Helping Nervous horses, donkeys and mules
It is very common to have a nervous horse because all horses are born that way. It is the training they receive or lack of it, their particular genetics and the combination of positive or negative experiences that determine whether a horse is more or less anxious as they grow up.
This means that with the right knowledge and approach, you can safely improve your horse’s confidence and problem-solving skills.
Safety first, don't risk making them more nervous.
It is important for your safety to listen to your horse. Don’t push them too far or try to ride them past a problem. You risk having an accident and your horse becoming more fearful and damaging the relationship.
You will often hear misguided advice to “ride them through it” or “make them do it so they learn it is ok.” However, I would ask you this: if you had a fear, maybe snakes or perhaps spiders, how many times would I have to make you hold a spider before you weren’t fearful any more? And if during one of our sessions to make you hold a spider, something went wrong, and the spider ran up your arm and got stuck in your hair, or the snake bit you, how much harder would it be to get you over your fear now and would you trust me to help you? We have to work in a way that we would be happy being worked with if we were in the same situation.
Provided you are using methods of training that focus on building the relationship, increasing your horse's confidence can be one of the best things you can do to reduce their nervous behaviour. While you are building their confidence, you will also increase your own. There are two keys to building confidence knowing the safe steps to stretch the comfort zones and the ability to ensure you complete the generalisation phase of training.
The course could have been held over a couple of days and cost much more. You'd go home with a few ideas and try one or two of them but this way I have gone through the course slowly, taken notes and put into practice the ideas as they've arisen. It's been really helpful and I've feel I've learnt a lot from it. It's a good way to work. Sandra Tudor
Next steps
You can use this website to find the answers to your next steps with me, whether that be to resolve a behaviour issue, learn about behaviour in general or read more or find the shaping plan you need. There are free podcast links on working with behaviour and building relationships on the free resources page to see if I am the trainer for you.
