the trainers at the barn for which I was working. Took him to Florida as a coming 5-year-old, showed him lightly in the 2’6" Baby Green Hunters at WEF. He was fabulous - both with myself and the trainer, he did really well and was incredibly brave. Never once looked at a jump, just the typical green things to work through - a bit of rushing down the lines, straightness, controlling his huge stride, etc. Hacked out alone and trailrode to the show grounds every day with no issue.
He continued competing the following summer and moved up to the 3’ Greens (trainer riding), doing well overall but not a huge fan of one particular arena up in Vermont, which we thought had to do with the bright yellow flowers and pine tree standards. In this particular ring, he did run out at a jump once - the first time I’d seen this happen - with the trainer riding, which was handled correctly without punishment, and he got through it.
Fast forward a year, I decide to switch career tracks and move to a city, thus giving up my grooming job and leaving my horse back home with the same trainers for a few months. During this period of time I don’t know entirely what happened, but he was kept in work. However, I came down to take a lesson at one point and his demeanor had completely changed. He was not the relaxed, agreeable horse I knew, but instead noticeably tense and overreactive to my aids. This was the first time he ever spooked hard with me riding and almost-but-not-quite stopped at a jump only 2’ tall. We got him checked for ulcers (nothing) and Lyme (also nothing) and, due to concerns about the training and organization at the prior barn, decided to move him up to a barn with a different trainer who I’d worked with for a long time in the past who is especially good with young hunters, especially those who are a bit on the “hotter” side as mind might be described.
It took this other trainer about 4-5 months to get his confidence back, and we figured something must have happened while I was gone at the prior farm that triggered this fear and anxiety. The new trainer ultimately did get him back to his confident, focused, normal self and he proceeded to get back on the show circuit with a ton of success, moving up most recently to the 3’6 and getting good ribbons in Florida (even taking a Junior into the 3’3 and doing a couple of 3’6 Eq classes). I rode him while he was in Florida and he was feeling better than ever, confidently finding distances and unfazed by any of the commotion or scary looking jumps.
He came back from Florida and resumed normal work at home with this same trainer, flatwork 3-4x per week, not much jumping at home. Since he is a sale horse, a trial was arranged with a potential buyer. Prior to going on trial, this same trainer wanted to get him comfortable with potentially jumping a liverpool. This process was started by rolling up a tarp (not while horse was present) between two sticks so that it was essentially the same size, shape, and color as a blue ground pole. When she went to walk my horse over this pole, he completely lost it - would not get within 10 feet of it. Trainer did not discipline him or get after him, just calmly worked him around it, slowly trying to get him closer, and eventually was able to have him walk over it somewhat calmly. BUT, ever since this day, he has become spooky and suspicious (whole body freezes up, snorting, even starts shaking with fear) of ANY slightly abnormal objects on the ground. No reaction to things up at eye level - only things on the ground.
Plain, unpainted crossrail. Cavalettis. Broom that fell over in the aisle. Flower box. Grooming bag. Dark rubber mats, especially when there’s a puddle or any sort of water (he becomes terrified of the foam that comes off of him and into the drain when I give him a bath). When jumping, he’ll stop when he sees a “new” (aka it has changed it’s location in the ring) jump for the first time, but not in a dirty way - it’s more of a two/three strides out type of thing, where his head goes up and he starts to go sideways. We can always work through it fairly easily - just patting him, walking him up past the jump again, and calmly but firmly reapproaching it and he pops over. By attempt three or four, he’s jumping calmly and is completely relaxed and back to normal. I can tell he gets scared on those first approaches that he’s going to get punished, so we avoid that at all costs. But it’s the strangest thing.
Any thoughts on why this behavior has suddenly appeared at such a magnitude? He has nearly three years of show experience, and yet this behavior is coming out at HOME in a familiar environment. We had his eyes tested (they’re totally fine), hocks/stifle injected, he is already on SmartCalm Ultra (has been for a couple of years) and gets regularly checked for ulcers. This behavior doesn’t seem to have to do with a reluctance of work, because the spooking comes out when I’m handling him on the ground, bathing, grooming, etc as well. The things he has suddenly become afraid of are objects that he never once batted an eye at for the first 2.5 years owning him. He is pretty good when ridden on the flat, but when jumping comes into the picture, he becomes a nervous wreck. He was so confident when I first got him that it’s really perplexing to see him like this now.
I’m open to any sort of training it might take to work through this. This guy means a lot to me and, while he is ultimately a sale horse, we are not going to rush to sell him until he is 100% confident and happy.
Thank you all!
