Working with a ruined horse

Just wanted to say that Cherie's post was AMAZING. Very, very, very good advice..

It's the only post that really makes sense. She hit it on the head of the nail. Horse's cannot learn, cannot break habits, cannot progress if they are in that reactive state. No matter what you do, it won't register.. will not cause any change in behavior until you get that horse focused and tackle each and every problem so he can't run away from it in any way.

OP just be careful. Reactive horses may be more unpredictable and for that reason dangerous to themselves and others.

Laugh..I agree, but didn't want to point out that the others didn't exactly help anything but did create a little spat..

Yes Cherie is right but do you know how to get the horse to think and not react? That is not exactly easy to explain.

If you are working with a reactive horse, you will want to use the confines of the round pen or you might be getting drug all over the place trying to lunge on a line.

So he reacts in the round pen. That is where being you need to be a leader to him. Show him that he doesnt need to fear the pen.

If you know Clinton Anderson's method, most horses start out being reactive. He uses the round pen to get them to think instead. Check out his lunging for respect videos. If you know his method, most horses stop being over reactive in the first day. They are not perfect after one day but there is a big change.
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My boy used to be the kind that would just run in circles no matter what you did it took lots of direction switches talking and time to get him to where he is today. I think as long as you stay confident and consistent with him you will be just fine maybe even take a step back and leave him untacked even and just play around with him till you get him relaxed then add the saddle then the rein.
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Agreed, I dealt with one. My current.. his mind was in another galaxy.. he was highly reactive and it was hard to get through to him. But I have and I am and others are now too because he is now focused and willing to learn.

There is a place for pats, and there is a place for round pens. The OP said the girl spend all her time in the round pen. Maybe what happened was the horse thought it's new life was going to be work work work in a small pen that had no end to it. And now he's stuck in that mentality. I don't know cause I don't know the horse, nor the girl that was with him for a while.

For my horse, it was people. People were his trigger, so we desensitized him to people and all the things associated with people. Maybe this horse's trigger is the round pen. Maybe it's the halter (hence being headshy.) Who knows.

Honestly you need to tackle every problem one step at a time and eventually you'll see improvement and understand what to do from there. This isn't a one size fits all approach.

It'll take some time, OP. Just please be careful. I stress ending on a good note. Follow Cherrie's advice.

Thank-you everyone.
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