LOL, nope, not personal, and certainly not trying to convince you to start lunging your yearlings 
I see nothing wrong with not wanting to.
I just donât understand what IS wrong given the parameters outlined 
I doubt very much heâd have any trouble with the âlungingâ that I and ford and edgewood have been talking about. If he does, then he ought to be concerned about yearlings out in a big field racing and taking sharp turns and doing rollbacks 
[QUOTE=JB;5757100]
I doubt very much heâd have any trouble with the âlungingâ that I and ford and edgewood have been talking about. If he does, then he ought to be concerned about yearlings out in a big field racing and taking sharp turns and doing rollbacks ;)[/QUOTE]
Just got in from feeding and riding my old jumper in the cool of the evening. While I was riding, the yearling and my young TB spent 15 minutes galloping from one end of the field to the other, sliding into the fence, careening about, bucking, rearing and pawing at each other, having a great time and otherwise giving me a heart attack. THAT is what scares me, not the halt-walk-halt transitions the yearling did for five minutes last week!
Iâve never lunged a yearling. Good heavens - what next? We lead our foals on a leadline from day 1. We use voice commands so they understand whoa. We feel itâs important for them to BE YOUNGSTERS and grow up with lots of turn out. They need to grow up before they start training.
And besides the leg issues - there is also the issue that you have a youngster on a lunge line and if they start acting up you can pull on the atlas axis area and that can set up problems all over their body.
I just donât understand why people canât be patient. I saw some idiot stallion owner chasing two 7 month old youngsters around a paddock and over cross rails. It was so stupid I couldnât believe it. Are we supposed to evaluating jumping ability on two youngsters careening around a paddock with two people chasing them over cross rails?
I think the best thing about this thread is that everyone is basically on the same page, but many still feel the need to vehemently argue for their âside.â :lol:
You mean like any horse has the capacity to do while simply being led?
I just donât understand why people canât be patient. I saw some idiot stallion owner chasing two 7 month old youngsters around a paddock and over cross rails. It was so stupid I couldnât believe it. Are we supposed to evaluating jumping ability on two youngsters careening around a paddock with two people chasing them over cross rails?
I agree thatâs stupid, but goodness, itâs hardly on par with 5 minutes every other week of walking in a large circle with a handful of trotting steps.
I like youngsters to have the correct idea, but itâs not part of their regular routine. As yearlings they get to be horses, occasionally coming in so Mommy can make them pretty and take pictures to get her through the Yak phase.
I try not to watch them roughhouse in turnout too much⊠It would give me heartfailure!
Recently on facebook someone posted video and pictures of their yearlings going over crossrails in the jumpshoot. That made me want to screamâŠ
[QUOTE=stolensilver;5756398]
Iâm stunned so many people here work their yearlings. I wouldnât. Ever. If you speak to most people who back horses they prefer to get a green untouched 3yo than one that has had a lot of work and handling so thereâs no advantage to lungeing a yearling. There are a lot of major down sides to it the most obvious of which is too much stress on young joints, tendons and ligaments.
My advice would be to turn your yearling out in a field with a group of friends and let them grow up for another 2 years. 3 is plenty early enough to start training a horse.[/QUOTE]
I certainly know no one who would prefer to get a feral 3 y.o. as opposed to one who is civilized. Now, I donât mean spoiled and obsessing about treats, I mean handled and socialized to things they will experience going forward. It is MUCH,MUCH easier to handle and introduce training to an animal who is prepared for it, than it is for one who is now 3, strong, opinionated and maybe doesnât really want to go to work.
As to OPâs question, we teach ours to longe as yearlings, one lesson, and then it isnât used again until we go to an overnite horse show. We then use it to exercise at these shows, three or four times in the year. Two year olds only longe at same shows, and with tack before being backed. After that, longeing as needed.
[QUOTE=fordtraktor;5756728]
To be clear, I donât start them because I think they will get too big later. I start them because I think it is good for them and doesnât hurt anything. It takes 5 minutes, about 3 times during the yearling year. Iâve got the time, Iâm now an ammy with my horses at home so I donât have the pressures of a training facility any more.
I have seen a couple big 3 year old WBs give trainers trouble when started later. They were not hurt, but ran off with the line to the barn, hit the end of the rope at a gallop, got loose because the cowboy couldnât hold them, ran through the fence kind of thing where they could have gotten hurt. Scary.
Iâve backed a lot of horses who havenât seen a longe line before 3 and it was totally fine. A few extra days to introduce the concept and the horse was good to go.
But if OP wants to lightly play with her baby I think it is OK as long as she shortens the duration and intensity of the sessions.[/QUOTE]
Iâm with you. All my young horses learn to lunge at all 3 gaits by their yearling year. Do I do it daily, weekly, monthly? No. But I will refresh them during the year, maybe three or four times to make sure the lesson stuck.
If your young horses are so fragile that they canât take an occasional lunge for 10 or so minutes, then youâre going to have a lot more problems than you bargained for a couple of years down the road.
SheeshâŠthe way my young horses have torn around fields as babies present far more risk for damage than a light lunge 4 or 5 times a year.
Iâd love to wait until some of my horses are 3 when they are about 16.2 or more hands and pushing 1000 to 1200 pounds before I teach them to lunge. Yeah, thatâs smart.
The ONLY time my yearlings/two year olds ever lung is at a breed show if theyâve been cooped up in a stall (normally they live out 24/7) and they are WOUND up. I will put them on a long lunge line and walk a big circle myself for no more than five minutes to get the goofiness out, even thatâs only if they are being really silly. I try to just run them in straight lines to warm up, which normally is perfectly fine. Even better if I can find an arena to turn them out in to let them choose if they want to be silly or not
My young horses are handled about once a week to pick up feet, fly spray, maybe tie for a bit, and that is it. I am âone of thoseâ, who prefers them to not be over handled. My first experience raising a youngster, then starting it, was one that I had exposed to everything and handled A LOT. He was the hardest Iâve ever started. I donât do that anymore. I do enjoy showing them, and donât think taking them out four or so times a year does any damage. However, I am a FIRM believer in letting them just grow up. Theyâve got their whole lives ahead of them to work.
10 minutes of longing a long yearling a couple or three times a week isnât going to harm her. Thatâs just silly. This is assuming you have common sense and arenât running her into the ground. Learning voice commands, learning to longe before they are huge/less pliable, and reinforcing always, always forward, and building a good work ethic are all excellent reasons to do it. I would use a longeline and maybe a chain too - I donât want them running themselves into the ground themselves, better to have a little control over them (as opposed to free longing).
I seriously wonder what the heck kind of longing is going on that their yearlings or 2 year olds are broken down from it? Never had it happen, never heard of anyone else having it happen either. Different strokes for different folks I guess??
Dazednconfused, I think this â http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eE7auqYFmuo â
is the kind of thing that is making everyoneâs head explode. Poor thing already looks lame at the trot.
Donât know this horse from Adam, googled âyearling longe line futurityâ and this is what came up.
Of all the lessons to be learned breeding horses - PATIENCE - is the most imortant. For some reason humans are just âdiddlersâ, impatient to move on and not accept the youngsters need to grow up. Do they careen around the field and slide - yes. But in those instances they are in control of themselves and not attached to something else. That NATURAL play does allow them to learn to control their own bodies.
This debate can go on forever but I wonât lunge yearlngs - as others have ponted out we have training focused on horses ready to be started. And I can tell you from my own experience. YOU NEVER REALLY KNOW HOW A HORSE OR PONY IS GOING TO ACCEPT THE STARTING UNDER SADDLE PROCESS. PERIOD âŠENDâŠFINISH. You can certainly work to have them understanding that the person handling them is the Alpha - but that should occur from day one with haltering and leading them. We do work in the stall with them to teach them to âyieldâ their hindquarters, by attaching the leadline and asking them to move their hindquarters away and around in both directions. We teach them to back and stand still. We have found this is a better exercise to pattern them with than a longe lesson (regardless of the size of the circle). Each to his own.
When we start them as late 2 1/2 yoâs or 3 yoâs depending on the individual horse or pony - we just start with the stall exercise of yielding and moving off a light contact and build the circle out. And once they are lunging well with equipment - we free lunge them. I learned this as a useful training tool in Germany and it has worked for us.
And I do know from experience that all to often people ruin the really easy and willing horses. They start the training to early and then just because they are so willing they keep increasing the training without considering that just because itâs a very willing horse - doesnât mean they are mature enough in their growth to handle more training. You see it all the time with horses that are willing jumpers - some people just keep pushing them and all too often they break down early.
Personally, I donât lunge the yearlings. I do practice a lot in hand (for HB shows) so they are learning the basics. I do like them to learn the commands, staying out of my space, reacting calmly etc. I choose to accomplish this through the work in hand while some choose to do it on a long line.
I think the basic thought behind most posters is NOT to lunge the horse like he is an adult that you are âworking a programâ with⊠How you chose to deal with the training of your young horse should be determined by your experience, his/her brain and buildâŠJMO.
No lunging babies for me. I feel like they have a whole lifetime for that stuff, and a limited amount of time to just be a baby. I bought a 2 yr old that barely would lead, and had some issues with boundaries from not much handling and still would rather do that again over one that has been overhandled, but thatâs why there are choices in this world! Iâm in the camp that I would run from a young horse that has been overhandled as a yearling. As long as you get them leading and being respectful on the ground-picking up feet and fly spray, thatsâ good enough for me and I didnât even get that when I bought my 2 year old. She still wasnât hard even though I am an ammy. I did all the groundwork, and taught her how to lunge at 2 1/2 and long lined and backed at 3. The next youngster I buy I might even wait longer until 3 just befor I back, as it didnât seem to have any value longing her sooner. My youngster was fairly balanced at 2 1/2, so it wasnât hard for her, but I think many WB lseem way too unbalanced at that age so why bother. I think when you only have a few horses, you want to do something with them (especially as ammies) and it is more for us than the horse. When you are pros or breeders with tons of horses its easier to let them be as you have enough to work, or at least pay someone to train! I also make sure to buy horses bred to have good temperments, so I think that is why mine wasnât hard even though she thought she was in charge at first and took a bit of firmness, patience, and repetition to show her I am boss. Each to their own, and if what everyone does works for them, then great.
Several folks have mentioned they donât want a youngster who has been âover handledâ
What exactly do you mean?
Do you really mean âimproperly handledâ?
If a horse has good manners and is polite and happy, does it matter whether thatâs the result of 5 minutes a week or 5 hours a week? And how would you know which it was if you were not regularly involved in his life?
I know people that treat their youngsters like puppies, instead of letting them grow up naturally. I just feel a little handling goes a long way! I guess I would know by the obstacle course that they lead the horse through when I am there to buy, or when you ask what they have done, most overhandlers are proud at all the neat things their yougsters can do, and the gladly tell you. On the flip side, I went to look at a yearling and the owner wasnât there and sent her daughter out to show me the horse. The teenager said she wonât touch the horse, and if I wanted to see her move, I had to lead her to the arena. That filly dragged me all the way there like she had never been out of the stall, and when I unhooked the lead, she spun narrowly missed my head with her hind feet! My trainer and I still laugh about this one as I later told the owner I thought she might be too much for me to handle. She said she prefers to leave them wild until thier MPT so they move fancier. She said the ones that are too broke donât show as well. That may be fine, but it wasnât a match for me as she was bloody dangerous! Beautiful mover thoughâŠ
I donât see anything wrong with lunging a yearling for 5 mins at only a walk/haltâŠI just donât see any benefit either.
If you want to teach a horse voice commands you can do that on a straight line, leading the horse. You can even teach them to match your speed, like teaching a dog to heel.
I guess I just donât see any real benefit to starting this part of a horseâs education at such a young age. And there are possible dangers if the lunger doesnât truly have control of the youngster and they get silly on you.
I look at it this way: WHY are you teaching a horse to lunge at such a young age? What is the reason?
Lunging is used for fitness and to prepare for under saddle work. Itâs not the best way to establish control in hand with a horse (at least in my experience). Well, when a horse is under 2 yrs of age, I think 24hr turn-out in the biggest pasture you can find and perhaps some light ponying (walk, some trot on good footing) is about as much as you need.
So you shouldnât need lunging for fitness in a horse that age.
In terms of teaching manners or voice commands, there are far more efficient and safer ways to do this than lunging.
And in the long, LONG list of things that young horses need to learn, I think trust & response to the human is #1âŠand personally I think that can be taught more effectively by exposing the youngster to different things, ground work and in hand work, and some light ponying than lunging can ever accomplish.
Is there danger? Probably, mainly because most horses are suicide risks from Day One. But thatâs just the nature of the beast.
So itâs not that I think lunging (as outlined by JB) would be harmful, but I donât see it as particularly useful either.
Now, when you get into 15 mins of trotting and cantering on the lunge, I think there IS a danger of torque on young legsâŠand again, whatâs the point?
If you have already taught your youngster voice commands (if that is your thing), and taught them how to learn by focusing on you, then teaching them to lunge is a pretty simple process. So whatâs the rush?
Just clarifying my POV.
I am not sure I understand the whole âlet them be horses or babiesâ for ones that live out 24/7 you are talking about 45 mins max of their day, they have 23 hours to be a horse otherwise. If you are only doing this once a week or so they have plenty of time to be a horse. Starting to work with yearlings that are later into their yearling year would be fine to me.
Like Kyzteke, I do not see the occasional and brief walk, jog, whoa type longe session as likely to cause harm. But, also like Kyzteke, I do not see the point of it.
I also see reasons for not teaching a youngster the sort of walk, jog, whoa longe session being advocated here. I breed dressage horses. I want my horses trained properly, with an emphasis on going forward from the start. So, I choose not to ask them to work on the longe until they are ready to do just that â work on the longe. They will be tught to go freely forward into a light contact from the get go. This has never been a problem, no matter how tall they grow. In fact, the taller the youngster, the longer we wait to start them. Size is not going to make them more difficult or unruly. But size does carry risk to their joints and the longer we wait on those big kids, the more likely all will go well.
As before, I am not trying to convince those who disagree with me. Just giving my own opinion and my reasons for it.
