@Tiedtotheride Foundational dressage skills are the same skills you need before, between, and after the jumps so you may know more than you think. Developing adjustability and responsiveness is key in both disciples. What sort of dressage exercises are you interested in trying?
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Then why did you, if we are all a bunch of ammie know-nothings?
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I’m sorry. I feel like you’re getting attacked from every which direction. I quit reading responses at a certain point because I think some posters lost sight of the original question.
Let me start by saying I do think that this is a dangerous behavior/response and I do encourage you to seriously take that into consideration and evaluate your goals before moving forward. I don’t know what your life is like outside of riding and how an injury could affect your career/finances/etc. Additionally, there is always a chance that ANY riding accident can cause life altering injuries as well, even more so in a situation where there is a confirmed danger. We all proceed at our own risk.
Now to the problem at hand… Without a video or first hand account, it’s hard to get a grip on what’s going on, so i’ll throw out some ideas on where I’d start. I think there are still some gaps in the equation before you can decide whether its a pain response or a learned behavior.
How are his angles? Has he had any corrective shoeing to address and support the navicular changes?
What’s your tack like? Have you played around with different pads/lifts/etc? Gel? Foam? Sheepskin? Does he have any skin irritation under the saddle? What bits have you tried? I personally have never met a horse that likes a twist. Have you tried adding a curb rein to help pick him up? If he like curb action, maybe he doesn’t like a curb rein. Maybe he prefers a converter.
I think it’s been covered, but how are his teeth? Has he been checked by an actual equine dentist?
What condition are his hocks in? Stifles?
What about his diet? I’ve known several horses that benefitted from a dietary overhaul.
I’d watch him closely from the ground. Can you set up a chute and send him down? Preferably with more than one fence. Then add a saddle. Does his behavior change?
All the things above are things I would do first… (you may have already, but again I quit reading) Any tack changes I would obviously test on the flat first to figure out his preference.
Creating a program under saddle to resolve his reaction after fences directly corresponds to the answers to the above questions. Regardless, I would most definitely bring this horse back down to flat only and reestablish connection. HE MUST BE IN FRONT OF YOUR LEG. How does he move his shoulders/haunches? How consistent is he within each gait. Does he slow down/speed up? How does he transition within the gait? How crisp is his response? If pain has been ruled out or managed, I would work towards really solidifying a clear and concise conversation under saddle with minimal leniencies. This sounds like a horse who needs a very solid and diligent ride every step of the way. Walk to canter transitions will help rock him back on his haunches and lift his shoulder up. I’d do a lot of pole work and cavalettis and really iron out any reactions or inconsistencies before reintroducing fences. Make sure you’re looking forward and your shoulders are back. Be supportive.
When reintroducing fences, switch it up. Work through the standards without setting fences. Create lanes so he must stay straight and focused. Use placement poles so he has to think and have some preservation. Gridwork so he has to sort it out for himself and carry himself through.
I might put my foot in my mouth here, but there are a lot of horses who develop bad behaviors who do not have pain. That said, there are a lot of options for a horse who has developed a bad behavior but you must be consistent and your must be intentional. In my experience, it’s not always an enjoyable ride, so if you ride for enjoyment, it may be time to see this at face value. If you have aspirations to become a professional, sometimes when you’re starting out you have to take the crap rides - but you’ll learn from them.
Just be sure to set boundaries for yourself. I personally wouldn’t be deterred from this, but that’s my opinion and I’ve not sat on this horse or had my confidence rocked by him. Myself, I won’t ever swing a leg over a horse that rears and flips. I don’t care if it’s done the 1.60’s all over Europe… it’s a big fat no from me.
**EDITED TO ADD: Horses like this require A LOT of thinking outside of the box and individual management.
Also want to add - if pain has been ruled out, yes maybe this horse doesn’t want to jump, but why? Is it confidence? Has he been failed by other riders. Confidence can be re-built. Again, that requires a lot of discipline on behalf of the rider. **
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@Live_Wire I appreciate your willingness to help the OP here and provide constructive advice, but one important point is that this is NOT the OP’s horse. OP isn’t making any of the decisions or paying the bills on his farriery (but he does seem to have some specific shoeing going on), diet, or vet care. And the owner of the horse is a professional who refuses to ride the horse or teach anyone else on the horse. Horse has had these issues for going on 10 years now (and maybe more, since he arrived to this owner with the problem), and OP has tried working on it off and on for 5 of those years, getting hurt more than once. The vet has said horse can’t jump over 2’6" ever again, but the behavior happens over very small jumps as well. OP has their own horse to ride and work with. For the horse’s own sake, I think it’s very fair to all involved to give up on jumping this horse. The OP’s only reason for wanting to keep jumping this horse is so he doesn’t get put down because she’s attached to the horse, although horse is already not useful to its owner and is still getting expensive care. There are a lot of other options and goals to choose from that don’t involve jumping and also don’t mean horse gets put down. But ultimately, he’s not OP’s horse, and it’s really not OP’s decision.
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Clearly the navicular was missed “countless times” by the previous vets then.
If he is in pain, then he should not be jumped. Period.
Why? Sounds like he’s being pretty loud and clear to me.
The fact that he comes bucking over to you when you call means nothing. Before I put one of my horses down years ago, there would be “good days” he would be out bucking in the pasture with the weanlings, and the next day he can’t even trot in the pasture on his own (“bad day”).
Why does he have to jump? Why can’t you find a different career for him that HE ENJOYS?
He’s quite obviously telling you he does not want to jump anymore.
Horses in pain might not do any of that. This year, I had to retire my good barrel horse when it was discovered he has crooked vertebrae in his neck (he was born with) that was pinching his spinal cord. I was also jumping him a little (we don’t have a ton of jumping in my area). He was GOOD. He was TALENTED. And he never once refused to do his job. Never bucked. No tail swish. No ear pinning, Never ever refused to go into the arena. But I noticed things in his performance that wasn’t right. The way he was starting to use his body to complete tasks was not right. The way he started to be heavy on the bit when he wasn’t before. It took a while (really, a year) for my vet and I to truly figure out the root problem and what was going on.
He’s now been rehomed to a wonderful family who is greatly enjoying to go on trail rides a couple times a month. I miss him dearly and would give anything to make one more run around the barrels with him, but his NEEDS come before mine.
It somewhat baffles me that your trainer is determining to just put him down, rather than to rehome or retrain him to do something else that he likes. And is not as physically demanding on his front feet as jumping.
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I think the OP said up-thread he wasn’t safe for a beginner to handle on the ground? So he is a horse who is difficult to handle, cannot jump at a hunter-jumper barn, cannot really be resold as a safe mount, is aging and expensive to maintain, and at a barn where there appears to be no interest in dressage (and, who knows, since no one has tried, he might not “like” the collection and contact of dressage, if he’s not used to it, and display the same antics).
It does sound like a sad situation, but, again, getting a horse in shape to be back in the program also doesn’t sound feasible. I mean, even if the OP and the vet found a “fix” (which would involve a high level of risk as well as would be potentially quite costly), I don’t think an ethical instructor would or should feel comfortable putting a 1-3X a week lesson student on this horse, ever.
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OP has probably checked out but I would like to paraphrase a wise old saying about riding and training horses.
Its only what you learn after you think you know it all that counts.
I mean this in a kind way, having been at this same point in my own journey as many who have offered advice on this thread. Perhaps OP has reached the point she is ready to start learning?
If she is willing to open eyes and ears and think, likely a different trainer is needed. OP told us current one “does not know or teach dressage”. Thats a fancy word for training basics. Whatever else is going on here, thats a big red flag for a young rider (27 is young) seriously trying to advance.
This horse is screaming at you too, LISTEN. THINK. Make your own choice based on reality.
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It is not baffling, imo. They have what is essentially a pro’s horse with too many limitations to do a pro horse’s job. The horse is not appropriate to a lesson program. The trainer cannot in good conscious use this horse in a lesson program. It has a well-documented history of severely injuring people. It is a legal liability. The trainer themselves refuses to ride this horse – a decision that is in line with the thinking of most pros (that I know, at least). They can’t afford to stick their neck out on dangerous horses with limited usefulness.
So, their options are to retrain the horse to rehome in a non-jumping job, retire it, or to put it down. If I had to guess, I’d say that they have concerns about rehoming this horse: too easy for it to fall through the cracks and end up in a bad situation and/or cause grave injury to an unsuspecting person.
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Exactly! Also, it’s been a decade that the trainer has had the horse. Presumably trainer already tried lots of stuff. At some point, it’s dangerous and sort of dumb to keep going, or to pass the problem along to someone else.
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One of my customers came to me with a horse like this. Was a top 3ft AA hunter, and one day stopped wanting to play for his previous owner. My customer took him on to try and rehab him. He had great days and bad days as well. He dumped her hard one day, landing off a jump and dolphining her off in a VERY similar manner as you describe, breaking her GPA in half…that week she sent him to Rood and Riddle for a full work up. Nuclear bone scan showed neck arthritis in addition to enostosis lesions. He became a pasture puff shortly thereafter.
He was also lovely to ride, well broke, etc…but when he hurt, he hurt, and he was SCREAMING for people to listen. She was lucky that she wasn’t severely hurt by this horse.
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I watched this happen back in the early 90s.
$40K Hunter, bought by an untalented AA who floated his teeth when she locked her hands in her crotch over jumps. 
Friend (who could ride) catchrode, did well & said he was like driving a car.
After about a year, horse started stopping for The Dental Rider…
Unfortunately, DR was also a cashcow for the trainer, wanted to show every weekend, do the As, etc.
So horse went to shows, got a nice ride from trainer in the “Pro” classes, then put on the brakes when DR was in the tack.
Ended up much depreciated when resold. 
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My trainer friends scored two separate WB jumpers who’d been brain fried. Last owners paid $50,000 +, my trainer friends took possession for $1. One had a crazy random buck which has since faded out. They are both doing intermediate lessons and leases, mostly flatwork. Some benign neglect on a field helped too I think.
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Sounds like two horses I knew, both owned by the same person. Owner spent about $50K for one and some ungodly amount for the other. Both trained very well and jumped around like a star. Owner was never taught how to stay with the horse over the jump so was left behind every. single. time. Jamming he horse in the teeth over every jump. First horse started refusing so on went the spurs and the pro rides with bigger spurs. Then horse started racing around the course to get it over with as soon as possible. Horse’s brain was fried by this time and blew a suspensory requiring several months rehab. In that time she bought horse number two. Same exact scenario but luckily she quit riding before she totally ruined that horse as well. Sold them both plus the daughter’s darling pony who, guess what? had the same issues. Ended up taking a bath on all of them.
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- You could see if the horse’s owner would be willing to do a bute trial to see how much he changes after a week of bute. At this point though, it might be habitual.
- I have a horse in my barn that does this from time to time (but not as bad…rider does not come off). I had gone to look at the horse before his current owner was suckered into buying him and I recognized a very spoiled horse whose owner made too many rules around this horse (to work around his quirks rather than fix them). When current owner bought him, they convinced her to keep him at the same barn and trainer sort of worked around his quirks and made lots of excused for him. In the end, I think his “dolphin-hops” where simply a horse that would sometimes over jump when taking off long or over a spooky jump, and would get caught in the mouth, so learned to brace his neck/jaw/back when he got into a long, or aimed at a spooky jump. That braced jaw/neck leads to a stiff back and a buck on the land. It is a hard habit to break as the brace happens mid air when you can’t exactly supple them.
- Getting on after a bad fall is a very bad idea. Please take concussions more seriously and learn about proper after care. You may have given yourself brain damage that won’t show up until you are much older.
- If you want to save this horse, I suggest looking into Equitation Science to fix his ground work issues. If he had better ground work he could probably find a home as a flat horse or basic dressage horse. Pleasant horses are much more likely to get good homes/care. He does sound like he was previously spoiled and doesn’t understand the training/rules and is probably quite stressed about life. Running over people/being bullish isn’t dominance…this is a flight/fight/fear response .
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No ANIMAL is worth getting hurt over…especially repeatedly.
Some horses cannot be helped or fixed, it seems everyone has concluded that except for you.
You’re 27 years old, in 30 years (and possibly sooner) you will be feeling the effects of this horses behavior every day in the form of arthritis etc. Not to mention the danger you out yourself in for permanent/lasting brain from falls directly to the head.
A year and a half ago I came off a naughty 3 year old stud. Blew up out of nowhere and nastily….I landed directly on my head and had a seizure when I hit the ground. I ended up in physical therapy for months, my
back is still not the same and I suffer from debilitating headaches. Thinking the behavior was the result of him being a stud, I had him gelded and returned to riding him. He was incident free for 9 months before he blew up on my assistant and tossed her. Good for another 3 months before dumping her again, (out of nowhere broke in 2, broncing while spinning around in place.) I got back on him and he tried the same thing to me as soon as I stepped on.
This horse had the finest vet care available, concluded there was absolutely nothing physically wrong. And you could never pin point a particular situation in which he would always buck.
Owners ended up basically giving him away with full disclosure to another trainer who wanted to cowboy the behavior out of him (which was fine by all of us).
You can’t justify the risk of riding one nasty horse when there’s so many good horses to ride (including your own.)
And frankly, he’s not your problem, he’s your trainers problem……and I think she has it right by not riding him and definitely not using him in a lesson program. Although I question her judgement to allow someone else to ride him.
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Oof. OP, for your safety and this poor horse’s sanity, please listen to the heaps of good advice you’ve received here. Please.
When I was a kiddo, I had a trainer who was more or less useless except for one saying that has stuck with me for my 30+ year riding career: “There are just some rides you don’t need to take”. I have heeded that advice since the first time I heard it at maybe 7 or 8 years old.
I own this horse, OP. He was the most expensive horse I’ve ever purchased and I’ve invested the GDP of a small country into him and into making him successful. He had all the right working parts for an upper level jumper: scopy, catty, quick in the air, a complete dressage education through I1 and schooling I2, the best custom saddles, custom bits, every supplement/supportive therapy that could possible exist…you name it, I did it. I wanted this horse to want to do his job SO badly. But he hated EVERY SINGLE SECOND of it. Every second. Spooky, had a massive buck/bolt, evasive, could be an incredibly dirty stopper…the works. When he was on, we were completely unbeatable. I won jump offs at WEF and HITS and VT by 3-4 seconds on a regular basis…or he wanted me dead. There was no in between. We did everything vetting wise; CT, MRI, rads, nuclear scintigraphy. 5 or 6 different farriers, some brought in from out of state. Hell, I even called a dagum horse psychic and guess what she told me? The horse HATES his job. Hates it. Doesn’t want to do it, won’t do it, and nothing that I or any trainer from backyard to big name is going to change this.
What does he want to do? He wants to trail ride. Bitless. With plain front shoes, no supplements, and maybe the occasional trot but that’s it. And while this is what I knew and I hardly believe that this woman actually “talked” to my horse, it was my final straw and I did just that. And you know what? He’s the happiest he’s ever been in the 13 years I’ve owned him. He lives in a little herd fondly known as the Chestnut Brigade (ironically made up of my now retired A/O hunter, my retired adult Eq and former Big Eq horse, and him - my retired A/O jumper. These three traveled the country together, so it’s pretty cute that they get to spend their retirement in the same pasture!) and we pluck him out a few times a month and meander down the trails like a couple of old fogies. He’s a completely different horse and I’m fortunate I was able to give him this life and this retirement.
But the difference between my horse and the one you’ve posted about? I OWN him. I am responsible for him. I am stuck with his quirks and his idiosyncrasies and his problems. I bought him, so it’s all on me. You, on the other hand, have the ability to walk away from what sounds like an incredibly untenable situation.
I have another one who is a similar sort for me but without the training problems. He’s not everyone’s cup of tea to ride (18.1, the length of a semi-truck, super heavy, and can get extremely forward), but I can put absolutely anyone on him to walk around safely. He’s lovely on the ground though a bit nippy, but safe for everyone and anyone to handle as long as they pay attention to his teeth. However, he requires more medical management than any horse I’ve ever met or hope to ever meet again. He’s had 3 colic surgeries, two major bouts of laminitis, recurrent EPM (is completely symptom free on daily Protazil but will be on it for the rest of his life), chronic colic, frequently goes on hunger strikes, cannot be too hot or too cold…the list goes on and on. His medical management alone costs well north of $5000/month. That said, his breeder has the financial means to keep this horse alive and well and I have an attachment to him greater than to any of my other horses of which there are more than a few. She and I have come to an agreement that I will continue to care for this horse for the rest of his life and she will pay his medical/wellness bills. I’ve lost sleep for this horse, left a wedding where I was the Maid of Honor for this horse, I’ve chartered flights and driven all night and sacrificed pretty much everything for this horse. And to me, it’s been worth every single second of it. But even after everything he’s been through, he is sound, rideable, and LOVES his job at 20 years old. We’re back horse showing and he practically bowls me over to get on the trailer every time I open the ramp. And if tomorrow his breeder decides that she’ll no longer pay his bills, I’ll sell whatever I have to keep this horse happy, healthy, and alive because he’s that important to me. I get it, I do. But this horse can also be ridden by (many) others, he can be handled by absolutely everybody including my completely non-horsey dad. He’s safe, sane, and reliable. And he loves, loves, loves his job. He shows up to work 110% of the time. This is not the horse you’ve described to us, OP.
If he’s safe to do flatwork, just do the damned flatwork. All correctly executed flatwork has a basis in dressage; the horse does not need a piaffe or a passage or tempis! Just correct, fundamental flatwork. Screw the jumping, get some help on the ground if you really want to invest good money after bad, but forget about the rest of it. The horse is telling you he can’t/won’t/doesn’t want to do this job. There is no shame in walking away and absolutely no shame in behavioral euthanasia (it is sometimes the kindest thing you can do for an animal), but if you insist on going forward with him, you need to drastically change your expectations and quietly close your wallet. This horse is not your problem, but if he breaks your neck he’s going to ruin your life.
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My God, girl! I am a horse lover who has spent > half her life rehabbing OTTB’s of all types. Some of them turn into nice riding horses. Some of them don’t. Horses come in as many types as people.
Someone has already spent thousands on vet bills. He came back from one sale because of bad behavior and his owner/trainer is smart enough to not get on him. Do you see a pattern here?
1, This horse is: 1. hurting. 2. This horse does not want to jump. 3 This horse knows what he can get away with. 4. All of the above.
As Kenny Rogers sings: You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold em…
SO, STOP, ALREADY! You will get hurt. Badly hurt. And, for what?
Of course, this is just my opinion.
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This last statement…if this horse breaks your neck, he’s going to ruin your life.
I could not have put it ANY better.
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First things first. Navicular changes are usually caused by bad farrier work. Let me guess, long toes? Get the feet fixed and NOT with wedges and heart bars which just mask the problem. Shorten the toes and get the heel back under him. You can’t assume this isn’t a pain reaction when you know his feet hurt!
Once the feet are taken care of, if he’s still doing this, I would try him in something that you can lift his head with. Pelham, three ring maybe if he’s sensitive. Poles on the ground on the landing side could encourage him to reach down with his nose so I wouldn’t try that but maybe jumping on a circle or landing and asking him something immediately like maybe downward transition to trot over trot poles but it sounds to me that this behavior wont change. There will always be a risk.
I rode a horse like this. It’s not fun! So when it’s no longer fun for you to get hurt maybe you should just let him be a flat horse. But fix his feet regardless.
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This type of thread and situation is always complicated by the fact whoever posts asking for help does not control the horses management. If its not their horse, most realistic suggestions require owner consent ( and often checkbook) and are just not possible.
Thats why the advice on here is pretty consistently don’t ride this particular horse. Its a no win situation for horse that hates its job and/or is in considerable pain and rider he has hurt and will continue to hurt who is powerless to change anything.
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