Rearing

["Carolyn Burgess" <carolyn_burgess@hotmail.com>]

I haven't seen this discussed yet, but alot of times rearing is caused by 
the rider.  I have a girl friend who used to have an Arabian.  She was an 
experienced ring riders, a novice at serious trail riding.  She went out 
with a veteran trail rider who was not used to "training" new trail riders.  
She assumed that my friend was an old hat at this.  Well, when they went to 
cross a long, narrow bridge that had no side rails, the experience rider 
crossed the bridge without incident.  My friend got on to the bridge (under 
saddle) and the horse hesitated.  Instead of being an active rider and 
legging the horse along over the bridge, she didn't realize the situation 
she was in.  The horse went from hesitation to backing up.  She didn't take 
control of the situation and the horse backed up and fell off the bridge 
into the water, throwing her onto the embankment.  It took her two hours to 
get the horse out of the swamp, with police threating to shoot the horse.  
It was very bad.

So she was shaken, and so was the horse.  She felt that she couldn't trust 
this horse anymore, and he definitely (with good reason) didn't trust her.  
He was injured and needed a couple of weeks of layup.  Myself and another 
friend decided that she needed to ride with people who were experienced 
trail riders and experienced at helping others become trail riders.  We were 
out on another trail ride, and the Arab was behaving as a nervous Arab 
would, he was rushing and jigging, and the more he would rush and jig, the 
more nervous she would get.  And she started holding the reins firmly, with 
alot of contact, and then she started pulling, and holding and pulling some 
more and still holding.  And I was watching this, and it was like she was 
trying to get him to rear.  He started to pogo on his front legs, and next 
thing you know, he was up. Not very high, and it caught her off guard and 
she slid up and over the cantle of the saddle onto his rump.  He dropped 
down onto all fours before she slid off.

My girl friend and I rode him seperately and he was fine. Yes he would rush 
and jig a little, but if you relaxed, he would relax.  So my point is that 
you need to examine if you are doing something that is causing the horse to 
rear.

Carolyn Burgess
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