I recently got a new QH mare, she’s ten but still very green. When I rode her the other day (just walking) she would randomly stop walking. So I would give her full rein and click (her cue to walk) and she did nothing. Then I would use some heel pressure (not much) and instead of walking she backed up really violently. Once she half reared and once she backed so violent I almost fell off. She has no other vices. She’s my first project horse. Any tips?
Rearing is a very serious problem that can get you killed.
A horse that has learned to rear as an evasion needs to be evaluated by a professional.
Some may be able to be retrained, not many will be that safe afterwards, may revert to rearing when provoked,
Others are beyond retraining without putting the rider’s life in danger.
I know trainers that were paralyzed when a horse reared on top of them, some others were outright killed.
I had a horse that was on his way to the slaughter plant for rearing while in the roping box.
One day he reared, went over, crashing in there and almost killing his owner, that spent weeks in the hospital rehabbing.
He never reared with me, but I was always very careful never to put him in a situation to try that.
I am a professional, training horses for a living and he was a personal horse, not one for resale.
If he had reared with me, he would have been gone in a minute.
Rearing horses don’t make good project horses to train-retrain and sell.
While you may get them over rearing with you, you have to be very careful when it is time to sell them.
The market of people that want and can ride a horse that may rear if things don’t go well is very, very small.
Get help evaluating that horse, see what you have there.
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I agree with Bluey - rearing is a deal-breaker for me. My very first horse is a rearer. It’s his go-to response for any situation when he’s made to do something he doesn’t want to do. I no longer ride him, but I have him as a companion. He even rears on the ground if he makes up his mind he’s not.gonna.do.it.
In my horse’s case, I suspect it’s because he is back at the knee and his front leg hurts him.
Before I realized this, I had someone else train and show him for me. He learned not to rear with her. But obviously the behavior did not go away. He reared with a subsequent trainer. Just before his knee really started giving him trouble and he had to be retired.
it wasn’t anything serious at all, very small, wasn’t what you two are thinking, and her main I-don’t-want-to-this reaction is just backing. back to the rear, I guess I should have explained better, it was due to the backing, she faulted
When she refuses to walk, can you pull her head around and ask her to walk off? Typically they will, and if not, she won’t be hopping around or even likely to try her backing up trick.
Do you have someone that can help you? Maybe put her (and you) on the lunge line and work thru it that way?
thanks that sounds like a great idea
Oh, when you said she reared so badly you almost fell off, I thought that was a serious problem.
A balky horse will stop, back off, hop around, rear a bit, buck, even lay down, all ways horses resist moving forward.
The best way to keep them going is to be proactive, keep their mind busy, have a task for them, so they don’t have time to think if they want to go on or not, too busy doing things to try to balk.
For that, it takes skills gained thru experience and good understanding and timing so you can keep the horse going when you feel it’s mind is going to the balk state, before it gets there.
Once a horse has parked itself, then the rider is at a disadvantage, has to first start the horse moving again, a horse that doesn’t want to go on and then is when turning it sideways some times helps untrack the horse with minimum resistance.
When a horse has some problem, first be sure there is nothing physical there, a bad tooth, an ill fitting saddle, a crooked rider unbalancing the horse, a horse about to come down with something and not feeling good at all, or with a real green horse, one that is getting confused and is not sure it wants to keep trying to figure things out.
Good luck.
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Riding a started horse is a completely different skill set than colt starting. Colt starting is actually pretty easy if you know the process and the smaller steps along the way.
Your horse doesn’t sound like she knows even the very basic answer to the question “go forward when I ask”.
No big deal, it’s an easy issue to address, but you have to start from the ground and work your way back up.
Remember that she isn’t being bad, she just doesn’t have any education in riding. Horses aren’t born knowing this stuff.
She may have anxiety from separation anxiety (a natural behavior horses must be trained to overcome), or anxiety from “Destination addiction”, where she wants to be somewhere other than where you are telling her to go. Or she may have anxiety from her innate flight instincts, which again she must be trained to overcome so she can safely be ridden. Again, horses are herd and flight animals first and foremost, and a 3 year old has most likely never been taught to work against her instincts to follow her new leader…you! That’s the first step to making her safe and happy to go where you point her.
None of this stuff is a big deal, nor is it difficult to train horses to overcome, you just need to know what to do and when 
I have started several colts now and learned most of what I know now from Warwick Schiller (i was an experienced rider before i started learning to start young horses. Colt starting is a specific discipline all on its own).
A young horse should first look to you as its leader. It must then learn to control its emotions with no one on its back. It must know how to give to pressure, and how to look for answers (a release) from its handler. THEN it is ready to just begin the process of making sure it doesn’t have any fear issues with first…putting on a saddle pad, then putting on a saddle, then you putting your foot up to the stirrup, and so on and so forth. If a horse has anxiety about any of those things that you don’t pick up on before you get on to try and go for a ride, you could end up in a wreck. Your young horse also must learn not to fear you or things in its surroundings through some desensitizing, and that also helps teaching him to control his own emotions.
Then once under saddle, the horse must control its emotions on a completely loose rein at walk trot and canter. This starts by teaching your horse lateral flexion and disengaging, then bending to a stop. Teaching a horse to disengage under saddle from a halt is the first step in teaching him to go off of light leg pressure. You are sensitizing your horse to his very first aid, in a safe and controlled way. If your horse can’t move his hind end over from a light request at a standstill, he’s not ready to walk forward.
After disengaging and lateral flection… Then you must let your horse decide for itself that it doesn’t want to be near its other herd mates or somewhere in the arena other than where you are directing him. This is done with a simple series of exercises that allow the horse to think going where you point him is his idea…by making the wrong thing hard right thing easy sort of thing. Then you can progress to more advanced ridden work once all that is sorted out. A LOTTTTTTTTT if not all rearing issues are related to #1…not knowing how to move off pressure and #2 horse was never trained to choose being away from it’s herd (separation anxiety and destination addiction…2 totally easy things to train).
Warwick details his entire colt starting process on his videos page for $25 a month. Starting colts is actually really easy, but you need to know the specific sequence of training steps and goals, and how to teach a horse to give to pressure. You can see all different temperaments and types of horses on there … there are something like 400 videos. He walks you through all the ground work, the first 5 rides, then the first 100 days under saddle, then days 101-180. If you follow his program exactly as it’s laid out, you’ll have a beginner safe horse in 90 days! It’s really simple, and if you already know how to ride, you’ll have no trouble figuring it out on your own.
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Do you know anything about this horse’s real training history?
Is she fairly green and somewhat confused? In that case the advice of Luvmydutch is good.
Or is she a spoiled older horse that has learned to balk? Did someone start her badly, then throw her in a field when she got unmanageable? Is this why she was passed on to you as a project horse?
I would first rule out the obvious, including saddle fit and back pain.
Also horses don’t tend to run backwards as an evasion unless they have been overtaught backing up by a rider, either as a dscipline for not going forward (OK, you won’t go forward, we are going to go back!!) or in some context of trying to teach sliding stops.
Balking a really really annoying habit for a horse, and IME it never actually goes away 100 % once they learn it is the most effective resistance ever. And although you would think not moving is a fairly safe resistance for the rider, it can also escalate easily to bucking from a standstill, rearing, back up, etc.
Force is only of limited use in these cases. Also if a horse is in a determined balking fit, all the obvious things like trying to move the haunches or the neck are useless.
I would also say that a horse that reacts like this can sometimes upset itself with its own reactions. the horse may be anticipating some reaction from you after the intitial balk (like you are going to reef her backwards) and then doing that.
I would suggest starting over with longe work, get her used to moving forward with you, and then have someone longe you in the saddle after a week or so. Trail riding, especially with other horses, can get her going forward if she is basically ring sour.
Good luck, and if you get her fixed, let me know what worked!
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Yes sorry I misread that as the horse was 3. If she is 10 and green…or 15 and misbehaving…barring physical pain…the same principles apply to all horsed at every age. Best of luck!
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Truth be told OP, I’m really confused by your post.
Either she reared or she didn’t. In my opinion, a “little” rear is just as serious as a full rear because it only takes a split second for a horse to decide to escalate it to a full rear.
And the way you describe things, you are being meek with her (give her “not much” heel pressure) yet she is violently reacting to your meek cues. Something is amiss.
Overall, this horse has a serious lack of forward motion (rearing or backing). I would be willing to bet there are other holes in her training.
Do you have an experienced trainer that you can work with? It sounds like this horse needs a confident rider to get through these holes in her training.
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The fact that she is 10 years old yet green sets off alarms in my mind.
She reared badly enough that you nearly fell off – that sounds like a full rear to me, not just a pop-up.
The fact that you are making excuses for her, and rewording your OP in a subsequent post, raises more alarms for me.
It sounds like you are green too. Not a good match, IME and IMO – green plus green = black and blue if not worse.
I second what the others have said about sending her to a professional trainer. If it it were me, I would get rid of her. But it’s hard to sell a horse that rears.
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Is she spur trained? If so and you a clicking and putting heel pressure on thats the cue to back up in the western pleasure world.
Try a click and “fan” with your legs and see if that changes anything.
Regardless, get a compotent trainer for help
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What type of bit are you using? Agree with considering she is spur training. Is her dental work current? saddle fit? Is there a reason she is green at 10? (like someone started her and failed when she was younger).
This. Refusal to go forward is a deal breaker for me, because it can very easily escalate to rearing, which is THE most dangerous vice a horse can have, in my opinion, and also because it generally goes hand in hand with a lack of work ethic/sour attitude.
IF your horse is just so green that she doesn’t know what you want, you MAY be able to rehab her with very competent, consistent professional help. However, this will always be her go-to evasion, and it’s not one I care to deal with. You may feel differently.
If she balks, it’s usually better to have this conversation with an opening rein rather than trying to just have it going straight forward from leg or stick. It changes the conversation from a confrontation to “let’s do this instead.”
If you feel her start to balk, try opening the rein and having her follow her nose into a turning step and giving her a place to go sideways instead of getting in a fight.
I used to own a horse who would put on the parking brakes if he felt overwhelmed, and it NEVER worked to try to bully him out of it from leg. A little opening rein turn step and a he would unstick and carry on.
You never know what sort of fights their previous riders have brought to them, and sometimes its better to just meet them halfway.
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Make sure you’re not leaning forward and sitting with a light seat. My normally forward pony will get balky if you lean forward or sit heavy driving your seat bones. Had a dressage trainer come out to put a few rides on him and she couldn’t get him forward, her seat was too heavy for his preference. He was started at 11 under saddle, but a previous driving pony. Use an opening rein and get out of the ring. Get a friend to ride with and follow them. Builds up the confidence and keeps you from having to nag. Does the horse have a voice command to go forward from the ground?
so anyway this was a while ago and the confusion with the post, when she backed i almost fell off not when she reared. and no im still not sure of her training history. the 10 year old green thing, we were told by her owners that the wife’s parent’s owned the qh farm where my horse was born. she was given to the wife at birth. the family however was never able to take her due to thier finacial standing. they got her shortly after she turned nine and took her straight to a trainer. other than that i have no idea what her life has been like. its been about five months since i purchased her and shes doing great. she hasnt reared since the first month after i got her. im not exactly sure how i fixed the problem or even what it was. it just got smaller and smaller untill it went away. she now does this thing where when we’re warming up she doesnt want to lope so we’ll be loping along and she just stops. i just tell her to continue loping and she doesnt do it anymore. other than that shes great! we are getting 18 second barrel times and im not pushing her at all. we also just recently jumped 2ft for the first time.
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Glad to hear things are working better for you. I don’t barrel race so what I do might not apply. I bought a horse at auction April 27. I contacted all previous owners (you can find anything on the internet!) and had a though knowledge of what training and use the gelding had. Still, he was new to me, a horse, and I’m an old lady. I proceeded cautiously (as you did). We walked, we trotted, and eventually we cantered. After about 6 weeks, of pretty much continual use, he developed sticky feet. I’d saddle, lead to the arena, and mount. At that point he refused to take a step. If I applied pressure --spur or crop --he pinned his ears and did a pretty good imitation of a horse that was going to buck and even did a (really small) buck when really smacked. I tried a few things --lunging before riding --and still the sticky feet continued. Now, if I took him out with other horses, trail riding, he was fine. So I contacted my grand daughter’s trainer who has a million years of experience with horses (western, cow, penning, reining). He had me bring the horse down and watched me ride him. Two things right off. My saddle pad was worn out allowing the pommel to rub the wither at times --but enough the horse was a bit sore --especially if I leaned forward (what I did when I wanted him to go forward). That was the second problem --as a reformed English rider --I was used to leaning forward into transitions --this horse --trained western, found that annoying, especially with his sore withers. AND the big reason I was having a problem –no consistency. Trainer pointed out (after watching me ride) -I appeared to have no plan. He said (and I guess I did know this at one point) --EVERY ride, regardless of what I plan to do, STARTS with a routine for warm up. In my horse’s case, he said after a brief walk to check saddle/tack and make sure everything’s good, immediately start 10m circles with the nose tilted in at the trot. I did so --and it was kick-kick-kick until the trot came and immediately stop kicking–but only as long as horse kept up the trot. Any break in gait got him a kick-kick-kick–not hard kicking, but annoying kicking. When horse relaxed (in my horse’s case, he puts his head down and ears into neutral position --allow him to trot forward in a straight line. Then 10 min circles the other way until he relaxes then straight line. After about 10 min of circles, the straight line developed into a canter. If there is any hint of buck or resistance, back to the trotted circles and try again, the straight line now becoming a canter without resistance. ONLY when there is a smooth transition from trot to canter do we make big (20 m) cantered circles or go down the edge of the arena in a straight line.
What this does is reward the horse for relaxed trotting and cantering by leaving him alone and allowing him to go straight (easier than circles) and punish (make more work) resistance or disobedience with discomfort (small trotted circles). AND since I was a big part of the problem --bought a new saddle pad that makes the saddle fit better, remember to lean back when asking for transitions (sit on my pockets) and give this new-to-me horse a longer time to respond to what I’m asking --I was pretty quick to assume he was resistant when he was confused.
So now, no matter what I’m doing --riding fence, mounted archery practice, trail riding, fox hunting, we start with our trotted circles --sometimes the venue doesn’t allow for a long cantered line --that’s ok --the trotted circles into straight lines reminds the horse of what to expect.
The ironic thing is --I knew about the importance of a routine warm up --but because I’d been riding the same QH for the past 12 years (my old horse) --we’d kind of gotten so used to each other, that I didn’t do it any more --just got on and rode. Yet I distinctly remember when I bought him --15 years ago (he was my daughter’s horse for 2 years), the (same) trainer had him doing a warm up routine. By the time I rode him, either I did it without thinking, or I forgot I did it.
So you might try a 10-15 min warm up routine --same pattern every time --to cure the stopping --right now, she’s being rewarded (with rest) for stopping. Make it unpleasant. If she stops, immediately make a small turn into the fence, and trot her in 5-10 small 10 m circles. Then canter straight. She might figure out pretty quick that stopping SUCKS!
balking, backing, rearing can be caused by saddle pinching the wither area.
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