 What do you do when your horse is bugged or hypersensitive to bugs? This is such a common question that I get and this is the time of year where it's beautiful and we get to be outside and we're excited and all of a sudden we come out to the trails and our horses are throwing their heads and they're uncomfortable because of bugs. So what do you do about this? Let's let's talk about that. I'm on a thoroughbred that's got quite a bit of life. He raced a long time so he's got some brace in there and and so the bugs it's one of those things where you know you can tell it bothers him he's sensitive. So let's talk about this. When he is bothered by bugs his life is going to come up and that's why he's throwing his head. Let's embrace that and say you know if your life is up let's go for a little trot. Now I don't want to go running back to the barn yet but what I might do is say you know you're bothered by those bugs so let's move and that's going to do two things. It's going to take that energy that he has that that sort of life that he has. It's gonna put him to work directed into something like movement. There's another feature and that is we will be moving air will be flowing and the bugs won't be as bad at the trot. Now I'm pretty bold so I can take a horse and if they're bothered by by bugs I can canter or gallop and then I really don't have an issue of bugs but for most of you just even trotting is enough to get a little airflow and get your horse to where he's not being bothered as much. So as we go we're just using obstacles I want him to think about his feet not about bugs on his side or bugs on his head. I want him to think about his feet. Take that energy in that life put it into looking at where my dog is here or where your feet are what's in front of you. Go through some brush because that's gonna rub the bugs off of them and move them for some time maybe a few minutes depending on your situation. I might reach up grab some branches I might even reach over and help get the bugs off of him and make him understand that I'm a good guy because I'll help him here. You've got some bugs on your neck I'll help you you've got some bugs on your up I'll help you take the whip use it as a fly shoe as you're moving pretty soon he will become more comfortable so back to work. So what I want is movement because he's irritated and he's not comfortable standing still or walking slow. Now I want you to think about something you decide to go trail riding with your friends and they're all on slower calm horses and you're on this hot throw bread that's more sensitive and you want to walk down the trail with the group it might not work for you you might need to adjust to fit that situation you may need to take your horse out by yourself and work in this manner so now he's moved quite a bit and I'm walking in fact it's kind of interesting I'm able to take him through branches and he sees a reason he says yeah I'll go through those branches rub those bugs off a little more reason to go through that he's more comfortable because I did move for a few minutes so now could I bring the walk down slower now if he starts to get bothered with bugs and he starts to flip his head or swishes tail I won't get too greedy I don't want to force the walk chase my dog here for a second fact use my dog's little energy to get my horse's energy up there look at that that's awesome so my horse is really looking at my dog which you can't see Buster thinks it's fun we're not as bothered with the bugs it's fun again movement I want you to go under things so the branches going under this is a tough one for me going under the branches going through the narrow passageway so we go around under all helping to get bugs away we'll find a through go through the brush right and so pretty soon my horse looks to me he thinks about his feet his attention's not so much on on the bugs and I can then say let's take it easy let's slow down a little bit and maybe even we'll get to a place where we can stop now don't get greedy because if you stop too long he's gonna get antsy he's gonna throw his head he's gonna switch his tail he's gonna get bothered his life will come up and he'll want to move but if we think about this we can take this sort of irritation right and we can use it to get our horses lively directed into what we want work and use that as a lesson to work with our horses I hope that makes sense about what to do when your horses bothered by bugs I hope this these are some techniques that you can use take take this and go ahead and give it some time practice with it see what you can do maybe keep your horses on the move a little more before you know it they're gonna settle in and they're gonna be able to handle these bugs a lot better