Willow

Tried out a 5 y.o. Hannoverian mare yesterday. Built uphill, very slick and shiny bay with a pretty constant expression of wonderment. She seemed sweet enough, and a decent mover - didn't blow me away but I thought she was decent. I felt she was being lunged with her side reins a bit short, but I kept my mouth shut. The owner didn't push her forward at all and she traveled on the forehand with her neck curled and behind the bit. When the owner rode her the mare moved better and didn't really misbehave beyond throwing her head a bit, balking at the gate, and taking the wrong lead a few times before taking the correct one with a buck. I hopped on her and things went well enough at first- she didn't really want to take contact on the bit even though I kept my reins quite long- she simply curled her neck and avoided the bit entirely. When I tried to get her more forward the results were mixed- she would go for a minute then back off, and occassionaly stop and threatened to rear a bit when I tapped with the whip and it took a lot of banging on her sides to get her going again. When she did trot consistantly she was pretty smooth, but she got tired of it pretty quickly and started breaking to canter. I brought her back and it was a lot of wierd hybrid canter-trot-canter-trot. I got her settled a bit and thought, "Ok, now let's let her canter." She would not. Threw her head, bucked a bit, sidestepped, trotted fast, etc. I tried about 3 times, and rather than let things escalate more in front of a seller on a horse I don't own (Not my horse, not my battle) I chose to have her trot nicely a bit more and halted, then hopped off and told her owner she could go ahead and get the canter transition a couple of times if she wanted- that way the mare gets the benefit of the doubt if she's just confused by me, but doesn't get away with not doing what's asked of her. She threw her head a bit for the owner but did take the canter, and I wasn't surprised. I didn't feel afraid of the mare or worried I would go off- she wasn't that quick and I felt pretty secure. I didn't like the way she kept ducking behind the bit and refusing to go forward, though I'm pretty confident I could school her for a while and get her going well. Not unusual for a green horse, but I'm not certain she has a good attitude- she seemed a bit lazy, which is no big deal, but I also didn't feel like she was that eager to please- not unusual, but I'm not sure she's a good enough mover to want to put the time and energy into her without a great attitude. So we'll see. Definitely better than the last horse I looked at, but she doesn't completely thrill me either.