is my pony cracked to hunt?

I

IonaN

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about a month ago i did a kiddies hunt on her and she was fine until the very end(she got excited and kept spinning round) last weeek i did a normal hunt on her and she was a completely different pony...took off all the time,jumped like a stag, bucked and wouldn't walk or stand, she just bounced around every where as fast as possible....i'm planning on huntng her again but if she's like how she was on the last hunt i'm not sure if it would be a good idea,i don't want to get hurt or put any one else in danger wen she freaks out!!!!!!!!!!

does any one have any thoughts on this or any ideas that might help?????????
she gets a small scoup of low energy feed once a day as she's prone to loosing weight!!!!!
 
Hunting can make or break a horse, and while a bit of first season excitement is to be expected - if you don't feel safe then you'd be better stopping for this year.

There is plenty you can do to get her used to being in big groups. A lot of PC branches do large ride-outs through the summer, you can do some cross country schooling or hunter trials to get her jumping properly in the field, and newcomers/PC days and cubbing are great. Cubbing isn't so fast so she may be better - you'll have to wait until September, though!

If you are confident enough to ride her forwards and give her a telling off when she's being an idiot then I'd say maybe carry on hunting her a few more times to get her through this stupid period, if it is just stupidity ... but if you have any doubts, stop now.

What do you feed her?
 
Hunting often turns the most placid horse into a TB type of mind.
I think for the safety of everybody around you, as well as their horses, you, and your pony....you need to work on some schooling before taking off Hunting again.
You must teach this pony to respect you and your aides before you hit the open countryside!!!
Good luck!
 
This sounds just like an over-excited pony and a lot of horses get very excited out on a hunt. If the kiddies hunt was her first then she didn't know what too expect and so didn't get as excited until near the end when she realised how much fun it was. The second time she went out she knew what was going on and so got excited straight away just like a kid in a sweet shop!

I would take her out in smaller groups of horses on fast hacks to see if she still gets as excited. Slowly increase the numbers of horses and the excitement levels. Wait until she can cope at each stage before going to the next.

If you want to carry on hunting her then you or someone else will need to brave it and ride her through it until she starts to see it all as just everyday and boring. However there is no guarantee that she was ever calm down about it completely. I have a pony who gets extremely excited in such situations, bucking, rearing and prancing everywhere. He has improved over the years and it only tends to be the odd occasions (especially if the weather is cold) that he gets like it now but at 17 yrs old he still has his days.

Good luck!
 
check all her equipment and see if there was anything to freak her out around the jump.
 
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