Taking a backed 4year old for walks

[sherry90]

Personal preference and depends on the roads round your yard in my opinion. As a 3-4yo I regularly hand walked my youngster round the village but these are mainly 30mph roads and quiet country lanes. I wouldn’t long rein on these roads though due to amount of traffic/vehicles unless I had someone else on foot to be in situ to move to his head if needed.

 

[sherry90]

Also to add, I lead out off a dually headcollar (loose) and a lunge line.

 

[Roasted Chestnuts]

I’ve been walking my boy out on the road in company and by himself since he was a weanling. Obviously when he was small it was short walks but now we are up to about 5km of walking as he’s three and is being long lined in the school in prep for being taken out with a friend on the road.

 

[scats]

Definitely depends on the horse. I’d take Polly in hand anywhere, I wouldn’t with Millie.

 

[Tarragon]

I think that riding out on a safe horse and leading a youngster is also a very valuable experience. They get to see the wider world and also get used to having a "body" up above them.

 

[paddy555]

I don't have a school so everything I do has to be on the roads or common and the roads are mostly single track
My aim is to meet difficult situations, tractors, lorries the bigger the better and anything else. That is all done led but then we move onto long reins. Leading is eventually done with the rope over the horse's neck and the horse following my body language. If anything goes wrong I can grab him but he is listening to me all the time.

Anything I am going to go past ridden I expect them to march past on long reins.
To try and avoid some of the problems they have learnt the one rein stop before we start going out on long reins and practised it and so have I. They have also learnt voice commands especially the rein back and the half halt and the emergency stop command. On the road I walk in the centre and keep the horse on the left. That way I am protecting the horse

I use short long reins that are ropes so I am walking very close to the hindquarters and the ring on the roller is very large so the rope slides though very quickly. If we met say a large lorry that the horse was still learning about then one stride and I would have one rope released and another stride and I would be at his head either leading, standing or reassuring him. I find normal long reins very long and faffy. No way could I cope with sorting them out with a lorry breathing up the horse's nose. Short ones make life very easy.
I traffic train them using the car, landrover and the tractor. I do it with the engine off and then we work up to doing on long reins with the engine being revved up and the horse squeezing past in a gap so narrow he hits his side on the wall. Then we do that backwards. I long rein past semi feral ponies and we drive any cattle and sheep we find in the way which teaches him something else.

I long rein both alone and with another horse. I make the other horse trot off so mine learns to be left behind or to turn around and leave the other horse.
Everything I do on the long reins is what I will be doing on top in the same neighbourhood. If I lived in a city obviously I would do something different as my riding would be different.

I know some people are brilliant riders and much prefer to be on top but I prefer the horse to have learnt all the basics with me on the ground and I find it gives them a good grounding.

 

[Illtellyoulater]

I think it might depend on confidence as well as preference. I spent ten years backing horses with a old school nagsman. He was brilliant on the long lines, I was the jockey. Consequently I find it easier to communicate when up on their backs and feel more confident there than on the ground, whereas he had a similar connection from the ground (although a fabulous jockey too, esp in his youth).
The extensive long lining he did made my life much easier when we started riding them out though