I’m not sure what you are finding funny here.
I’ve said it twice at this point. You wanna quote the other one too, for posterity?
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The poor OP, her attempt to ask for advice on how to retrain a WP stock horse turned into a debate about paint horse breeding for hunters.
I am guessing the OP’s daughter is not aiming for fancy upper level type hunter shows here. She just wants to know how to make her riding horse happier doing a little more of a hunter type movement compared to the WP movement it was trained previously. Tricks and tips on how to get from point A to point B from people who might have done this in the past.
@Kehlderado, does your daughter do any work outside the ring? Does this horse move out better out on trails? This might be a way to get the horse moving out more and using those muscles so it can then learn to do it in the ring.
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I’m not sure what you are finding funny here.
I’ve said it twice at this point. You wanna quote the other one too, for posterity?
Nah, I’m busy visualizing my miniature horse going and jumping grand prix with me next summer since the only thing limiting his potential is apparently my mind. #believe
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Honey if that’s where you took that statement that’s on you.
Glad I provided you with a laugh today. Clearly you were in need of one.
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I’m sorry but my response here has nothing to do with my comments on another thread.
Rather, I owned, bred and showed AQHA at breed/AHSA shows for years and owned an AQHA Appendix that couldn’t make the distances for USEF rated 3’+ hunters due to conformation limitations.
Morgan’s have different conformation attributes than stock horses.
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Another poster here that is going to kindly agree to disagree with you.
An example: I had an “old school by today’s standards” WP bred QH gelding that was NOT a natural lead changer. I tried and tried to get this horse solid in his changes, but some days I felt like pounding my head on a desk. I had help from different trainers and friends as well for guidance. Free longeing, this horse would never attempt to even change leads, just run around cross firing and counter cantering. Sold him, and the owner that has him now can only get changes on him 50% of the time. Trust me, I TRIED my heart out with this horse-- he was just never going to go out and do an effortless western riding pattern in order to be competitive.
Horse I have now is 6 and can do flying changes with no effort, she’s just soooo natural at it and because of this, she’s an absolute blast to ride!
I have a hard time with people that take a horse that excels in one discipline, attempt to make them into the total opposite and then expect the horse to perform well…IMO, it’s completely unfair to that animal. WP bred horses naturally are low headed and slow legged nowadays, it’s what we’ve bred them to be, so they can excel in WP and then move to the all around events. Of course there will always be the duds that flunk out or ones that are the exception to the rule…it seems that this is becoming less frequent these days as the WP/ HUS gene pool is shrinking drastically.
Regarding OP’s horse, it sounds like the job they are asking is going to be too much for this horse. Yes, he is trying his best to please, but in the end he will not be what they want him to be-- no amount of training and pushing forward is going to make this horse into a competitive fence horse…he is what he is. I am not trying to be negative, just realistic!
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Look. I’m sure you can train your ass off and get what you want out of your animals.
The fact is, purpose bred horses will find the whole process easier, because they’re purpose bred.
Be fair to your horse and find him a job that’s EASY for him. Not try to “prove it to the world” that he can do XYZ. Sure he can. But the purposebred animal can too, and does it better having basically come out of the womb doing it.
If you’re talking about beebopping around the local circuit, go ahead and have fun. But to be competitive at the top levels, you have to have animals that are made for the job.
I could NEVER get my TB to beat @Arelle ‘s purpose-bred HUS horses. I could NEVER get my appendix QH (my former 4’ jumper, competitive in NIHJA, named Clean Sweep for a reason) to be competitive against Valegro.
And even if I could, at what cost? Even if they can, their conformation probably says they shouldn’t - this was the case with my appendix. He had to step down at 13 due to arthritis.
Trying to cram the square peg into the round hole, while possible, will be painful for the horse and/or rider more often than not. Yeah, we all love an underdog story. But they’re rare, as they should be.
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He has had it drilled into him for many years what is acceptable in the arena. I think trying to get him out of his comfort zone and arena mindset is to work on lengthening the canter out in the open.
Of course a QH can lengthen his stride and I am sure that at liberty in the pasture he can run with the best of them.
How much he can lengthen or how much ground he can cover is limited by his conformation but I think you can see his frustration by his acting out. Getting him out of the arena may be your first step.
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Well, since my horse jumped the 5’ arena wall from a standstill once, he must be LRK3DE material. At least my husband seems to think so. And he’s a paint too.
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