Today you all are going to meet Bob Harley, Bob Marley's redneck cousin. AKA In a Smoking Instant
We went to a UCDavis sale a few years back to bid on a a stud horse for a friend of ours. He was going to be out of town and really wanted the horse so we took a trailer and went to do his bidding. Before we got there they pulled the horse he wanted from the sale. We decided to stay and see what they had to offer. Mr. Wonderful gets a bidders number. Now.... Mr. Wonderful with a number is not usually a good thing. He likes auctions and he loves to gamble. I figured it was a horse sale and I was safe. Not so much. The last horse through the sale was a bred mare. She was eight years old, an AQHA pleasure bred mare, but looked more like a cow horse than a pleasure horse. She was bred to the stud we were there to buy, Little Doc Belle. He is by a big time cutting horse sire out of Texas - SR Instant Choice. Mr. Wonderful couldn't help himself and placed the opening bid of $375. No one else bid. No one. Nada-nother bid. So we went home with a bred mare. He just kept repeating... But the stud fee was $750. I got a good deal.
Bob was born the next spring. Mr.Wonderful always refers to him as HIS horse. Whatever. The minute he hit the ground I said...oh baby, baby- What a looker, he is all mine. And he has always been a real looker. Very stylish. You got to love a pretty bay horse. But Bob has had his issues. Bob is not like any of my other horses. He has always been a little obnoxious. At about 3 weeks old, he learned he could push his momma away from her feed. He would literally run backwards and kick the crap out of her. She would just move off and act all butt hurt. She never did the momma mare thing and discipline him. He grew increasingly bold. At four months I decided to have him gelded to see if that put a damper on his attitude. That along with the ground work was helping but he still was a bratty little thing. After I got him to the point where you could catch him, lead him, trim his feet, etc. I pretty much left him alone to grow. But the mistake I made was I left him alone, as in without other horses to teach him some manners. I should have put him out with the twisted sisters. Hindsight is 20/20. So he spent the winter and most of his yearling year on his own. As a two year old I sent him to a cowboy to get him started.
This is the post after I picked him up:
I took Bob Harley to the trainer to start his education. Here comes some of the bad. The trainer feels that he has no sense of self preservation. Not good. I sent him to the same trainer that started Scooter for me. I really like and respect him. I listened to what he said when I picked him up last week and am mulling it over. I turned Bob out with the broodmares and am going to give him until next spring to kind of soak up what he learned and then give him one more chance at a trainer to see if he matures or changes in his time out. I hate to give up on a horse to easy, but on the other hand I hate to throw money away too.
The other issues that my cowboy trainer warned me of was that Bob would try to bite or kick him while he was mounting and dismounting and that he would charge the stall cleaner while she was cleaning the stalls. But the good news was that he was not a bucker.
I did as I had planned and I put him out with the twisted sisters and left him to deal for about 5 months. Beginning of this year, I brought him in and started taking him up to RD's with me. She and I worked with him several times on the ground and then one of us would get on him in the round pen. Things were going o.k. He was a little spastic but I wasn't seeing any of the behavior that the cowboy trainer had mentioned. He was standing still to be mounted and dismounted. He is reactive still but he seemed to be really trying to be good. When I brought Lily home, I left him with RD. I shared all the information that I had from cowboy trainer and we decided to give him some time and see where it went. She called me three days in and said "get rid of this horse, he is dangerous". He had gotten untied and she grabbed at the lead rope he was dragging and he had kicked her in the back. RD has a young daughter and the thought of her possibly getting kicked by my horse overwhelmed me. If he was so ready to fire, he wasn't safe. I corresponded with another horsey friend and asked her opinion. She said the same thing... get rid of him. I had made my decision. Mr. Wonderful was NOT on board with this decision. He said that I was being to quick to judge. He said that I had not spent enough time on this horse to know if I was making the right decision. Frankly I didn't care what he thought, he wasn't the one that had to spend the time or take the risk of getting kicked, bit or bucked off. A week later, RD calls me back and says that she was too quick to judge. That he was coming along nicely and she admitted that it was probably her fault that she got kicked. That she had startled him, she knew what kind of young, reactive horse he was and that she had put herself in a position that she shouldn't have. Well. o.k. Now what? I scrapped the plans to sell him and decided to leave him there for now.
My original plan was to have Scooter go out for training first as he is a year older than Bob. Not being to sure that RD is a perfect fit for Scooter, I sent him to TL. Which is MY choice. But that also means that I have to pull Bob out of training. RD is more than annoyed with me over pulling him. She says he is coming along fine, that he isn't displaying any BAD behaviors but he has a huge motor and that he can and will put up a fight if he doesn't want to do something. She is worried that I can't get through to him or that I will be afraid to go there with him. When I went to pick him up she rode him for me. He walked off while she was getting on, which I hate. She said that she could fix that. He was grinding on the bit and was a nervous mess. She had ridden him that morning and said he was way better in the morning than he was that afternoon. I hate to say this... but I felt that her annoyance with me, had flowed over to my horse. And then I felt guilty.
I decided that Mr. Wonderful was right. Now... here comes the lesson part, finally. I was relying on second hand information to tell me what to do with this horse. I should know this horse better than anyone and I don't. (You would have thought I would have figured that out by now - see Lily posts) I owed it to Bob Harley to get to know him for myself. I took him to the boarding facility where Semper is and started over.
The first day, he was... na,na,na,nervous. Gnawing on the bit. Wouldn't stand still to be mounted. He didn't offer to nip or bite, just would not stand still. So that is all I worked on. I must have gotten on and off eight or ten times before he gave it up and stood still. I just sat there for a good 15 minutes. Wouldn't let him walk off. When he was standing relaxed I got off and put him up. No fight. No mess. Just quiet. Went out the second day and started again. And you know what? He was quieter. It only took two tries and he stood still. Less chomping on the bit and he didn't offer to move off until asked. I walked him around and he was in a hurry and anxious. I quietly asked him to go into a small circle when he got in a hurry. After a few circles he just soften and relaxed. We walked and jogged for about 20 minutes and when he was good and relaxed, soft and willing, I quit, got off and put him up.
This has been the scenario for the last several weeks. Each day adding a little more. I changed things up and put him in a bosal, I spent time working him from the ground, some days before I rode, some days after. TL rode him and she likes him. Sunday I took him out on a trail ride with a good friend. She rides a seasoned trail horse and it was a perfect outing for our first time. We met Lycra clad, helmet wearing bicyclist and he took it all in stride. We even saw a snake on the trail - not a rattler but a snake none the less and he was fine.
I have to say, I couldn't be more disgusted with myself and pleased with him all at the same time. Disgusted because I was so willing to become a sheep and just go along with the hype. Disgusted because I didn't do my due diligence in spending time getting to know this horse. Disgusted because Mr. Wonderful might have been right. (OK not really - I am actually happy he was vocal and persistent) Pleased to know that this horse might just become a good citizen after all. I am not saying he is perfect, or that he is going to be a fabulous show horse, or a kids horse, but pleased because he is teaching me something.
Yay, kel! I'm happy he's working out. I'm not sure if I'm your "horsey friend", but I know we corresponded about this horse. Based on what you told me, I would still say the same thing I said. But...its true that it was all second hand info, and nothing counts as much as your own "feel" for a horse. It would have been different if he'd kicked at you and you'd told me you had a bad feeling about him and thought he was dangerous.
ReplyDeleteThat said, be careful. We had a horse here once that we were warned about. A broke older rope horse gelding. He minded his manners perfectly for almost a year. And then tried to bite and kick my friend Wally (his owner)--both times very hard. Like it would have done serious damage if he'd connected. Both times the horse had the excuse of being "startled". Wally sold him and I've always felt it was the right choice. I don't mean to undermine you at all--but I do think its worth being careful. I hope Bob turns out great.
Yes Laura you are the horsey friend and I provided you with the same second hand information that I got. I completely agreed with your advice based on the information I gave you. I do think this horse is a different sort. Not sure if it is a different good or bad, but different. Time is going to tell. But the next time I make the decision to sell him, it will be because I know all the facts.
ReplyDeleteI want to be carefully optomistic. I am really working hard to "de-sensitize" him. I don't get to wrapped up in all that but I can see where a horse like this needs to be handled a lot.
One thing that I have noticed about him that I haven't seen so much in my other horses is - when you are working him on the ground and he does something right and is rewarded, he immediately drops his head really low (like to his knees) and works his mouth, sighs and relaxes. It is all very exaggerated. Like he is relieved that he as done something right. Have you ever seen that? Maybe I am reading it wrong???
It is a lesson in progress and it has only been a couple of weeks... the other shoe could fall any minute!
I would read it the same as you, kel, the way you describe it. Like the horse really wants to figure out what's right. My guess would be he's just a forceful, aggressive horse by nature (based on what you've said in the post) and that he's learned that its not always OK to act that way. At some level he wants to please, so is trying very hard to sort out what "right" behavior is--if its not reacting forcefully and aggressively. I am going to do a post next Weds on another horse who (despite appearing to be a real flake) actually tries really hard to please and IS trustworthy. I know Bob is not a flake, but its kind of a similar paradigm. And my favorite horse of all time, Flanigan, was an extremely assertive personality--he just learned to use that to his rider's advantage, rather than using it against said rider. Maybe Bob will be like that.
ReplyDeleteYou know we all want to see the positives in their behaviors and sometimes we over look the obvious negatives in the process. I am going to continue to be cautious and remain open minded.
ReplyDeleteI can't wait to read the post. Horses like Bob are like one of those 3D jigsaw puzzle to me. I need to draw from others experiences to do the best job I can for him.
The very sensitive, reactive ones may take special handling - my Red is a bit like this - if you push too hard he overloads and gets very worried and braced. He also used to show signs of aggression/reactiveness when worried - he's a horse that's still learning that he can be safe even if he isn't in charge - don't think this was always the case for him. Keep your eyes and ears open - the work you've done with him so far sounds promising, but be sure to stay safe.
ReplyDeleteAs they say, one man's junk is another man's treasure. IE everyone perceives things differently. I think you are smart to get a read on Bob for yourself. However, as others have cautioned, be careful. Your vision may be distorted by emotional strings... those apron strings from having him around since he was born.
ReplyDeleteSince he seems to respond to reward, how does he do if he is patted and loved on when he does right? Buck really focused on this a lot with a horse he broke and I saw him do so even with his own horse. He commented that you should, "rub your horse bald"!!
Kate - you are right on with the overload thing. I think that his flight instinct kicks in pretty quickly. That is why I have really gone out of my way to dial it down. Don't get me wrong, I still expect him to be accepting of being touched and handled etc, but I don't react when he gets nervous. I just try to keep it simple and cool headed. Seems to be working - so far. It has only been a couple of weeks.
ReplyDeleteDreaming.. he does love praise and he wants to be rubbed and messed with. It is kind of funny... when haltering him, he literally tries to stick his nose in the halter before you are ready. He looks for it, puts his head down and is so patient about standing while I am tying it. He also likes being clipped and bathed. Go figure? And you are right... I am somewhat distorted by emotional strings. They are like having children and giving up to easy is just not an option. Hopefully I will be able to see the signs when they present themselves. If not..that is what you are all here for. :)