Home Current News News Archive Shop/Advertise Ridecamp Classified Events Learn/AERC
Endurance.Net Home Ridecamp Archives
ridecamp@endurance.net
[Archives Index]   [Date Index]   [Thread Index]   [Author Index]   [Subject Index]

Re: [RC] Conditioning an older horse??? - firedancefarms

Hi Chris,
We did a 25 with our stallion last year at age 18.  We plan to do a 50 with him this year at age 19, slow of course.  Physically, there is no problem, if the mares would stop kicking him the day before we are going to a ride!   But you have to be careful with older stallions, as they can be very unpredictable.  We were very careful to introduce him to camping etc in small steps (the first one being not to fight the horse in the window tied to the trailer!) and make very sure he was PERFECT around other horses.   Although we got him last Dec, we did not feel confident enough to take him on a ride until October, when hormones were lower and he was not breeding mares.  I do not know if we will ride this horse on rides in the spring and summer when hormones start to kick in. 
 
We had another stallion we got when he was 16, and much as I wanted to race him, we never felt confident enough with him to take him on a ride.  He had never really been "off the farm" and, although broke, we did not trust him to not cause a problem.  Standing around in a halter and having other horses standing around in halters only meant one thing to him!
 
Keep in mind it is not the ride that is the problem.  It is the camping, tied up all night, other horses getting loose, the vet checks, close exposure to other horses at the water trough that you have to worry about.
 
Bottom line...he'll do the ride fine, but we found it took an awful lot of training to handle the other aspects of the ride.
 
Happy Trails,
Louise
 
Louise Burton
Firedance Farms Endurance Arabians
http://pages.prodigy.net/firedancefarms
 

Replies
[RC] Conditioning an older horse???, Chris Paus