How much does your horse trust you?

diamonddogs

diamonddogs

Active Member
Apr 14, 2008
1,293
0
36
Badiddlyboing, Odawidaho
Mine seems to trust me on the ground but worries when I'm riding because of my blooming confidence issues. If something upsets her she has a look on her face that says "OK, I'll come with you, but if that <insert horse-eating item here> comes to eat us, I'm off!"

What really prompted the question though was something I was thinking about last night. Usually someone fetches Kels in for me so she can have a haynet before I get there after work so I don't need to hang about after she's had a feed, but sometimes she's still out when I arrive.

I call her at the gate and nine times out of ten she'll come running. I appreciate she's hungry, but it dawned on me what a massive leap of faith it is for a horse to leave the safety of the herd and walk/trot/canter alone across an empty field in the dark. It can't just be for the food, because there's still a bit of manky grass left in the back field where they all congregate and she's quite partial to a nibble of hawthorn, of which there's plenty.
 
Storm trusts me plenty in hand and on the ground but tis a different matter altogether once I'm on her back!lol, we make each other nervous and it begins a viscious circle that is very hard to break! Daft isn't it, considering I've had her almost 6 years you'd think that I'd be able to fool myself and her into being confident!? Well, we're working on it, I think being confident on the ground helps - it certainly helps me with the ridden work, I make an effort to say to myself "well, if we were on the ground and I were leading she'd go past the scary object so being up here is no different". OH says I make her nervous and he's right!
 
I thin Shay trusts me, He's always been not too bad when out hacking and if I say go he says ok, but he had some real trust issues on the ground and was really bolshy when I got him, now he's pretty good most of the time, he will even load into a horse trailer with me but that took some major training, he used to bugger off in hand but now he is 99% to lead, he only has the odd moment when theres more grass outside the field than in it and usually it;s when I am putting him back in the 6 acre field.
 
borderdragon said:
i think all in all it all depends on how much trust you have in each other
if you trust your horse your horse will trust you:dance:
Click to expand...

True - just wish I could do this!!!
On the ground I'm with you DDogs, I trust him, he trusts me. I've seen him get snorty at stuff and now I just walk up to whatever it is and smack it repeatedly to make noise and act casual (traffic barricades, abandoned ploughing machinery in the stubble fields, etc.) after a couple of seconds he'll take a sniff and thats us. Ridden, I transmit huge 'oh crap' vibes that can make him spook at the same thing we sorted out on the ground the day before. The more spooks we get through the more I think he learns to trust me.
 
How true is this!!!

I feel really bad about this as well because I know I'm letting her down in two respects: one, she needs me to reassure just like when we're doing groundwork, so if I feel "oh crap!" I'm telling her there's something to worry about (sometimes there isn't anything at all except maybe she's spotted something interesting and her head comes up to investigate - she's a very "looky" horse) but I feel "oh CRAP!" then she's "What????" and so it goes on.

Secondly, and this is just me humanising her again :))) she's such a sweetheart and always looks after her rider she must be thinking she's done something wrong for me not to trust her. If someone directed the accusation that I don't trust her at me, I'd deny it vehemently, but deep down, isn't that exactly what's happening, albeit subconsciously?

Anyway, I'm taking baby steps and I'm determined to be back on form before autumn - already I feel frustrated by the weather, when this time last year it was a grand excuse not to do any ridden work!
 
newrider.com
Top Bottom
Back