High energy horse.

buck-wild-chick

Songster
11 Years
Jul 24, 2008
1,675
7
161
Hamilton C. FL
Ok I have a 5yr old p.o.a pony mare. I got her back in May and she has been a trip.
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But over all shes got alot better.

But I Lunge her before I ride just to get her worked up and give her a chance to exert any bucks she may have LOL.
Well She has always been lazy on the lunge line So I use a whip. I DO NOT HIT HER WITH IT. But it gets her going.

The past month she has had ALOT of energy and as soon as I get her going in the circle she starts RUNNING around me and the only way I can stop her is to let her keep going untill she cools down alittle then I can turn her around.
I have not switched her feed,or the amount I feed. I was told by a fellow horse owner that most horses are full of p!$$ and vingor this time of year. IDK what to do. I only weigh 100 pounds and Im tired of being dragged by a 800 pound pony.
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I feel for ya. I used to have a percheron cross that was the same way, and she had NO brakes.
I could not handle her, I finally traded her to someone BIGGER than me with more power and horse experience.

Here is her pic - she is a beautiful girl but way to fiesty for me (that is me on her)

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In cool weather horses are more likely to act up because the brisk air makes them feel frisky. I will tell you that sweet feed and corn or high protien feed can be a catalyst for over activity. I suggest if you feed any of the above that you put her on oats and a 10-12% pelleted feed with no molasses and a good quality grass hay. This will help in that department if your feed is part of the problem. Your putting her on lunge is a very good thing, continue that before every ride. Good luck
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How you lunge her may be the problem. If you've been encouraging her to move forward on the lunge, she may have taken it into her head to just buzz off every time you lunge her. So here's what to do: start without a whip. Go into the lunge ring & keep the lunge rein very short (I take it you use one,if not, start). Make her go round in a very small circle around you & gradually give her more rein to move out. If she buzzes off, immediately shorten the rein until she is doing circles so small, she stops. Then start again. Soon you will have a nice calm lunge pony. I'm a horse trainer & encounter these kind of problems all the time.
 
You need to maintain control. I'm not a fan of just letting a horse blast off energy on the lunge. They should still be under control. Controlled walk, trot, and canter. You can get them to work and wear off energy while still controlling not only the gait but the speed and extension of that gait. I have some hot barrel horses and I never use lunging to wear off energy. I want them to have energy. I just work on controlling that energy and putting it into work. Letting a horse play and do whatever it wants when you first start working it is only going to make it worse the next time. You are encouraging the horse to be hot and hard to handle. Instead you need to work on basic lunging exercises from the beginning and never let the horse just buck around or race off on the lunge. From the moment you catch them you are in control. Wear their energy off on exercises that improve their handling not just wild antics.
 
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Big ditto here. Also try adding in some poles for her to step over. Give her mind something to think about BEFORE she gets bored and blows you off. Once you get her lunging at an even pace, then don't just expect one gait, but ask her to transition up and down from Walk - Trot - Lope and so forth. So many times people take lunging as just running the horse/pony in a circle. This is the best time to challange their minds with tasks for them to do. You can teach voice commands very easily at this stage. I also don't encourage a horse to do anything more than walk the first 10 laps around. Then I work most of my time on poles/jumps/or obsticles at a trot. I use a canter/lope on the lunge for them to open up their lungs and stretch their muscles inbetween a task and then back at that task in whatever gait needed. I start all my horses in a round pen on a lunge line, but as they learn what they are doing I love to take them into an arena and work them on traveling at the lunge also.

I love a horse with energy this time of year! Not that I need speed, but I hate a lazy dead horse. LOL
 

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