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| Keeping Your Horse Cool, Calm, and Collected |
Has your normally docile horse been acting hot lately, full of nervous energy and constantly on the move? While it's normal for horses to have spirited moments, chronic hyperactivity can stem from dietary, health, or training issues. With some adjustments to your horse's routine, you can help him chill out and return to his quieter self. This guide covers tips for identifying the causes of excitability, solutions to try, and long-term strategies for keeping your horse cool.
What's Causing the Hot Behavior?
Before making changes, spend time observing your horse's behavior and look for patterns. Comparing to his normal habits makes it easier to pinpoint root causes.
Signs of a Hot Horse
Frequent signs of a hyper horse include:
- Prancing or jogging during lead work
- Rushing jumps or quickly popping over small fences
- Constantly moving in the stall
- Acting distracted while riding or training
- Pinning ears back and kicking out
If you notice these behaviors becoming more common, document how often they happen over a week. For example, does your horse act hyper multiple times a day or just when it's time to ride? This helps determine appropriate solutions.
Considering Potential Triggers
Four main factors that can trigger excitable behavior are:
Diet and Nutrition
Feeding healthy calories keeps your horse's weight steady and gives him sustained energy. But some feeds like grain and sweet mixes provide quick carbohydrate jolts. Limiting those while ensuring proper nutrition helps avoid energy spikes.
Lack of Exercise
Pent-up energy causes anxiety and tension. Turnout and free-exercise create physical and mental outlets for excess energy.
Training Techniques
Asking for too much too soon when jumping or loping can make horses nervous and tense. Ensuring training plans match your horse's confidence and abilities minimizes stress triggers.
Pain or Discomfort
Irritation from ill-fitted tack, underlying lameness, or back pain elicits the "hot" fight-or-flight response. Identifying and treating sources of discomfort helps horses relax.
Now let's explore solutions for addressing each of these common hot horse triggers.
Diet and Exercise Solutions for Cooling Down
Getting the diet and exercise equation right is key for any horse, but especially excitable ones. Targeted adjustments can make a big impact.
Adjusting Your Horse's Diet
Work with your veterinarian or equine nutritionist to ensure your feeding program provides balanced nutrition without excess energy.
Ideas to try:
- Eliminate grain or sweet feeds
- Stick to hay, grazing, and supplements
- Soak hay cubes to reduce sugars
- Slow down feeding time
- Use slow-feeder nets
- Divide daily ration into multiple small meals
- Increase fat and fiber
- Add rice bran, beet pulp, etc.
Increasing Turnout Time
Aim for 10+ hours of paddock or pasture access daily so your horse can:
- Socialize
- Playing helps relieve anxiety
- Graze continuously
- Mimics natural eating patterns
- Travel several miles per day
- Fulfills movement requirements
Monitor behavior during and after turnout periods. If hyperactivity seems reduced following ample turnout time, you've likely found an effective solution.
Adding Structured Exercise
Longeing and round pen workouts help channel energy and build focus through:
- Changing directions and gait transitions
- Periods of trotting and cantering
- Fun patterns like figure eights
About 20-30 minutes, 2-3 times a week aids relaxation while preventing boredom from endless circles.
Training and Riding Adjustments
Sometimes hyperactivity stems from confusion, fear, or discomfort caused by training techniques. Tweaking your program helps lower stress triggers.
Evaluating Your Approach
Ask yourself questions like:
- Does my horse seem mentally overwhelmed?
- Break skills into smaller steps
- Am I advancing too quickly over fences or terrain changes?
- Stick to lower heights until confidence builds
- Could tack fit be causing irritation or restriction?
- Have a professional assess saddle fit
Ensuring you aren't progressing too rapidly or causing inadvertent discomfort makes a big difference.
Adjusting Workouts
To lower anxiety, implement habits like:
- Warm up thoroughly at the walk
- Take time to stretch and loosen muscles
Include consistent flatwork
- Build strength and balance with cavaletti or ground poles
- Increase praise and relaxation periods
- Reward try and release pressure frequently
- Regularly hack outside the arena
- Change environments to prevent boredom
These strategies prevent your horse from dreading ridden work times and reduce chances of misbehavior occurring.
Ongoing Management for a Cooler Horse
Consistency creates security. Establishing steady routines, addressing health issues early, and proactively managing diet and exercise gives your horse the best chance of maintaining a quieter mentality long-term.
Checking for Pain
Schedule regular veterinary checkups to:
- Rule out back or limb pain
- X-ray and ultrasound when necessary
- Address dental issues
- Sharp points cause chewing discomfort
- Allow thermography scans
- Identify inflammation
Fixing problems early on improves comfort. It also prevents your horse from learning to act up due to pain-prompted anxiety.
Creating a Set Schedule
Build a written plan outlining consistent times for:
- Feeding
- Space meals and snacks evenly
- Turnout and paddock time
- Ensure at least 10 hours daily
- Rides and training sessions
- Limit to 5-6 days per week to allow muscles to rebuild
Make small tweaks as seasons and weather fluctuate but keeping a steady routine establishes needed predictability.
Sticking to Changes Long-Term
Avoid backsliding on solutions like:
- Ongoing feed adjustments
- Work with your nutritionist to adapt plans as needed
- Consistent exercise
- Maintain turnout and riding regimens
- Close behavior monitoring
- Note diet, turnout, and training each day
Staying aware of your horse's baseline makes it easier to identify triggers should hot behaviors flare up again. Keeping notes helps determine what works versus what doesn't.
The steps required to calm an anxious horse vary, but the keys are identifying causes and making slow, steady changes. With attention to health, nutrition, training, and management, you can help your equine partner chill out. It takes diligence, but the outcome — a happier horse and happier owner — makes it all worthwhile!