Looking for outside perspective on issue with new horse

[2DogsFarm]

@SkiPony

My attempts to ride him through it seem to escalate his response, and that’s when I started getting truly nervous on him.

While it would be helpful if your vet finds a physical reason, you do understand that your nerves travel down the reins & feed into the behavior?
You get on, horse does “something:”, you tense up, horse detects the tension & does “something else”, etc.
The more you react, the more he tenses/reacts & so on ad nauseum.
Your trainer gets a better ride as she does not get as tense.

[quote=“J-Lu, post:3, topic:758634”]
your horse is learning to get out of work with bad habits and he thinks he’s winning.
[/qote]
*typos fixed @J-Lu - I am the Grammar Police

Not so much “winning” as getting whatever is making him unhappy - whether relief from pain or your tension - to stop.

[stb]

Years ago I bought a horse that turned out to be a bad bucker. There were several red flags, which I ignored, but I also found out later that the previous owner knew the horse was a bucker and did not disclose. Horse was skinny when I bought him, and as he fattened up and felt better he would buck randomly and explosively. He also became a real bully on the ground. Again, I should have known better.

Anyway, I had the horse about 6 months when the bucking began. Horse was in regular work, diet was low sugar and starch, etc. The horse also became a bit of a bully on the ground. He was big and strong and he knew it. He would be fine one minute and then explode the next. He had a real loose screw and I could never figure out what would happen to set him off. I later found out that he had a long history of his behavior.

In retrospect, I believe he was skinny for a reason, as he was much easier to handle when he was skinny and probably not feeling well. I sold the horse for $1.00 with full disclosure to a young horse trainer in the area. The horse scared me and I found that I didn’t want to ride him at all. So I cut my losses and moved on.

The next horse I bought was a gem, and he will be with me until his last day. I have never been sorry that I sold that other horse. He was an injury waiting to happen and I feel I was lucky to escape unscathed. Riding should be fun and you should want to ride your horse. If not, something is wrong. Sometimes you get a bad horse. Sometimes a horse is just a bad match. It really doesn’t matter which it is - if you are not having fun with your horse you you are missing the point of having a horse.

[Spudsmyguy]

I gave away a horse to people who wanted a horse to pet and groom. I told them he was dangerous to ride and he was. A confirmed bucker, I mean this horse had hang time in the air that’s how bad he was. Of course, none of this was disclosed to me when I went to try him.
When he was good, he was really good but I never trusted him and moved him out.

[ridernc]

This sounds a lot like the situation I was in last year, though I (full) leased instead of bought a QH gelding. I’m also a 30-something re-rider with about 1.5 years of re-riding experience. I leased the QH last April because he was supposedly a quiet, uncomplicated ride to W/T/C with. He quickly became terribly buddy sour, and it was a constant effort to keep him under control. As the workload increased (mainly starting to canter), he got dangerous. Refusing to go forward, bucking, rearing, etc. The behaviors were the same with my trainers who were doing regular pro rides.

I had the vet, saddle fitter, and body worker out for him. Late summer, he was diagnosed with ulcers, and I did about 6 weeks of treatment and time off. Re-scoped completely clean. Slowly brought him back into work and the behaviors were exactly the same for the following 4-6 weeks. Was there something else going on? Was it a learned pain response that was going to take time to go away? Was he just a jerk? I’ll never know because he wasn’t fun to ride anymore, and I was starting to be afraid, so I finally sent him back to his owner after 7 months.

In my particular situation, I didn’t send him back sooner because I didn’t want to be a quitter. I didn’t want him to end up in a worse situation. I didn’t want to be horseless. This seems silly now, but it took this experience for me to realize that it’s ok to not stick it out with every horse you ride. You’re not always a good match, and it’s too expensive (in money and time) to force yourself to continue doing something with a horse you don’t enjoy, or worse, are afraid of.

About a month later, another horse landed in my lap. She and I are a much better fit, and I am back to enjoying my time at the barn. I am so glad I finally decided to let him go so that this wonderful girl and I could meet.

[findeight]

Just have to add a general comment here because many others reading here may run into this …if you have a horse that is repeatedly bucking when asked to go forward? Do NOT back it up or pull into small circles as a punishment or correction. Go forward.

First off horse does not understand what its doing wrong. More important backing up lets him get all four feet underneath with weight on the rear where he can really buck hard, worse, they can rear. You want to keep going forward, the disobedience is not going forward and if you can keep them going forward with their head up, they cant buck that hard and often lose interest Sometimes a smart slap on the rear with the buck aids the horses understanding of the forward concept and the buck being a mistake. This is usually best done by qualified riders who can multitask thru the nonsense.

For this specific horse, think its gone past anything easily corrected and something is wrong. If OP thinks unemotionally about how she bought this one? The hurry or somebody else will and not feeling she had enough time to really make an informed decision? Shes got some thinking to do about more then giving up on this horse because he bucks her off. Which I think is a perfectly good reason based on my own experiences being deliberately bucked off, reared off, spun off, scraped off against a fence repeatedly by a horse. Once, Ill give them, repeatedly is no accident or bad fit or period of adjustment and Im done with them. Fall off enough by accident without a horse trying to do it to me,

This horse was on consignment with trainer, right? Did trainer share how much her cut or percentage of the sale price was? OP realize trainer was working for seller to get her to buy and buy fast? Trainer going to discount training rides since seller paid trainer for selling it and it has very shortly after that sale proven to be a mistake?

Much to mull over here but its clear OP can act to rehome or try to return this horse with no regrets or guilt. Anybody questions that, ask them jf they will take over riding him.

[Dr_Doolittle]

OP - what did the vet say?

Sorry you’re going through this, and I will echo what everyone else has said: life is too short to dread every ride on your horse, and unless there is something easily fixable – maybe there is? (or might he have S/I issues? KS? Did you x-ray the back? Ulcers?) it’s a good idea to cut your losses, move on, and find something more suitable. Sellers often lie! It’s an unfortunate fact of the horse business

Makes me wonder about your “trainer“ as well…

[Gardenhorse]

I’m also wondering what the vet said and what OP has decided.

I wouldn’t be as critical of the trainer without more information. Some barns have multiple trainers. The horse could well have been on consignment at the barn with a different trainer. She said in the original post that she and trainer only got to ride him once.

[SkiPony]

Sorry for the late update. I was visiting family for a long weekend and much needed break . I’ll try to briefly touch on a couple topics.

The vet didn’t find anything particularly concerning with her physical exam, and I wasn’t interested in paying for more in depth diagnostics with no focus point.

The horse was on consignment with the barn owner, not my trainer, and BO claims no prior knowledge of issue (though an employee was aware of the prior issue and is the one that originally mentioned it).

I am aware my nervousness and apprehension is not helping the situation.

My trainer is putting some more pro-rides on him with the likely plan of selling him. I did watch her ride yesterday, and he went pretty well- not an easy looking ride, but no bucking.

Thank you everyone for your replies. I mostly ride for fun and to improve for myself, and I appreciate the feedback that it’s ok to move on when it’s no longer fun.

[shiloh]

I had a horse like that and I sympathize with you. When the thing you do for fun isn’t it’s time to move on.

I hope you find a good horse and start having fun again.

[Tarlo_Farm]

Just want to say that circling a horse that’s trying to buck isn’t punitive, but a way to keep a horse from bucking while you’re moving them forward…without a buck.

[jonquil]

Get rid of him before he ruins riding for you forever. It happened to me, and even though I now have a calm, quiet horse it’ll never be the same for me.