How do I get my Pony to focus?

Lu Lu: How do I get my Pony to focus?
Everytime i take my pony out just me and him, he is focused on me, and I really feel a connection. Then someone might walk up to the arena, and he just zones out and stoppes focusing on me. Even sometimes when I work him in the arena he won’t listen to me, he ignores me. I have tried to take him somewhere where there are less distractions, but nothing works. How do I get him to focus on me?

Answers and Views:

Answer by Just Ask Me
grab a carrot 🙂

Answer by Ajierene
When you are alone work one circles, serpentines and doing a 20 M figure 8 – this is a figure eight basically in on half or third of the ring, where each side is a small circle. Also work on bending her head to the left and the right – you can start this on a circle, where she is bending inside and out – use inside rein and inside leg for the bend and outside leg to keep her out on the circle. Same with outside bend. bending her head left, use left rein and push her towards the right with your left leg -use the right leg to prevent her from going to far right.

When she is doing this readily and you go into the arena with other horses, when she stops paying attention to you, ask for the bend on the circle or to the left and the right. You can work on some serpentines and throw circles in there so that she has to focus on you because you are constantly changing what you are doing and asking her to do something.

She will start paying attention to you more on a regular basis since she isn’t sure what you are going to ask next.

Answer by michaela b
your just going to have to be prepared you should always be thinkin two steps ahead of your horse!!!

Answer by horse lover 72
you can tell that he’s paying attention to you when his ears are back. what i do when my horse isnt paying attention i hault him and back him up. becasue a horse has to be focased on you when he is backing. also i would bend him in the oppisite direction he is looking.

Answer by green hearts
Hmm.. This is a little difficult. My mare does the same thing any time she sees the other horses so i turn her to the oppisit direction. IM going to buy horse blinders to stop her from doing this.
I think it will help you too.
https://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/69/Horse_wearing_blinders.jpg/150px-Horse_wearing_blinders.jpg&imgrefurl=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blinders&h=219&w=150&sz=9&hl=en&start=17&um=1&tbnid=BfQNVpx_oBY1yM:&tbnh=107&tbnw=73&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dhorse%2Bwinkers%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN
i think that it stops the horse from turning side to side and keeps them focused good luck.

Answer by ponyrider68
play with your reins, move your legs, do something that he has to respond to. that is the best i can think of!!!

Answer by Kate H
try using some sort of “treat” after a while he will eventually get used to only focusing on you.

Answer by ponygirl21
My horse does the exact same thing. He totally stops paying attention when another horse comes into the arena or he sees something he thinks is weird or something. What Ajiriene said is the best advice u can get. Do lots of small circles, serpentines, changes of direction so they are constantly having to listen to know wha to do. I have honestly found that this really helps my horse settle and pay attention to me while I’m riding him.

Answer by Georgie B
if you have the time, try halting, walking foward two paces, back one and foward two then halting. the horse should listen more then. it has always worked for me when i go to the shows and my pony is watching everything else

GEORGIE & BOOTS