[CowGirlUp9448]

I recently traded my 4 year old StB mare (who was VERY greenbroke and turned out to be more then I personally could finsh, my brother who's a trainer, and was going to finish her for me, only has a lung and a half due to blood clots and the winters are very hard on him so we decided I should get something with more time under saddle) for a 5 year old Morgan x who has been Amish broke. They broke him to work, ride, and drive. But since he isn't gaited the guy who has him now dosen't want something that isn't gaited. Anyway sorry for all the history just thought it would be helpful for you to know when you are helping me.

The guy told me he has only been ridden two times in 8 months and they have both been recently when he was showing him to potential buyers. He's currently turned out in 80+ acres of pasture with 19 other horses. He is fat and sassy. They also told me he is a little hard to catch at times but consdiering he is in so much pasture with so many other horses that maybe one reason, I'm assuming.. I know big sassy horses can be "playful" at times and be like that.. Gosh Arrow is sometimes hard to catch when he is "feeling his oats" as my dad says lol.

Anyways on to my questioning all yall, lol.. I want to get him back in shape to be rode at least 3 times a week. But since he hasn't been rode in so long I want to take it slow.
Now my questions are...How should I go about getting him back in "shape" or back to being ridden several times a week?

Now the reason I put this in training was I wanted to see what all advice yall have about the catching? I pretty much know what to do but I want to see if you all can come up with anything I wouldn't have thought about?

I won't get him til Sunday. They are doing an even trade and bringing him to me so I couldn't complain about when I got him lol I'm sure I will need yalls help further as I doubt he is everything they say he is.. Prior to deciding to trade with me they only had him listed for $400.00 So I am a little suspicious. (My dad says I am just naturally like that due to being lied to so many times about horses).

Congrats to anyone who read through all this hehe.. And thanks for any and all help in advance

 

[justsambam08]

Well I guess that depends on what exactly you're expecting.....I got my OTTB for 500 dollars, and he needed to be fattened up, reconditioned to improve his build a little bit, and also trained in the art of riding. He is 11 years old, but has been on the track all of his life--so I got a very very stable green broke horse.

For 400 dollars, you can definitely expect work, lol. For the slimming down process, look at what his current diet is--up his roughage and knock his grain down a little. Stick with a lot of walking and trotting and transitions....Make him go from trotting to a dead stop, for instance. If you can build up his muscle, that will also burn more calories/fat. There's no reason why you can't ride him three times a week as soon as you get him--it just won't be as long or as hard as you want it to be. In fact, the more often you work him (for the first six weeks, I worked my gelding daily) the easier it will be to bring him down to three days a week of medium to heavy work.

 

[kevinshorses]

I doubt that you could ride him hard enough to hurt him. Just ride him and work on getting him slimmed down. Don't worry about riding him too hard. Recreational riding is usualy classified as light riding. Very very few people ride horses hard every day. I only ride mine moderately most days so don't overestimate how hard you will be riding the horse. I wouldn't feed any grain unless he can't maintain his wieght with the riding your doing.

 

[CowGirlUp9448]

Thanks to you both. He's only 5 and was broken at 2 1/2 to 3 years old so I don't know I know some of the Amish around here work there horses pretty hard especially when training. I guess I didn't want to give him to much to do since he's so young lol.

 

[southerncowgirl93]

ride him a little longer than you think he can handle. That's what I did with my horse. I rode her about five minutes longer the first few days after she started breathing kinda heavy, then when she got better, bumped it to ten minutes, etc. until she got where I wanted. Also going up and down hills. They have to push more.