Great teaching sir. I have an Appy that tends to be belligerent and lets me know that he does not like to work. You made so many great points here that i can use with him. He needs reminders at times and often I feel like I am being too hard on him, but then I remember how much it hurts when he smacks me in the cheek with his head when he blocks me from entering his stall. One incident was me bending down to pick up his feed tub and he hit me from behind with his head. He did it with enough force that drove my head into the wall. It was no accident , and he was immediatley corrected. Rubber feed tubs dont hurt that much either if you know what I mean. Hated myself for ten minutes , but he never did that again.
Made the big mistake of sending a mare for a gal to ride for a couple months . Told her I would pay for her to take two lessons a week with the barn owner who had known my mare a long time. She took no lessons and totally messed up the mare. Never again. Took many months to line her out. I’d want to R/O any physical issues as a first step. He is exhibiting many behaviors which can be pain related such as head flinging, tail ringing, cantering disunited, not standing to be mounted and bucking.
I'm an old gal who's owned a pretty darn belligerent half draft for about 10 years. Long story short, I've had to learn how to work through the problems and because he's so determined, we've been on something of a merry-go-round. Training a spoiled horse is nothing like riding an unspoiled one. I got tired of it a few years ago and sort of turned him out in favor of another horse, but I decided to take another shot at it recently before we're both too old to try again. Lots more back story, but with that out of the way, I just want to say that this series has been quite the inspiration, maybe even encouraged me to get on the big guy's back again. Melanie is a gifted young rider who is very lucky to have a mentor like you. My big horse and I got to work today - all the old resistances surfaced (pale versions of the old days!) and at several points I thought of Melanie and I immediately relaxed and slowed myself down. Today's ride was really encouraging - actually it ended up being kind of fun. So thank you both for putting your experience out there for the rest of us to benefit from.
Thanks I’m glad you found this video. There’s a whole series on this particular horse. He did need a bit of an attitude adjustment but, as you say, there was no need to be nasty to him. He went on to become a much better citizen.
No such thing as a belligerent horse, the horse is being a horse. What you call a belligerent horse I call a horse that is not trained, it is the fault of the human I promise he would not be this way if you started him or I did so on. So the horse is not belligerent he was allowed to act like a horse while the humans was supposed to be in control this is the fault of the human. You putting human thoughts and emotions onto this horse. like rude and Belligerent all I see is a horse being a horse, he is acting like this because humans allow this behavior to grow. You are doing the right thing to bring him back to the groundwork but this is not a bad horse this was a horse that had humans that did not understand horses.
Belligerent means hostile or aggressive. That’s the definition and if that horse is hostile or aggressive then that’s what it is and it’s belligerent. Don’t get offended for describing the horse exactly as it is.
I feel the same way as you , and that horse did not try to munch on his arm the horse was trying to smell his hand and he decided to elbow it and then he said "but decides to be a little carnivorous about things" 😒 just say what he did instead ...like getting in your space and not making it more then it was 🤔🤨
