BO has two bays at my barn that people are shocked to hear are Paints. They both do hunters.
Edited to change ‘socked’ to ‘shocked’ but may have been a fruedian slip because they both beautiful white socks.
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Thanks for the recommendation! I just followed the group. I am in NO WAY shopping, but I like to keep an eye on what’s out there, especially for friends who are shopping. A smart and brave horse is always desirable.
Where are you located? I’ll be ISO for an Iberian/Iberian cross in the next six months or so…
There are lots of those in Ontario for decent prices.
I’m definitely considering looking up there-- I’m in New England. Last time I was shopping COVID was still in full swing and getting there to visit would be a royal pain. Looks like I should be renewing my passport…
Southern California
If you can deal with young horses some of the ag schools have auctions with some nice horses.
Texas A&M https://www.facebook.com/102481905708278/posts/130959982860470/
University of Florida Sale in the Swamp
https://animal.ifas.ufl.edu/equine/breeding--sales/sale-in-the-swamp/
This is the root issue. There are lots of remote learning opportunities available.
Folks accustomed to lesson/showing only would do good for themselves to expand their definition of “fun with my horse” to include training their own. Limiting yourself to the already trained horse was less of a problem in the past.
But the industry has been built on some pretty weak foundations. ( including Worker compensation and client/amateur education)
Horses have been underpriced for a long time. Even the cheapest set up of breeding horses at scale in the in USA means an unbroken 3yr old should be ATLEAST several thousand dollars. Trained horses? Low 5 figures baseline for just a safe to ride, ‘basic broke’ horse.
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I think this is more of a factor than many people want to consider. Cheap horses, are never really cheap. Somewhere, someone put time and money into them. Even without a show record, they were fed, housed, and cared for. I, while not a breeder by trade, bred my very lovely mare to a very lovely stallion and got a beautiful filly. I was lucky in that my mare: 1. Took on the first try 2. Zero complications during pregnancy 3. Lived on family farm 4. Easy foaling/healthy foal 5. Filly has had minimal issues so far in her nearly 3 years of life. Anything under $20k would be losing money on the “investment”, not even counting the cost of getting my mare to start with. So, in essence, when people want an educated horse for cheap, they essentially want someone else to subsidize their hobby. If you want cheap, they will have a catch (or a few) by being green, health issues, or aged. If you get one that is educated, sound, young, and cheap, someone else subsidized your ride. It is a harsh reality.
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The hard part with a lot of the AQHA breeding is that they breed for a downhill built horse that moves with a big stride for the hunter under saddle classes. And a lot of them are huge, 17h+ with tiny feet combined with structural weaknesses they often don’t stand up to much jumping. I’m not saying never buy one, but I’d look very hard at the sire and the dam before I’d buy one and I’d probably wait to get one that is 3+ yo so there is a better idea of what it’ll look like. I have lots of friends who breed HUS Quarter Horses and I’ve been begging them to produce horses with a more uphill build. Hopefully it’s going that way!
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I’d guess that 80% or more of the Quarter Horses winning the HUS and English classes at breed shows are Appendix. They can get their “white papers” after they get a number of points, so maybe don’t stay Appendix. There are thousands of them being born every year.
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What are his bloodlines? He’s cute!!
Yeah for sure - I probably wouldn’t buy a foal, but broadly speaking, I think they tend to grow up a bit faster than WBs so by the time they’re 3yo you’re probably going to have a pretty good idea of what you’ll end up with. I’ve seen some WBs that are practically unrecognizable to their 3yo selves, and maybe it’s just confirmation bias, but I haven’t noticed that with QHs so much.
I didn’t run into terrible issues re: hooves on the HUS bred ones (halter lines on the other hand… yikes). As you mentioned, many of them are actually Appendix though.
Yes I guess I should have said I don’t see many of them around anymore! Not around here.
They definitely mature more quickly than warmbloods! I currently own a QH, warmblood and a TB. They all 3 stopped growing by the time they were 4 and (ironically) the warmblood was the fastest. But my parents (and grandparents etc) raised Quarter Horses so I’m most familiar with them. They had cowhorse and race bred Quarter Horses.
I definitely recommend looking at sport-type QHs. I purchased a 7 year old QH mare for my daughter who was 8 at the time. The mare has turned out to be the most amazing 3-ring packer. She has just the right amount of forward, is super adjustable and never ever stops at a fence. She does have a wicked spin on her though if she spooks. Her mom was a junior hunter, and I’m told her lines are more sport-based (Last Detail x Rugged Lark). I know very little about QHs but this mare is just amazing. The pic is of her and my 12 year old daughter doing the jumpers last week.
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My first Children’s horse a million years ago was an Appendix. He had such a good brain that we bought him for me when I was 13 and he was only 3. My mom- a total beginner- could ride him! He was super-cute and a gorgeous mover, but after 3’3" his form began to fall apart, so he wasn’t going to make up into a Junior Hunter. He was sold to an AA to do the 3’ stuff with, and they cleaned up. He was such a good egg. 
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Rugged Lark was one of my most favorite horses ever. He was unbelievably versatile and had an amazing brain!
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That’s really neat to know, thanks for sharing!
