Any horse can spook from a sudden sound or movement. Some are worse than others. However, there is no such thing as a bombproof horse. Being a pray animal a horse is on constant alert and he will react first and than think later. If you want to be with horses you must accept this fact and respect horse's nature. You need to work with it not against it to improve the situation.

It is a rider's job to educate his/her horse and lower the level of spookiness by replacing it gradually with trust and concentration. First of all the rider must work on himself/herself. There are two important aspects: physical and mental. You cannot start working on your mental aspect until you improve the physical one.

Physical - If you have a good seat and sudden movements of your horse do not throw you out of balance you will not worry a lot about his spookiness. On the other hand, you will dread his spooks if you thrown violently around the saddle, and even fall down in the worst case. The violent movement of your body in the saddle worsened by pulling on the reins will scare your horse even more. Next time he will spook more. Improving your seat, fitness level and balance is vital to improving the situation. Quiet and connected seat will help you to develop more awareness of your horse's movement. You will feel his tension or acceleration much earlier and will be able to stay in balance with your horse.

Mental - What is going on in your head when your horse spooks is very important. There are two most common mistakes I see when riders deal with spookiness. First mistake - you are simply afraid because you do not have a good seat. You will accidentally punish your horse with the reins by using them to keep your balance. You will be mad at him because he scared you and you think he is behaving badly. Even if you do not punish your horse after he has spooked you will be afraid. You cannot convince your body and your mind that you are not afraid when you lose your balance every time your horse spooks. Being afraid will make you hold him if you are anticipating a spook. This only proves to your horse there is something to worry about and increases likelihood of sudden jumps and spins. All of that will only aggravate the situation. Solution - develop more secure seat!
Another mental mistake - Even if you have a secure seat you still see him as a bad boy who deserves chastising for misbehaving. You were working on something and instead of listening to you he has spooked. You get upset even annoyed with him thinking:"Stupid horse, what so scary about that door!" You may yank the reins, kick or yell. This again only proves to him there is something to be afraid here and he will spook even more.

The best solution to spookiness is:

• developing your seat
• developing your horse's trust in you
• gradual exposure to as many stimuluses as possible.

The last one is easy to understand. If you take your horse by a spooky object 500 times, eventually he will be OK with the object. If you want to help your horse trust you in spooky situations do not get involved too much in it. Look at it with humor and light heart. For example, you are working on 20 meter circle in trot and snow slides off the roof. Your horse rises his head, stiffens up and jumps forward/sideways or runs. Do not get involved, do not get scared, upset or mad. Horses react very quickly but they get over it very fast. They run for a few strides or jump sideways and that is it. As soon as the first reaction is over continue to work on your 20 meter circle. He may be more tense, or he may want to go faster. Work on these issues one at a time like with any other you encounter in your training. Instead of telling him not to do something, ask him to work for you. Your attitude will show him that you are calm and there is nothing to worry about. Because you didn't scare him or punish him with your actions he will start seeing you as a leader who knows what to do, whose calmness is very reassuring and whose leadership he will gladly follow.

Happy riding...