Training Horse Profile: Dozer the Percheron

 Training Goals:

• Desensitizing
• Standing for saddling, mounting
• Riding tune-up

Dozer is approximately 18 years old and has been intermittently ridden the last few years due to lack of time on his owner's part.  A former Amish plow horse, he was retired from field work at the age of 8 because of lack of stamina due to laryngeal hemiplegia (roaring). He was treated for this condition through tie- back surgery and was used frequently by his current owners for a variety of activities.  Since sitting for the past few years, he had developed some annoying behaviors that were making it difficult to use him for trail riding.  Behaviors like walking off while trying to mount, not standing still, prancing around, and getting spooked at noises or when seeing things out of the corner of his eye.  The goal was to work through these issues so that they can get back to enjoying trail riding.

One of the neatest things about this guy, is that he lives with camels and goes trail riding with them!  The funny part is that he is afraid of the camels when they have their saddles on.  He shares a pasture with them but once the saddle is on, they become a VERY SCARY CREATURE.

The Big Handsome Guy

For the first week, Dozer was pretty anxious and had difficulty standing still for more than a few seconds. When asked to stand still, he got frustrated and irritated which he exhibited with nipping and pawing.  Even just standing in the round pen for grooming was a challenge and I spent most of the week lunging, asking him to stand quietly, and then lunging again. It took him a week to stop snorting and prancing whenever we walked by the two angus calves near the round pen.

Once he settled in, Dozer was much more relaxed and I was able to start desensitizing him.  I exposed him to a bunch of different things on the ground and then again from the saddle.  When it came time to start riding him, I didn't have any problems with him standing for mounting.  Perhaps he learned his lesson from all of the previous exercises on standing still!

I couldn't quite get my foot into the stirrup and I don't currently have a mounting block.  A bucket was the perfect height and was easily moveable.  It required a bit of careful balancing so that it didn't tip.  One of the days it did tip and I ended up falling back and sort of knocking the bucket underneath of Dozer.  He just gave me a funny look 😂

When you can't quite reach the stirrup,
a bucket is a cheap mounting block!

He wasn't able to get his feet trimmed before he arrived and they were overdue, so my farrier got him trimmed up.  Dozer used to only be trimmed in stocks and can sometimes still be difficult for the farrier.  I was expecting it to be a little bit of a struggle since he had never met my farrier before, but he stood like a perfect gentleman.  He was the most cooperative horse of the day!

To work on desensitizing his peripheral vision, I hung various things on the round pen panels that I could reach for.  At first, even leaning to reach out would cause him to spook away.  As I continued to work with him, I was able to reach out and touch the objects but he would still spook if I tried to pick them up. After lots of repetition and exposure, he gradually was less reactive to me reaching for things and eventually no longer spooked.

He makes my stirrups look really short!

After I desensitized him to everything I could come up with inside the round pen, I started taking him out to explore new territory.  He discovered a few scary things (a wood bench LOL), but after a few minutes he was able to overcome each thing and they were no longer scary after that.

How do you help a horse overcome their fear of a scary object? Let the horse stop and look.  Praise them for standing still.  Keep them turned toward it and circle back if they spook away. Ask for steps towards the object and allow them to pause after each step forward. Be patient!

At the end of the month, all of the spooking issues had resolved and he was much more relaxed overall.  I was able to pull leaves off of trees as we were passing by, snap twigs off, take off my jacket, reach for things and bring them towards him.  I don't have any camels, so his owners are on their own with that 😜