Does Anybody Have Any Tips for Working With Problem Horses?
I am currently working with y friends 13 year old paint/TB mare. she generally has great ground manners but once in the saddle she just cant trust enough to where you can trust her. she is very well dressage trained but thats beside the point, when you try to canter her she likes to test you and buck. she is unpredictable, sometimes shes good and sometimes you can eally tell that she was abused with her previous owner(she was also drugged when she was bought by my friend.) any tips??
Have you looked at her back? Or is the saddle pinching her? Just a suggestion. Because my horse was also brought to me drugged with a back and hock problem that I had no idea about until very recently. He never showed any sign of discomfort until one day he just kept bucking and what seemed like to be testing me. We had the vet look at him and he ended up having severe back pain and hock pain. So we had the vet give him back and hock injections and now he is way better then he has ever been. Maybe if this is the case your horse could just be in some pain. Just pinch her back with your fingers on each side of her spine and give a slight pinch all the way down her back. If he dips her back she is in pain. Hope this maybe helped a little!
Try some exercises with her on the lunge line for a bit, then try and get back on her. Or discipline her when she does something wrong, like say she doesn’t let you pick her foot up to pick it, every couple of tries smack her. Trust me it works whether they are dressage horses, jumping horses, or race horses.