Silly event horses...

[yellowbritches]

Seriously, what is it with big, bad, brave event horses and things they find hard? We set up some raised cavelleti today in the ring to help everyone out in their fitness work. For SOME REASON the two best jumpers in the barn, Vernon and the Dun One, found this concept mind boggling. They both spent the entire ride BOUNCING the cavelletti. Vernon, in his first attempt at doing the triple bounce at 4+ feet, stepped on a pole and broke it. :mad: It was rather ridiculous, especially while Vernon and Dunny would bounce through and make a mess of it, the BFG, rather fat and a bit out of shape, would gleefully trot through like a superstar. :rolleyes: BFG's new (bigger) baby brother figured the concept out in no time flat. But can Vernon and Dunny do it? Noooooo.....

So, they went for hill and road work instead. ;) Dunny actually did his best flat work while on the road.

Event horses are silly.:yes:

[LLDM]

Eventers of all species seem to find the simplest things harder than most. I've found that to be true all the way up the chain and all the way back down here staring back at me from the mirror. ;)

SCFarm

[enjoytheride]

My mare can canter groundpoles set 4 1/2 feet apart. Since I was trying to trot them I was not amused although my trainer was slightly amazed.

[Janet]

Music once did the opposite. We were doing a sequence of 6 bounces ( about 2'), and she decided it was easier to treat the last set as a giant oxer.

It took me 2 weeks straight to get Belle to canter politely over a rail on the ground.

BTW, is Brain back with you?

[Snapdragon]

My mare can canter groundpoles set 4 1/2 feet apart. Since I was trying to trot them I was not amused although my trainer was slightly amazed.

That's some fancy foot work!

My mare treats a pole on the ground as an opportunity to jump 3'6". Just practicing, mom. When she was younger (so glad those days are over), she thought a bounce was a good opportunity to jump oxers and a one-stride could so more easily be done as a bounce.:lol: When that happened, my instructor said she was just showing off.:winkgrin: She would trot up to the base, cool as can be, and then Wheeee!

I've since convinced her that it really doesn't have to be so complicated--and she listened! There is a god!

You are so right: Silly, silly event horses.

[yellowbritches]

The little mare NEVER did figure out trot poles. I remember nearly falling off of her from laughing so hard one day when I COULD. NOT. get her to TROT a set of poles. She cantered them every time.

Janet, Brain is still at school. We miss him...but maybe not his person so much. ;) He's in very good hands, though.

[Ritazza]

My big, brave event horse can do all sort of fancy pole work, over some pretty scary looking tarpy-filled things too, as we were doing the other day. What can she NOT do that was happening that same day? Deal with the fact that there was steam on the arena mirrors. Absolutely TERRIFIED her. Completely perfect when we were jumping near the mirrors, but WALKING on a long rein near the mirrors? She was bolting the other way.

[Jazzy Lady]

Mine spooks at small fence... not kidding.

Bring on a huge friggen oxer and he's game, but set up a vertical at 2' and he will drop his head and snort at it and then launch over it like it is going to eat him... except in a grid. It's odd.

It's like the idiot horses who will jump anything that you point them at, but heaven forbid you have to gallop BESIDE it to get somewhere... it may just eat you.

[Cheval Gris]

I was pondering this profound thought just today! I have the green event horse that will jump any scarey trakehner on cross country that he has never seen, any drop into the water, but today..... we were doing gymnastics...pole on the ground, 6 ft to a 2'6 verticle, two strides, verticle, 6 ft to another ground pole...left lead going toward the house a super star. Right lead going away from the house, can't figure out where to put his feet, much less what the heck those stupid poles on the ground are for. Gah. :yes:

[Nomini]

The intermediate pony cannot hack out without either going competely sideways or slamming on the brakes and going backwards spooking at a log or rock on the side of the trail. If she's galloping straight at it, she'll jump ANYTHING. But trotting by 6 inch tall logs, things might be trying to eat her! The fitter she is, the tighter I have to hang on. I've actually almost had refusals at the upper levels because she spooked passing the BN fence next to her big one. Guess she likes to keep it interesting! As for event horses and their strange quirks, I think they all have to be a little crazy, just like their riders. That's what separates us and them from those in any other discipline!

[Nancy!]

My event horse is the same. He will willing jump anything in front of him but don't ask him to walk beside a jump as he will spook. Silly guy.

Nancy!

[ezmissg]

My mare can canter groundpoles set 4 1/2 feet apart. Since I was trying to trot them I was not amused although my trainer was slightly amazed.

It took me 2 weeks straight to get Belle to canter politely over a rail on the ground. QUOTE]

[QUOTE=Snapdragon;3774730]
My mare treats a pole on the ground as an opportunity to jump 3'6". Just practicing, mom... my instructor said she was just showing off.:winkgrin: She would trot up to the base, cool as can be, and then Wheeee!

When are you guys riding MY mare? ;) And, hey -- wait -- I just noticed these all appear to be MARES! That shouldn't be surprising!

The common belief is that my girl approaches everything asked of her with "oh, anyone can do THAT! But, watch THIS!!" She works very hard at being an over-achiever.

[Hence, the meaning of my username....] :lol:

[Coppers mom]

My event horse is the same. He will willing jump anything in front of him but don't ask him to walk beside a jump as he will spook. Silly guy.

Nancy!

That's the way my horse is. As long as she's barreling at it, she has no problem. Walk by something any closer than 10 feet though? No way is that happening.

For example, I set cones (the very same ones we jump over on a weekly basis) up in the arena today to work on perfecting our 20 meter circles. First, I tried to go around the outside of the cones, and didn't we didn't get within 15 feet of them. So I decided to go on the inside of the cones so at least she wouldn't be running to the other end of the arena. Poor thing ended up doing a bunch of 10 meter circles and nearly having a meltdown before I decided I'd just wing it at the next show *sigh* lol

[Crazy_Eventer]

My horse can't seem to handle a single ground pole. that's right, he can't canter over a single ground pole without some sort of giant leap-I think the whole concept just confuses him since why would we be going over a stick on the ground when we could be jumping the oxer in the corner? :D maybe he thinks it's some sort of trick question that's harder than it actually is?

[beeblebrox]

I have one horse who will not get anywhere near a liver pool but will go down and jump the snot out of it. BUT god forbid if you ask him to trot or canter nearby it! He also takes hard looks at BN or N logs yet he is a prelim horse ;-) Always jumps them just stares dumbfounded at the small ones

[Kairoshorses]

Ha...my horse is the same....if we're barreling at it, he's not afraid of anything. But walk by it? SCARY!

We just got back from our ranch in the panhandle of TX....where there were COWS. And antelope. And deer. He was in a tizzy the entire time. Wouldn't eat, and barely drank. Poor thing. How DO those ranch horses do it?:lol:

[subk]

I could never do field dressage anywhere near stadium jumps. Never batted an eye when asked to jump anything, but ask him to walk trot and canter around the very same fences in the very same field that he'd been asked to wtc around everyday his whole life and he just couldn't do it without acting like an idiot. Of course warming up at an event in a warm up ring with jumps was not a problem. He found every excuse possible not to concentrate on dressage--but I never failed to forgive him of his dressage disability after XC!

[slp2]

I've got a great example of this sort of nonsense. At an event, my gelding once jumped around stadium nicely (SJ was held last) and won his division. Then we had to lead the victory gallop. Then he proceeded to spook at all the jumps in the stadium ring while we tried to do a victory gallop (in fact we could only do a victory TROT since he was so busy gawking at everything). :rolleyes: Of course, those were the very same jumps that he just had jumped on his course. Sigh--he was always one taco short of the full mexican platter . . . . ;)

[Bobthehorse]

Bob is scared of nothing...but rocks. And things that look like rocks. Like dirty chunks of snow, or small bags of garbage. Its ridiculous. Not the shooting range, or the snow zinging off the coverall, or the deer, or the trucks ripping by at 120km/hr, or any of that good stuff. He is too busy looking for rocks to glare and snort at.

Hmmm, what does AJ find hard....I havent found anything yet! (Though he does like to pretend things are hard). Apparently while I was away, my coach thought he was a little spicy, so let him free lunge before she rode. He ripped around for a bit, then at X he reared, and hopped on his hind legs 3 or 4 times. Not like little hops, like a good few feet off the ground. She said he looked like a kangaroo. And also, decided not to ride.

[asterix]

The prelim horse CANNOT do the diabolical "jump the flower box" exercise. You know, a single flower box, maybe 2 1/2 feet wide, 6 INCHES high (plus flowers, of course)?

He knocks it over, veers sideways to avoid it, steps on it, etc.

Very embarrassing.

The baby horse is SUPER calm at events, places he's never been with crazy pony clubbers falling off and loose horses zooming around (er, last summer's Seneca schooling day, anyone?); falls asleep.
Hacking in HIS OWN field, which he lives in 24 hours a day? Monsters behind every bush. Eyes bulging, neck arched, made-up lateral movements which involve each body part going a different direction, the whole nine yards. Only in his own field. :lol:

[Bobthehorse]

The baby horse is SUPER calm at events, places he's never been with crazy pony clubbers falling off and loose horses zooming around (er, last summer's Seneca schooling day, anyone?); falls asleep.
Hacking in HIS OWN field, which he lives in 24 hours a day? Monsters behind every bush. Eyes bulging, neck arched, made-up lateral movements which involve each body part going a different direction, the whole nine yards. Only in his own field. :lol:

Mine too! Its like off property he is too embarrassed to be a weeny.

[allpurpose]

Retired prelim eventer, now old lady packer, will have no truck with squirrels. We can be in the middle of a 20 acre field by our selves schooling dressage movements, but god forbid a squirrel should shoot up a tree anywhere on the tree line! We're airborne instantly, then flat out galloping in the opposite direction, eyes rolling, nostrils flaring.

Hacking quietly through the woods? Ware-squirrels overhead! You'd think they're Oz-like flying monkeys that will swoop down and carry him away!

Squirrels in his paddock? He'll hide behind the roundbale quivering in fright.

I'm tempted to get a stuffed squirrel and hang it in his stall! He'd probably have a heart attack! :eek:

[yellowbritches]

Both Big, Bad, Brave Dunny and Big, Bad, Brave Ruby Boy have a hard time with "stuff" in general. Both are very likely to unload you if you dare come too close to certain "stuff". "Stuff" terrifies them. Now, ask either to gallop down to "stuff", sure, why the hell not?! Dunny is horrible hacking, though we're working on that...but we're finding that certain trails are ok, and certain trails are Dunny eating.

Vernon, though a little better than he was last year, still prefers to JUMP poles than walk, trot, or canter quietly over them.

[Hilary]

Clancy used to have to go through "remedial trot poles' every 6 months, or whenever I got a wild hair to do trot poles.

It usually went like this:

Set up 4-5 trot poles to work with. Attempt #1 = trot trot LEAP. Attempts 2-6 LEAP LEAP BOLT LEAP SQUEAL etc.

Put 1 pole in the middle of the ring. Go over it at the walk (leap) until we can walk calmly. Then try trotting. When we manage that, add pole #2. When we can walk over 2 poles walk the first, trot the second. When we can do that, we trot the 2 poles, but usually after a walk approach. Trot approach = LEAP. (bolt, squeal etc)

Add a third pole. If we do that, well, it's probably been an hour and I decide to call it a day and forget about trot poles for the next 6 months.

Actually, I did learn *MY* lesson pretty quick, and started with 1 pole after only 2 versions of the above excitement.

Star thinks trot poles are big old snore, which is nice. :)

[piaffeprincess98]

My ex-advanced horse is the same as many here. He is so spooky. He hates rocks on the ground like the giant ones in the woods at Frying Pan Park. He doesn't like going by liverpools or mounting blocks because the sand he kicks up clicks against them. He will leap sideways if we are galloping past a XC jump. I've learned to be quick and anticipate when he's going to spook. I just make sure I'm secure in the saddle and that I'm ready to shift my weight to the way he is going to leap. It just makes me laugh though. He's quirky and I'd rather he do that than be dull.

My OTTB used to jump single trot rails, but my trainer insisted that we get him to trot quietly over them. It could turn into something bad down the road, so he got over that quickly.

[Snapdragon]

What is it about those rocks at Frying Pan? My other mare--not the overachiever (ezmissg, that's the perfect word for it)--always freaks out about them, even though she's seen them at least 50 times. Jumps she's jumping: not a problem. Rocks, trash cans, mailboxes, jumps not being jumped: the devil incarnate.

So, this leads me to, why do they get so freaked out by miscellaneous objects--even ones they've seen on a regular basis?

Where I boarded the rock freak, they added a new XC jump to the field; it was just a log. We went out to hack and from hundreds of feet away, she was, "OMG! WHAT IS THAT!" I finally got her to trot by it with just a bit of the hairy eyeball. We reversed direction, trotting again toward the evil new log. It was like she had never seen it before! Same reaction as her first.

Something new in their home environment, I can understand (like the chickens that appeared in our neighbor's yard overnight next to the ring--overachiever mare never got over that--so glad they moved them; she just doesn't do chickens), but stuff they see all the time: why the drama?

[Nomini]

Hahaha those stupid rocks in Frying Pan were exactly what I was thinking about! My first prelim was there and the course ran around that loop in the woods with those stupid rocks. The pony went backwards and I swear it took me 30 seconds to get her past the big one (narrow trail and gigantic rock). No jump penalties, but quite a few time ones! I don't balme the horses, they look like they really could eat you.

[pwynnnorman]

White lines on the side of the road, yellow ones in the middle--I'd guestimate 50-60% of eventing Teddibabies couldn't/can't handle 'em. Cat, Ted, Kyle, Coda (the old version, not the new and improved one), the only one I can think of which evented or is headed to event and didn't think the lines were sneaky snakes waiting to ensnare someone was Cass (at least not when I rode him). Even Katie, who did combined driving (a la eventing in harness?), I'm told was problematic with the lines on the road.

Colin can't handle livestock of any kind. Cats and dogs, he tells me, are "domestics," so they're OK. Illamas and Emus aren't American Livestock, so he also doesn't recognize them as threats. Potbellied pigs, he says, are uniquely and ridiculously "domestic livestock," which make them by far the worst of the worst. Kev agrees, having lawndarted me wickedly the first time he realized my neighbor has one. (Although, come to think of it, Kevvie's never jumped a white line...no, wait, he's never been trustworthy enough to hack on major paved roads, so he's untested...OOops, but wait! He DID skittle away from and then refuse to approach a tiny streak of lime I'd dropped. This is the creature who gleefully swooped over the Prelim logs of "Pletchers Dunes," sans rider. Go figure!)

[yellowbritches]

Vernon, brave and fantastic as he is, is terrified of manhole covers. He turned himself inside out at one at FPP, and we have to walk past a few on hacks...he gives them all the real stink eye, and does a fancy little side step to get by.

Paco is terrified of parked trailers, but he doesn't count...he's a nut anyway.

[mythical84]

The prelim horse CANNOT do the diabolical "jump the flower box" exercise. You know, a single flower box, maybe 2 1/2 feet wide, 6 INCHES high (plus flowers, of course)?

He knocks it over, veers sideways to avoid it, steps on it, etc.

Very embarrassing.

The baby horse is SUPER calm at events, places he's never been with crazy pony clubbers falling off and loose horses zooming around (er, last summer's Seneca schooling day, anyone?); falls asleep.
Hacking in HIS OWN field, which he lives in 24 hours a day? Monsters behind every bush. Eyes bulging, neck arched, made-up lateral movements which involve each body part going a different direction, the whole nine yards. Only in his own field. :lol:

One of my funniest rides on Jack was when I decided to jump the coop (the one closest to Camp Friendship) back into the hayfield instead of going the long way to get the gate. I didn't bother to put his flash on that day because I was just hacking. Well we jumped the coop and then my sweet sweet Jack grabbed the bit and took off towards his buddies. The only thing that stopped us was when he spooked at a giant intermediate table that had *just* been put out for an upcoming HTs. We almost screeched to a halt as a certain farm owner watched laughing on the tractor. :lol:

[asterix]

mythical, I swear that man just hangs out on the tractor waiting for us to entertain him!!!

I still remember the day I thought riding William (for the rest of you, 17.3 hands, ID cross, very big personality) bareback around the hay field during the unrecognized HT was a good idea. They were down to Elementary, in the other field, but the PA system, flagged jumps, etc. were too much for him. He was puffed up to about 19 hands, snorting and piaffing. I was clinging on for dear life in shorts and sneakers. We were kind of accidentally heading for the XC warmup, populated with tiny children on tiny horses, all beginning to cast some wild eyes our way as we bore down on them.

The farm owner, allegedly "working," was sitting in the tractor, helpless with laughter.

sigh.

[artienallie]

Vernon, brave and fantastic as he is, is terrified of manhole covers. He turned himself inside out at one at FPP, and we have to walk past a few on hacks...he gives them all the real stink eye, and does a fancy little side step to get by.

Paco is terrified of parked trailers, but he doesn't count...he's a nut anyway.

With Allie, it's the openings to culvert pipes. :rolleyes: Terrible, Allie-eating monsters are going to come out and GET her if she has to go past them on hacks.

Maybe it's cows that live in the culverts. All cows eat petite chestnut mares, you know.

[inquisitive]

The little mare NEVER did figure out trot poles. I remember nearly falling off of her from laughing so hard one day when I COULD. NOT. get her to TROT a set of poles. She cantered them every time.

Q also thinks its fun to jump across two of them like it's a ditch:rolleyes: