breaking a habit

[mink]

my horse is starting to develop a habit of wanting to crowd me in the stall , what is the proper way to discourage her to stop this? i should add that she moves back over once i holler at her……..mink

[Does’ Leap]

I had the same thing happen with one of my geldings. Whenever I entered his stall I would have my leatherman in hand. When he leaned against me he would lean against the tip of my pliars. The only pressure on the tip of the pliars is what he exerted. When he stopped leaning toward me the pressure went away. He stopped doing it.

George

[grey]

When mine are in the stalls, they don’t get fed till they are as far away from me as a stall will allow, with their head at or below wither height. When they are loose in the pasture or corral, no one gets food till everyone is as far away as I tell them to be, which varies according to their attitudes. Food is a great motivator.

[Plowboy]

My 86 yr old mentor still raises and trains Haflingers but also buys a few in if he finds a bargain. He stops by my Dad’s farm quite often and once after he had bought a young team at a sale we asked how they were coming along. He is a slight wiry little man but tough as nails and strong for his age. He went on to say they may have never been in stalls before because one was uneasy and the other had smushed him against the partition. He said the second night he led her in the stall he had an iron hook in his hand. When she went to smush him he jabbed her in the side of her shoulder. ” Now she steps back a step and gets over as far as she can to let me out”, he said. Sometimes it takes a little force to keep[ from getting hurt. Similar method that George used with his horse quick and simple.

[mink]

thanks for the replies ,i tried the plier trick and it really seems to work . a little poke in the shoulder and she steps away. hopefully now she will just stop doing it.

[drafthossluvr]

be careful poking your horse with pliers or with hooks etc..! i don’t know what kind of horses everyone else has but ours aren’t half dead and wouldn’t take to that too well. you may want her to get over, but think of your own safety as well. if one of ours does that then a good holler of get over there does the trick fine.

[grey]

Mine get a jab with this and that, as the occasion warrants. They know when they’ve done wrong and take their “licks”. Definitely not half-dead.

[Carl Russell]

An elbow held outward from the body, either in the ribs or the flank is all I have ever needed. The point being find the point on the horse where they will flinch, and show them that if they push into you, they will cause themselves discomfort. It usually takes very few applications.

I rarely raise my voice in this case. Just cause the pain/discomfort and steadily calmly tell the horse to step over. Release the pressure as soon as they let off, but be right there in case they aren’t sure exactly what you mean.

Sometimes I may grit my teeth and speak with a bit more meaning, but I don’t want the horse to think I am threatened in any way, and I don’t want the horse to step over because they are afraid of leaning into me. I just want them to know that I don’t want them leaning on me, that I want them to step away from me, and that if they don’t they will be uncomfortable until they do.

Carl

[ngcmcn]

Interesting thread, I have a mare new to me as well that will lean into me when i enter the stall. She’s a bit green and has smushed me a time or two. What i realized with her was that she was afraid of what she couldn’t see behind her, so i’d let her know i was there then ask her to step over, in a quite narrow stall. On lead i will also re-inforce the step over command by gently touching the tickle spot on the flank with slight pressure on the lead.

Actually moving into an attacker is an instinctual reflex with horses, cattle, and humans.

Neal maine

[DraftDriver]

I am the same as you are Carl…when I am in the trailer I always put my mare Trixie on the side with the slide door as she will step over when I ask and tap her to get her attention as well as say her name. As I am going by, she keeps Smoke in place for me. My husband can put his arms up and they won’t smoosh him but me, I got caught between them once!!

In the stalls, if they are at the stall gate I can touch their chest and tell them back, which is their cue to back and let me in and not crowd me. I have even gone so far as to stand over the food till the animal got the idea of not crowding me, then counting to ten and letting them have the grain. My Quarter Horse gelding Terry was horrible about crowding and would slam me against the wall of the stall so I took a farriers nail in with me. He came rushing over as I went to feed him (he had several other issues too from being spoiled) so I would simply hold the nail where he would run right into it all the while ignoring him and doing what I was doing. Couple times of that and he stopped.

Being a woman, I am not as strong as a man so I personally rely more on voice commands than anything else. It has helped me a lot…

[mink]

been well over a month now and the horse dont crowd me anymore.now im thinking it was her way of trying to intimidate me. i use the same tone carl spoke of and now its almost automatic that when i speak her name she steps over and makes room.. excellent advise ……..mink

[OldKat]

@mink 15371 wrote:

been well over a month now and the horse dont crowd me anymore.now im thinking it was her way of trying to intimidate me. i use the same tone carl spoke of and now its almost automatic that when i speak her name she steps over and makes room.. excellent advise ……..mink

I’ve had a similar experience with one of my mares. I injured my back twice last year, once in January and just when I recovered from that I did it up royally in June. So much so that the doctor said if I insisted on doing things to destroy the disc in my L4 lumbar I should plan on being fitted for a wheel chair. That slowed me down enough to listen. During the time period from June to now I have not harnessed my girls one time; hard to when you can’t lift over 15 pounds.

I now have a “cautious” release to resume activities, but unfortunately Rachel has used the period of inactivity to stake out her claim as alpha horse on the place. The other day she had Maggie hemmed up in a tight corner and was trying to use her heels on her. She has already worked the gelding over so much that I can no longer turn him out with the mares. She runs both of the bulls that I have in the lot with her; including one that outweighs her by app. 1,000 pounds. The incident the other day got my goat for sure. I hollered at her three times to leave Maggie alone, but she only looked at me and resumed what she was doing. The fact that she looked at me told me that she knew full well what she was doing was out of bounds, but she didn’t care. She was also starting to crowd me around the barn, standing too close to me in the stall etc.

I went down to the little trap where I had them while they were eating hay from a round bale feeder that I have rigged up with a cover over it and I let Maggie out to return to the barn. Then I made Rachel feel a little of the heat she was dishing out. I’ll not get into specifics, but let’s just say her nostrils were flared and her eyes were big when we got through. She had no halter on, but I happened to spy a piece of light weight chain that I use to hold one of the gates open hanging from the post where I keep it when not in use. It was too short to put around her neck to lead her with, so I slipped it in her mouth like a bit and then pulled it snug under her jaw. As I walked her SLOWLY back to the barn she was trying to work that chain out of her mouth. The more she worked it in her mouth the more she was rubbing her bars raw. When we got to her slip stall (with feed already in the trough) I would let her take a step forward one at a time with the command “step”, with a strong “whoa!” in between. (no halter on her, nor with the chain in her mouth) Then I would give her a “back” command until she backed 10 to 15′ from the feed trough. Then I repeated the whole process, again and again. The others were nearly finished eating before she was even allowed to nibble a bite of her feed, but you know what? Her behavior is markedly improved since then; she is not trying to boss everybody around anymore…especially me.

Now if it will just dry out enough to let me get the harness back on them everything will be as it should be. NOT complaining about the rain though; not after the 100 year drought we had last year!

[TBigLug]

@Carl Russell 14367 wrote:

Sometimes I may grit my teeth and speak with a bit more meaning, but I don’t want the horse to think I am threatened in any way, and I don’t want the horse to step over because they are afraid of leaning into me. I just want them to know that I don’t want them leaning on me, that I want them to step away from me, and that if they don’t they will be uncomfortable until they do.

Carl

This is my approach. Body posture and energy will get the point across. I’ve gritted my teeth and use more than one less than hospitable word when it came to getting them to not crowd my space. Then, lighten up as soon as they do what you want. Believe it or not, your horses do want to make you happy and seek your aproval. Most of the time! 😉

If thet doesn’t work I have also done the pliers in hand trick and that will get them on track quickly. Glad to hear it’s working for you as well.

[Author]

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