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[oxowoman]

Does The Natural Stuff Help Spooking?
I Would Appreciate Any Help With My Very Spooky, Woosi Horse Rudi

[inhs]

yep. Advice and retreat works well (increase their tolerance towards scary stuff over time)

also the groundwork helps horses to reliase you are the leadher, thus when they see somethign scary they are then more inclined to follow your lead, rather than just panic & bolt off.

(sorry, thats all a bit brief, but am in work :) )

[wonkeywoody]

Ditto.

Go to

www.iceryder.net/7games

When you've got the hang of the basics you can introduce the plastic bags, tarps umbrellas etc etc - take your time - you need a solid trust with your horse.

[rosiej]

Spooking can really be improved.
Few things to look at first : eyesight, hearing (for the obvious reasons!) and of course all the usual pain checks - a horse who is in pain has more reason to be jumpy and afraid as more likely to be weaker running away.
Some horses are made spookier by the attitude of the rider, a nervy rider can create a nervy horse and sometimes an overly brash rider can also make the horse more sensitive.
Some horses are natural 'spookers' - an old friend of mine was convinced that these horses had been born to be scouts and lookouts and nothing would chance them or move them from this role. I, on the other hand, do believe there are some good ways to improve the behaviour, but it can be a bit of a longterm program - although good improvement can be seen in one session a lot of consistency is needed to really change the horses outlook.

Advance and retreat with something like plastic bag on a stick can help, as well as leading work over and under and around spooky objects.
Equally important is some groundwork, but moving the horse around you are letting him know you are looking after him and he doesnt need to be the scout any more, you are taking that responsibility away and telling him exactly where to go to be comfortable and safe, so the more acurate, soft and giving you can get him firstly on the ground and then under saddle - in all sorts of environments the better.
Sometimes teaching something like a shoulder in ridden, or a head lower from the ground, can give you a handy tool to help remind the horse to let you take control when things are scary without trying to force him to do the scary thing just yet - almost like taking a small childs hand.

Personally, I think the best way to look at it is to change the relationship between you and your horse rather than just train the horse, a lot of the time things need specific tweeking looking at the way you handle your horse before, during and after spooking, so its quite individual, but, for example stopping the horse and reassuring him and regaining control of his feet well BEFORE he spooks is a great solution - of course it means you need to be reading your horses stress levels and maybe even subtely controlling him all the time, asking for longer and shorter steps in walk, flexing left and right, shoulder fore, etc so that you are constantly looking after him, directing him and finding small things to praise him for can really help his confidence, better than abandoning him to look after himslef then being suprised when he does just that.
Then again other horses much better left alone to be able to look - sorry its just so individual but some food for thought at least.

Good luck
Rosie
x

I am running a spookbusting and bombproofing clinic this spring if anyone is interested.

[Skib]

Just to say I really lke your post RosieJ.

I've seen both Michael Peace and Mark Rashid work with spooky horses at clinics - and it got it into my head that, with some horses at least, you can teach not to spook.
But like so much in riding it hangs on whether the owner believes it can be done?
I ride Riding School horses. I've seen Yard Managers who like you believed it was possible to teach horses to hack without spooking but others who think it is not possible and that all horses inevitably spook.

To answer the original poster - Yes, This may be one difference between NH and conventional horsemanship. In conventional riding, authority and the whip and firm contact is the cure, but in NH (or horse psychology) we allow a horse to learn about the object itself?
The professional convenrtional way is quick, you can get on with the work in hand? Whereas the NH teaching psychology way takes time which a professional cant afford?

[AengusOg]

I have a book here..........'The Days Of The Garron', written in 1980, by Dr A F Fraser.

The book is a study of equine biology with particular reference to the Highland Pony. He puts forward the following theory, based on the evolutionary adaptations which have resulted in the position of the horse's eyes on its head:

" The eyes of the horse are arranged so that it is able to see almost entirely to its rear and completely on both sides all at one time. This spectacular panoramic or scanning capacity of the horse's vision was undoubtedly a key feature in its early adaptation."

He goes on to describe how this works:

"He is unable to focus his eyes close enough to see objects very keenly if less than four feet from his face." He maintains, "When he concentrates to focus his eyes forward to his maximum ability he appears momentarily to lose the ability to observe conciously to the rear and to the sides."

He goes on, "Most breeds of horse have their eyes so laterally placed that their rear vision is blocked only by the width of their body. This vision, together with his keen awareness of sudden movement and his preparedness for quick flight, made the horse, when he was a hunted animal, difficult to apprehend by potential predators."

He explains, "Normally the horse has monocular vision, that is, the ability to see seperate things with each eye at the same time. As a result of this he may be able to see an object with one eye only for a while till adjustment of view brings the object into the view of the other eye also."

This effectively means that the horse can scan the distant horizon and most things in his immediate surroundings simultaneously, and with all in focus. However he goes on to say this:

"One significant effect of this is that minor objects, as they come into view, appear to jump suddenly into the horse's vision as the second eye catches up with the first eye to observe properly a given object. It is this visual characteristic which explains the horse's inclination to shy from minor objects. This also explains why they are more likely to shy from moving minor objects less than they do from stationary ones; moving ones sail into view, while stationary ones jump into it and into sudden conciousness. Alteration of head position may also be required to bring a stationary item into view with inevitable sudden awareness."

He believes, "Again, the smaller the object the more the horse is likely to have this object come unexpectedly into his vision and cause him to shy."

Later in the chapter Dr. Fraser explains how the retina of the horse's eye is a flat surface (in humans and many higher animals it is curved), and that it is tilted to such an extent that the horse is unable to see objects above the level of his eyebrows. He states, "If the horse raises his head he can see things at a distance much better,.......if he lowers his head, close objects come into sharper view. By moving his head in a lateral direction, to one side or the other, the horse is capable of making use of the relatively flat retina for focussing."

This would explain why a horse will throw its head up when a tractor comes into view three fields away, then shies at the plastic bag (which we feel he must have seen, because we did) five seconds later.

The book is IBSN 0 904265 26 9. MacDonald Publishers

Sorry about the length of this post, but much of it would have meant little otherwise.

[eml]

I think rosiej has summed up my view pretty well. yes you can desensitise a horse but the desentisising only works as long as they trust the rider.

My old horse was a 'looker' very intelligent and needed to work things out for himself so we 'agreed' that minor starts were quite ok just please don't frighten yourself so much I fall off!

My new ride would be embarrased to spook,standing still may be acceptable but his owners assures me was very spooky with her to the extent she fell off. I have seen him get this way once when totally overridden by someone I was teaching, almost as if to say 'just back off I can do it without any of your stress'

Working with my youngster however I need the 'keep the brain focused on me' tactic and constant requests to keep him focused.

We spend a lot of time working with increasing scary things but it is not always the objects that are the issue. One of our school horses hacks out through heavy traffic,copes with bird scarers, kids on bouncy castles but will then have an unexpected leap at something still, insignificant and in no way a horse eating monster ...last was the war memorial in a neighbouring village :o

[Francis Burton]

AengusOg - Thanks for taking time to type in those quotes from Fraser's book. Very interesting, and I think there is definitely something in what he writes. However, I should mention the last section about how the shape of a horse's retina affects the way objects are focused has fallen out of favour, certainly since 1980. Good evidence exists now to disprove the "ramp retina theory". For decades that was what the textbooks taught, but most of those published these days have caught up with current thinking, namely that near and far objects are brought into focus in exactly the same way as we (and other mammals) do, by changing the shape of the lens. Any movements of the head associated with attention are more likely to be due to bringing objects out of the blind area into monocular view, or from monocular to binocular view. Nevertheless, it is likely that horses are unable to bring about changes in focus as rapidly as we can, so sudden moves nearby may be all the more startling.

[Harry Hobbes]

Does The Natural Stuff Help Spooking?
I Would Appreciate Any Help With My Very Spooky, Woosi Horse RudiYou may wish to review this thread: http://77.72.200.82/forum/showthread.php?t=47709

...specifically, the coments regarding "confidence," "fear," and "leadership."

Best regards,
Harry

[jinglejoys]

Yep! Fire Engines at full belt down country lane followed by two motor bikes no problem but that mule eating Mac Donalds polistyrene cup!!!!!__Now THAT'S another matter:D
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y190/jinglejoys/Bms-2.jpg

I find any form of NH helps him concentrate much better and listen to me

[AengusOg]

Thanks for that Francis Burton.

[cvb]

Interesting demo at the Scottish Horse Event last weekend - Andrew Hamilton was doing a Sj thing on a green 4 year old. The horse has apparently not been out and about much - so was quite amazed at having a few hundred people watching him ! Andrew got people in the crowd to feed him polos and pet him - rather than making any kind of a deal about it. Worked nicely.

But then as he build up the jumping exercise, the horse jinked out of the grid and he came off. Now remember the guy was miked up, so we could here anything he said...

a minor exclamation was about as bad as it got. Then he just walked calmly to catch the horse, got back on, got his assistants to adjust the grid (to a lower level of complexity) and went back to work.

The difference that made to the horse was great to see. The horse got calmer, more confident, and really settled into his work.

So often we hear "leadership" being closely associcated with "dominating" your horse, telling them what to do - with the connotation that no silly business will be tolerated.

But in this situation there was clear leadership - a very obvious message that there was nothing to worry about, that the rider would only ask the horse things he knew the horse could do, and the horse accepted that leadership.

No sticks, no spurs, no yelling, no rough riding.

REALLY nice to see :D

[cvb]

p.s. that thread Harry posted - you'll notice I'm there. I have a spooky horse. I also use NH type approaches. The frequency and intensity of Fi's spooks have both reduced. She has been diagnosed with DJD. And we haven't hacked out for a couple of years now. Its all part of the same story. Pain was one issue, leadership was another - and part of that is what I was offering Fi (whether I was tense, braced etc) and part of it was understanding (like the story I just posted) what her current limits are. Sure we stretch them a little where we can... but stretch them too far and you take yourself and the horse into "panic zone" which is never a great place to be.