For fun- Mine like grazing on large rolling fields for most of the year and sometimes a game of scrabble on cold winter nights.
The reason multi-purpose horses exist is because their owners do multiple things with them. To discourage this is to do the horse a dis-service. My best horse hunted in the winter, dressage shows in the summer, trail rode all year, and generally indulged all my whims. I used to school her whilst out sitting on point. After that she was a damned fine brood mare. She is now 30, and keeps everybody in order. The question is, do they actually not enjoy certain things, or do we teach them not to enjoy them ? I think a huge part of it depends on their early training.
Yes, the early training is probably key. It might be hard to take a 15 year old horse who had never been out of an arena, and get them quickly adjusted to trails, if they were basically a nervous horse. It would take probably as much time as teaching a young horse to relax, and people that buy fully trained horses for a purpose often don’t have the time, skills, or desire, to retrain for a secondary use.
I think any breed could adapt to trail riding as in hacking out, if started off doing it young. Many but not all individuals of most breeds could handle a little scrambling, if introduced to it in a progressive fashion. Not all individuals are going to be totally trustworthy in tight situations. And I think that a good western rider, or an eventer or fox hunter, someone who was really comfortable in the wide open outdoors and thought it was an important component of riding, could get almost any horse that was well-trained in the arena, to hack out in a relaxed way. The things that would be issues, might be the extent that the horse was barn sour, herd bound, overall anxious about the rider’s hands, or had some bolt, buck, or rear. Spooking at genuinely unfamiliar things is something you can work through.
I think if you were trying to retrain an arena horse to trails, handwalking and grass walks out on the trails would be a good idea first. Let the horse get comfortable away from the barn, and associate the trail with decompressing. Do confidence-building ground work back in the arena. Then for the first number of rides, go out with another rider (a responsible one) and just walk, let horse follow. Etc.
What does mine do for fun? Tons.
But one of the best is watching him when he knows he is going on a trailer ride. He gets soooo excited and spins a few times in his stall. He knows he can’t run on the trailer, but he wants to. He loves going for rides :).
yes, trail rides, in hand work, and low level jumping. Most horses shouldn’t work hard more then 3x a week in dressage anyways…
[QUOTE=right horse at the right time;8828566]
What does mine do for fun? Tons.
But one of the best is watching him when he knows he is going on a trailer ride. He gets soooo excited and spins a few times in his stall. He knows he can’t run on the trailer, but he wants to. He loves going for rides :).[/QUOTE]
My old horse used to run out into his paddock and spin and rear and whinny when he saw me hitch up the trailer. He LOVED going places. He was just like a dog when you say, “Wanna go for a ride!”
[QUOTE=Sandy M;8828792]
My old horse used to run out into his paddock and spin and rear and whinny when he saw me hitch up the trailer. He LOVED going places. He was just like a dog when you say, “Wanna go for a ride!”[/QUOTE]
Yes! Just like my boy!
“Wanna go bye bye trailer?” He loves it, just as you said, just like my dog does.
So cute :).
My OTTB girl likes to go as fast as I will let her on the trails!!! She also like likes to jump. We are more adrenaline junkies than dressage and she sticks her tongue out… so dressage is probably never going to be her niche. We do it because it is like eating vegetables… good for you. Our Chocolate Cake is trail riding and jumping xc.
We were having a lot of fun with trail rides and going up the mountain but wildfires and construction have pretty much taken both from us. We still hack around the property, hand walk, and play in the arena.
We have yee haw rides sometimes in the arena. Her Friesian gallop is not much of a gallop but a lot of fun anyway.
[QUOTE=Sandy M;8828792]
My old horse used to run out into his paddock and spin and rear and whinny when he saw me hitch up the trailer. He LOVED going places. He was just like a dog when you say, “Wanna go for a ride!”[/QUOTE]
I had a mare that would practically beg to get loaded when she heard my truck and trailer pull in. 
We’d get wherever we were going and she’d look around heave a great satisfied sigh and all was right in the world!!
For fun, my Shagya gelding rolls in the mud :lol:
But - we do intersperse our schooling with regular hacks out on the many gravel roads we have and there is a very nice park with trails only a mile up the road. He enjoys the variety. I work him over cavaletti too, for variety/strength training but I doubt he thinks that’s fun.
Growing up, I had no arena, so grew up riding down roads and galloping in my grandpa’s harvested soybean fields. I don’t gallop like that any more - I’m getting a bit too old for that but we still hack out on the roads about twice a week.
If you really care about two or more disciplines, and want one horse to do both, then you need to think about which you have the better resources to train, and then get a horse that already knows how to do the other. I do foxhunting and dressage. I board at a dressage facility without any trails, and where hardly anybody jumps. I decided that if I was ever going to get out fox-hunting I needed a horse who could already to that – it would take me forever to get there if I had to trailer every time I wanted to train. Actually, if it was just one horse, I probably could have done it. But I have multiple horses, so every time I trailer one somewhere, it means the other two don’t get ridden. Maybe someday I will find the magical unicorn stable that has a good dressage trainer, good areas, trails out back, and a jumper or eventer barn next door!! (of course, but the time I find it, my back will probably be giving out and I will be ready to take up driving instead).
