i have a 4 yr old gelding with bad ground manners but they are improving , i have weekly lessons under saddle with a great instructor who is great with young horses , i've started doing the leading lessons with the daully halter which is workin well ( still having trouble with the kicking when saddleing him up as i have spoken about earlier and he does the same thing picking up his feet) does anyone have suggestions as to when to do join up
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Fiona
Since no one has commented on your question I will, so here goes. You should start Join Up right now. Your horse is old enough to understand what you are "saying" to him. Before you attempt Join Up I would recommend watching the third and fourth lessons on Join Up and the Dually halter until you feel comfortable in the concepts. Once Join Up is achieved make sure that you just walk around the round pen with your horse and continue to pet him on the forehead. Relax and have fun!
I am sure you will do quite well.
Cheers
Yea, Join up would definatly be the first thing you should do with your horse.
HorseCrazy
Hi Fiona!
I don't know why, but I did already answer yesterday, and now I have to see that my comment has disappeared!
So, I'll try again.
I think you already should have done join up before starting with doing anything else. If you watch Mony in his show demonstrations, the first thing he does is join up, equal to what he is going to do with the horse after it.
This might also solve the problem of your horses' bad ground manners. You will have to show him, that you are the leader of your herd of two and that he can feel save when having you as his lead mare. After achieving join up you will have to touch your horse everywhere to establish more trust. Then you should saddle him very slowly. Maybe he sees the saddlegirth as a kind of snake, and because the "snake" is too near to him he has no space to flee, so that he is kicking after it. So it is a thing of fight or flight.
I would also reccomend watching the lessons abou how to catch your horse in the field, as it shows a lot about how to behave step by step. For example horses see a lead rope as a snake as well, because somebody is swinging it around too much. It might be the same with your saddlegirth, so, just try it, I am sure, you will be successful.
Good luck and let me hear about how you both are doing!
With greetings from Hamburg, Germany,
Jasmin
thank you every one, i will do join up on monday with a friend and will keep every one up to date on how i'm going I feel i'm getting through a little more every day ( i don't get upset with him, I mean with my voice i think he could tell when i was getting frustrated through my tone , now i'm very aware of my voice. this is helping alot ) i'm doing the dually lessons daily almost I realise it's a long road and that is what i want, as banjo will be my last horse as he is young and i 'm older and all the little acheivments give me much pleasure
Hi Fiona!
Jasmin here, again. Now I know why my first comment has "disappeared". I recognized that you commented on your problem twice, both times the same comment. And I answered on both of them!
Greetings, Jasmin
Well done, Fiona and welcome to Forum. Join up is certainly the way to go and as you do not have a round yard try it in the small paddock area at Yarrambat. Watch all Monty's join up videos first. Good luck with it!