tongue over bit

Question
Hi,i have a pony who s 14.3 hands. We have only had him a couple of months. He is brilliant in the fields and on the roads when we are out on our own. Although he has bolted a couple of times , we thought he was testing us.When there are any other ponies / horses  being rode he gets very giddy, twice in the last week he has bolted and i have not been able to stop him. He throws his head up, thus throwing his bit to the back of his mouth. The last time he did it my 12 year old daughter was riding him, usually she can slow him down before he reaches the stables, but this time he wasn!t having it. We were warned not to canter him back to the stables, so we always walk him back, but it is happening away from the stables. I appreciate any advice.

Thanks

Jackie

Answer
Jackie,

You're going to have to spend some time re-training him so that he has reliable brakes.  This can take some time and patience but the results are worth it.  

First off you need to establish some respect with him.  Bolting, at any time, unless maybe a close lightning bolt or something, is unacceptable.  Go back to ring work.  Start  him over and work on teaching him to work with you and respond to you.  You might even consider going to a bitless bridle.  It has worked wonders on horses who did not like bits and had various ways of letting you know it. Do a search online for "one rein stop".  There are videos and DVD's on how to train a horse to have a foolproof stop.  These are all natural horsemanship methods and give you a truly trained horse.  If not familiar with natural horsemanship training it will really open your eyes.   Ponies are very smart; much smarter than most horses I've trained.  Once you get him working with you I think he'll come around pretty fast.  And they respond well to natural horsemanship methods.  


Best of luck with him.  He sounds like a really nice boy who just needs some fine tuning to eliminate some undesirable behavior.  

Lyn