Cinchy?

You're welcome, and good luck! I'm sure you will get this worked out, I can tell you have the dedication to do it right :)

The walking or cinching up in stages prevents any pinching that might be happening as well as it is bad practice (in my opinion) to cinch up all at once where you are tacking up... to each his own.

I do not let mine walk when I am taking or cinching but in between the times I make it tighter. I do not want them to get the idea they can walk off or around. They must stand still for tacking and mounting.

Most of horses bad behavior such as being cinchy or walking when being mounted or barn sour is mad by the human not the horse. Do not go there and you will not have that problem.

kchfuller - I agree, and as I stated in my post, I always do my cinches up extremely gently and in degrees. I'll snug the saddle while they're tied, then walk them and tighten and then warm up and tighten. I was merely saying I don't want her walking in circles around me being the only way I'm able to get a saddle on her.

nhareiner - Can you elaborate? I fully agree they are man made problems, but how would you go about resolving it? I am fully open to suggestion and if you think perhaps it's me causing this behavior, I'd honestly enjoy the insight. I'm more then open to the fact that it's ME making the mistake, because the sooner I can identify the problem the sooner I can work towards fixing it

My gelding came to me super girthy. He'd even bite at me when I'd go to tighten it (I always did it slowly and gently, he was obviously just anticipating). After going back to basics, as Spirithorse described, I now have no problems whatsoever with putting the girth on. One other thing that helps is to pick a foot up after you've done the initial fastening. Tanner would forget to hold his breath, let out a deep sigh and then I could gently take it up another notch or so. He even bit me at first when I was just gently brushing him in the girth area (to make sure there were no sores or dirt that would rub) but now he loves having it brushed and scratched. Incidentally it really only took a week or so of patience and restarting to get him to the point he is at now. Best of luck, as you said, you have a ton of patience and it will serve you well.

SAME! My TB did the same with me, and if I am not careful, he will do the same.

What I did was I put a fleece girth cover over his girth, which helped. And then I would start to girth up slowly.

While in the crossties in the barn, I would put the girth buckles to the first holes in my billets.

Bridle him up, put my helmet and gloves on and then I would move the girth up to the next holes.

Then I would lead him to the arena we were going to work in, or the mounting block out by the CC course or the mounting block outside the barn to go for a hack - didn't matter, whichever - I would tighten the girth up a smidge more, to the point where it wouldn't slide when I got on.

Then as we started our ride, a few minutes later, I would tighten it up before work, or our hack or what have ya.

If I am not careful - such as last night, I was talking away with a friend while I was tacking up, and without paying any attention, I tightened up the girth too soon for him, which resulted in him swinging his head towards me with a chomp to the air.

Ooops. My fault!

My gelding is girthy.....I usually take it in small stages, even though he pins his ears at me, he's learned that's the only acceptable behavior for showing unhappiness when I start to saddle him. I probably should take it in the three stages (cinch up, walk, cinch up, warm up, cinch up, ride) but since we only do walk-trot, I can skip that third step. Ironically though, he loves the actual act of going around the ring and doing work, he just doesn't like getting there.

Like I said in an earlier post. I cinch in 3-4 increments. I start out so it just touches the horse when I am tacking up in cross ties. Then before I take them out I tighten it again but not all the way. Then I walk them about 1/2 way to the arena and tighten it up again and walk the rest of the way out and once I get through the gate to the arena I finish tightening it up and walk to the center of the arena where I will get on. This way it give the horse a chance to understand what is going on and it not hitting them all at once. It also give the skin a chance to flex its way out and not all wrinkled and such. By the time you clime on the horse is use to the cinch and the skin is flat.

In all my years of owning riding and showing horses which have been quite a few. I have yet to ever have a cinchy horse. Cassie is the closest thing to one and that comes from the trainer cinching her up in just 2 times. It have taken no time to get her over what little she was cinchy by doing it this way.

Just go at it slowly. It is when you try and tighten it up all at once that you get the most problems.

Is it possible she is sore in the girth area? When I got my boy checked up recently he had soreness where the girth sits behind the elbow, so he got lasered, massaged and linimented.

My arab pony is girthy. He's a sensitive boy :]

He has never bitten, etc. But he just hates it - He is not comfortable when you put it on. I put it on in stages, stretch his legs, walk him, he has a girth cover, we keep the hair shaved (he also gets girth gall - shaving helps prevent it) but he still pretends he's crippled once you finish doing it up! He takes these tiny old man steps for about 10 metres, and then he is fine.

Just one of his little idiosyncrasies!

Sorry i must have miss read your post ... good to know we are on the same page

I have a friend who's horse flips over backwards if you cinch him too fast so we walk him to tighten it up. But he is a major extreme!

I don't let mine walk when I tack them up - just an fyi