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 Veteran
Posts: 124
| I bought a cart pony from an Amish family back in June. I had romantic notions of this sweet little pony that my kids and I could love on, but she is not turning out to be that way. She's very head shy and standoffish. I'd say she has kind of the stereotypical "pony attitude." Is there a way to bond with her better and get her to come around and be friendlier? She's 10 years old. I try to get her out just to walk around and graze a little just so she doesn't associate people with strictly work, but she really has no interest in being petted or get attention. I'm very bonded with all of my other horses, and it's really bugging me she wants nothing to do with me! |
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 A Somebody to Everybody
Posts: 41354
  
Location: Under The Big Sky Of Texas | I'm thinking since the Amish dont have horses for pets to love on they are more of a tool to them, I bet she dont come around to being a sweet pet much , shes probably been a tool since the day she was born. |
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Married to a Louie Lover
Posts: 3303
| Like the previous poster said, she’s probably never known much for affection.
Give it time. We brought a 5 yr old home last fall who had no doubt been handled roughly. He wanted nothing to do with us. We have been patient, we have made it a point to handle him deliberately and slowly, for a while we made an effort to only have good experiences and tried to never put him in a situation to test his trust of us.
He’s coming around. He’s still not the easiest one in the bunch to catch, and he’s a pistol to trim his feet. But he’s showing more interest in us, he’ll walk up to us if we’re in the pen and not wanting to catch him. He’ll take cookies out of my hand now - if you held your hand up to him like that when we got him he would have run backwards.
It’s a process. She may never be “loveable”, but she may become tolerable. |
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Veteran
Posts: 155
| We had a gelding that was around 10, that had been used on a working ranch, who wasn't very personable. We just messed with him alot. He got baths, groomed, braided, brushed, petted, ect. He came around and really had a cool personality after that! |
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 I'm Cooler Offline
Posts: 6387
Location: Pacific Northwest | Agreed with above posters, it can just take time. We have bought two horses that were working ranch horses and used mainly as “tools”. Not mistreated by any means, but they never looked to people for affection because they just plain had never had it. They both have came around eventually. Once they discovered treats that helped a lot lol |
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 The Bling Princess
Posts: 3411
Location: North Dakota | Lots of love and never run out of treats:) |
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Folks on-line