Please tell me your stories of reformed balkers

[AnastasiaBeaverhousen]

OP
I admire your willingness to go the extra mile for this horse .

I imagine at sometime before you got him, someone tried some natural horsemanship that resulted in a horse that really has no use for humans.

I highly recommend Warwick Schiller. Especially his later videos about connecting with your horse . His later videos are quite different from his earlier videos in how he works with horses That, to me, is valuable as a teaching tool as well.

I would invest a little more time in earning this horse s trust .

I completely agree with you in that this horse must learn to accept being handled, and must learn to be stand quietly and be calm for the vet, farrier, etc. Respect boundaries of course.

I’m not sure I understand your thought process about why one horse “deserves” to be up and the other has to earn it?

[Alterration]

It’s not really about deserves like they remotely understand it In fact, both of them have been going out. It was more about the level of consistency necessary for the balking horse at this juncture that is not necessary for the older horse. And I do generally allow my horses, all of them, some leeway for preferences.

But this horse’s preferences have been taken into account to the point that he is now resistant.

If it were just the going outside and it were consistent that would be one thing. But he can stop dead halfway down the barn aisle in either direction for no reason at all. Or halfway to the arena. Or get stuck in his stall. Other times he leaves the stall to go out to the pasture without issue or walks to the arena without issue. It’s not consistent. It isn’t a particular spot, time of day, or anything else. It is very much about how he feels and what he would prefer to do in that moment.

Today he chose not to come in. All the rest of the horses were in, and I had to not only go retrieve him from the far corner (paddock, no grass where he was) he offered to balk on the way in, but thankfully I had the stick, simply tapped him gently on the rump, and we continued on. Why was he standing where he was standing? Who knows.

He shows no visible signs of fear, no tension in his muzzle, eye, or neck. If you tug on him, he will put his head up and resist, but he is not bothered, and if you don’t put tension on him or ask him to move he’ll cock a leg and fall asleep. It’s the darnedest thing.

This horse has never been NH’d, though I’ll agree that his human interactions to date have told him that we are inconsistent at best, pushovers at worst. He was in breed-show land until the age of 4, when my friend bought him, and I know what happened to him from there.

He literally has been bribed with a carrot in front of his nose or tranquilized. At one point he was on enough calming supplements to down a small elephant. If he did not want to do a thing he was not asked to, nor was he taught to. Always there was an excuse for his behavior. “Oh he doesn’t like fly spray”. “Oh he doesn’t like the wash rack”. “Oh he doesn’t like the paddock”. “Oh, he doesn’t like…” “Oh, he just is a little nippy”. He has been through at least 5 trainers and none of them were NH. All “conventional” in 4 different disciplines. But in that short period of time, he received no consistency.

I do follow Warwick’s stuff - good stuff

I’ve had balkers, biters, spookers, buckers, rearers, and all manner of other training issues (including just plain old green horses) but never one that was this bad. So I was hopeful that I’d get some stories of people who were successful. I’m afraid by providing detail people have latched on to the wrong thing - that’s my bad for not explaining it all well.

[endlessclimb]

Again, you’re doing fine. He doesn’t get to have ‘preferences’ until he’s on the bandwagon, the way you describe preferences. He was handled by excuse-filled over-horsed people up until now, and now he has to learn you’re worth listening to and if he chooses not to there’s a consequence, whereas before there was either none or he could con someone out of a carrot by locking himself to the ground.

Some consistency and he will be just fine. With this particular horse, it would be a good long while before I offered a treat for anything related to leading. It’s an expectation that he will lead, you’re not begging. Treats may have their place in the fly-spray part of his new education, or the wash rack, or maybe even his feet to start. But not for the leading, IMO. He has already learned that gluing himself to planet earth earns him treats, so that whole game needs to be turned on its head (just what you’re doing - gluing yourself to earth earns you a TAP TAP with the whip, little man, let’s get going…)

You’re doing perfect by him. Thank goodness for you, as who knows how many of this exact horse end up on a one way semi trip, all because no one taught them basic handling.

[Alterration]

I should also clarify - my horses do get treats. Generally speaking I’ve always treated them when caught from the pasture. I have not used them as reward (other than that), but typically rely on other things - praise, scratches, a break - depending on who they are.

What I refer to as bribery was really more luring without a click or other intent to reduce reliance on the treat. So, to stand in the wash rack, he would not only be lured in by a carrot (when possible) but carrots would be shoved in his face as long as he would stand in there (for example).

Now that all that is said -

He does do something else very strange - I’d call it almost dissociation. When he is asked to do something he does not want to do, or even sometimes just while leading, his eye leaves. I don’t really have a better description than that, but it feels like you are no longer relevant. He is very attentive when standing, but the checking out is very obvious. That is how he ran over people in the past - they are just no longer there to him.

It may be that the trauma is actually with leading itself. Since he was a halter horse, trained to be a nut on the end of the lead rope, it’s possible that leading became very stressful. Then, when he was out of that world and they attempted to make him a normal horse, he had to be led with a chain at all times and the rules changed. He may have then been over-corrected and now he’s just like “screw you guys, I’ll never get this right” (obviously he isn’t thinking that in actuality, but he may not truly know the right answer any more).

The tapping and cueing is working. He’s learning that not only is nothing horrible going to happen, but that I’m consistent. I’m sure we will be fine - it’s just a super new issue to this degree.

The aggression is a concern, but I suspect that was brought on by the lack of consistent boundaries. He hasn’t offered anything of the sort here.

[SuzieQNutter]

Tapping, cueing and praising will work.

[hybriseris]

@Alterration

The aggression is a concern, but I suspect that was brought on by the lack of consistent boundaries. He hasn’t offered anything of the sort here.

My lease mare was like this before I found her. Her owner was very candid with me that she needs consistency, and clear boundaries. She’s at the stage in her life where correct retraining has eliminated most of her past behavior and she can have her preferences and her quirks because she does what needs doing, but every once in a while when the mood strikes she’ll test the waters.

However what IS completely gone is the aggression, besides the typical occasional ugly mare face. Which is something, because I’m under the impression that her owner was in the same situation where you in, where she had to do right by this horse because with anyone else it would have ended up shipped off to the end of the road. This mare was very, very aggressive and was kicked out of two trainer’s barns, one of which at the end was at the point of being unable to lead her from her stall because she’d come at them teeth bared and front hooves out.

Knowing her as I do now, I think it came down to a lack of consistency and fair treatment in the home before her current owner bought her. She is whip smart, naturally on the anxious side, and very willing to take charge if someone else won’t, and I can easily see how if she wasn’t given rules and expectations that her behavior could have gotten to the point of resentment (as much as a horse could identify with that) and a belief that humans around her weren’t worth trusting to keep her safe or tell her what to do.

She never turned in to a cuddlebug, but she’s never attempted any sort of aggression with me or anyone else either and vets/farrier etc regularly comment on how well she stands for them. There’s definitely hope for this gelding with the consistency you’re giving him! It sounds like his moments are tied in to having mostly uncertainty and free reign in his life up to this point.

[lenapesadie]

I know a reformed balking draft horse. His original MO was to balk (on the ground) if he didn’t want to go wherever it was that one was trying to lead him to. Escalating pressure was met with a turn and bolt. Bolting Belgians are rather hard to keep a hold of.

A mix of NH ground work, clicker training and many years spent as a beloved backyard pet have turned the tide for him. A toddler could lead him with a ribbon around his neck to wherever now.

Said Belgian came from an Amish driving background. For this horse, I suspect that once he realized he wasn’t going to be asked to do anything too onerous and that snacks were forthcoming that he no longer felt the need to balk.

Interestingly, he never balked under saddle. We were told he didn’t balk driving either but we’ve never driven him so I can’t verify that claim.

[AnastasiaBeaverhousen]

OP Thanks for clarifying .
The main thing is to patient, fair, and consistent and you are all of those

My horse was very amiable for the most part, but when he didn’t want to do something, he was 100% about it.

Loading him into a trailer was a knock down drag out, and that was on me. I had no trailer and no chance to train him when he was young. So it used to take hours even with drugs.

I didn’t give in, I was just more obdurant than he, and I wasn’t going to let him win. And no, I didn’t beat the crap out if him, although I sure wanted to.

I was very lucky in that respect. He never had to go to the vet.

Long story to say that with time and patience you can retrain him.

I think you’ve got this