Anxious Horse - Looking to Spook

I received this question via e-mail and it is something that everyone of us has likely experienced. "Hello, I am riding a 6 year old mare, she is supposedly half Quarterhorse and half Tennesse Walker. She was someone's trail horse and ridden for a couple years before I bought her. She is very gentle and comfortable to ride, but she has a habit where  she looks left then right seemingly waiting for something to scare her. When there is a noise or something that does  scare her, she will flinch or take a quick step away, never jumping or really spooking but these rides are becoming tedious where I don't enjoy them. I thought if I rode her enough, the "wet saddle blankets make good horses theroy" she would come around but it isn't getting any better. Do you have any insight on this problem or what is going on? Thank you in advance, Blessings, Myra."

Momentarily, or for longer than a moment, a horse's fear or anxiety can take over where their mind is away from the rider. This is not an intentional deal of ignoring the rider,    it is just a simple instinctive reaction by the horse. You have to get back into their mind and you do so by directing them. Directing the horse, or what some would call putting them to work or moving their feet, usually brings them mentally back to the rider. You could think of it as distracting the horse from the fear stimulus by asking them to do something.

When faced with anxiety or fear, a horse's head will come up so they get elevation for sight and can look directly out the center of the eye. One of things I do when my horses mentally stray from me is to ask them to soften at the poll (the portion of the neck just behind the ears where the Atlas and Axis vertebrae are). 

 Notes on softness: I begin to build this softness in my horses from the first handling where I can use my hand on the poll to ask them to drop their head and I use a verbal command of 'drop your head', and getting the same with a hand on their halter or bridle, or even a loose lead line. I look to get their poll on or close to a level equal to the withers with their nose vertical. This is referred to as vertical flexion. In the beginning, you'll have to apply some pressure, not a lot of pressure but really a sugestion, but soon just a touch (think an ounce of pressure) will do it and even the voice command will usually work if the horse isn't distracted. You are going to need this good on a horse in order to get him collected and better balanced later on. IA lack of balance is really apparent when backing a horse if the horse's head is up, his back is hollowed out, so when the horse moves back he is pushing and falling with the front end. It's an ugly back to be frank. When the horse is soft, head down, his back is more rounded where he can back with the back end engaged and with the some of the weight taken off the front end, he can step with the front feet as opposed to pushing and dragging them.

Back to ready to spook question,...when in the saddle and my horse starts to tune me out, I can use alternating pressure (sometimes very slight and sometimes more of a short bumping) on the reins to signal an ask for softness. Depending on how far along the horse is, the dropping of the head and the nose going more vertical, may last just a second. Or if the horse is well along in training he may hold that for several strides, in any case once you release and his head comes back up you can ask him for softness again. This works pretty well to get the horse mentally back to you.

Yet another way I would approach getting the horse back to me with his mind is to move the feet. I generally don't back a horse when he is looking for sonething to spook on, like Myra describes in her question. But I have before, and when I do I ask for a halt followed by a step backwards. Then I ask for a step forward and a halt, then before the horse can mentally disengage, ask for two steps forward. However, usually I try to get his mind back when moving the feet by asking for a short leg yield to one side then the other, or if the horse is further along, maybe a shoulder in movement followed by a reach with his inside front foot to get back straight on the line of travel.

Sometimes a horse can be distracted by things that normally don't bring up his anxiety like when he is looking to spook. This could be other horses in a distant pen, human activity, or whatever. So another thing I do is to stop my horse, bring the front end over 45 to 90 degrees then jump out to a trot or canter so a few strides, then stop, back several steps, bring the front end over in the oppisite direction and jump out to a trot or canter and repeat. This serves pretty well to get a horse mind back to you. In any event, when the horse begins to get nervous, looking for a threat and looks like they are about to spook, that fear is coming between you as a the leader and the horse. You have to get their mind back to you.