Not accepting the cart

[hylights]

First can he stand tied in an arena where he can watch another horse( a buddy horse if at all possible) being driven to the cart? Then Have someone driving the other horse in the cart and you longlining him directly behind the cart, then in an arena, you longline him while someone else is driving the cart put to the other horse, particularly one he knows well ?

Two things here, he sees and hears a buddy horse driving quietly to the cart, and longlining him behind the cart being driven is similar to a technique we have used to get riding horses who are afraid of carts or bicycles to get used to them, it has to do with the horse feels comfortable when they are the "chaser" and they are chasing the scary thing away.

After that I would consider ponying him behind the cart while driving a buddy horse in the cart.

He really could gain confidence from a trusted herd mate who is calmly working in the cart.

 

[MiniNHF]

Have you ponyed him with another driving horse? That is the first thing I do when it comes to introducing them to the cart. I never had a problem when they are ponyed to it. The next day I use the sending exercise and send them between me and the cart, and every side of the cart. Then I ask them to back in between the shafts, once they back confidently between the shafts I start by trying to scare them with the cart. I am bumping the shafts on their sides, I'm trying to make as much racket as I can and if I feel that they are comfortable with that I hook them up and we ground drive at first and I get in and go.

Before I even think about driving them they do close to two weeks of ground work, and that doesn't include any driving training, just learning the basics. And I ground drive them maybe a week before I introduce them to the cart. It sounds like he has missed something in the ground work, or like others said he may just not cut out to be a driving horse, or he may just take a lot longer to train.

First can he stand tied in an arena where he can watch another horse( a buddy horse if at all possible) being driven to the cart? Then Have someone driving the other horse in the cart and you longlining him directly behind the cart, then in an arena, you longline him while someone else is driving the cart put to the other horse, particularly one he knows well ?

Two things here, he sees and hears a buddy horse driving quietly to the cart, and longlining him behind the cart being driven is similar to a technique we have used to get riding horses who are afraid of carts or bicycles to get used to them, it has to do with the horse feels comfortable when they are the "chaser" and they are chasing the scary thing away.

After that I would consider ponying him behind the cart while driving a buddy horse in the cart.

He really could gain confidence from a trusted herd mate who is calmly working in the cart.

Both times we do his good 20 min work out of ground driving, so he has all the unwanted "spunk" outta him. But after his "1st episode", we had someone in a cart passing around him while I long lined him with his closed bridle and surcingle. We had a few out burst when the cart went by him and he decided to rear and flip over, by the second time of him doing that I think he realized it hurt more to rear up and flip over then to just let the cart pass him and be quiet. This was with a regular show cart, so it wasnt quite as noisey as a easy entry but disturbed him enough; which is odd to be me since he has been around carts at shows but then again that wasnt with a closed bridle on.

The ponying him with the cart is actually a good idea, i never really thought about that one. They have a few quiet geldings who drive which would probably be good for him to be hooked to.

This past weekend i did hook the poles to him again and of course he was just extremely quiet with them and then all of a sudden I when I decided to walk him down the driveway, as soon as those shafts hit the asphalt he freaked out... apparently he didnt like the vibration on his sides, so i finally got a reaction! So I proceeded to mix up the ground we were on and it was a challenge because he was just not happy. We are thinking about rigging something to the back side of the shafts, that might create a little more bounce when it goes over the ground. This explains why nothing else he has pulled has effected him.

I really appreciate the help and ideas.