Whats the best way to start teaching your horse to jump?

Question

I mean I know you start out small, but do you start off not riding, and using a lead to run the horse over the object? Or do you start off on his back? Whats the safest way? How dangerous is it to start jumping your horse? Whats the maximum height for a horse who's barely 5 feet at the shoulder? Am I asking too many questions?

=] Thanx, anything helps.

Answer 1

you cant start jumping jumping until the horses knees are closed... you need to start out with trotting ground poles... then cantering ground poles... then you can start jumping... i would get a trainer to help you out or call and ask for advice from a trainer... they are a big help when starting your horse with something new.. the others have good answers too.....

Answer 2

Start with trot poles on the ground... lots of trot poles. Once your horse can do those no prob, stack 3 into a pyramid, and approach in a confident trot. When you have mastered that, make a mini cross pole at the bottem hole, and slowly work your way up. As for max  height, it really depends on your horse's ability more than anything. And work your way up slowly.

Don't do this all at once. Spend a week for trot poles..... 4 or 5 days for the pyramid and then maybe progress to a crosspole

You can do this mounted. If your horse is not very confident in the trot poles, you can lounge him over the trot poles, still at a trot

Answer 3

6 questions in 1 (not to many:) )

Ok first start only walking over troting poles. then troting over them. then get little caviletti and lunge over them. Jump over little crosses.

DON'T KEEP GOING OVER AND OVER JUMPS - otherwise the pony might think it did something wrong. go over it, then pat it and praise it maybe give it a treat  then do something else, then go back to the jumping. and gradually build you way up. Just remember give lots of praise. and be confident, trust your horse and don't get grumpy. Just work it out piece by piece. DONT WHIP AND KICK YOUR HORSE IF HER DOESN'T GO OVER!

I can be dangerous just remember to wear a hard hat and maybe a hard vest (Body protector)

As for the height question. There is no max. I have a mare who is only just 5 and is 4.7 at the withers and she can jump 5.5 foot. and my late pony frank was 4.4 and he jumped 5 foot.

Answer 4

you can have your horse to walk over the poles the try to show him horses who jump then make him try to jump just really small do it again and again until he can jump higher and higher.

Answer 5

I taught my horse to jump, what i did was a I worked on ground poles a lot, and then i just put jump standards for him to go throught ( with me riding him), with out a pole. Then once your horse is comfortable whit the standards try putting a pole like 5 inchs of the ground. Then every day raise the pole up a little bit, and then once you get to height you can work on, just keep doing it until your horse can come at it at an even speed, and feel comfortable as you go over it. if your horse is spooky, start with plain unpainted poles. i found that when i started putting flowers under the jumps, my horse started over jumping them ( he doesn't anymore). But remember to not push your horse to hard, some horses just aren't natural jumpers.

     All horses are different, some tiny pony's can jump higher then large horses, it all depends on your horse, but once you'll probably know when you've reached the highest jumps you should be jumping.

P.S  It's easier to jump your horse the first couple of times while your riding, because you can keep there speed up (or down), and they cant just deek out. when you go over the first couple of jumps approach at the trot, then later you can work on the canter.

and also horses are measured in hands.

hope this helps ; )

Answer 6

www.wikihow.com/Train-a-Horse-to-Jump - Cached