When your horse spooks at nothing....

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EquineCompare

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I have been riding a lovely ID x for a friend. She is a great ride but her only vice is that she spooks at things that aren't there :rolleyes: She can have dogs running up to her barking, tractors teaming past her and not a flinch but then she will shy at a small bird in the hedgerow a mile away or something that I just can't see at all! You get the feeling she is spooking just for the sake of it / to play up sometimes :rolleyes:

How would you peeps deal with this?
 
laugh - tell big ruby she is a great big girls blouse & keep moving forward - at least this kind of horse ensures that hacking is never dull:D
maybe its just an irish draughtx mare thing
 
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EquineCompare said:
I have been riding a lovely ID x for a friend. She is a great ride but her only vice is that she spooks at things that aren't there :rolleyes: She can have dogs running up to her barking, tractors teaming past her and not a flinch but then she will shy at a small bird in the hedgerow a mile away or something that I just can't see at all! You get the feeling she is spooking just for the sake of it / to play up sometimes :rolleyes:

How would you peeps deal with this?
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If you have ever read any of my threads, then I have always said my mare is spooky and evasive. She is however still young (well she is eight, but was backed shortly before she was seven)

Anway, I too have those issues (our outdoor school is probably one of the scariest places to rider her...lol)

The only thing I can advise you to do, is a) Groundwork to de-sensitize her to sudden noises, flying objects and the such like) Just an hour ago i was dragging a bucket around the school...lol

And b) when she does spook, pay no notice and remain calm. I.e if she is playing around a bit or being a little testing then do nothing back and carry on as normal. Easier said then done of course, but never the less it does work. Also, don't know if you do but (I try not to) don't sit there and look for things, or tense up in the slightest when anything does happen, look away from anything she may or may not spook at and just completely ignore it. The slightest tense from a rider, or one that is slightly apprehensive will make such a big difference (not a in a good way) so laugh at it, ignore it whatever you do don't play on it.

Oh one more thing, make sure she is busy as well, so maybe if on a hack some transitions, bending the neck either way for suppleing, leg yielding (if appropriate) and such like, so she hasn't got time to be looking our for potential monsters. And obviously in the school you can do tonnes more things to keep her busy - But moving forwards is the most basic and important one.x

Goodluck
 
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Springer does that sometimes :rolleyes:
He'll shy away from a hedge when theres nothing in it, but he'll walk past a tractor revving it's engine, like he did yesterday :rolleyes:
I don't know why he thinks a bird will eat him but a tractor won't lol!
Generally i just push him through it, like if he's shying away or feels like he will spook i try to get his mind thinking about something else like striding out or trotting on to prove that theres nothing there that wants to eat him!
 
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My old mare did this all the time. There was no such thing as a quiet hack lol. Used to just push her on & keep her busy with leg- yields & shoulder in. At the grand age of 26 she would still spook at the horse - eating birds in the hedgerow! :D
 
Joy would do this when bored or overchallenged.

Other times would include when I though she was spooking at nothing only to realise that it was something that I hadn't noticed.
 
I had a whole year of this with my boy, however it was own to seperation anxiety and on a number of occasions he span round and headed home...

Anyway all i did was ignore him, as if nothing was happening... because nothing was happening so i'd just turn him round squeeze him on with a confident seat maybe a few words of encouragement if need be and that was about it. Made the whole thing very un-eventful and now he never really spooks :)
 
I would just ignore it or, if necessary, use positive leg and voice aids to encourage the horse forwards. I wouldn't make a big fuss about it as horse's by nature are spooky, nervous and sensitive prey animals so getting uppity about a horse behaving like a horse is just ridiculous.

x
 
Mine is also not the boldest boy, but I did notice improvement in him when I was feeding him Equiguard plus. He was just a nicer horse to ride and work with, 'thinkier' was how my instructor described it, when before playing scared was his best work-dodging move.
Riding forward, not focusing your attention on whatever the horse is spooking at, and not being tense is a good way to show the horse that there's nothing worth making a fuss of.
 
You get used to it if you own an arab! I think Lou looks where she's going less than 50%of the time :D
To be honest, the best thing is not to react because that shows your horse there is nothing to worry about. Keep your rein contact the same and just carry on riding forward. If you stay nice and relaxed, they don't tend to fuss so much :)
 
I try to ignore it, although when I get really fed up with it I have been known to shout or growl at him.
He did it when my friend was riding him and she gave him a pat :eek: I did a bit of growling then, but not at him :D
 
I just try to ignore it and push on forwards.
If you're confident, they'll be more confident too.
If you make an issue of it, they'll think that it really is a big deal as you're reacting to it too, so will spook again the next time!
 
She's been desensitised to what most horses find scary big noisy situations.. because you can desensitise them to things like that. But sudden things, no matter how small, will continue to make a jumpy horse jump. You can't really desensitise to that sort of thing. I'm jumpy myself, always have been, no amount of making me jump on purpose has made me any less jumpy over the years. I think it's the same for horses.
Ignore it in the sense of "help her with it, stay calm". no point making a deal out of something she can't help happening.
 
i tend to just ignore it, keep looking where im going and tell her to "get on with it you stupid mare!"

occasionally when shes just been a bit rubbish (jumping away from bins or side stepping round puddles) i do tell her off, shes old enough to know better- she could sidestep into the path of a car or down a ditch or anything which isnt worth the risk for me or her (or anyone who rides her)
 
If you had a horse's photographic memory, you'd know when a blade of grass was out of place and therefore potentially life threatening ;)
 
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