Sticky youngster under saddle

[candyappy]

@blue_heron

She’s four. Four year olds are not known for their logic and ability to suffer fools. But in a year, you will have a five year old who is more confident and had the experience of working with you to solve a training problem, which is a skill you will need to install, because by next year, you will have a different problem to solve together.

Just for the record I would have thought you were making excuses EXCEPT I have just finished a year with my just turned 5 year old that I have never experienced in 40+ years of riding and training my own horses.

He finally seems to once again be the lovely, forward , agreeable , willing horse he was at 3… I can only hope with each ride we progress. This last year was one I would like to forget and they definitely can say NO continually. I just did what I could with him that day and for him very , very slowly it got better.

He is wicked smart too. I think that makes it worse!

[outerbanks77]

Deleted.

[athelas]

It gets better! I have a WONDERFUL 7 year old who is just now developing the strength behind to really carry himself in the canter and be adjustable. He was a lamb at 4, a jackass at 5 and a lot of 6, and now has one of the best work ethics I’ve ever met. The brain goes all the time which made the baby years that much harder but at the end of the day, he’s a forward horse and a forward horse is a safe one. By nature, I am not a tinker-er so that helps. He gets seen by the fitter when he tells me he needs it–same with the body worker and vet and all under the guiding eye of my trainer.

Each horse is an individual, don’t adhere to anybody’s timeline.

[omare]

Well likely going in a side direction here, but I found a neck strap on a baby that I might feel insecure about helpful, especially if you don’t have much in front of you. You can loop one or both pinkies in it or hold with your reins and leave the mouth alone, if you want to leave them open in front so to speak. But I always made sure it was loose enough I could raise my hand if needed w/o having to drop the neck strap. You can also pull on it to steady them after giddy-upping ( ) (But that was with baby racehorses…that needed to learn to go forward, not dressage candidates.)

[TwiSedai]

To give a little bit of hope, my extremely sticky, very very green, new horse that would slam on the brakes after about two steps of trot then refuse to even walk again when I first got him about a month and a half ago, just did his first walk trot test yesterday at our in-house schooling show. It took some building up the trot bit by bit (go three steps then walk and praise, go five steps then walk and praise, etc), then once we could get up to half a circle or so I’d reward him if he gave a good transition, gave me a few steps of a more forward trot, or a few steps of a relaxed trot if he tensed up and put his head up and hollowed.

I’m quite relieved, this guy was a freebie and I was questioning if we’d get past this weirdness after the first week. But I basically had to decide, is he doing it out of stubbornness or out of insecurity and anxiety? In his case, he felt very insecure and would get nervous, and in his nervousness felt better stopping, so I really encouraged the slightest bit of try on his part and he started to relax more and more. If I had gone the other way and upped pressure to make him keep going, I think it would have backfired hard (actually I know it would have since that’s what the one that started him and ended up convincing me to take him did, she’s a great rider but can be a bit too intense for very sensitive ones). And now that he’s more confident, we are able to start upping the pressure a bit to get more forward and for longer. Canter is still a ways off, I want him more solid in his WT work and able to canter easily on the lunge on a large circle. But it IS possible, if there is nothing physical causing the stickiness.