Need some help with a longreining/lunging problem

[JaniceH]

My little pony decided to show a few of his true colours this evening. The person who is helping me out a few times a week is horse aware and is stewarding co-ordinator for a carriage driving group (she is also a retired primary school teacher and taught my husband who is 38!) , and has longreined and lunged her own horses (she has five) but not really schooled with longreins as I have been taught, but if she doesnt help me then I cant do it on my own, so its a bit of a catch 22 situation, but she is a really lovely person and I can talk to her easily :D she also understands how nervous I am. She was longrein lunging Ben to start with and when he got into trot, decided to break into canter and buck and plunge and do a few loopie leapies. This is what he did with me at my driving instructors and one of the reasons why I was really wary of him :( He is being longreined in an open bridle at the moment as we are waiting for his harness to arrive, but also so he doesnt end up running into us. Every time Ben went into trot he ignored Jo (the person helping me) and run off into canter and then bucked and plunged. At one point he was bucking and plunging at exactly the same place in the circle. He had a couple of good circuits and changes of rein and going large, and then I had a go, round in the circle and he did the bucking and plunging twice. He doesnt tank off (which he has done with me before) and does come back when you gently pull on both the reins, but he looked really cross and fired up. When I got him back to the stable he was a bit wide eyed and 'up' if that makes sense. He is out all day, and is just on hay chaff and a couple of apples (and a calmer!). I am not sure whether it was naughtyness, high spirits (at 4pm after being out all day?) or if he was reacting to the other horses being in their stables but out of view as they had been brought in, whereas normally we have schooled while they are still outside. He didnt call to any of them, or stop to listen to them, so I am not sure.

Any ideas as to how to stop this? I think if I called out a loud 'no' he would panic and take off, and if I push him on he just bucks on.

I really really HATE this, as it makes me feel really shaky and nervous, because he is on long reins you can brace yourself against it and you have a bit more control than just with a single lunge rein, but I just wish I knew how to make him work properly without doing this.

[Dizzy]

I'd ignore it and send him on. Use your riens just as you would if you were riding him, inside to ask for the bend, outside for support, but send him into the rien.

When he's being naughty, don't be afraid to use your voice and keep him going forward with a good flick of the rien, or maybe your friend could give him a flick with lunge whip. I wouldn't worry about him breaking into canter, praise him for going forward, then ask for trot. If he's difficult to slow down reduce the size of your circle and keep him going for a few circuits then ask again. Don't be tempted to brace on the riens, he's not going to go on forever, he will tire eventually, just make sure that when he does make the transistion into trot, that you asked for it.

Once he's trotting ask for walk, using the same rules. Once he's walking, start all over again.

He'll soon realise that regardless of what he does, you still expect him to work.

I know its not easy, my mare Breeze had a very naughty spell being lunged when she younger. She did the plunge, buck and bolt. I ended up getting a friend to help me, between the 2 of us we anchored her, ignored the bucking, but kept asking for forward nicely.

Like you we only wanted trot, but got canter (and a fast one at that), once she realised she couldn't break free and we kept her in canter until we decided she could trot, the penny soon dropped that cantering around in a circle is bloody hard work. It didn't take long before the transistion into trot was relaxed and willing.

[galadriel]

When I'm working the horse around me, instead of under me, I know that I may have a little less direct control. But I still need to be the ones making the decisions...

I tend to treat lunge sessions with a greener horse fairly loosely. The horse may not be paying enough attention to me, the horse may be having some issues with aids/body language, or the horse may simply be pushing the limits. Whatever he does do, whether or not I initially asked for it, I try to anticipate and make it look like my idea.

For example: if horse takes a couple of bouncy trot steps and looks to be going into canter, I'll ask for canter. If he starts looking a little tired and getting slow, I ask him to slow.

If I'm having difficulty convincing him to slow with my regular aids, I have another method which can help. PErmit the horse to take off into his chosen speed (trying to anticipate & ask for it, so it's my idea). Then I wait for him to start looking tired/wanting to slow...THEN I push him on. Eventually, he really really wants to slow, but can't until I permit it. When I do finally ask him to slow, it's exactly what he wants to do.

Repeated use of this method can begin to help the horse associate me asking him to slow with him WANTing to slow. So whether or not he already understood slowing aids well, he comes to respect them a lot more.

Also--have you had his teeth done yet? I wonder if that's a contributing factor.

[shandy84]

When Bramble is nauthy (in a running off way) I use the method Dizzy describes and for Bramble's training at the monment Galadriel's method is one of my biggest helpers.

Don't forget you spent time pulling his mane earlier in the day and this will unsettle and irritate any pony no matter if they complain at the time or not they get somewhat moody :)

Think on the good points from this:

He didn't bolt off
He didn't run into anybody
He came back when requested
He wasn't nasty after the session and you ended on a good note

Those to me are some positive things, sometimes ponies will take the mick (don't I know it) but you need to look to see the good inside them train as much as you can that day and end on a positive note and just accept it as a worse session than normal but by no means the end of the world as you did achieve some personal breakthroughs if nothing else.

This is a learning experience for you both, Ben may well have been testing Jo as well as she has been working with him long enough for him to try and test her but if she wins anything he may throw at her he should settle back down again, it's about concentrating on any mini breakthroughs rather than any bad things he may have done

[Tangle]

I had my first ever lunging lesson last week (where we decided I needed a lot more practice :rolleyes: ). The horse we were using can lunge nicely, but will let you know if he doesn't think you're doing it right. When I asked for trot I got a similar reaction to that you're seeing with Ben (he'd buck, and start running in).

After the session we came to the conclusion my biggest problems were visible lack of confidence and being too quiet.

The first one's hard to work on, but the latter I should be able to fix. My lesson was "if I've asked for trot and I (eventually) get a nice trot if I don't tell him that's what I wanted, how will he know he got it right?". So I'm now walking round the house saying "good boy" to my OH every time he does something right :D.

Don't know if that's any use, but I thought it might help :).