This article will attempt to identify common behavioral problems, their causes, and treatment ideas. It is important to treat misbehavior before it leads to an undesirable horse, or an injured horse or owner. Also, it is better to prevent a problem or correct it before it becomes a habit. It is also important to do a cost-comparison between sending your horse to a professional trainer or taking a trip to the local emergency room. unless you are confident in your own skills, it is often more effective to have an experienced horseman work with your horse.

Many horse will turn their hindquarters towards you when you are attempting to halter them in a stall or corner of a paddock. These horses are either afraid of the situation or are aggressive or misbehaving so they will not be caught. Both horses may kick, so it is important to approach with caution. Neither horse should be haltered until it turns to face you. If the horse is being naughty, you will have to convey the message that his behavior is unacceptable. This is most often accomplished by popping him on the hindquarters while vocally admonishing him. The second he turns out of the corner, he should be rewarded vocally and possibly with food. You should then assume a passive stance and retreat slightly so he will come to you.

Note that if you misdiagnosed the cause of the horse hiding in the corner, and he is actually exhibiting a fear response, the previous act of discipline will only make the situation worse. Nervous horses need to be verbally calmed, then persuaded to turn by food rewards or more gentle techniques.

If you are rewarding a horse with food, do not allow him to become pushy when searching for his snack, or to begin biting in anticipation of more food.

In the wild, horse will eat wood products. Domestic horses eat wood for a variety of reasons including deficiencies in the quality or quantity of their diet, boredom, or as shows of aggression to a neighboring horse across the fence. Wood chewing can lead to dental or gastrointestinal disease in the horse, and can necessitate costly repairs of your farm. If your horse is chewing wood, you should first consider the quality of your feed. If the diet is inadequate the horse may look un-thrifty and may also be coprophagic (eat manure). The dietary crude protein may need to be increased.

Naturally, horses will graze for 10-16 hours of the day. If your horse only has short feeding times, you may decrease his wood chewing by increasing the amount of hay fed, turning him out on pasture, increasing the number of feedings per day, or feeding a pelleted feed which takes longer to consume.

Attempts should be made to cover available wood with metal or bad tasting substances such as chew stop, soap, or tobacco sauce. A low voltage electric wire may also be run along wooden surfaces.

Finally, attempts should be made to alleviate boredom. This can be done by increasing turnout time, providing a companion animal, placing toys in the stall, or feeding hay ad lib. Common toys include milk jugs hung from the ceiling, small tire inner tubes, stall balls, or a metal mirror hung at eye level. Common companion animals include hornless goats, gelding ponies, and chickens. These attempts to alleviate boredom should also be used to correct horses which weave in their stalls (stand in one place and swing head and shoulders from side to side) or pace in their stalls or along a fence line.

Cribbing occurs when a horse places its upper front teeth on an object, flexes its neck, then inhales and swallows air. This is a learned vice, and it causes dental problems, cresty necks, and gas colic. Treatment should include alleviating boredom, and applying cribbing straps. Common straps are a combination of leather and metal and maybe a simple strap around the throatlatch or a more complex halter type apparatus. Straps seem to be most effective when the vice is just acquired. Often they are difficult to keep on the horse without getting them too tight, or they may cause calluses.

If severe cribbing leads to weight loss and recurrent bouts of colic, surgical intervention may be necessary. the surgery entails removing a portion of the nerves and muscle of the neck in the throatlatch. The success of the procedure is debatable.