Correcting the Spooky Horse

I have been a horse nut for as long as I can remember. I had owned a number of horses which I had some training to do on each horse after my purchase. But it wasn't until I purchased a totally untouched horse, raised in the wild that I had the challenge to correct a horse that was prone to flight. It took me a while to correct and thankfully my horse, myself and others around him never got hurt in the process. I hope this article will help you correct this problem in your horse, quickly and without injuries.

I was tired of retraining horses and tired of trying to fix a problem that someone else had created in a horse that I purchased for my own. So in order to fix this problem I found a yearling that had been field bred and spent the first year of his life in the Cascade mountains. He was untouched and totally wild. I negotiated his price, and an agreement to get him to the sellers home and the understanding that I have the use of her round pen for 2 weeks.

The first four to five days it seemed as though there was little to no progress made, but on day 6 I started to see improvement and by day 14 I had him in a straight load trailer without a fight. I was truly amazed that an animal so wild just 2 weeks before could be transformed in 14 days with just 2 to 3 hours a day of slow gentle work on my part.

This was just the beginning of many years of training. He is now 12 years old and is a wonderful trail horse and a true companion of mine. He is not fully trained as I don't think any horse, at least any of my horses ever are. I believe in the saying, "always be training", and I always will be. He is smart and gentle now but he was a problem to get the flight instinct out of him and make him use his brain. I would work with him and think I had him fixed until a turkey would fly up on the trail and suddenly I was without a horse under me!

A flighty horse has to be fixed and until he is, the horse will be dangerous to handler, rider and the people that are around him as well as dangerous to himself. The final straw was when I was camping, I got two horses saddled and ready to go for a ride, I tried them to a hitching post and went to the outhouse. When I came out I noticed that something was bothering my horse, I don't know what, could have been a horsefly or something. I started over to him at a quick walk so I could untie him and find out what was going on. As I got to him, and before I could get the quick release knot untied he exploded. Now this is a big horse, about 1400 pounds, at a standing position he sprung off the ground like he sprouted wings. He came down on the hitching post which broke off at each end and was now a log tied to him which scared him more and he took off. Now my other horse is still tied to the log and as he takes off she has no choice but to follow. There I was watching my two horses running off in the camp with a log between them. What a wreck!

From this story you can see that something very slight can create a terrible situation and a flighty horse needs to be corrected before these things happen. This was the hardest thing to correct in this horse and I attribute it to the first year of his life when he had real predators like bears and mountain lions. It took a lot to get him to think before flight but I did get that result and so can you.

Here is the

~ I ride ~

Horses can be fairly inexpensive to keep unless they get sick or hurt. Here are some things to consider for keeping your horse healthy and happy. From providing shelter for bad weather areas, if you should blanket your horse in winter months, worming, vacinations, hoof care and more. I hope you find it here, but if not just leave your questions and I will answer them to the best of my ability.    Click here to leave comments

I had no idea that most of the saddles, tack, harnesses and horse supplies sold in the US are actually made in India or Pakistan. As Americans in these tough financial times, more than ever before, we need to support American made products. But when doing my research I discovered the surprising reality that very little of the horse tack we buy is made in this country. I soon could see it would be hard to find a manufacturer of quality products made with craftsmanship and fine materials right here in the US.

At Sugar River Saddlery and Tack you will find that all the materials we use and the manufacturing of our saddles and tack are all made in the U.S.A. We pride ourselves in quality saddles and tack for our customers. 

Along with quality you need a great fitting saddle and with our unique saddle fitting process, you will be able to see for yourself before the saddle is made how we get the best fit possible for your horse.  All our saddles are custom made to your specifications which we build for you once you get the tree size.

You'll find that our custom saddles are not custom priced. You will pay about the same price for our saddles as you would one that is not custom made or custom fit. These saddles come with whatever feature you may want, from tooling to silver, custom stirup length and much much more. Check out our wide selection of choices you will have to choose from. Your saddle will be unique, you won't see another like it on the trail or in the show ring.  Leave Comment