What is the best age for breaking horses?

Question

What is the best age for breaking horses?

Answer 1

It depends on the individual horse and what kind of job it is going to do.  Some horses can handle the new experiences earlier than others.

Generally speaking a racehorse will be backed at about 18 months old.  In my experience the colts are backed just before Christmas and the fillies in the new year.  After they have been backed they will be turned away for a few weeks, or months if needed, to grow a little stronger.  Once they are brought back in they will go through the backing process again before beginning trotting work and eventually work up to cantering.  In GB the two year old races do not start until the end of March, and the vast majority of two year olds do not run until the summer.

As far as other breeds/types go, I'd advise backing at about 3 years old before turning away for about 6 months.  Once brought back in, begin with lunging and long reining to strengthen the horse and get it used to voice commands.  Depending how well the horse responds to this work you can then progress to ridden work.

Remember that each horse is an individual and should never be worked for more than an hour or so a day to begin with.  Working them for long periods will make them sour and uninterested in the work.  Don't forget that teaching a horse to be ridden is like us learning a foreign language - could you handle French lessons all day every day?!

Answer 2

generally speaking, I talked to my vet about it with both my babies.

I got one of them at 2, and did a pre purcahse exam that included xrays.. Due to the xrays. . . the vet said he was fine to break anytime after the next 6 months ( so at 2 1/2) He was a TB and his growth plates were almost complete. He was fine boned as well.

The other i got at 3 coming 4. The vet xrayed again and reccomended waiting a bit, so we broke him after he was 4. He was a Warmblood and very thick...so I guess it depends.

Best bet , i'd wait till 3 for a finer bred horse and 3 1/2 for a wb or thick breed. You want to go slowly and remember that lunging the horse is not always great either, so if you have acess to an arena you may want to 'free lunge'  not just use the tiny circle.

Answer 3

i thimk the best age is two to 4 because the older they get the harder it is two break ummm but you need to start ground breaking um two to three weeks after birth

Answer 4

I think a lot depends on the horse, the rider, and the intended use of the horse.  

FWIW, I'm a great believer that the athleticism of the horse is grounded in a good beginning as a youngster, that it is impossible to raise an athlete as a "hothouse flower."  To build the bone and muscle that an athlete requires, I believe that young horses have to be able to run together as a group at least until they're late yearlings.  That doesn't mean they're never handled, but it does mean that they aren't spending most of their time in stalls or small pens where they never can raise a gallop and stretch their limbs.  The unfortunate thing is that people who raise young horses for show or sale want to keep them blemish-free and in show shape, and that requires keeping them in a stall.

Ground handling should commence ASAP after foaling, so that by the time a horse is a yearling it will allow itself to be caught, haltered, led, and stand quietly while its feet are worked on.  There are other things you can do to help bring the baby along-- things like accustoming it to the sound and feel of clippers, having a towel or saddlecloth dragged along its back or flipped under its belly so it doesn't freak out, wearing bandages or leg wraps, and being loaded and unloaded from a trailer.  But until the baby is a "long yearling," most of its days should be spent out in pasture being a horse.

Economics for show and race horses mostly demand that that by the end of their yearling year, they should be started under saddle and accustomed to wearing a bridle.  This is usually no big deal, in terms of physical stress to the horse:  it's a matter of handling and teaching, rather than physically conditioning.  I personally think it's good to work on these things when the colt or filly has the maturity to handle them without going to pieces if anything goes wrong or there are distractions;  and that's kind of an individual thing, you have to sort it out for each horse.

I think that up until this point, nobody would have any problem with training young horses.  But once you start asking them to bear weight and then physically condition them for performance, this is where you start to get disagreements, because if you work young horses too hard too early, you may induce injuries and problems that will follow the horse for the rest of its life.

A lot of trainers prefer not to get a young horse into a serious regimen of physical training and weight-bearing unitl there is radiographic evidence that the epihyseal plates of the knee joints have closed.  This occurs sometime around 2-3 years of age, but varies from horse to horse.  And of course not all trainers are going to go through the expense of having knee X-rays done to assess the maturity of the joint.  

This is also where economics plays a big part in things:  if you're a trainer whose livelihood depends on having two-year-old horses win at the races or shows, you're going to be reluctant to wait.  If you're a "pinhooker" who depends on reselling as two-year-olds horses you bought as yearlings, you're going to need to push them some.  

It's this intersection of economics with what is in the best interests of the horse where people get into "train wrecks."  Horses for race or show or sale are, in a lot of cases, "perishable commodities;" if you don't have them ready when the opportunities for them to race or show are sell come, you lose money.  

My personal feeling for a pleasure horse for my own use is that I'll train it to drive as a late two-year-old, as long as the maturity of mind is there, because driving is not as physically demanding as riding is, and you can get a whole lot of training issues accomplished before you ever ask the horse to bear the weight of a rider.  But most people don't drive horses, and don't know how to train them for driving, so this isn't an option for them.

I think most of us would like to see horses achieve a degree of physical maturity that enables them to stand the stresses on their bodies before they go into hard physical training;  and that's usually not until late in their two-year-old year at the earliest, and more typically at three or even older.  Most horses have the mind to deal with training a lot earlier, and I don't think anyone has any issues with that kind of training as long as you let the horse tell you if you're trying to move too fast.  

...And let's not even get started on the use of steroids and other pharmaceuticals used to accelerate the physical development of horses that are not yet mature! :-(

Answer 5

When you are old enough to have patience, and young enough to heal quickly!

Answer 6

2 years old, and here's a great site for the best way to do it.

http://www.horsetrainingsuccess.com/

Answer 7

It depends on the horse in racing they break in around 18 months but it showing and other areas it tends to be around 3 years but it best to take everything in to mind as some horses may not be physical or mentally ready at 3 or before

Answer 8

Depends on what you are asking the horse to do in later life. Most people would say 3, but horses can and should be handled on the ground long before that- in fact, training should be started when the horse is born. Saddle training is usually started at 3 for most types of pleasure and riding horses- but with young Thoroughbreds, the horse is ridden at 15 to 18 months of age, depending on where the animal is being raised and trained. ( By the way, if you "Break" a horse- you will end up with just that- a "Broken" horse. The term most of us in the performance and show industries now use is "Start", not "Break". )