MFT questions

They really aren't all that rare. You can find them on DreamHorse, Equine Now, most all of the horse listings. They shouldn't trot, no gaited horse should trot. If they trot they aren't gaited which means the horse wouldn't be a foxtrotter. :wink:

They wouldn't be shown in dressage or trained in English unless they are shown with other gaited horses. You would see more of them if you were on a truly gaited horse forum.

SmoothTrails said:

They're not that rare. I'm from TN and they are around everywhere. They should never trot. Although they can it is not a desirable gait. It is the same in TWHs. Trotting and pacing are both wrong in a gaited horse. Most of the time it is caused by a rider who doesn't know gaited horses, incorrect trimming/shoeing, or poor conformation for the gait.

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Thank you SmoothTrails for the clarification. I guess what it comes down to is if you have a gaited horse that trots and you want to sell it don't try to sell it as a gaited. A gaited horse that trots is like a sin in the gaited owners mind. I just wouldn't see much point in buying and often paying top dollar for a gaited horse just to make it trot. That would be like buying a jumper with fantastic bloodlines and then use it as a barrel horse.

ponyboy said:

Icelandics both gait and trot. But I wasn't asking if they SHOULD trot, I was asking if they ever DO trot. Some laterally gaited horses stop gaiting and I wanted to know if foxtrotters had the same problem.



I don't care about showing, just training. All the foxtrotters I've seen have been trained Western.

I have a book that lists MFT's as a rare breed. They seem to be concentrated in a few areas and rare everywhere else.

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Any horse will trot. Trotting is easy, gaiting is harder. Although it is natural sometimes if a horse isn't ridden for a length of time they will revert to trotting. You also sit gaiteds a bit different which allows them to set their back correctly and gait. The person I bought my "trotty" Kentucky mountain horse from just let her trot to keep up with everyone else's horses. Hence she learned to trot to keep up at an early age and wouldn't try to gait at all.

Also in every gaited breed there are those few babies born that never gait.
Their is a stallion that once in a while produces babies that don't ever gait.

When you get into MFT breed shows they are shown more in dressage style so I guess you could say they are trained English for that.