Hi Jan,
I recognized you from your post and your picture. As to being barn sour when farther out… yes, yes, Ty can do that too, except he gets quick when he’s fed up and wants to go home, he doesn’t try backing or rearing or any of that. It was infrequent that I was on long trail rides, but the last one that was about an hour and a half with Jules, Ty got just fed up and wanted to canter by the other horses and he was literally just steaming and wanting to run home… he had it… it was too much work for him… even though there were other horses there. I think he was in poorer condition than he is now so a new hill to climb was just a bit much for him. He said in no uncertain terms “I want to go home.” And this was 3/4 through the trail ride.
He has gotten a bit barn sour when I got him going again this past time when I came back from the hospital blood pressure incident and wrist rest (where they inserted the camera in and said “don’t lift anything more than 6 pounds for 4 days” so as to not rupture the wrist blood vessel. I came back to Ty after six days and he would try to turn around right at Sanaa’s turnout corrals on our way to the roping arena. He would just turn as much of his body around as possible and if I had dropped the reins I guarantee he would have gone back to his corral… It really ticked me off because he should have no say so in the matter. I’d turn his head around and in one or two cases gave him a little bop with the crop and after he did that a few days with no reward of going back and only punishment, he ceased.
My mare never did that, neither did my gelding. But Ty has done it. I think it’s because he’s basically lazy and trying to get out of work. This is why I think he does the spooking runaway too, to get out of work… it is not simply fear of cantering. After my fall (which happened after his “successful” runaway - successful in that it got him out of work with me) he didn’t have to do much of anything for a long time. He got ponied for several weeks and turned out. Then Jose took him and he worked for 20 minutes 4 days a week… I have always worked him over an hour every day of the week… so he’s getting a heftier workload with me. We arena ride for 20-30 minutes and then take a half-hour to 45 min. trail ride usually alone. He always comes back hot and sweaty with me. He didn’t with Jose. Also, remember his previous owners let him sit on his butt and only lunged him once a week. I bet he thinks he’s getting worked half to death! Now that I think about it, I wonder if Drifter had been left sitting just like Ty was, and now resents being asked to work since he had been on vacay for an extended period of time… just wondering… and perhaps his current behavior worked on other riders to get out of work… with more beginner (not forceful) riders? Horses learn bad stuff quite easily. Did I ever tell you how my running quarter gelding learned to rear? I taught him not to in 2 quick and short lessons with a lot of spinning and crop… (beat the crap out of him – not sorry, it worked). He had been attacked by pit bulls while we were out riding and I had only had him for one week, right off the racetrack… a month of training from the racetrack before I got him… so I didn’t know if I could stop him if he got running, so I baled off his back when one of the pits bit him in the chest and he reared up. That taught him to rear. The very next time I took him out he tried to rear so he could run home. He tried that twice and that was it. Horses learn things that quick… one incident.
Steph
