Teaching Bertie how to stand still at the mounting block

17 Oct Teaching Bertie how to stand still at the mounting block

Wouldn’t it be nice if your horse would stand like a statue for you to get on?

Stand completely still till you ask them to move. Even if you want to or need to stand there for 10 minutes.

I have mentioned many times before how much it annoys me when horses walk off when you are about the get on. It is such a simple thing to do but so many horses start walking off either as soon as you put your foot in the stirrup or as soon as you sit in the saddle.

People teach their horses to jump those massive fences or do very complicated dressage movements. Those same horses need two people holding them so that the rider can get on. Not all of them obviously! Just trying to make a point!

I have recently got this little gelding in training. He is called Bertie and he is 13 years old.
He is not a problem horse by any means but has just learnt some bad habits over the years. One of them is walking off when being mounted.

We took a little video of how I teach horses to stand still. It took about 20 minutes to get him to understand what I want from him.  Remember he is 13 years old and might have been doing it for 10 years or so.

Make them think like it was their idea to stand still! That way you will get a long-term solution. Everyone can make their horse stand still but then you are going to have to make them every single time. Train them to want to stand still. Make it the easiest option for them and they will never walk off again.

If they want to walk off, you let them but make it on your terms! Anything you can think of. It has to be hard enough for them so that standing still doesn’t look like such a bad idea anymore.

Build it up in stages. Don’t get on them when they are doing the right thing. Let’s say if a horse always starts walking when you put your foot in the stirrup but that one time you put your foot in the stirrup and they stay still do the opposite what he thinks you are going to do. Don’t get on! Get off and give him that release so that he understands that was the right thing to do! Then just build from there.

Bertie did really well and the next time I ride him he might walk off again but it will be a lot quicker to fix that. The third time it might only take one reminder and then after that, he will always stand still.

Bertie has already learnt some of the groundwork so I was confident he has enough respect and trust for me that he is not going to try to kick me or panic when I pressure him and staying close to him!

He doesn’t do that to be naughty. It’s just habit because he has probably never been taught to know otherwise.

People get on their horses, horse immediately starts walking, rider stops the horse by pulling the reins. Horse stops, rider gives him a pat! What did the horse learn there? That when you pull the reins I need to stop! The horse is not wrong! You just never taught him how not to walk off in the first place.