Trailer Ribbon

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Posted by admin | Posted in Parts And Stuff | Posted on 29-10-2010

Tags: film, matsuuragc09, movies, trailer, video

Trailer Ribbon

Trailer Ribbon
How do I handle horse separation anxiety at a show?

I have a 9 year old QH gelding and 9 year old American Shetland mare pony that I board together. So they are together all the time. Their stalls are across the barn from eachother and their pastures are next to eachother. My gelding is fine when we are at the barn. However, when we go to a show he freaks out unless he is right next to her. On the ground he starts fish tailing on the side of the trailer if he cannot see her and recently when I was riding him away from the pony to pick up my daughter's ribbons, he turned hard on me and started bucking and rearing. I got him under control once we were back next to the pony. Problem is they separate during different events etc. It is hard to keep him under control when the pony goes into the arena for classes. Even when holding him on the ground he tries to rear. These are both my daughters horses, so they have to be taken to the shows together. What can I do with him? At home he is so sweet and safe. Shows are dangerous for us!

I have a pair like that. Well, just the gelding. The mare could care less. My daughter would use both of them when we went to shows. We would unload them separately. Gelding first...cause mare didn't care. We would take him to his stall first.

Then we would unload mare out of sight of gelding, and made sure that he could not see her. We put their stalls on the same side...with about 2 stalls or more between them. When we needed the mare...we would take her out, and walk the LONG way around, so we didn't need to pass his stall. And we never let him pass hers.

He would paw and call for awhile...then give it up. But we had to make sure we kept them separated from view.

Maybe a couple of days before your show...can you separate them out of sight of each other? Kinda getting your gelding used to the idea? I've really had to work with my gelding.

We would work both horses in the same arena...and never let the gelding next to 'his' mare. If the fit throwing got real bad...we would remove the mare and keep him there working. Never letting him next to her. We would block him with another horse and rider...keep them on the same side, so if he wanted to look at her, he had to turn his head...and we wouldn't allow him to turn his head.

Working him continually, to get his attention focused on us...instead of her. When he would 'forget' about her for a moment and focus on us...we would relax and let him rest...praising him. He would still look at her, but he learned he had to do what the rider wanted. He's like that to this day...will watch her if he can...but KNOWS he has to what we want.

He can leave her now without any kind of protesting. And is NEVER allowed to rush back to her...because then we will just push him past her and go back to work. It just took consistent training day after day of making him work...even with her right there. And keeping them separated while we were working.

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