Weanling with a BAD attitude, HELP!!

[Blue feather]

I have a 6 month old filly by Partners Hero. It's my understanding they notoriously have bad attitudes. If I get near her she pins her ears back and grinds her teeth. When I get near her hind she kicks. She does lead but throws her head alot. She doesn't like to be brushed or touched at all. I did imprint her as a new born. She hasn't always been like this, it seems to have gotten much worse since weaning(2 weeks ago). I've been working with her daily but she doesn't seem to be improving. Any suggestions?

[Bohemia]

I can't offer any advice, but your post has me worried, since my mare is in foal to Partner's Hero!

[racefan55]

Natural horsemanship has worked wonders for me. The will learn respect and basic ground manners, and it is a lot easier than fighting with them.

[karenkarenn]

First do you have her with others?
Second is there any way that you can not interact with her ( besides feeding and watering) for let say three days.
Make her miss you. Alot weanlings look for the attention after there is none.

[bcassidy]

Isolate her and bring her the feed. While she is feeding you can start to handle her. Start with small steps and increase your actions over time. Let her learn that you are connected with meals----just like her mom did. Even the toughest foals I have raised responded well to this approach. Better to get on with this early----only gets worse over time. Just remember small steps and be consistent. I usually start at the head and work my way back and down finishing with picking up their feet and holding them for 30 secs or so and then tapping a piece of wood on their soles. It could take three months before she is really well broken to hand.

[Dave C]

I know exactly what you are going through. My current 2yo was the meanest, nastiest filly I've ever had the displeasure to work with: her own mother didn't even like her, only tolerated her, forget about the other horses or people. As a baby I like to brush them and give them lots of attention to make thing easier as they get older. Any touching woulc result in biting, striking and kicking until I stopped trying to touch her. She would bite people it seemed just on general principle: biting not nipping. I had to tell everyone in the family to not go into the herd unescorted because she would just walk up to people and bite. If you tried to discpline her she would not back down but would escalate into an all out war.

This persisted/got worse through her yearling year. I had her halter broke, she was good with her feet, very trainable but NOBODY was allowed to touch the princess. Fortunately by the time I started breaking her early in her 2yo year she started to mellow. I still have to hold onto her halter with one hand and watch for cow kicks when I brush her, but she no longer bites unprovoked and I now expect that by the time she is 5 she will be an very nice horse to work with.

Someone posted here a quote from Azeri's trainer several months back that reminded me of my filly and might give you some insight into yours. It went something like: "she doesn't like any of the people in the barn, nor any of the other horsess, the only one she seems to like is herself, and she likes herself a lot".

My advice therefore is to do with your filly the things that need to be done (leading, foot work etc), but if she doesn't want to be touched don't bother trying to brush her: you're not going to make her love it.

[Supernova]

Someone posted here a quote from Azeri's trainer several months back that reminded me of my filly and might give you some insight into yours. It went something like: "she doesn't like any of the people in the barn, nor any of the other horsess, the only one she seems to like is herself, and she likes herself a lot".

sounds like a few horses i know!

[aurora]

Too late for your filly but here's something to look into for the next ones. I tried the French method this year of gentling a foal instead of imprinting and it worked wonders. My filly is very friendly and seeks human attention. There are some articles on the 'net about how this was done. Essentiall it involves tieing up the mare in the stall (I didn' have to do this because my mare was so gentle) when the foal is new born and then at first just standing in the stall next to the mare. (I was too tired /lazy to stand after foal watching and just sat on a bucket) This is repeated at 15 (if I remember right) minute intervals, daily for about a week. The foal will eventually figure out (per the article) that the mare doesn't mind the human so it isn't afraid and will eventually interact.

And to add to this, the temptation is to reach out to the foal to pet it but I resisted this and let the foal come to me, sniff and inspect my arms. It seemed to forget that I was in the stall earlier to medicate its navel while it was laying down.

[Denise]

PH is a very tough stallion, so it's no surprise he might stamp his get with that trait. But he does get wonderful runners, so if you can create a tolerant relationship, as Aurora points out, the foal should figure out things soon. Good luck!

[Dave C]

Too late for your filly but here's something to look into for the next ones. I tried the French method this year of gentling a foal instead of imprinting and it worked wonders. My filly is very friendly and seeks human attention. There are some articles on the 'net about how this was done. Essentiall it involves tieing up the mare in the stall (I didn' have to do this because my mare was so gentle) when the foal is new born and then at first just standing in the stall next to the mare. (I was too tired /lazy to stand after foal watching and just sat on a bucket) This is repeated at 15 (if I remember right) minute intervals, daily for about a week. The foal will eventually figure out (per the article) that the mare doesn't mind the human so it isn't afraid and will eventually interact.

And to add to this, the temptation is to reach out to the foal to pet it but I resisted this and let the foal come to me, sniff and inspect my arms. It seemed to forget that I was in the stall earlier to medicate its navel while it was laying down.

I am familiar with the technique. It works very well with normal foals that are naturally curious. With my filly she did not come up to me to check me out, she just backed up and started wailing away and after 3 or 4 days I got the message.

[clh]

Problem is this weanling will turn into a yearling soon and I've dealt with yearlings with attitudes from hell. Best to try and calm her down now. We actually brought in a "trainer" to work with our colts for a few weeks and it worked wonders here at our farm. At least I could hande them after that.

My Teuflesburg colt as a weanling this year would not let you touch him at all right after he was born. For the first month you could not touch him anywhere that he wouldn't bite, kick, buck, etc... Craziest thing I've ever seen. It took alot of patience, sitting in the stall, touching him and fighting him when I did catch him to know he wasn't going to get hurt before he finally settled down.

Good luck - and practice the old bob and weave technique for when you are in the stall

[Rachel Alexandra]

I have a 6 month old filly by Partners Hero. It's my understanding they notoriously have bad attitudes. If I get near her she pins her ears back and grinds her teeth. When I get near her hind she kicks. She does lead but throws her head alot. She doesn't like to be brushed or touched at all. I did imprint her as a new born. She hasn't always been like this, it seems to have gotten much worse since weaning(2 weeks ago). I've been working with her daily but she doesn't seem to be improving. Any suggestions?

This is the personality of your filly. You have to adjust to it. All the methods in the world would not work. It's just her. You obviously did nothing wrong in raising her. She just has an aggressive nature that has to be dealt with differently.
What you describe is her being very territorial. She is pinning her ears at you just like she would another horse that is in her area. Stand up to her and let her know your place. By this, I don't mean beating her, but using a firm hand. Correct her when she does something wrong, but not in an over aggressive way. She is the type that would put up a big fight if you started whipping on her.
Can you turn her out with other weanlings? This would help to a degree but she will always try to be the boss.
Look on the bright side, these little aggressive fillies usually make good runners as long as the people handling them up to that point understands their nature.

[aurora]

One thing I've done with these babies, actually most of them, is to get out my gentling stick. Actually, its just a short handle off of a toilet plunger where I've tied a padded leather glove onto the working end. It is a real backsaver for those old farts like me that don't like to bend over any more and most importantly it keeps me out of their target area. I just use the gloved end to pet their legs. They hate it at first and will kick at it but the glove doesn't care. It just keeps coming back. They eventually get used to it and (after some weeks of this) will allow me to substitute my hand for the glove. I acutally have to bend over for this part. But by now they aren't so apt to kick my head off.

[clh]

One thing I've done with these babies, actually most of them, is to get out my gentling stick. Actually, its just a short handle off of a toilet plunger where I've tied a padded leather glove onto the working end. It is a real backsaver for those old farts like me that don't like to bend over any more and most importantly it keeps me out of their target area. I just use the gloved end to pet their legs. They hate it at first and will kick at it but the glove doesn't care. It just keeps coming back. They eventually get used to it and (after some weeks of this) will allow me to substitute my hand for the glove. I acutally have to bend over for this part. But by now they aren't so apt to kick my head off.

LOL - We use a ceiling fan duster on our babies legs to get them used to having them touched. We run it all over their legs, bellies, etc... alot. They usually don't have a problem when you start touching their legs with your hands.

[horse]

I'll assume that you are able to catch her in a pasture from which she can be led or you are able to " drive her " into a barn and close the doors to capture her in a stall where you are able to install a halter.
As part of that daily handling, lead her into a confined space where you continue to work with her. My experience success has been to create a very small padded stall, by stacking over 60% of any stall with bales of bedding straw shoulder high, reducing the square footage where she is able to move. (A two horse trailer presenting the same square footage is not padded.) Teach her to stand while hand feeding her, brushing her, touch legs, pick hoofs, add blankets, cross ties, chifney bit, etc, .... all will come. It will take a while to see results. Patient handling over time in a confined space is the key to behavior modification. Good luck.