This was my first thought too. The horse already bolts, now it’s balking. It’s being ridden by multiple people, at least one of whom folds if the horse behaves a certain way. Horse will keep trying behaviors to get the rider to fold… coming up next is rearing and/or exploding.
A free ride isn’t worth it if you get hurt - PT is expensive, surgery is expensive, even a new helmet is expensive.
Research shows that the occasionally rewarded behavior is reinforced MUCH heavier than the consistently rewarded behavior. Counterintuitive sometimes to what we’d assume - an animal that sometimes gets their reward is more likely to keep trying the behavior vs one that is always rewarded and then the reward stops. Because maybe THIS time it’ll work! That’s why it’s really hard to train out a behavior that is occasionally reinforced by someone else or by your own “misses”.
For this horse, she’s occasionally being rewarded for balking/bolting/spooking. Horses ARE intelligent enough to tailor their behavior to certain riders, but they have to be in a comfortable baseline state to do so. Being afraid and/or in pain makes this almost impossible (until drugs or extreme force get involved, anyway).
Anyway, a small tangent about training and horse behavior that boils down to “be careful OP!”.
I agree. I get up on elderly school horses in their twenties and reschool them. After a few months of 30 minutes a week these horses end up giving all their riders a better ride, not just me.
Well here’s the good and the bad news-I rode the horse last night and she was generally fine.
I combined a few different ideas that have been provided in here (some I read after and will try to implement next time I ride her). I always have a whip but I also put a pair of spurs on. Beginning of the ride she certainly didn’t want to go in some areas but in the “safe” areas I just made sure she was alright with the spurs, worked on bending around the ribcage, did some dramatic leg yields leading with the shoulder first. Then I asked her to go near the stuff to check her reaction-she tried to stop but I gave her a little spur and she backed up a few steps, then went forward towards it and I immediately gave with the rein and scratched her withers. I did this a few times, then after that I went back to normal work and was able to circle by the things pretty successfully as long as I kept my leg on as we went past. Getting a dramatic leg yield towards it helped a lot. I did also make sure to get her into that corner that she’s so scared of so I could get off her there and gave lots of praise.
She definitely went around a little curled up with her neck today (this is something we work on every single time we ride her as it’s just her favorite place to be) but I didn’t want to throw too many things at her at once so I just let that be for now since the ride was brief anyways. But I like the idea of working her hard (within reason) in the safe spaces, and making the scary spots the places where she can stop and take a breath so she thinks better of those areas so I will be implementing that in the future too!
But I think overall, the mare is just worse for the other rider. There was even a very loud noise while I was on her and near the scary stuff (someone accidentally dropped something), and she certainly spooked but just took a couple steps then stopped. I really expected much worse behavior from her last night after her other rider ended up getting off her the night before.
I do also agree with you all that it is kind of an iffy situation - thus far the mare has never once felt like she is going to rear but if she ever does feel like she’ll have a big reaction I’m not going to push it. I don’t really know how to explain it but when she does plant her feet and refuse to move she doesn’t feel like she’s going to explode at all. I like it less when she starts backing up, but she does that quite infrequently and I’ve been able to stop it quickly. But if I ever start to feel unsafe I’m not risking it, as I have my own horse to ride and take care of as well.
Truthfully-and I understand this is super unrealistic-I am hoping I can get a more consistent ride on her when the other rider’s lease ends, which will be later this year. I won’t pay to ride the horse so the owner would have to be willing to foot the bill so I don’t foresee that happening (although she does pay half her board right now and doesn’t ride her), but I do like the mare quite a lot when she’s going well. She’s quirky as hell and won’t suit most riders but I have fun on her. Best case scenario is her owner gets healthier and starts riding her and enjoying her all on her own of course, but unfortunately it’s not looking likely.
Wow I did not know this! It makes sense the way you explain it though. I wonder what this horse would be like if the other rider would put her foot down as well-nothing against her as she is a good rider and endlessly patient with the horse, but I think she’s just a little bit too timid to really say no.
Oh that’s very interesting - I think I intuitively knew that but it’s fascinating that research backs it up.
I also fully believe horses tailor their behavior to riders, plus we now have research that they can plan ahead and strategize. I suspect we have been underestimating their intelligence/cognitive skills for a long time!
Yeah it seems this horse tailors her behavior HARD to riders haha. She also has always gone through phases of refusing to stand at the mounting block for the other rider-it will take like 20 minutes sometimes to get on her because she will wait for the rider to get on the mounting block and then spin her butt away. I have had the horse not stand for me to get on maybe once and she never did it again with me.
You can tell inform the other ride about the work hard in safe area and rest in scary spot. Perhaps she will try implementing that too.
Ryan Rose in some of his videos discusses the idea of getting them to work in the safe places and then releasing them in the scary or don’t want to stay places. He does this with all kinds of situations, including standing to be saddled, getting onto a trailer, going to all parts of the arena, etc. Warwick Schiller does similar exercises in some of his videos as well. This might be a great insight you could give the other rider after you’ve had some success with it.
Another possibility is to ride the horse up to just a step or two before the spot where it might ordinarily spook or stop. Then halt the horse intentionally yourself. Then just stand there for several minutes, until everyone is good and bored. If the horse tries to move off on her own, don’t let her. Then move her forward intentionally to a couple of steps beyond the boundary of her “comfort zone,” and stop again, intentionally. Then get good and bored over the next several minutes. Then, intentionally, ask her to move off and set her to work for a few minutes with a lot of praise. Then repeat the stopping, standing, and being bored routine again. I’d only do this a couple of times, but it might help to underline the idea that you (the rider) get to decide when and where you’ll move and go. And it’s also low-conflict and asks the horse to remain checked in with you even when you’re not asking her to respond to a leg or rein aid.
Good luck!
“How do you get a horse that plant their feet to move?”
Simple, direct answer, you catch horse before it plants feet.
How do you do that?
Keep horse busy working for you, paying attention, where you can teach that.
Then use that the horse knows to move as asked and not plant feet when you are where horse may plant feet, before it does. 
Thank you guys for all your suggestions! I think I’ve made decent progress with this mare.
We had a rough few weeks-the snow was falling off the indoor roof like crazy and our road to hack out to our trails was super icy so I wasn’t willing to risk bringing such a spooky horse out there in case she bolted at something. After a couple of attempts working her in the indoor while scary noises were happening she clearly decided me=hell and would no longer let me catch her in the paddock…can’t really blame her lol.
I’ve spent the past couple of weeks doing a bunch of stuff to get her to not only realize I am not trying to torture her, but also get her past all the scary corners. Every night I’ve been going in her stall and scratching her withers and just saying hello (so she doesn’t see me and think I’m always going to torment her for an hour), and when I ride her at night when she’s already in her stall and thus catchable, I’ve been giving her a treat once I get on, a treat once I can get her into one of the scary corners, and I get off her right at the far door that she’s so afraid of. I also jumped her one day just to do something that she enjoys more than flatting.
Yesterday, I didn’t have quite enough time to ride her before other plans so I went out to the paddock, she let me catch her with minimal antics (thank god!), and I brought her in, brushed her and did some carrot stretches, put her back out, then came back and grabbed her again to ride after my plans. She didn’t move a muscle when I went to get her that time-and she was absolutely amazing for our ride!
It seems a combination of catching her and getting her more forward again before she can halt as well as making the scary spots the areas where the work is easiest has helped her the most. I don’t necessarily expect her to ever be manageable when there is snow sliding off the roof - but I have a little bit more hope that I can actually get productive rides with her in the scary ring!
One of the horses at the barn I work at is spookier in the indoor. The owner rides him in ear poms and a Fenwick liquid titanium mask with ears. It seems to help. We call it his Batman mask.
30 years ago a friend was a groom for a foxhunting barn. One mare would only hunt quietly with a magnet pad on her poll under the crownpiece.
I’ve wondered about this-I don’t have the titanium mask, but I do have a back on track poll pad. Maybe I’ll give it a go for a few rides and see how it goes since it’s so easy to take on and off.
I just wanted to comment further on this because it’s very true.
You can’t (and shouldn’t) expect everything to go perfectly. It’s just impossible. You have to work on each small thing at a time, and unfortunately ignore the rest of the undesirable things that are going on … because you aren’t ready to work on those yet.
For example: I took my young horse and myself to a Josh Lyons clinic last fall (which was awesome). You progress through certain movements and to use one thing as an example, we were working on asking the horse to move to the right and to maintain moving to the right, because that’s what we asked. It didn’t matter if the horse dropped their shoulder. It didn’t matter if the horse’s head was in the sky. Because we were not working on those things. We were simply working on asking the horse to maintain going to the right, such as in a large circle. You sometimes have to ignore other things that are happening in order to make progress with the FIRST thing. And then later in training, you’ll address the rest as you go.
So I would say your goal at this point is to keep the feet moving. Simple. Doesn’t really matter what else is happening as long as the feet are moving, to avoid the problem of the feet locking up.
Hey, on the bright side, when this is happening, her feet will not be stuck!!! 
(She’ll be “moving” for sure!)
Years before I got the Fenwick Face Mask with ears I used only a BOT Poll Cap.
The horses love the Poll Cap and I still use it with my Fenwick Face Mask with ears.
With the Fenwick Face Mask with ears the horses are more FOCUSED on the rider and less reactive to stuff in the environment, as in what used to cause a side-ways teleport now gets maybe a flinch or a turned ear, plus the flies and gnats cannot get on or into their ears.
hahaha right! This mare prefers two speeds-halt or bolt lol
By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. You may also receive promotional emails from The Chronicle of the Horse. You can opt out at any time.
For Customers
Company
Terms of Use
