# cinch bound



## jamjam (Dec 29, 2009)

I have just gotten a new horse. He is beautiful, grey, 17h, and built like a tank, 19yo. He came from a stable that used him for a schooling horse for children and retired him because he got tired of the kids yanking him around. Supposedly he was slightly cinch bound. No problem as I have worked with cinch bound horses before and if you go about it properly no problem. This horse has a great disposition. You can walk right up to him with the bridle and he will open his mouth to accept the bit (so much for kids yanking him around?). Ride him bareback and he's a dream. He will stand for you to put a saddle on his back but just reach for the cinch and he goes nuts. He rears, will go over backwards, go down and freak out. Is there any hope for this guy or should I just return him. They do not want him to go to a sale as they said he is to good a horse. Something must have really happened to this poor horse. The school had him for 8yrs. We did get the saddle on him once. It took 4 of us but as soon as you put a foot in the stirrup to mount he went nuts and you ended up on the ground.


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## offthegrid (Aug 11, 2009)

What a sad story! 
Might be worth paying for a good vet and/or chiro (my clinic has a vet that is both so that would be my choice) to give him a once over.

My guess is that something related to the saddle/cinch is or has caused him great pain.... 

If he is still in pain, it might be a simple fix (new saddle, for example) especially since he allows you to ride bareback. If the vet cannot find anything and it seems to be mental, it might not be the right match for you if you're looking for a horse to ride immediately.

Personally I think things like that might be pretty fix-able but if you're not looking for a project it might not be very fun. He might need a a season or two of turnout with some massage/chiro and reintroduction to tack.


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## Maverick_mg (Mar 11, 2010)

Poor guy. Makes me wonder what could have happened to him. 
I second the vet check and equine massage. If it is a mental thing, I would prolly work on desensitizing. Start with a training crop, rub his body with the crop, from there I would move to draping a lead rope across his back and see if he will let you reach under him to gab the end of the rope to make a loop you can tighten to mock a chinch. If/When all goes well with that, I would move on to a surcingle, then when you think you want to give a saddle a go again, maybe start with a bareback saddle. 
I wish you the best on this if you take it on. A few times I've worked to desensitize a horse to a bridle or halter, rescues who were beat on the head with shovels and things, but never to a chinch. Its a lot of frustrating work, IMO, and you cant rush things. 
Hopefully someone else will chime in that has some experience with this.
Good luck.


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## Lisa in WA (Oct 11, 2004)

I had a mare like this, a draft/TB cross pinto who was the sweetest thing in the world till she was girthed. Then she fought and bucked like a demon. We couldn't figure out what the problem was, and I eventually gave her away and the person I gave her to gave her away. It was eventually discovered that she had sustained a broken rib in her past and I pretty much know how she did it.

A rancher's cows had gotten loose and came to our place and spooked the horses. Lucy tried to jump a farm gate from a standstill and came down on the gate, crushing it. We had the vet out and he said the only injury was a puncture to her knee but she was also an extremely stoic mare and I think she might have broken the rib then...but gave no indication at all.


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## WJMartin (Nov 2, 2011)

Wow! I had never considered any of these things with a rescue mare I have. She will go anywhere you lead her but try to put any weight on her and she has a fit. Just figured she was onery, maybe it's pain.


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## mountainwmn (Sep 11, 2009)

Good idea to check into health issues, but here is how I would fix it if there is nothing hurting him now. First get him standing, on a lead rope with you walking all around and him not moving. If you do round pen work I have found that easiest, if not a lead is fine you don't want him tied. Pretend you have a saddle on him and reach under for the cinch. If he protests, do it until he is reasonable then put him away. If he doesn't, move to the next step...throw a lead over him like a saddle and reach under to cinch it. Then you move to throwing the saddle on and off. don't worry about cinching it for a while, just throw it on and off. Then move to reaching for it but not actually doing it. Then do it but not tight.....just step by step with each step taking whatever time it needs....I will usually work with something like this 5 or more times a day, 5 or 10 minutes at a time. Try not to get him upset, but to stop right before he gets upset. And keep doing each thing until he's bored with it before you move to the next step. Once he's bored with being saddled, spend some time moving him around with the saddle, putting a foot in the stirrup, then putting weight on it, then getting up but not on, all the way until you're on. I like to teach them in the round pen and work them if they don't stand still, it doesn't take long for them to figure out that they would rather do whatever it is you want them to do than have to work. 
My mare would flip right over as soon as she saw the saddle come near her. I don't think it was saddle pain, but a rider that was too big, too hard on her mouth, and too hard of work for her condition. You couldn't ride her without the saddle either.


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## wr (Aug 10, 2003)

I'm of the opinion that there aren't too many man made issues that can't be sorted out. 

As others have stated, you should make sure the problem isn't an injury or medical issue. If it is, it might be a relatively easy fix and if it's not, I you'll have to decide how much time you're willing to invest in retraining or if you'll need someone else to handle it for you.


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## Cliff (Jun 30, 2007)

I would be very suspicious of a severe pain issue also.


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## jamjam (Dec 29, 2009)

There doesn't seem to be any pain. He will calmly let you put the saddle on his back, brush him, massage his sides and belly with no problem and it's only when he senses you are reaching for the cinch.


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## offthegrid (Aug 11, 2009)

jamjam said:


> There doesn't seem to be any pain. He will calmly let you put the saddle on his back, brush him, massage his sides and belly with no problem and it's only when he senses you are reaching for the cinch.


Well... "doesn't seem" to be pain does not mean there isn't pain. 
But it's far more likely that a cinch used to cause great pain and the horse is afraid. Can you try a bareback pad? English saddle? 

If the horse is worth riding, it's worth having a good vet check it out. If the horse will let you ride him, but freaks out about the cinch....something happened that scared him or caused a great deal of pain. I'm betting on fear of pain, not just "scared"....


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## jamjam (Dec 29, 2009)

I agree that something happened that caused pain and they are not telling me. He's great riding bareback and has no problem with someone getting on his back. The whole problem is the cinch.


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## Teej (Jan 14, 2012)

Do you know yet what this horse loves above all else? If you do try redirecting his attention to that thing while saddling him. Here's 2 examples of what I'm talking about.

1) Had a filly that came back from the trainer with a saddle issue. She'd do many of the things you're describing only with her it was when you started to swing the saddle up onto her back. She loved treats and I'll add now that she had been taught from the get-go that being rude about getting a treat was nonacceptable behavior. I don't allow them to grab them from my hand, they have to take them nicely, they are not allowed to bite at my pockets if they smell them in there, they'll get their nose pinched if they do and then I walk away and they get nothing. It doesn't take long for them to get the hang of how they have to behave in order to get that reward. Sorry, I'll get back to the point now: For her first few retraining sessions I needed a second person to help. I'd have hubby let her see & smell a treat in his hand and that would redirect her mind while I gently placed the saddle on her back. She would be so focused on getting that treat that she wasn't even thinking about the saddle. As soon as that saddle was fully rested on her back she got the treat. Remove saddle without cinching and do it all over again. I'd do this 3 or 4 times before actually cinching the saddle up and riding, which she didn't mind that part. Next day we went through that routine again. After that she was standing well enough to be saddled that I no longer needed help but still rewarded her with a treat after getting her saddled. Then it was every other day that she'd get a treat and then every third day and eventually no treat at all but I always saddled her gently so she wouldn't go back to hating it again. Even when there was a day I wasn't going to ride I still took the time to saddle her until it became a nonissue.

2) We have this cat that would jump onto the back of whatever horse I was brushing or messing with so that she could get her share of attention. One day I was working with a new colt on picking up his feet when that durn cat jumped on his back and scared the dickens out of him. He no longer wanted anything to do with having me or anyone else even touch a leg let alone pick up a foot. However he loved getting brushed. So it was the same deal as with that filly. Hubby brushed while I picked up his feet. If he squirmed the brushing stopped, when he stood still the brushing started again. That colt is 6 years old now and stands like a trouper while getting shod. Cat decided she didn't like getting bucked off and gave up riding horses and took up 4-wheelers.LOL Seriously, she wants a ride on the 4-wheeler every day, I think she has species identity disorder and thinks she's a dog instead of a cat.

So if you're willing to invest a lot of time and a lot of patience into this gelding then you can probably work him through it. You just need to find out what he loves and retrain him to associate getting cinched up with that thing.


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## oregon woodsmok (Dec 19, 2010)

Will the horse allow a blanket? If not, the problem might have been a blanket instead of a saddle. A horse tangled in the straps of a horse blanket can be very badly hurt and frightened.

Blanket accident is not unusual if riding students are allowed to place and remove blankets. Students can do some really dumb things.


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## Cliff (Jun 30, 2007)

jamjam said:


> There doesn't seem to be any pain. He will calmly let you put the saddle on his back, brush him, massage his sides and belly with no problem and it's only when he senses you are reaching for the cinch.


There may not be pain till the cinch is tightened. So you wouldn't really know by how he acts without a saddle on.


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## offthegrid (Aug 11, 2009)

Being a sucker for a problem horse and a money pit, I would probably take him and plan to ride him bareback for a while, give him lots of turnout and TLC, have the vet/chiro look him over; possibly some massage therapy if nothing else turns up.

Good point about the blankets being the root cause; so that is another area where you would want to be very careful.

I agree with wr that most man-made problems can be fixed. I just can't believe a horse who is willing to let you ride bareback isn't worth helping....it might not even be that hard. I'd start with something like a bareback pad with a cinch (something very light) and if you can get it on him, just let him wear it for a little while and take it off. Then with luck, work up to having him let you ride him in it.

Ultimately you will want to be sure any saddle you choose fits him very well.

Of course, if you are looking for a horse that is immediately rideable, this might not be the one for you. Poor guy....makes you wonder, though?


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## RLStewart (Sep 10, 2006)

One thing to keep in mind and maybe research alittle is PSSM. Its a muscle disorder and can cause cinchy-ness and sore backs along with tying up. Alot of vets don't seem to know much about it. You didn't say what breed this horse was but this disorder is in all stock breeds and draft horses also have a related problem, EPSM. My gelding was quite the bronc before we figured out what the problem was. It can be managed mostly with a specialized diet and exercise program. I know a girl who only rides her PSSM horse bareback because she can't stand to be cinched up.


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## bergere (May 11, 2002)

If it turns out he has no health issues and his tack properly fits.... 
Look into Tteam/Ttouch. 
I have seen people use Ttouch on horse's that did what yours is doing, and got them over the issue.


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