rechooling a trotter?

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pelena

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Hello! My old (and retired) pony in France has just acquired a new fieldmate, a trotter mare who was brought home by our farmer neighbours as she had been left in a field to the point of neglect. She is still young (7) but has only been lightly broken to ride and has raced as a trotter (I know) before being dumped in a field for the past year.... They are hoping she might make a fun hack for their daughter, who is a reasonably good rider, but are willing to keep her regardless (they have plenty of land).

I go back to see my family quite a bit and have been asked if I can help out with her when I am around, which I am more than happy to do, but does anyone on here have a clue how to go about it? Is it hard to teach them to canter, for instance? I have taken on a few youngsters, including my own, in the past but I admit I am a bit stumped on that one so would appreciate any suggestions! :)
 
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So long as it doesn't pace naturally then it is much like schooling a normal riding horse. Canter is hard initially as many are never allowed to canter when working. The best time to get the canter is out on a hack with plenty of space and a friend in front to get them moving.

Ex pacers are harder as they tend to go into a pace when excited - If they were born naturally pacing they will be far harder to get them to trot than the horse who was hoppled to pace. Trotting poles work well to encourage them to trot but will take a lot more time and patience. I rode a pacer for three days on a trek and he was so comfortable I didn't have to rise to the trot all the time.
 
Evelyn said:
So long as it doesn't pace naturally then it is much like schooling a normal riding horse. Canter is hard initially as many are never allowed to canter when working. The best time to get the canter is out on a hack with plenty of space and a friend in front to get them moving.

Ex pacers are harder as they tend to go into a pace when excited - If they were born naturally pacing they will be far harder to get them to trot than the horse who was hoppled to pace. Trotting poles work well to encourage them to trot but will take a lot more time and patience. I rode a pacer for three days on a trek and he was so comfortable I didn't have to rise to the trot all the time.
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Thanks, that's really helpful. I will have to see how we get on! Poor girl, I haven't seen her yet but my mum said she arrived with totally overgrown feet so she will be getting a full check-up before we do any work with her. Most of these ex-trotters go for meat in France so I'm really glad they brought her back home. :(
 
Schooling with trotting poles is how we did it. We concentrated on his trot for the first couple of months, and only when he was really comfortable and going nicely in trot did we introduce the transition to canter and the canter. Slow, but regular and consistent schooling was how we re-trained ours and it worked well.
 
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