How to get your Horse to Back Up Out of your Space SAFELY! | [Backing Up an Anxious and Pushy Horse] 

Can take time and consistency, especially when most undesirable behaviors don’t just happen overnight. 👍🏻

Great question. I’ll provide the best answer I can here and then in an upcoming video answer more in-depth. Anxiety shows up in several forms and for horses can send them into survival mode- fight, flight, freeze. Depending on personality and the situation- horses may be more apt to default or try one survival mechanism over the other. Let’s be clear though there’s a difference between dominant and aggressive. In your circumstance one that comes into pressure & pushes through it merely needs to learn to yield away from it. This may require increasing the amount of energy and pressure until the horse tries a difference response. It is situational which makes it all the more important to look at what our horse is doing objectively that way we can respond in the most effective manner possible.

Yes! Great skill for horses to know. Here you go: videos.coltonwoodshorsemanship.com

In this exercise it’s a driving energy that would ask the horse to back- not necessarily a push (because horses often lean initially into a pushing pressure). First- Make sure you stay at a distance where they cannot reach you if they strike even if that means you need a longer rope. Second- let’s keep it simple. All we’re doing initially is asking the horse to get the concept of thinking backwards so then their feet can follow their mind backwards. So you start by using this exact sequence shown in this video. At some point you identify the horse is THINKING about their front feet coming forward (striking motion) which is the opposite direction than what we’d like them to be thinking. Then I may raise my own energy, may even wave my hands up and down like a jumping Jack X type motion or I may even firmly pull the slack out of the lead rope to where the nose band of the halter bumps their nose with the thought process that if they think forward in this moment theirs more pressure physical and energetically to be found. The most important piece is when the horse does think back and their feet follow you release all pressure and let that idea feel really good!

@@Coltonwoodshorsemanship Wow thank you so much for your detailed response, I really appreciate it :) I will definitely be giving this a go, thank you :)

You’re very welcome!