what age do you let your children hack out alone?

My two daughters have both hacked alone from the age of 11 but the ponies have been ok ( nothing is 100% ) and we have hacked the routes around here many times together and I know how long it takes and they have had mobiles. That said I have been known to follow discreetly in the car, without them knowing for the first hack and still worry!! But they both gain so much from it.


I think kids spend too long in the school and their seat is helped greatly from hacking alone or otherwise.
 
i was about 11 or 12 i think but i preferred going with other people (a couple years older) before then i would go out with my mum or other riders unless i was going on a VERY short hack around the block, basically no roads and my mum knew where i was. i had also been riding regularly (by this point i was riding every day) before going out alone, and my pony was a little *****.. and im 17 now, i think people worry too much
 
started hacking alone at 12 with a nappy pony who spent most time on his back legs- I am 24 now so it wasn't that long ago.

We lived near Windsor at the time and hacking included a lot of main roads leading to/from the motorway.
 
from the age of about 9 [shes now 14] my daughter was hacking out with other adults & older children - very rural horsefriendly area & lots of bridleways & gated roads - she got so much from riding with someone other than her boring mother:) - she has never been interested in solo hacking - much to sociable - ie chatty- for that
just to add - both ponies she had in that time were sane & sensible
 
I hacked out when i was 11/12 but always with my friend who was a few years older than me, we had great fun, picknick hacks and everything, although we both had fairly safe ponys on the road and was in the middle of the countryside!

Always had to both keep our mobiles on us!
I'm 15 now and my mums happy for me to hack alone, as long as i've got mob on me incase :)
 
i started hacking on my own at 10. cob was safe as houses. id HATE it if my mum wouldnt let me hack out til i was 16/17!! im 17 now and people ask me to take out their ''crazy bad to hack out on their own'' horses and its fine. im glad my mum trusts my ability :)
 
I think I was allowed to hack out alone from the age of 12/13... but then again it may not have been so much 'allowed' as I decided and I have a feeling that if that was the case they were resigned to the fact that they wouldn't be able to do anything about it!

I keep meeting a young lad on a gorgeous 15.2ish TB type on one of my work routes. He can't be more than 12 max, and the horse is spooky enough, but he rides it beautifully and is much more sensible than a lot of adult riders round here, coping with meeting traffic on narrow lanes etc.
 
At the age of 12 (im 20 now) i was out alone sometimes with more than 1 horse! i was also escourting rides for the riding school i rode at. we didnt exactly have 'typical riding school horses' either. quite a few of them were there because quite simply if they did not do 2-3hr work a day they were unrideable types. yes there were some hairy moments (but i had equally the same no when with others) but tbh i am the rider i am today because i was given those oppotuinities. i suppose i was fortunate in the fact that neither of my parents are horsey they used to drop me off at nine in the morning and pick me up a five on the weekends and never really knew what i was up to during the day cos i wasnt foolish enough to tell them lol!!!

i would say be careful encourage her to have lessons and initially go with her certainly until she is on quieter roads (or maybe hacking round the fields at the farm to begin with) until you are both confident enough to let her go out alone. but in the longer term she can only gain experience by being out there doing it. at the end of the day shes not going to learn how to handle situations out on the road until shes been there and done it a few times scary as it is for you. make sure she has a working phone with her and that your not too far away and know the route.
 
I think it depends on many things, the ability of the rider, the reliability of the horse and the hacking.

My daughter is 9, she's a damn good rider and has a super 13.2hh pony thats as safe as they come.
We hack out together on proper hacks or she goes with a friend of mine.

She also rides in the school on her own when I am mucking out, and sometimes takes her for a wander up the farm tracks on her own or around the field opposite the barn.
Now I can see her at all times, but the reality is if something happened, I couldn't grab her pony.
But I guess I could get to her pretty quick.

Her and her pals often go into the field opposite on their own with Mums watching from the barn entrance, not one of us could intervene if the horses got spooked, but then I couldn't when out hacking with her and on my own horses back. She would have to deal with whatever her pony threw at her.

Proper hacking on her own, be years from now. Not sure she'd even want to though, she's a sociable kid and likes riding with the other kids, much more fun :D

Times have changed, my sister and I would bugger off the whole day at 8 & 9 and ride all day with no adult supervision and no one knew where we went or what we got up to, those days were great :)
 
I think the barn where I lease a pony only lets out kids 15 and older on trail by themselves. 14 and younger have to have an adult with them.
 
I think when i got my first pony at 12 my parents never really said anything but i didnt really hack her alot, if i did it would be along the lane
but even when i was 14 and used to go for 2/3hour hacks my dad was still like make sure you've got your phone on and your not gonna fall off and be in danger
but i know my pony well so i didnt do anything stupid and ive always been safe hacking with her *touchwood*
 
I was 10 when I started hacking on my own. I used to ride one pony out, who could be a nappy brat, come back and take another one out. I hacked on roads, open fields and woodland and never had so much as a problem. At 13 I was hacking out my mums very sharp 16.2hh mare.

I was put on a shetland at 6 mnths old and was hacking alongside my mum off the lead rein when I was 4 and never went back on! But it depends on how confident your daughter is. My mum trusted my ability and my friends and I used to have some mad hacks which was great for my riding!
 
I remember goin for short hacks by myself when I was about 8 or 9 (cause i still had my first pony), but they were in a very very quiet and horsey area, so it was perfectly safe!!
and as I got older we moved yards to one with a lot o off road hacking, and then I was off out by myself an others all the time :-)

My ponies were wonderful though, and mum trusted them with me and also me with them :)

I'm pretty sure she wouldn't have let me near any fast or busy roads until I was at least 13 though, but it's a subject which never came up cause there weren't any :)
 
I'm 16 now but have been allowed to hack out on my own for the past 2 years on my cob, who is actually better behaved on his own.
My mum is a very novicy rider, but she hacked him out on his own and I was worried for her! some role reversal there.

I often hack out with only one other person who maybe an adult, or it could by my friends who are younger, varying from 11-15. TBH I think there are more adults at the yard who are unsafe on the road than kids. I think it is less to do with age and more with maturity, and the horse.
The hacking around me is on roads as well as fields, and they're not extremely busy, but you usually meet a few cars.
 
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