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The Importance of Lesson Horse and Tack Selection:

Lessons from the Bergen Equestrian Center

Categories: Management

Wow! After evaluating twenty-some lesson horses in less than two days, and after reviewing the importance of tack fit for lessons horses, I thought it would be helpful to highlight some of the lessons learned from this kind of exercise.

We recently started turn-key management of the Bergen Equestrian Center, located in Leonia, NJ, and I had the pleasure of conducting a lesson horse and tack evaluation staff training session at the Center. The staff were great, putting in long hours and helping get through the evaluations with great enthusiasm and a deep love for the horses. It was so rewarding to receive comments from the staff about how being advocates for the horse is so important....yes, clients make our facilities possible and providing them with an excellent experience is our focus, but we are all there because we love the horses! And lesson horses are such amazing, generous creatures...

Lesson 1: Temperament and disposition are very important and we all know that; a willing, calm and friendly attitude goes a long way! But, it’s not enough; the lesson horse must also be a versatile, healthy mount with a low, long-term price tag.

Lesson 2: Training in different disciplines and levels makes a lesson horse more versatile and therefore better able to make money for the facility by serving several different sectors of the market.

Lesson 3: Even if a lesson horse has good temperament and training, he still needs to be healthy and have the right conformation for the job. Health is important in terms of the bottom line because a lesson horse with a high monthly vet/care bill may be taking on a full work load but if he costs more to keep healthy than he makes, then he loses the facility money. And conformation matters because if we tax a horse's body beyond its capabilities we will cause health problems and break down. We owe the lesson horse the right start in terms of health: only horses with the right age and conformation to do the job required should be selected for lesson programs.

Lesson 4: Tack selection for lesson horses is also important and frequently not taken into consideration. When it comes to the health and price-tag of a lesson horse, tack can tip the balance. The wrong size and type of bit can hurt a horse’s mouth and cause riding issues, and bad saddle fit is the number one cause for back pain in horses. It can lead to soundness issues, dangerous reactions to the pain that are frequently mistaken for misbehavior and treated as such, etc. Some saddle brands and designs fit some breeds, sizes and/or types of horses better than others so a horse's final purchase price is dependent on the price of the tack he will need.

I will write more about this issue for the next Equestrian Services newsletter so please check in again for that. In the meantime, more lessons will arise as we continue our evaluations and trainings and I will share them as we go...and I welcome lessons learned from others! That is the beauty of the horse world; we learn something new every day!

- Alex Abella, Director, Equestrian Management

Posted by jenniferd at 2:03 PM | Link | 1 comment

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Re: The Importance of Lesson Horse and Tack Selection:

All too often I see horses that have old scars from improperly fitting tack that the have had to endure at some point during their lives. These scars are telltale signs that the horse could have some residual behavioral or training problem left over from these old tack scars and the trainer or rider must be sensitive to these issues.

Example 1 was a fourth level Dutch Warmblood gelding that had roundish patches of white hairs (the size of a silver dollars) on his rather high withers. These scars were on either side of the withers and not evenly spaced. This horse was always cold backed and did anything from hump his back to try and buck the first three or four steps after saddling. Through chiropractic and massage therapy, we kept him comfortable but he will always remember the pain of that saddle that left those scars.

Example 2 was a large Arabian schoolmaster that one could ride three abreast bareback or in a dressge seat equitation class and win. Either way, he was always very heavy on the bit, and upon examining his teeth the first time we found a constriction ring on his tonque from someone in the past 'tying his tongue' while bitted (probably in the stall for a long time) and as a result the tie almost severed his tongue. The poor beast probably had no feeling in his tongue since that incident. This was not poorly fitted tack, mind you, but still a scar that told legends about this horse.

Good lesson horses are kind and forgiving, sound and able, and I am always careful to go over them and analize every white hair. I have seen scars on the poll and nose from ill fitting bridles, scars on the jaw from too tight curb chains, scars on the girth area (very common) from poor tack or tack on a sandy horse, and of course the most common is the back and withers from a poorly fitting saddle.

Shelley Van den Neste

Posted by shelleyvdn on November 3, 2008 at 3:30 PM

The Importance of Lesson Horse and Tack Selection:

Lessons from the Bergen Equestrian Center

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