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How Do You Fix Spooky

Hunter/Jumper
#1

I was offered the opportunity to bring a TB back into work and get him fit again, and then I would keep the ride on him once he was doing “real things” again. Fell in love with him after our first few rides, and everything was going really smoothly.
Fast forward about 2 months later, and a miniature donkey has been relocated to the paddock directly beside the outdoor sand ring. Mr.TB believes the donkey is here to murder him, and our rides have turned into full focus on the donkey and not much getting accomplished.
Tonight was the worst time of it all, he was spooking at the donkey at one end of the ring, chairs placed at the opposite end of the ring, and the sound of ATV’s zooming in the background. He was not spooky at all before the donkey was relocated, and I feel now he is just on high alert at all times for anything and everything in the ring’s vicinity. He actually almost squished me today in the wash stall because the donkey gasp walked towards the other hay pile.

Currently, when I ride, I ask him to keep his focus on me and what I’m asking for - maintaining contact, bend this way, leg yield here, circle there, etc. but the donkey/chairs/etc. seem to always catch his attention enough that he falls out of shape, flails a bit, and has a mini-freak out before resuming to his gentlemanly self. When he really spooks hard, he canters or hops sideways, sometimes spins, and has even bolted out of the sand ring onto the grass away from the donkey that trotted to his hay. It is to the point now that I can’t ride with other people in the ring, as we have sidestepped into some other riders and horses (spookiness is the same whether alone or with others in the ring). My next plan of action is to ride in the indoor arena to see if the spookiness is a new trait related to fitness/diet/something else wrong, or if it really is just the environment outside that has him mind-boggled. He is in good health, good teeth, tack/bit/routine/etc. has not changed.

Tips, suggestions, and magic cures greatly appreciated!

#2

Sounds like he needs to spend some time with (or next to) the donkey. Is that a possibility?

5 Likes
#3

I had a tb that never got over the donkey. She ended up in surgery due to the donkey hanging around her water trough overnight one night. She didn’t drink.all night. She ended up fine but she never got comfortable within 500 feet of the donkey.
I sure hope your guy decides donkeys are ok

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#4

I was also thinking along the lines of him spending more time around the donkey. Even if you just chill at one end of the arena and let him watch the creature. Or do your grooming nearby. When the horse stands calm and composed, reward him. Maybe he just needs time to gawk then get bored with it.

Might be a good opportunity for some ground work that could carry over to under saddle.

The other approach would be to ignore the donkey, ignore his antics, and work on. Nothing special. I own a Drama Queen gelding and this is the best approach 95% of the time.

Ride him in the indoor and see how that goes. Easy enough to try. He could be looking to get out of work, for a variety of reasons.

I do know that some horses never get over these long ear invaders, so in that case, your training needs to be good enough that horse can keep some semblance of composure with enough focus on you that he can continue with his work. It won’t be the most relaxed ride, but it shouldn’t be explosive or uncontrolled either.

#5

Small + big ears=an instinctive “could this be a HYENA?” Just a random possibility.

Anecdotal evidence–I guess this qualifies as a “magic cure.”

My riding teacher’s main riding horse has/had a deep seated phobia about judge’s stands. She had halter broke him as a weanling when it was built and that horse never got over the fear and distress he felt when he heard the power tools and bangs of wood back then, well over a decade ago. Then he left her barn, and many years later she managed to get him, and when he came back it was with the attitude that the judge’s stands were gateways into the deepest abyss of Hell, with demons who could come out and eat horses. Supreme Peril!

I talked my riding teacher into giving me lessons on this horse. First I determined an eye problem, any unexpected movement behind the horse triggered an immediate bolt. I got the horse D’yon blinkers and they helped a lot. He bolted a lot less.

But the horse still considered the judge’s stand the gates of Hell. Then I got the horse a Fenwick Face Mask with Ears. Out on the trail this horse immediately started listening to his rider and ignoring all those tigers and lions that had to be lurking in the vegetation just waiting to attack, kill, and eat that horse (he took it all so personally!) The difference in the horse especially out on the trail when my teacher forgot to put the face mask on was night and day. With the face mask on he was almost like a normal horse, without the face mask every single problem came back magnified.

After trying just about every bit in the stable my riding teacher found out that he was a lot less fussy about the world when she rode him in a Kimberwick. Soon after I got the horse a titanium coated Kimberwick and he had another dramatic improvement out on the trails. He stopped fussing at everything and he actually listened to his rider instead of looking for scary stuff around him.

He got ridden out on the trails for around a year in the titanium coated Kimberwick, the Fenwick Face Mask with ears and D’yon blinkers, mostly with his other main rider, with very few problems. They do also use a running martingale on this horse out on the trail but before all this other gear the running martingale did not help much for keeping the horse listening to his rider.

Then one day his other rider decided to ride him in the ring again. He IGNORED the judge’s stand. When they passed it he did not startle, he did not rivet all on his attention on it, he did not shy away, and he did not bolt. My riding teacher was SO HAPPY! She even talked about letting me use him for lessons again (I think she was scared I would get hurt riding him since I my MS is worse than when I rode him last.)

I know some people will pooh-pooh these suggestions. I do not consider these things that much different than putting any type of martingale on, putting ever more severe bits in the horse’s mouth, lunging the horse to exhaustion, using drugs or supplement mega doses or using training gadgets that bind the horse’s movement.

On my riding teacher’s crazy Arab (and yes, he is not completely sane without this help) these things are literally a life saver. They make this horse SAFER TO RIDE, and his riders can now relax and enjoy the ride instead of riding a frenzied, frantic horse who is on the edge of blowing up every minute of the ride. These things make it safer for the horse too, since this horse sort of gets “blind” in his fear and shows no signs of self-preservation. Do note that this process took well over two years, adding one piece of this gear at a time, but the frantic, crazy, fire breathing dragon has transformed into a horse that is relatively safe out on the trails.

1 Like
#6

I second the blinker idea, as it made a big difference to a mule we had who became very fearful after a dismounting accident. He wore full sized blinkers from a driving bridle and seemed much happier with them.

I currently ride both the spookiest mule and the spookiest horse on the planet, and the only approach I’ve found that works well is gradual habituation.

It’s certainly not perfect (their dna is their dna), but my mule is older now and in many ways is now less spooky than other horses and mules his age. That may be simply because he’s had more exposure, or it may be because I’m a clicker trainer so haven’t tried to force him to approach the things he fears, and have instead found ways to give him time while associating lots and lots of rewards with those things?

Flooding (exposing them all at once until they quit reacting) may seem like it works, but I’m not convinced that it actually does except maybe in a very specific way. IOW, they might get over their fear of that one donkey in that one environment, but I think that gradual habituation may set them up for an overall reduction in their fear of everything.

I’ve always had a donkey here so mine grew up around them and have no fear of them, but if I had a horse who feared donkeys I’d put him over the fence from the donkey in an area big enough so the horse could be as far away as he wanted, and then I’d leave him to approach the donkey on his own time.

If that kind of turnout wasn’t available, then I start turning the horse out as far away from the donkey as possible, and then move him closer and closer as he became comfortable enough where he was.

And yes, it takes time, just as it would if anyone feared for their safety.

I’d also be looking for ways that I could help my horse become more comfortable in general, because I think other fears, even when low level, can set them up to be highly fearful of things they wouldn’t be if they were coming from a calmer place.

4 Likes
#7

Firstly, I don’t like the advice telling you to just put the horse next to the donkey. I feel like when people just move horses around to solve training issues it doesn’t actually teach the horse anything you’re just making the horse “suck it up”. I don’t like it. Same thing when people isolate a horse that’s got really bad separation anxiety. You’re not addressing any issues with the suck it up, buttercup” approach.

In my opinion, when you have a horse that’s truly terrified of something, you can’t just ask them to ignore it and go about your ride. If there was an axe murder standing near you at work but your boss told you to ignore it, I’m going to guess you wouldn’t be very focused on your work because you’d be terrified of the axe murderer, right? For that reason, I would spend your rides convincing the horse that the donkey is not an axe murderer and he has no reason to be worried.

When I’m dealing with a horse like that, I’d do very short sessions frequently until the horse gets more and more comfortable with whatever the scary thing is. For the first session, I might just turn the horse loose out in the arena and just see what he does. Maybe let him race around for 5 minutes, investigate, snort, etc and then put him back in his paddock. The horse goes to bed with the confidence he survived one donkey encounter. The next day maybe I would lunge the horse in the OPPOSITE end from where the donkey is. When you’re done lunging, take a few steps in the direction of the donkey and just let the horse relax. Keep that up until you can get as close as possible to the donkey. Eventually the horse will start to associate relaxation with being close to the donkey. DONT force the horse to go up to it. If he’s scared from 50 feet away, he’s obviously going to be even more terrified from 25 feet away.

Once you get comfortable with lunging, then you can get on and ride. Do the same thing, work at the OPPOSITE end from the donkey, and rest closer to the donkey. Do that every day until your horse and sit and relax close to the scary end of the arena.

If you do all this, the horse will learn with every session that the donkey has still not killed him AND that you didn’t MAKE him do anything he didn’t want to do. That trust is important for the next time there’s a really scary thing. When my mare was 3 we went through this exact situation when the neighbors moved cows in the pasture across from the arena. It took about a week doing this stuff until she finally relaxed and realized the cows were not horse-eating monsters. Months later the neighbors moved the cows away and put pigs in that pasture and my horse was still worried at first but it took her significantly less time to come to the realization that pigs are fine too. She knows that it’s ok to be scared and she can trust me to listen to her and not MAKE her do anything she didn’t want to do and that’s what gets her to relax.

2 Likes
#8

Along the same lines, I know some will disagree with me, but if the donkey owner will allow it, go over and love on the little guy while in sight of the horse, AND bring some really desirable treats, be sure the horse knows what they are (give him 1 or a bite or 2) then walk right to the donkey and just love on him and GIVE HIM THE TREATS. Jealousy and greed are powerful motives. He may very well walk closer to the donkey on his own, just for the yummies. If he gets close enough to have some, that’s a reward for his bravery.

This sort of thing helped me with plastic bags - the REALLY DESIRABLE TREAT was juicing leftovers from apple/carrot juice out of the Jack Lalane juicer, presented in a couple layers of plastic shopping bags. She held out only up to the point that another horse stuck his nose in the bag and started chomping. Then all bets were off. “I’m YOUR horse, and I WANT THAT!” and of course I mustn’t be giving treats to some lowely barnmate.

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#9

I don’t necessarily think giving the donkey treats would do anything but I do think giving the horse treats for being around the donkey is a good plan. I think treats can interrupt the fear because they go “oh my god I’m going to die- hey is that a cookie you have for me?” My mare is very food motivated so when we were working on her fear of cows I would just do some hand grazing near the cows. It gives them a little extra motivation to be brave.

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#10

similar to some advice here, when i have a spooky one, I focus on the buttons you need to put on them. When they are attuned to that they will listen to you even with some distractions. That said, you need an environment to make progress there. so, feeding cookies near the donkey or other tricks might help get the fear down a notch. I also don’t believe in kicking them on when they are panicking and going sideways. I feel like this is the antithesis of most people’s advice, but sometimes I do downward transitions by the scary object. You still need them in front of leg and moving leg to hand to do the downward, and they also have to keep their shizat together to listen and slow down. Less bolting off results.

how calm or not is he if you hand walk near the donkey and just let him see the sights? i am often less tense on the ground (i.e. not expecting to be twirled off), and I will walk a horse around to show it the sights if I believe it will be nervous or spooky.

Hope that helps. Good luck. please report back on how it goes!

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#11

I used to ride a lovely TB that got sold to a barn not far away which had a goat. This normally quiet, well-behaved, non-spooky horse was totally freaked out by the presence of the goat, he just could not adjust and eventually had to be sent to another (goat-less) barn.

I don’t think its fair to make OP’s horse spend enforced time with the donkey though, its almost cruel if he is truly that scared and I don’t think it will necessarily help solve the problem.

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#12

I think it’s time to put him in a field next to the donkey.
I’d do something like:
day 1: walk back and fourth past donkey on the lead. Lots of pats
day 2: stand next to donkey pen for a good long time. 15-20 min or until the horse stops snorting.
day 3: longer time near donkey. Reassess. Is the horse acting better around the donkey or do you need more time standing next to it?
day 4: put horse in the paddock next to donkey with some yummy grain/hay and leave the horse until it calms down. Don’t take it out if it’s running around like a lunatic as you would be reinforcing the fear.
day 5: whole day next to donkey. Repeat until the horse won’t run away from the fence line when donkey comes to visit.
day 6/whenever horse is used to donkey: someone walks the donkey around the arena while you also walk your horse around arena
day 7: reintroduce riding in the outdoor again.

The horse needs to get over the donkey. I’m firmly in the camp of horses must be able to get over their fears. I totally understand a one time spook, because even I jump at stuff that startled me. But a continuous spook day after day would not be tolerated by me.

Also rule out pain issues. Sometimes horses will fixate on items that are ‘scary’ when really they just don’t want to work because they are in pain.

#13

This is what’s called “flooding” or “prolonged exposure therapy” in the animal behavior world. It used to be the gold standard for training but recently people are coming around to alternative methods. Flooding does work and you can use it to get a horse not to react but you’re still not addressing the fear, you’re addressing the reaction. IME, it’s a great way to teach a horse to shut down and to lose their trust.

Personally I think these methods are dated and even cruel. It’s just one of those things that’s just been around for so long and so normalized nobody really questions it unfortunately. Just because something “works” doesn’t make it good training.

3 Likes
#14

When I got my TB, I brought him home and put him in the pasture with my donkey. The horse had never seen a donkey before and he was horrified. After a lot of freaking out and snorting and bulging eyeballs and running around, when I went to bed that first evening they were at opposite ends of the pasture (as far apart as they could be). The next morning, they were grazing next to each other. The horse never had another problem with the donkey.

I needed a cow too because my horse was also horrified by cows.

Maybe it would help if you turned your horse out with the donkey and another horse that isn’t afraid of the donkey. And your horse would be OK when he saw that the other horse wasn’t afraid?

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#15

thank you everyone for your suggestions! Currently, Mr.TB can see the donkey from his field and can choose to ignore it if he so pleases, but typically must have the donkey within eyesight in order to eat hay and grain. He is not spooky of the donkey when in his paddock, nor walking near the donkey’s paddock heading into the barn. Mr. TB also must stand near the donkey’s paddock in order to be mounted, which he typically does so quietly. There will be times that we are working in the ring at the other end, and as soon as the donkey moves an inch, our focus is completely gone. Unfortunately, the riding ring is not fenced, so free lunging or turning the horse out next to the donkey is not an option - only lunging and riding. I have to bathe Mr.TB in the wash racks near donkey’s paddock and yesterday the horse jumped on me and nearly squashed me between the wash rack walls and his body because he saw the donkey move out of the corner of his eye. When I hand graze after our rides, we munch near the donkey. Owner does not allow hand-fed treats, so positive reinforcement beyond being allowed to hand graze the yummy grass is not really possible. In terms of riding, I can get him to a point where he is focused as the end of the ring near the donkey at a trot, but if the donkey moves an inch, everything falls apart. I will take a look at the liquid titanium stuff, it is beginning to become popular here. Owner also mentioned that horse was previously on vit B when he was a show horse in his former years, so I wonder if that is something we should reconsider.

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#16

And what is the alternative? Never introduce the horse and donkey?
I would consider flooding to be just sticking them together until they sort it out. That’s not what I’m suggesting. It can be done slowly (and should be, to prevent injuries) . But the horse does need to learn that the donkey won’t kill it, and ignoring it and trying to push through the ride isn’t working.

4 Likes
#17

My entire first comment is what I feel like a good alternative and if you read it, I never said to ignore the donkey. But I’m sorry I don’t believe in just letting them be afraid and scared until they eventually shut down and suck it up. You have to stay within their emotional threshold. If you just MAKE them stand next to it even though they’re telling you they’re clearly afraid, you’re not listening or empathizing with your horse. And flooding doesn’t actually address the fear you’re just waiting out their anxiety until they get tired and give up.

Same thing if you just make them go in a paddock next to the donkey and force them to stay there until they calm down. Why? What’s the point of that? You shouldn’t be punishing them for being afraid by making them stay there longer. If they’re already terrified being 50 feet away from the thing, obviously they’re going to be terrified being 20 feet from it. But if you stay within their anxiety threshold, they’ll 1) trust you more because they know you’re listening to them and they know you’re not going to force them to do anything they’re afraid to do And 2) they build up confidence all on their own. But if you’re at the point where the horse is already snorting and terrified, you’ve already pushed your horse way too far.

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#18

Some of these ideas may work for the horse and some may not. There’s a lot of individuality out there. One thing you might try is just some very low-key, focused groundwork.

Initially, if you can get someone to help you, do some groundwork or lunging of the horse in another area where the donkey isn’t so visible. You want to get the groundwork sans donkey right before you introduce the donkey into the mix. By groundwork I mean incredibly simple things, like walking quietly beside you–with attention on you, maybe stepping over some ground poles beside you, backing up in hand, etc. But no need to do it to death. Just get the horse to focus on you, and praise him up the wazoo when he does.

Then walk the horse into the arena near the donkey and just walk him around a couple of times, again praising dramatically when he focuses on you. Then, if all is going well, get someone else whom the horse knows to go over to the donkey in the field and pat it, then come into the arena and pat the horse. Praise for sanity on the horse’s part. Then let the other person hold the horse while you go to pet the donkey. And then you return to the horse. Praise ecstatically for sanity.

If the horse can’t quite hold it together, take him out of the arena, do some additional groundwork elsewhere and be done for the day. Think about whether another attempt on another day would be useful, or if a different approach is called for.

For my horse, the worst thing was minis. OMG. What are they? They were in the front paddock that we had to pass to go out to trails. Wearing blankets or fly-sheets and hoods! Shiver with horror My horse never truly got over the fear of being murdered by the minis, but she could walk by them with only a brief sidestep. She always kept an ear cocked in their direction, though, so she’d hear them coming for her…

Good luck.

4 Likes
#19

I don’t think you actually read what I wrote.
you don’t just stick them together and hope for the best. You start by walking back and fourth and lots of encouragement. You don’t progress to standing with the horse near the donkeys fence if the horse is still a fire breathing dragon while walking around. that isn’t helpful.
What I suggested and what you suggested aren’t very different at all.
But I still believe that the best way to make sure the horse gets over the donkey fear is to eventually make friends with the donkey. That is done by putting them next to each other. But you don’t just do that immediately and hope everything goes well.

Also, from OP’s comments, horse is walking by and ignoring donkey. It just seems to be an issue when he’s being worked with. So no, I don’t think putting them next to each other for a while is going to cause any sort of crisis

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#20

Hmm, sounds like this might be ‘selective’ spookiness. :wink:
work has gotten harder, more is being asked, and being scared of something is a convenient way out.
I’d try riding somewhere else and see if he finds something else to be scared of there.
Who owns the donkey? Would they be open to moving it somewhere that he can be next to it and spend some more time with it?

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