I praised my horse instead of punishing him...

Question

i was riding in my barn's arena and as i was trotting my horse past a gate that was surrounded by tall grass, he spooked and jumped quickly to the left...and guess who was leaning to the right?..me...so anyway i fell off, but i got back on and walked my horse to the gate, and pat him for reasurance and to let him know there was nothing to be afraid of, but one of my friends said i should have punished him for throwing me off and for spooking at the gate, so now im wondering if i did the right thing?... what do you guys think?

Answer 1

I've only had two horses ever spook as avoidance to doing something I asked them to. Than I did take a firm stand. I've found that if you ignore a spook as it is happening, the horse slowly stops the behaviour. If you don't make a big deal out of it then neither will your horse.

So to answer your question, punishment would have only freaked your horse out more. Getting back on and walking past the spooky object while you ignored it would have worked as well. If it gets out of hand then stopping to have them look would work as well. I would have held off on praise until after he went past the spooky area calmly.

In short, you didn't do anything wrong. Just be careful it doesn't become a habit. He should spook when scared not for fun or avoidance. You'll know as he will all of a sudden find things he never found scary before very spooky.

Good Luck :)

Answer 2

Of course you did the right thing. Patting the horse for reassurance is more calming the horse than praising the horse. There is a difference. If the horse got spooked and you fell off, the right thing to do is to calm the horse first and then get back on. Horses do not understand punishment (also known as abuse) and punishment produces no positive results. All horses are spookable to some extent and even horses that are spook-proofed for all intents and practical purposes can occasionally be spooked. It is a natural reflex mechanism which is fundamentally universal in all creatures, humans as well, and horses too. But it seems this incident is a wake up call to work a little more on lessening the horse's insecurity and to work a little more on desensitizing the horse to fear. It's not likely you will ever condition the horse to perform calmly if it's tail is on fire but for all intents and practical purposes you can achieve a goal near that by working to increase the horse's trust in you as its leader. But at any rate, I suggest you ignore your friend's criticism for not punishing him for throwing you off because, first of all, punishment doesn't work, and second, what the horse did was not motivated by an intent to throw you off. What the horse did was motivated by fear and I am sure you are wise enough to know that punishing fear motivated behavior will never desensitize the horse to fear or lessen the horse's insecurity. Punishing your horse will only cause it to not trust you and become afraid of you rather than confident with you and more trusting. Calm conditioning and patient desensitizing is what works.

Answer 3

God, no. He wasn't being naughty, he was simply having an "ahhh!'" moment. You did absolutely the right thing. There was nothing to punish him for.

That said, it's difficult to judge without having seen the spook. Some horses will "pretend" to spook, when really they're just being a big old pain. However, should this occur, you don't run over to your horse and beat him. He would have no idea why. Rather, you ride him by that spot again, making sure to have plenty of outside rein, bend, and foreword. Do not let him stop. If he's a brat and just shies away from it anyway, try twirling him around in a tight, tight circle. Like, really make him spin, until he's dizzy, then walk forewards again. See if he'll try that again! ;-)

Answer 4

He was scared.  Hitting a frightened animal reinforces their fear.  Walking him to the thing that scared him was a good idea.  Also having a rider fall off can be scary. If the horse thinks that after the rider goes off, he will get hit when caught, the horse is likely to play "keep away".  

You did the right thing.  

Answer 5

You should never punish a horse for spooking! Punishing them only makes it worse and creates a small little instance into a big scary event. You did the right thing by reassuring him that everything is alright. If a horse see something scary and knows that you will punish him for spooking then he will spook and he will no longer trust you. If he knows that you will make sure that it is alright than he will trust you and eventually not spook at all because he has placed all of you trust in you. You definately did the right thing!

Answer 6

you could have done something better to make him more confident wen passing the gate but he did not plan to buck u off. he got sacred and for your friend to say 'punish' him - thats ware she went wrong. if he spooked because he was frightened, and then after u recovered u were to get back on him and give him a good hit on the neck he would not kno why he was being 'punished'.

u did fine, but u could have stood up, walked over to him mounted and continued riding. then walk past the thing that spooked him and be ready, but dont force him to look at it. after walking past it a few times and he does not spook, walk away and stoke his neck. then get off and try reintroducing him into the gate.

it doesn't make sense for him to be punished because he was frighted or just unknowing of the gate. u must try and see things from your horses point of view. and by acting as if it were nothing, u are displaying the things of a confident rider and leader, thus ur horse will be confident.

so dont hit him or punish him. u can correct the situation by kindly reintroducing him to new things that may have scared or surprised him.

Answer 7

the reason u fell off was because u were leaning it wasnt his fault its not like he bucked you off or reared you off. Horses spook and they are animals of flight I think you did the right thing by staying calm walking him past letting him re assure himself then getting back on.  

Answer 8

what thats insane...dont listen to ur friend...if u got scared of something would like it if ur parents got mad at you...of course not because you couldnt help it...he didnt throw u it was just an accident...i wouldnt necessilary pat him but just walking past it a few times is all...if your horse spooks immediatly do a circle or leg yeild to get him immediatly focusing on you....

good luck!! =]]

Answer 9

You were right. Never, ever punish your horse after you've gotten up from a fall. After three seconds, the horse no longer associates punishment (or praise) with the action. If you fall off, get up, and then punish your horse, he's not thinking "Ooooh, I'm sorry, I won't spook again!" He's thinking "What? What did I do? She got up, came to me, and hit me...next time I'm going to run away." If you get up, take him to the gate, and reassure him, he'll think "Aww, okay, it's not so scary."

But don't pat and coo at him when he spooks and you don't fall off. If he spooks, just ride on like nothing happened. Otherwise, he'll get it in his head that you WANT him to spook--after all, when he did it, you patted his withers and spoke to him in a sweet voice.  

Answer 10

I can't see why you would punish him.  If he was scared of the gate(even for a few seconds) and you had punished him for it, do you think that would make him less afraid of it?  So, no, you should not have punished him.  If anything it would have made him more afraid of the gate.

Answer 11

If he does that again you should get back on, walk him by and if he doesn't spook then try a trot, if he doesn't spook canter, if he does start again. Also gently pet himand talk still holding your reins though. It may help if the horse has learned to trust you.

Answer 12

You did the right thing, your friend is wrong. Youre supposed to pat the horse and reassure him when he spooks, not punish him. Imagine if you got scared, would you want people punishing you, or would you want them reassuring you? Isn't it obvious? Tell your friend that SHEs wrong, and explain it to her.

Answer 13

i think you did a good job because if you had punished him he might have ended up getting more scared because he would add getting punished to whatever he was spooked by and would really get spooked the next time

Answer 14

I think you did the correct thing.

My horse is very spooky, he is a mustang that we trained and he gets scares of things like bags, garbage cans, ect. If he spooks we have him stand there and sniff it until he feels relaxed. We praise him and stroke him to encourage him.

In the wild herd of horses do the same thing...nuzzle each other for comfort and a bit more confidence if they are scared. Good work :)

Answer 15

You did the right thing. If you would of punished him for spooking it would probably scare him more. Throwing you off is normly when the horse bucks or stops at a jump and you fly off.

The best thing you can do when you fall off is stay clam and remount and reasure your horse not punish them.

Answer 16

you did the right thing because it was a accident and he did not mean it but when he does any thing real bad do not hit but kind of yell at him   a little so he learns his leason well never  hit because that makes him scared of you i know because i have  2 dogs  hope this helps!

Answer 17

You absolutely did the right thing!  Here's why:

John Lyons has a saying about horses that I absolutely love.  Once the 'crime' has been commited, you have 3 seconds to convince that horse you're the devil but anything past that is cruelty.  Your horse's conscious thought process isn't long enough for him to know that he's being punished for.  It took time for you to stand up, get control of the horse, calm yourself down, get back in the saddle, and re-introduce the situation.

Since it sounds like a complete accident, I won't worry about it at all.  However, if it does become habit then some reasonable discipline needs to take place.

Excellent decision.

Answer 18

I do not believe you should ever punish a horse, its not about him being scared of you its about him respecting you, however patting him ,though to you is reassuring when i do it and i shouldnt its me being nervous and reassuring myself sending mixed signals to the horse , walk him past the gate from a distance getting closer every time by all means use your voice to reassure him keeping it at a steady tone and your seat i know how hard it is when you've had a fright to remain calm and hide those nerves but you really need to because your his leader and if your scared he thinks it must be really scarey. good luck!!

Answer 19

he didnt mean to!!!! he was just scared. Haven't you gotten scared and fell or hit something and knocked it over? It was a accident.

Answer 20

Horses only have a memory for 3 seconds (unless they are taught by repetition but that's a whole other story).  So if you would have gotten back on and punished him, he would have had no idea why.  And if you would have punished him by the gate, he would have associated fear with the gate, not associated the punishment with his earlier action.

Now praising him for being afraid of something isn't good either.  Horses don't really understand reassurance very well.  If a horse is spooky about something, you need to work them through it, keep their feet moving while they face that object.  Then they will eventually be happy to stand and face it because the scary object provides the release they are looking for.  That's the really short version, anyway.

Answer 21

you don't physically punish a horse, you desensitze it. keep taking him around the objects and new an different stuff everyday and eventually he will learn to spook in place, so to speak, that way you dont get thrown. put praising him and immediately taking him away from the object did tell him that it was ok to spook like that.  

Answer 22

If you fall off there is no way to punish him. As soon as your horse acts up, you reprimand him immediately. If you did it after you fell off, your horse would have probably thought he was just getting punished for nothing. If you didn't fall off you could have done something, but you did. So you did the right thing by trying to calm him down and getting him by it.