I was reminded once again of the hazards of equestrian activities a few days ago. My horse fell on me.
She had been giving me some trouble for a few days and it was getting progressively worse. I was familiar with this bad behavior, as she had done it before. It had been over 6 months since the last incident so I thought I had trained it out of her.
The problem was her reaction to the leg and spur when I asked for vertical flexion (giving in the poll). She does find it difficult, but instead of resisting, she slams on the brakes and starts violently throwing her head around. I ride her in a thin loose ring snaffle, but when she has resistance on her mind, she’s so strong she can rip the reins out of my hands.
On this day, she stopped, and started throwing her head around. I bent her nose to my boot and she started to go sideways. I could feel her losing balance. I thought some sense of self-preservation would kick in and she would either stop or go forward. Instead, she pulled her head down and sideways, her front leg went straight out, and down she went.
It felt like slow motion, and she initially went down straight, like a camel. It gave me time to get my feet out of the stirrups. By the time she was all the way on the ground, she rolled slightly sideways onto my leg, but I was able to pull it free.
Her ongoing difficulties caused me to search for answers in unusual places. I’m most familiar with dressage training, but none of the techniques I tried on her worked.
I found the answers at a Clinton Anderson demonstration. He refers to his training techniques as The Method. I found the groundwork very effective and have been working my horse using his Method for about a year.
I was glad for it on this day. I didn’t want to get back on, so I did various groundwork exercises. After she was relaxed and listening, I got back on asked her to go forward on a loose rein. She complied and I ended the session.
I needed a way to translate the ground work to under saddle. The next day I asked my husband to help me. I put the rope halter on over her bridle, got on, and had him do the groundwork. She is trained to follow the lead, so whenever she got stuck, he would pull her head to the inside and point with his arm in the direction I wanted to go. If she didn’t respond, he would swing the stick.
This worked great, as long as she knew he had the line. The minute he took it off, she stopped.
I decided to leave the line on the halter and hold it myself. That did the trick. If she stopped and refused to move, I would pull her head slightly to the inside, and she would follow the lead.
After a few minutes, she was pretty solid and I could catch her before she stopped and essentially prevent the behavior.
The video shows the second day. I had my husband help me again. You can see at these certain points in the video where she stops and I work through a few different things. Initially I thought if I yanked the line it might help her focus, but I could see that after about a minute it wasn’t working. Pulling her head to the inside was the most effective. Although the stopping never went away entirely, at least I had a way to deal with it.
Most people would say a horse that reacts badly to the leg should be made to go forward. I would say that too. I normally would swallow my fear, put the reins in one hand, and either use a long jumping bat or spank her with the long rope. The problem is she shuts down, and if she is irritated with the bat or the long rope, she will either buck or swing her head and pull the reins out of my hands. The head swinging is what caused her to fall before.
I’ve learned that sometimes being patient and non-confrontational is the best way to handle her. Each horse is different, and if I do something that doesn’t work, I have to admit that I was wrong and try something else.
I included another video to demonstrate some of the groundwork.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xq0sB5eXVZ0 Liesl – riding with rope halter and 14 ‘ lead
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noS8ivJ0I-U Justine – groundwork exercises
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