I have a 10 year old warmblood who has stopped showing for a bit. I’ve owned him three years. When I bought he he was being given depo and we continued until last October when the safety of administration became and issue. Since then he is (obviously) less quiet, tougher to ride. But he also randomly will exhibit explosive rage in the field wi th his pasture mates - chasing them with the whites of his eyes showing, resulting in him dripping with sweat and having to be brought in. This has happened randomly about three times in ten months. When he is brought in, he is visibly upset by his behavior and very worried. He is NOT an aggressive horse on the ground. He’s sweet, albeit a little pushy. Has anyone ever seen anything like this?
Edited to add. I apologize for typos. I’m on a phone.
well now that the drug has cleared the system and his normal hormone balance restored, you may be seeing why someone put him on the drug in the first place. You will probably be best served by consulting with a top notch vet center and seeing if there are any tests that can be done to detect abnormal testosterone or other hormone levels. If he has anxiety and brain issues, you may be stuck with a horse that needs some form of medication to be usable, which may leave you in a show ring quandary. YOU might see if regumate is an option, but first dig in to a diagnosis.
9 Likes
Rage is probably not the best word here. More likely extreme anxiety and territorial behavior. Perhaps individual turnout would be a better choice for him?
Is he acting like a thug under-saddle around other horses or is it just occasionally loose in the field with a group?
As an aside, every sporthorse vet I ever asked has said testing for elevated T levels in geldings rarely reveals that to be the cause of aggressive behavior. About 90+% come back normal. Anecdotally, theres no central data base or specific records. Don’t think its expensive to run the test and you might want to run a blood panel anyway. Easy way to answer quite a few questions…
If he was imported as an adult, very likely he was offered intact to give buyers the choice of stud or gelding. Many of these actually covered or were teased and collected to test what they put kn the ground. You can remove the equipment but the tolerated (because it was a stud) behavior remains. Not everybody demands impeccable ground manners In studs and it’s hard to untrain, easier to mask, especially in a sale horse.
I should think since its only happened 3 times in 10 months and he’s otherwise fine? Its not T related and just avoiding group turnout should remove the opportunity fir the behavior.
3 Likes
Why the heck was my response unapproved?
All I said is, basically, if hes usually sweet but has had 3 episodes in 10 months when turned out in a group? Don’t turn him out in a group as its highly unlikely its hormones. Bad manners in a group. Avoid it.
What was the issue that made administration of depo unsafe? If this horse is not showing and he’s this unhappy off the depo-- maybe he should just be on it unless there’s another solution to his problem. Because he sounds really stressed.
We stopped giving the depo for a few reasons:1) not legal anymore 2) my vet was not comfortable prescribing it since horses were randomly dying. The horse does have a tendency to get angry when you ride him. Not all the time but it is in him. He got run into (t-boned) at Harrisburg before he showed and went into the show ring clearly angry. His trip reflected that. I am going to have the vet pull blood and check his testosterone level to see if we can rule that out. He was imported at a 6 year old. Didn’t really do much his first year here then I bought him as a 7 year old.
You could try feeding an oral supplement combo, like select at ease plus a mare-based one (Feisty mare for example) and see if those help? Another option to look into is a gut one, such as Mad Barn Visceral which also has at-ease components.
IF he’s on anything with MSM, try to remove it, it can make some horses jittery / hot / reactive (I’m not sure why, but it does happen to some)
Scope for ulcers and check for hind-gut acidosis, ulcers, and stomach worms/bots. This can cause a horse to get agitated during work as well.
I would suggest removing him from a group for safety reasons. For his safety and the others horses, perhaps he can share a fence line instead. Since its rare, every 3 months or so, it would be hard to pin point if something is a trigger. Does it happen when a new round bale went out? When the manure gets pushed back? When the paddock got harrowed? If you can find out what causes his anxiety you could potentially remove the trigger. But until then, I would put him on individual. See if he has a tear-around panic by himself or if its just when hes in groups. I’m all for group turnout, for socialization, but when it becomes dangerous individual is the best option.
Also horses don’t get angry and hold onto it for several minutes, agitated yes, but not “im going to ruin this course because im mad” angry. My bet is the rider or horse got uneasy when they had a collision, or the horse got injured, and resulted in a poor round. Generally, if i was in warm up and my horse got t-boned by another and then was acting off or nervous or agitated from it, I would have scratched the round or the entire day. Set the horse up for success, always. If you don’t consider the horse as a living being, and force him to work even if hes having an off day, I can guarantee you he will be sour fast.
7 Likes
This is highly unlikely, but is it possible he’s a cryptorchid? Again, highly unlikely because the vet who gelded him would have likely found this when he/she gelded him. BUT, surgery for cryptorchid colts is more invasive and extensive than a simple gelding procedure (often done out in the open air), so your horse would have had to have the secondary surgery at the vet’s office. It could be possible your horse was sold to a new owner, moved, etc. and the second surgery was never done or put off indefinitely (especially because cryptorchid colts don’t really show signs of a problem until they’re older). A hormone test will determine if the second testicle is still intact.
More likely are the diagnoses listed by others on this thread. Jut be aware that testosterone is not the only hormone that causes “rage” in geldings; too much estrogen can have a similar effect. Hormone test will measure for this, too.
3 Likes
Keep in mind in the wild, horses have lots of space to stay apart from those they aren’t friends with. In a field, their choices of distancing are restricted. As much as I want my horses to be “horses”, solo turnout with friends over the fence seems to be a safer choice and a lot easier on my nerves not having to watch the shenanigans!
1 Like
If he was t-boned at a show, could he had a horse version of PTSD? Perhaps the other horses’ posture occasionally trigger the memory of the accident?
That said, randomly loosing it in turn out and/or under saddle is a common denominator in the two horses I have worked with who had broken their necks higher up. (C2).
Solitary turn out might be your best option to keep the other horses safe.
1 Like
Thanks everyone for their brainstorming and suggestions. I guess no one else has ever experienced something like this. As for the poster who said we should have scratched the class at Harrisburg - it was medal finals so that wasn’t really an option. The horse was clearly angry. It wasn’t the rider’s emotions affecting him. And yeah, if you watched the trip it WAS a big old F-u from the horse right after fence 3. But hey everyone is entitled to their opinions.
What we are saying when we say horses don’t do this is that normally hhorsesdo not so this. If you are convinced that this is real there are 1 of 2 reasons.
1 it did not happen as said.
2 it did happen as said. If so this is not normal for horses at all.
There is no but this is normal for this horse. It is not normal. This should be addressed in every handling of the horse in turnout, in handling and under saddle. Something is not right. Which is a) why he was on depo and b) which you have figured out enough to post on COTH.
It’s always a choice to do a class or not. As riders we have the responsibility to do what is right for the horse. From this account of the incident, I would have scratched because it sounds like the horse was scared after.
As others have said, horses do not get “angry” in the same way people do. Pain and intimidation, yes. I would try to think about the incident and resulting behavior more from his point of view and reassess.
6 Likes
What’s with the attitude? People are trying to help?
I would remove anything triggering for the moment. No group turnout if that’s a problem. Don’t ride in situations where he tends to be fractious. And then I’d have the vet out for a complete blood panel, check eyes, and overall soundness/wellness exam. Clearly something is bothering him and apparently the depo was smoothing it out somewhat. Without the depo you are seeing more of what was underlying. Hard to say what that issue is without a better work up.
6 Likes
I’ve heard this about a horse on prascend. Any chance he’s on cushings medication?
You might want to consider EDM. It’s a process to come to that diagnosis, and unfortunately only confirmed during necropsy, but we’ve started to see it more frequently. It might be coincidental that these behaviors are happening with the discontinuation of the depo. Some of this sounds very similar to behaviors I’ve seen other horses exhibit.
I would suspect an undiagnosed soundness issue. People jump all over depo to take the edge off their horses, when the horse really needs a vet work up.
2 Likes
This is NOT normal behavior. However, I feel that it is unlikely that the behavior is totally random, more likely you simply aren’t able to identify the trigger. The trigger could be a change in the group (and added, changed, or removed horse), a new horse turned out in an adjacent paddock, a mare in season nearby, a pasture-mate deciding to try to move up the hierarchy by one rung, etc. In some cases, horses can form a deep bond with a single pasture mate and express extreme behavior to “defend” that special friend from even innocent attention by other horses with surprising intensity. I have seen that in geldings on occasion.
By all means involve the vet, but honestly I think you need to make a change in his turnout situation. For safety reasons–both his safety and the safety of other horses in the group–I would put him on private turnout or even better, turnout with a single friend, ideally a horse that is quiet but tough.
In your case, I think there is a reasonable likelihood that your horse was gelded late. In that case, it is not unusual for a horse to retain some stallion like behaviors–including the possibility of some very strong ideas and behaviors in herd settings.
Horses don’t have “PTSD” but they absolutely make deep associations between circumstances and a bad thing happening, even when the circumstances and the bad thing weren’t related. Depending on the horse, the association may gradually wear off with time, or it may take the form of an ingrained reaction.
Regarding his behavior under saddle, I think he just is who he is. Horses are large prey animals and are wired to be very aware of and sensitive to their environment. I think that is best addressed by training, confidence building, and protecting him from situations that cause him stress. For example, trying to school him at shows at times when the ring is quieter, etc.
Also, I completely agree with your and your vet’s decision to stop the depo. Obviously you have to for showing, but even if you weren’t showing there are better and safer options for non-show legal calming effects.
It’s interesting you say this. This is purely anecdotal, but our barn had a 16-ish year old warmblood gelding who was a true puppy-dog packer 99% of the time, but every once in a blue moon, he would seem to snap and would charge/buck his rider into the rail or some similar bad behavior designed to get her off. It only happened 3-4 times over the couple years she owned him (as far as I know), but it was incredibly unpredictable and dangerous. At the time, it was chalked up to him just getting fed up with the monotony of life as a long stirrup-type horse… but come to think of it he was being treated for Cushings.
1 Like
