My brother and I own a large property (200+ acres) and we rent it out to a neighbor for crop farming. Over the last couple of years, a couple of friends with trailers and I have talked about trailering horses over for a trail ride. As of today, I know that my brother is fine with the idea. As is the farmer renting our fields - while he definitely wants any horses on the property to stay on the edges of the planted fields, he doesn’t think a couple of horse would cause appreciable damage to the crops.
But also the issue of liability came up in discussions today because we were all talking to a different neighbor about something else and he mentioned an incident where a rider had come on to his property and had a major incident. He’s still generally okay with horses on his property, but his sister, who is an actual horsewoman is extremely worried about liability, so in deference to her, he no longer allows riders.
Which made me wonder about liability for riders on my property. At this point, the only people I’m thinking about allowing to ride are my friend who owns my lease horse, and she’d trailer over both of her horses and we’d ride together. But another friend just started boarding at a facility that shares a short border with my property and since that boarding facility doesn’t have much in the way of trails, she’s asked if she could ride my land.
I want to allow this! I also think it would be awesome to ride my property with friends! My farm and family have history with horses (while my property was a dairy farm for most of the 20th century, I have photos of ancestors with their prized horses. Also have some old school laced half chaps in the attic. Horses are in my blood and the history of the property), but also I want to be careful.
Would having my friends sign a liability waiver be sufficient? Are there other concerns and legal issues I need to look into or know about before allowing a friend or two to ride on my property?