[maura]

I have a sweet wonderful 10 hand pony that we got for my daughter a couple of years ago and have kept as a pet since she outgrew him; and this week I'm finally making good on my pledge to break him to drive and give him a job.

I strongly suspect he's been driven before. First of all, he's in general sweet, well-mannered and well-broken, even pretty broke under saddle. IME, most small ponies are started by driving because of the lack of suitable riders.

So I put harness on him for the first time today, and the first clue was that he accepted the crupper with out turning a hair. When I first ground drove him, I picked up the reins and whip and asked him to walk on; he turned by keeping his body straight and crossing over as a horse in shafts will. Highly suspicious.

He was dead solid perfect ground driving. Walk, trot, halt, back in both directions and simple turns, perfect, no problem.

I then hitched a plastic tobaggon to the ends of the traces and had him drag it while ground driving; again, no problem.

Then I had my daughter sit in the tobaggon. He had a little trouble starting off pulling the weight from a standstill, but other than that, was fine. Again, since he could feel the weight on the traces, he would hold his body straight and cross over, rather than bend when he turned.

I am tempted just to hitch him to the cart tomorrow; but prudence prevails. I had my husband make a PVC U the same size as the shafts; I will add that to his ground driving ensemble tomorrow.

What do you think? Pony prodigy or driven before?

 

[jimmy]

sounds like he has been driven before,you would know for definite once he is in the cart and turn him full circle on the road,if he has no problems, then i,d say he knows his job

 

[churumbeque]

I think the weight of your daughter would be too much to pull not knowing how big she is. A cart and wheels doesn't have that much drag to it and is easy to pull. I wouldn't put more than 20 pds in the sled. If you can't pull it fairly easy then it is too heavy

 

[maura]

She's 70 pounds. That makes sense. I'm going to put something lighter in the sled today, and maybe try the cart tomorrow.

The cart has bicycle tires, so I'm hoping that will be easy for the little guy.

 

[22ponygirl527]

He definitely acts like an old pro.

 

[Zab]

He actually sound like my 2 years old colt who lived in a wild herd, got put on a plane, got neglected and then ended up with me; he ad barely seen a person before and definetly not a harness or cart. But he acts like he knows exactly what's it's about

Your horse is robably either well broke and has been pulling before, or he's a calm and good horse in general. Be careful but I don't think you'll get any problems.

Or have you already tried and how did it go?