How do I deal with a very left brained horse who is also very barn sour?

Question

My horse is very self confident and dominant in general and pretty confident in me, and yet she is still really barn sour. She is always ridiculously forward on the way home and if I am playing with her at liberty, as soon as I ask her to do anything that requires her to not give me two eyes, she is off. I am working on Parelli seven games at liberty in unenclosed spaces, and the circling game is the only one that really gives us trouble. Any suggestion? Natural horseman based answers would be best, but anything goes!

Thanks!

Answer 1

I don't have anybody's else's experience to quote but my own...

I grew up at Sea Horse Ranch, Half Moon Bay, CA.  They are STILL in business after 43 years, different owners but the same stable's still there.  We learned to deal with barn sour horses one way...  Take them in and out of the stable, MANY times during the day for a week, we used them as wrangle horses, horses used to push out other rental horses before we put them back on the trail with riders on them.

The more your horse learns that it's just going right back out the same trail, the more it will adjust to getting over the barnsour situation.

Okay, I can't copy and paste somebody else's experience, HOWEVER, I've used this routine for nearly 40 years on any horse that's acted barn sour and it WORKS.  Now whoever thumbed me down, get on your own horse and do the same!

Answer 2

How about an answer from a person who's learned from a natural horseman (many, in fact?).

Buck Brannaman tells a good story on buddy sour that relates - here's what you have to do:

1st.  Working on things might be fun and rewarding for you, but sometimes they aren't fun for the horse.  If you're working a lot on these games of Pat's, take some time together with your horse to just relax - take her out to graze some good grass for 15 minutes - even sometimes not working at all but relaxing together.  She's obviously equated what you want her to do with work and the barn with relaxation and work stopping - she's eager to get back there - you must show her the barn is not the only place to be relaxed and rewarded - even that "out there" can be just as much so.

Here's some hints:

First of all, work on teaching her that the barn is work - determine her area near the barn she identifies as "safe" by asking her to leave from different directions.  Note at what point she starts asking to go back.  Now go back to her "comfort zone" near the barn and ask her to do work - if riding, circling, working on responses, all things you and she likely identify as work - do this for maybe 10 minutes or so, then ask her to leave quietly - sit in neutral and quiet as she's going  the direction you want, when she wishes to return, allow her to and then work more in that area asking her to leave again in maybe 10 minutes.  When she gets out away from the barn at a pre-determined (in your head) distance, allow her to stop and rest, perhaps even getting off and sharing a treat or apple to show her this is fun - if you're done with the session, lead her back to the barn.  They remember the last thing you did, so if you worked hard in your normal work area, then returned to the barn where you get off and untack, she remembers you worked somewhere else, came to the barn and dismounted.  If you work near the barn, relax away from the barn, dismount and loosen the saddle "out there" that becomes her place to signify end of work.

Here's the story Buck tells - he took a buddy sour horse into an arena with a group of another riders.  The others all stood their horses at the other end of the arena.  Buck took the buddy sour horse to the other end of the arena and basically let it go - relaxed the reins just sitting on the horse - it meandered back to its buddies where it wanted to stop; Buck just kept it walking about and moving about wherever it wanted to, when it walked away from the group, he stopped prompting movement and allowed the horse to stop and rest.  In a few moments he turned back to his buddies and went back to them where Buck kept him moving just walking wherever he wanted, but moving.  The horse moved away from the group and when he got away, Buck relaxed and allow him to stop again.  He worked this for a couple hours asking the horse to go further awaywhen it quickly learned to leave the buddies and stop - before the session was done, the horse walked all the way to the opposite end of the arena from the buddies, took a deep breath and just stood there.

This concept is "making the right thing easy and the wrong thing hard" - the horses choices are to work when they do what they want or not work hard when they do what we request.

I believe Pat has a segment on this too - I don't remember where though - check it out.  Also check out Western Horseman books - there's one there by Pat as well as problem solving which includes Barn and Buddy Sour.  They run about $20 and they are good because they're easy reads and you can return over and over to them for remembering what to do.

Good luck!