Your biggest issue?

T

TBminx

New Member
Mar 22, 2013
1,922
0
0
What is your biggest issue hacking on the roads?

And your biggest issue hacking off road??

Mine on the road would be motorbikes zooming past from behind or large clattering lorries/trailers not slowing down :help:

Off road it is mainly being excited in a group in the open or it is horses galloping alongside in fields but usually pretty good if other horses are good :giggle:
 
On the road: two cars coming in opposite directions on a narrow road; large, noisy objects, and - worst of all! - a horse-drawn trap.

Off the road - hedges (anything can be lurking in a hedge).
 
Lol hedges and the green gate :giggle:

Horse drawn traps :help: That would finish mine off :frown:

Mine also do not like passing weird looking horses eg alpacas :redface:

She also was not a lover of someone practising their drumming on a lambeg drum in their garage and decided to run for her life which caused companion to run for his life too and we skidded round a road luckily with no cars at the time :redcarded:
 
TBminx said:
Horse drawn traps :help: That would finish mine off :frown:
Click to expand...

When I moved my old driving boy onto a large yard, everyone was so eager to 'hack out' with us to desensitise them to the dreaded horse & cart! Was great, we often had company when out :angel:

ETA: If we ever met a horse freaking out, we would usually stand still and let the horse get passed us. Out of interest what would a horse and rider prefer a horse&cart to do in an event of a meeting & freak out on a lane!?
 
Last edited:
Gimp said:
ETA: If we ever met a horse freaking out, we would usually stand still and let the horse get passed us. Out of interest what would a horse and rider prefer a horse&cart to do in an event of a meeting & freak out on a lane!?
Click to expand...

I prefer whatever 'hazard' it is to keep on going slowly forward and get past us while I try to hold Raf together. I just find it easier than trying to persuade him to go past IT. Suppose it depends on the amount of freak though - Raf would only attempt to spin and run or if he couldn't, shake, jump about and possibly sit down (he's done that twice but not for a long time thank goodness). He wouldn't do anything really bad like rear. If I had a rearer I'd probably prefer you to stay where you were! Trouble is you wouldn't know what my horse was like so I'd have to attempt to give you hand signals! Thank you for being so considerate though.

Raf is ok with horse and trap. Tractors are definitely our main problem on roads, along with boats on the canal. Off road it's probably water but that wouldn't worry me too much. I wish we didn't have to go on roads at all.
 
Bodshi said:
I prefer whatever 'hazard' it is to keep on going slowly forward and get past us while I try to hold Raf together. I just find it easier than trying to persuade him to go past IT. Suppose it depends on the amount of freak though - Raf would only attempt to spin and run or if he couldn't, shake, jump about and possibly sit down (he's done that twice but not for a long time thank goodness). He wouldn't do anything really bad like rear. If I had a rearer I'd probably prefer you to stay where you were! Trouble is you wouldn't know what my horse was like so I'd have to attempt to give you hand signals! Thank you for being so considerate though.
Click to expand...

Thats what I used to try and do, Stay still and wait for directions from the rider if they could or just try and weigh it up for myself. I wondered if it made things worse by staying still or not. I guess every horse is different! It was something I was always cautious about, especially as my Trap was a bit rattly
 
Ziggy hates the horses and carriage. I have managed both times by the (exceptionally civil) driver holding her horses still as I led him gently past. Both times he pooed twice from shed fear!
 
Jane&Ziggy said:
Ziggy hates the horses and carriage. I have managed both times by the (exceptionally civil) driver holding her horses still as I led him gently past. Both times he pooed twice from shed fear!
Click to expand...

bless him ! Its a shame you dont know anyone locally who drives. The horses at my yard seemed ok after a while if they watched us tacking up and came out on a hack/drive with us. It seemed to calm a few of the fiesty TB's down in our presence! My boy was so good in harness not reacting to the others at all and all the snorting,stamping and clattering of feet, especially as half the time he couldnt see what was going on ( blinkers) and could only hear a commotion.
 
On the road......no problem with Evie. Cherie is a different story, she likes to challenge big tractors:eek: I am constantly worried one will come around the corner.

Off road.....Cherie does like a buck or two.....or three:giggle: they are not little bounces either:frown:

Evie can be very strong. If she wants to take off I have had it. Its hang on and hope for the best lol.
 
Since my horse is affectionately known as the car crash cob ...

on roads ... everything

off road ... most things
 
Smarts is generally not scared of anything....we actually call her brave heart on the yard....she will walk past pylons, over iron bridges,.....but this weekend she was spooked by a man on a roof. For the life of me I couldn't see what it was that spooked her, and then realised.....thought it may have been Santa LOL
 
I think I prefer the monster to stand still and let me try and pass it if really freaking out and if not then to move past slowly and I always thank those that do but I suppose that just shows that its hard for non horsey drivers to know what to do when we differ a bit!!
 
Dolly is excellent with almost all traffic even on our narrow lanes - I am the big wimp when tractors and huge lorries squeeze past us though, as almost all of the boreens have deep ditches either side and I have a morbid fear of a horse stepping sideways and tumbling us both upside down into the ditch! So usually I have my heart pounding in my mouth whilst she either walks quietly on or stops calmly whilst the traffic inches past us.:redface: We don't have much, if any, wide open spaces to ride on...but she does like the feel of soft ground under her feet and I sense she would quite like to go for it, more often than not.:biggrin:

I have no idea what she would do if a horse and carriage came by us...it is just the trotters mainly around here, and they certainly wouldn't have the manners or patience to stop whilst I got her sorted. so that is just another little fear niggling the back of mind when we are out and about!

My old ride and drive horse used to spin around and try to charge off after the carriage if we saw one! I had more trouble stopping her from happily joining them than worrying about her freaking at them!:giggle:
 
TBminx said:
I think I prefer the monster to stand still and let me try and pass it if really freaking out and if not then to move past slowly and I always thank those that do but I suppose that just shows that its hard for non horsey drivers to know what to do when we differ a bit!!
Click to expand...

Absolutely! The way I see it (boyed up by watching lots of natural history documentaries) is that a predator such as a lion with a full tummy will saunter past a herd of gazelle minding it's own business and the gazelle seem to be aware that the lion is not in hunting mode and will just pass them by. On the other hand a lion which is hunting will stop and crouch ready for the pounce - so I think a tractor/lorry/horse and cart which stops before them is more scary because it's obviously waiting to pounce! However, I am also sure that I am projecting my own insecurities onto my horse and he's probably more concerned about how apprehensive I seem to be than by the actual scary object.

My RI once told me that sometimes if you can get a nervous horse off the road just a few feet by standing in a gateway or something then they will feel safe and not be scared of the tractor/lorry/horse and cart. I tried this with Raf and it was true, although I'm pretty sure RI was just putting her witchy NLP ideas into my head to make me confident and Raf was picking up on the idea that I felt safe, not that he felt safer being 3' further away from the tractor!
 
I have to say, Rubic was always fab on and off the roads. We have been passed by massive HGVs, lorries laden with bales of hay, tractors and ignorant car drivers and she honestly never batted an eyelash at them. It was as if they weren't even there. However newly painted road markings made her a bit on edge. She once spun and cantered off a couple of strides on a gravel track when a bird flew up from behind a hedge and I ate gravel. She did the same when she could hear quadbikes reving their engine but couldn't see them. She was fine if she saw them or the off-road motorbikes.

Off the road she would get startled by the odd deer.

Generally she was a bit sticky when hacking alone but would always go forward when I asked and in company she was usually the nanny horse!
 
Its a bit hit and miss with us. For the most part he's fine passing and being passed by everything and anything, but if it rattles at the wrong time (most likely culprit is a trailer or huge lorry) then it might have him quivering a bit. It depends how windy it is and how tired he is!

Off road, I can't believe I'm about to write this, but I don't think there's anything I worry about. Oh probably just having to squeeze through tight spots if a driver has parked too close in a gateway or on our paths (dog walkers are renowned for abandoning their cars in the middle of our tracks grrr!)

As for the pony and trap thing, I'm not sure what the best course of action is. All I know is that anything following from behind that keeps 'chasing' us, will just panic Flipo more, so if its following us, I'd try and get them to stop so I can turn Flip round and have him walk past and then turn and follow the scary object so he can see its not after him. (I did this the other day whensome runners sneaked up on us and continued to run behind sending Flipo into tail spin. I shouted for them to slow down and let me turn towards them so he could see they weren't a threat. We walked past in the opposite direction and then turned and followed them again.
 
Yes if I get into a driveway or a lane its not so bad and if I can get them to wait and let me turn and face the monster and walk or whoosh past its much better :happy:
 
newrider.com
Top Bottom
Back