Training Tips

Question: I have a question for you. I have never started riding a horse at 2. I have worked with them to get them ready, but never ridden them until they were at least 3 years old. Even on draft crosses. A woman had contacted me regarding coming to your clinic in October, with a 2 year old and I gave her your email address and web site. I have six 2 year olds here, but I don't feel that their bones are fully developed until they are 3. I know they race horses at 2, but it seems the results are always some sort of leg or back injuries eventually. What is your opinion on that?

Reply: I so agree with you there about it being better to start a horse in saddle at 3+, than it is at 2. But here's the problem: Most people call me/hire me to come start their 2 year olds in saddle. If I say no, wait until they're 3+, even 4+, most people aren't willing to wait, so what I do as a compromise there, even though I know it's not the ideal, is: I require them to get a vet's sign-off/check to get their assessment that at least the leg growth plates are closed. And even that route, I've lost a client or two along the way who just ignored that, didn't want to have that vet check (or the x-rays there which really aren't that expensive in the "bigger picture" scheme of things) and went with another trainer instead. Especially the owners of Arab types, whose leg growth plates don't close up until past 2 1/2 to 3, this is crucial; others, like Icelandics, for example: those growth plates don't close up until they are 4 years old (at least the Icelandic people know that and wait until past 4!). And I can't help that, how some people don't want to wait & turn to someone else instead when I've asked for that vet sign off; I just shrug it off, have to. But I won't start riding a horse whose (at least the legs minimum) growth plates haven't closed up yet. That's when I put the horse first. If the vet says it's okay, I start them in saddle - gently. But I do attempt to educate at the same time about growth plates and what they should/should not be doing on the back of young horses.

But I very much agree with you there. My own young paint, Doc, I purchased back when he just turned two (still very much a "little kid" physically & mentally). I got all his ground foundation training done, got my vet's okay to start in saddle at around 2 1/2, which I did....BUT....that's all I did. Just get him "started." Accustomed to the equipment, the mounting process. In arena. Just got him used to human on back, totally positive experience, while he was young and open and impressionable, but then...I left him completely alone there in that particular regard, until he was past 3. Even at 3, I only saddled him, reminded him how to ride (light, very brief riding) and still left him alone there with that. Just let him hang out with me all the time, often saddled/bridled up, but not ridden, and outside of that...just let him go live life as a horse, naturally, out in a large pasture with many other horses so that he would develop properly good horsey social skills (so very important to do, especially with young horses).

Doc loves to follow me around like a puppy dog during "work time." Or I let him hang out with me while I'm lessoning another horse -- trainer version of "take your kid to work day." He LOVES that and at those times, I'm getting some "quality/quantity" time in with him in my very busy schedule. But he's funny there, and actually quite a help to me often. Doc knows "the ropes" when he sees me training another horse (I let him be loose in the working area sometimes) especially regarding my program I teach every horse I'm training, Doc likes to get in on it. Like: if he sees a horse initially scared of plastic on the end of my training wand, he'll come running up and show, "oh, oh, I know this one!!...do the plastic on me, do it on me!!" like an eager little kid. And I do it and he stands there showing "ho-hum" body language and the other horse looks and reacts, "wow, it must not be so bad, okay, gulp, try me." Works!

My older horse, Gabe, who is 25, who is being slowly retired, I always used to use the same way. They become my "herd assistant," and they very quickly get the hang of: "when Mom asks, I step in and help here." It's kind of amazing because they honestly do get what I'm doing, they've just seen it so much and they do appear to perceive when I could use a little reinforcement to help another horse. Gabe in particular grew to be awesome at it. For example: if I were ponying a new, young starting-out horse off of Gabe and if the youngster balked suddenly, Gabe would shoot his head around and give the kid a very dirty leader look and he'd swish his tail to whack the kid on the butt to get him unstuck and moving again.

There are so many other useful ways to use a horse as you're awaiting their bones to mature. When Doc turned 4 I turned into the direction of what I think of as more real saddle training/riding. Teaching him more stuff up there. Honestly just getting going probably in most people's "traditional/old school" eyes. But I honestly felt he wasn't ready for that until 4, like most horses. And I keep lessons age- and time-appropriate, mostly just keeping it a positive experience. I bought Doc young because I plan to keep this horse for his entire life, and I wanted to make sure he had a great start from the beginning. And indeed he has.

To me it was well worth the wait to get Doc going seriously in saddle, and still will be, because I don't intend to ask much more of him than I am now until he's probably 5 or 6. Am playing that by instinct. I just know too much about this growth plate stuff and even prey animal emotional development stuff, and I honestly don't think it's worth the risk pushing too early. I was that way as a mom with my 3 kids, following the natural developmental rhythm that nature has in place there (plus, I am a developmental psychology major, so I know an awful lot about that as it pertains to emotionally readiness), and it's just instinct in me to be the same with my horses. For ME and my own horse, this is right. But I have other horses I own that I can ride who are older, so in a way, I can still understand the owner of a young "only child" horse and how eager they are to ride. So...it's a hard balance beam I have to walk there. The best route, I think, is: education. Educate the owner and hope they make their decisions that are based on the best interest of their horse. Some do, some don't. Is all we can do "out there."

There has been a lot of research out there about all this, how horses shouldn't be started seriously in saddle so young as we've been doing, until past 4. And we need to listen to that. Because that's how long it takes all their growth plates to close up (some, like in the neck, even later than that!), The closing of growth plates proceed from bottom to top, meaning: the leg growth plates close up first; then the back, then neck growth plates last, which in many horses, isn't until 4+. Here's how the growth plate closures proceed in the horse:

So, to me (and probably to you too), it makes perfect intelligent, common sense to WAIT patiently for that final training phase in a horse, more naturally. Kind of a duh, huh. But I don't find many average owners willing to wait that long, so I have to exist within "the real world" out there as best as I can, while still staying commited to human horse training education. Here is the ideal that trainers should be following for the optimal physical and emotional development of horses as I see it:

The more we know, the more we realize waiting for the horse's bones to mature just makes good common sense! Believe it or not..if you study the history of horse training...we used to know this! Back before the advent of the automobile and horses were needed to be kept sound and working longer, this all was common knowledge. But we lost a bit of wisdom somewhere along the line there that we need to regain and many of us in the natural horsemanship training field (which is dedicated to healthy equine/owner education) are working to get people better informed in this regard. It never hurts to wait longer before riding, but it can hurt if done too early, and that's the bottom line.

If you start a horse off well there, respecting what nature has in place already in the horse, you have a better chance of riding that horse, soundly, well into their 20's and 30's even. So...as we say in natural horsemanship: the long way is the short way. The time you take to get it right, patiently, the far more it will serve well your horse, and in the end: you.

By the way...There's a really good article on all this here, written by renowed NH trainer Deb Bennett, including more details about the ages that each specific growth plate closes up in horses and more - check it out: