People with Experience of Young, Green Irish Drafts

[Cbffamily]

Hi, I am looking for some advice from people who have experience of young, green Irish Drafts. I purchased a 5 year old hunter in Feb, who origeonally origeonally came from Ireland.
He has a great temperament and I have spent the last few weeks hacking and building a relationship with him. I purchased him for hacking and hunting, understanding I would need to invest in his learning due to his age. I am looking for advice on how I approach this.

I am into week 10 of lessons with a qualified instructor. Lessons involve getting him to soften onto the bit, transitions, work in walk and trot, turn on the forehand, circles to encourage bend, and leg yield walk and trot. However, he is very unbalanced and finds the canter transition impossible, and cannot hold the canter.

The trainer’s opinion is to keep pushing for canter in each weekly lesson. However I feel this makes him stressed, rush and stiff - the complete opposite to what I want.

I am of the opinion I need to stick to the basics with him, lunging, trot poles, encouraging him to be long and low, build his core, build flexibility, carrot stretches, perfect walk and trot, leg yield - take it slowly. Then appraise the canter, maybe out hacking to see if he can handle cantering in the school. Looking for advice based on your experience with this breed. Thanks in advance

 

[paddi22]

yeah I think your gut instinct is right. I'd keep doing what you are doing and only canter in fields and straight lines until he strengthens. if you can find a hill you can canter up I'd do that as it will help him sit on his hind a bit more and get stronger.

 

[Bernster]

I’m not well qualified to advise but I did buy a 5yo ID who wasn‘t as green as yours but did need work in the school. Agree with the above but dep on your level of riding, for me what was really helpful in addition was having my ins school him once a week. Helped him with the basics, helped iron out or address any issues that I might have created, and really helped his education. I still have her school him weekly so that he continues to progress, even though he’s now 11!

 

[dixie]

Yes I would be inclined to agree with you.
i have a similar 5yr ID and he is also unbalanced in the school. I’m not rushing him, doing lots of hacking. I have done small jumps. Trotting in and cantering away which is very natural to him and less stressful than just trying to canter circles.

 

[Cortez]

I'll preface this with the fact that I'm not an Irish Draught fan, but many/most 5 year olds are lumpen gurt oafs until they learn some balance and strengthen up.

 

[AdorableAlice]

I'll preface this with the fact that I'm not an Irish Draught fan, but many/most 5 year olds are lumpen gurt oafs until they learn some balance and strengthen up.

and I will second this but I am a ID fan and have had several over the years. The big ones don't strengthen up until that are a good 7. Mine did not do a lot on a surface as babies, they hacked without being allowed to rush so they could gain balance. Don't mess or rush the walk, as he gets stronger the walk will become balanced and more ground covering. A good walk will lead to a good canter.

 

[tristar]

you really need to listen to the horse, identify the weak areas and build on a solid base of simple fundamentals, and transitions of the progressive sort,

lots of regular sessions where you may not seem to be doing a lot but everything you do will be a little step nearer to what you want happening naturally, especially with canter

hacking is the chance to build up power and let canter come more freely. giving the horse more chance to continue openly not like in the school where you keep hitting corners

 

[Pearlsasinger]

I think I would look for a RI who wants to work with the horse rather against him. Very few horses are physically mature and balanced at 5, big ones have no chance.

 

[Bernster]

Hah they are indeed great lumpen oafs but I love em

 

[ownedbyaconnie]

Not a big green Irish draft but I did buy a green Irish connie and she really struggled to get canter in the school so I didn’t really try. I was same as you and thought what is the point it only stresses us both out and the canter we got wasn’t nice. Luckily my instructor agreed with me

So I carried on working on walk and trot in the school, lots of suppling work, lateral work, getting a consistent rhythm and bend and let cantering to out on hacks on nice straight tracks and up hills. Let her musculature build up and then attacked the canter in the school when it was pushing her slightly rather than stressing her out.

I did pop the odd cross pole from trot in the school and if she landed in canter I’d try for half a circle. Otherwise I just let her guide me, the more I rode her the more I could understand when she was finding something challenging but doable and when something was just too much.

 

[LEC]

A lot of ID have a terrible canter. It’s one of the reasons warmblood was injected into them for jumping. They were designed to pull a cart so didn’t need to canter. I think people expect them to often have a better canter than they do.

Though they have been refined over the years, the well known IDs like king of diamonds were prolific because they were sportier they didn’t have the bone of many and had a good canter for the breed. There is much becrying from some about the lack of bone in ID stallions now but people don’t want horses to pull carts.

My roundabout point is there are a lot of ID that have a crap canter and it takes a long time to develop as they take a long time to strengthen. I had a lumpy, useless one recently and he took ages to finally hold himself in balance and canter well in an arena. We used a lot of cavaletti and bounces to help him develop and get better footwork and balance.

 

[spacefaer]

We've had IDs for many many years. My first response is Get Out of of the Arena!
Young draughts are not balanced enough or strong enough to work on turns and circles at 5. They still have several years of growing and maturing to do.
Take him hacking - lots of different places, different terrain, by himself and in company. Let him learn his own balance and strengthen up. All his paces will improve by doing this.

School work will shut his paces down and will make him unenthusiastic about work.

 

[ihatework]

Not really IDs, they aren’t my type, but I would reduce the difficulty/intensity in the arena (which doesn’t mean don’t do some schooling!) and work on the canter outside of the arena.

Last one I had that struggled in an enclosed space with the canter was a huge cob x Tb (17.1hh ish), and the bulk of his canter work done in his first year under saddle was initially on the gallops - straight line, learning to get into, out of and stay in canter. Every single bloody week! Then with brief spells either on a big circle in a field or huge arena. I’d say it took the best part of a year to get a reasonably balanced, connected canter that could be presented in a dressage test

 

[Goldenstar]

I do have ID’s but when they are at that stage I don’t go in the school I use the schooling field .
I also would caution about doing to much work with the head low they built to pull and everything to do needs to done with you clear in your mind that you don’t want to encourage them to push down with their shoulders .You don’t want their noses lower than to point of the shoulder at first .
They take time they are big heavy horses and they develop slowly .
I would canter up gentle slopes until he is stronger .

 

[Goldenstar]

ps I agree with IHW you are talking about a year but thats not a year of doing nothing that’s a year working towards the horse being ready for prelim .

 

[Cbffamily]

****** Thank you everyone, really appreciate your replies **********

 

[Cbffamily]

I do have ID’s but when they are at that stage I don’t go in the school I use the schooling field .
I also would caution about doing to much work with the head low they built to pull and everything to do needs to done with you clear in your mind that you don’t want to encourage them to push down with their shoulders .You don’t want their noses lower than to point of the shoulder at first .
They take time they are big heavy horses and they develop slowly .
I would canter up gentle slopes until he is stronger .

This is an interesting point reagrding the head, so are you saying this because of their structural make-up?

 

[Asha]

I found with our young IDs the best thing was teaching them to canter out in an open field and teaching them voice commands. That way when you are ready to go into the arena its a bit easier . Plus when you want to do some school work id keep them out of a standard 40x20 arena. the corners just come up too quickly for them

 

[spacefaer]

This is an interesting point reagrding the head, so are you saying this because of their structural make-up?

They're originally designed to pull things - so you need them to learn to push from behind, not pull forwards with low heads. They need to get off their forehand, (which they are naturally built on - as a breed, they can tend towards having a "loaded" shoulder, conformationally speaking) Warmbloods tend to be built with a more uphill conformation (think carriage horses vs draught/plough horses) and that is where the desire for "long and low" work has originated. It isn't always suitable for all types of horse.

I would concentrate on getting transitions sharp and off the leg, and not worry about the head carriage. They will work in the "correct" outline, when the power is coming through from behind, and not before. Hillwork with transitions up and down hill will help a lot.

 

[Cortez]

Irish Draughts are designed for runny jumpy stuff, it baffles me why people insist on trying to make them do prancy things (other than for the obvious gymnastic benefit of course).

P.S. they haven't really been bred for harness for decades.

 

[Goldenstar]

They are draughts they not bred at their roots to move up hill .
They are big horses and it takes them ages to build the strength and poise in their bodies .
If you stick theirs heads too far down they just get stuck on the fronts ,that’s when you see them at five with a big bit in their mouth because they strong , they are strong ,they are not strong they are weak in their bodies and leaning on the rider .
A stretch for a horse starting training just needs to be a little more than they offer naturally just pushing the head down risks dumping the horse on its forehand .

Try to teach a draught to push with their chest for opening gates etc it’s as natural to them as breathing .I have not had one that did not understand that in a nano second
Lean against their chest when they are young they will lean back it’s natural so you have to teach them to step away from you with great care .
Often they are frightened by people when they are young they can then become bargy wooden brutes .
You need to understand them as you train them for any riding job even if that’s a being a nice hack .

 

[Goldenstar]

Irish Draughts are designed for runny jumpy stuff, it baffles me why people insist on trying to make them do prancy things (other than for the obvious gymnastic benefit of course).

P.S. they haven't really been bred for harness for decades.

I did not read the OP’s first post to mean she’s trying anything more than trying to train a nice riding horse.

 

[karenb]

I've had several young ID's over the years. Hacking, hacking and more hacking. You can do transitions and bending and leg yielding when you are out. As much hill work as you can do will teach him balance and strengthen his back end. Let him fall into canter naturually and then leave him alone to bowl along. 5 is young for an ID and they don't really mature until they are 7 or 8. Avoid the school.

 

[Goldenstar]

BTW I would always train the canter transition from walk if they struggle .
letting them run into does not help .

 

[sherry90]

I have a 7yo. He’s only just now building enough balance that his canter doesn’t feel a bit wall of death. Out hacking he was straight and forward - the school took time and I didn’t overdo it.

They are great lumps and not built traditionally for dressage but that doesn’t mean they can’t be trained to hold themselves so the work is easier. Mine is very trainable. Yes he’s more on the forehand than a purpose bred dressage warm blood but he moves well, good hock action and he doesn’t crap himself at a judges box or whiteboard ? I love them!

 

[spotty_pony]

Yes that's all perfectly normal. They don't mature until they are about 8/9. I broke in one last year (he is crossed with Friesian so he finds it even harder) and we are just cracking cantering in the school now - he is 6 this year. But he gets tired very quickly so I warm up, do some canter work early on and then do trot work at the end when he is getting tired. We probably only school for about 20 mins. We started by getting the canter out hacking and in straight lines, and now just canter large around the school.

 

[VioletStripe]

I'll preface this with the fact that I'm not an Irish Draught fan, but many/most 5 year olds are lumpen gurt oafs until they learn some balance and strengthen up.

Side question - Cortez I would love to know why you are so anti-ID! Not in a 'how could you' way but in a genuinely interested way. Is it all Irish breeds or just Draughts?


OP - I echo what most others have said on here. Build strength out hacking, and with lots of transitions out there too. A good walk means good canter, and start with quality of canter over quantity. Start with maybe 2 steps and a horrible rushing transition uphill, back to walk and stretch. IDs take a huge amount of time to fully develop, I rode one gelding which only really clicked at around age 8/9. My friend's ID mare used to trip a lot in canter in the school at the age of 6 when she first got her and it was only through taking it slowly and doing more hacking that this improved.

I often find walk-canter transitions easier to sit to and so develop strength for them than trot-canter. Also lots of lungeing on a big circle, or even just around the arena instead of a true 'circle', to let them find their balance - no gadgets, just one line not attached to their mouth, and let them do trot-canter and walk-canter transitions, not worrying about bend or quality too much at first. (and remember to boot or bandage them up for it!)


ETA - a bit further down the line, I find a nice way to build strength and a good canter transition is to spiral in and out of circles in trot, leg yielding out to a larger circle, and as you leg yield out to the large circle, use that bend, forward momentum, respect for the leg and balance to nudge them into canter and build up from a few steps there. Lovely exercise that I haven't found a horse not to benefit from yet - but take it slowly at first and build up the foundational strength.

 

[Cortez]

Double posted

 

[Cortez]

Side question - Cortez I would love to know why you are so anti-ID! Not in a 'how could you' way but in a genuinely interested way. Is it all Irish breeds or just Draughts?

I'm not anti ID's per se, indeed for hunting there's no better horse for the job. But I don't want to hunt, and I don't have any use for the particular talents of the Irish Draught Horse. They're not my sort of horse at all, so I don't have any and everybody's happy. I am extremely fond of Connemaras and used to have several in my business, they're the best horse in Ireland.

 

[daydreamer]

I have started sharing my friends ID. It is a bit different as he is older (mid-teens) but I have been finding the canter tricky (and everything else tbh), his stride just got shorter and shorter and he fell in so much he couldn't seem to maintain it at all. After not having much success making improvements on my own I have recently had a few lessons with my instructor and we have made great progress. She said part of the problem is that he is built downhill and doesn't use his back at all.

We spend the whole session doing transitions (WH every few strides, then WT every few strides then slow trot fast trot every few strides) and focus on keeping his head up. The improvement is amazing. He will be much stronger than your guy and will have better balance but the keeping the head up has been really useful and so different from what a lot of people would advise.