Driving your haflinger, fitting harness

One of the most important parts of driving is to have a WELL adjusted and fitted harness.
Do you like to go for a 10 mile hike with ill fitting shoes?  Well your horse has no desire to
pull your weight and the cart in an ill fitted harness. 
Harness comes in two basic styles.  Breast Collars and Working Collars.
We are going to focus on a breast collar harness for this blog.

First of all please realize all the weight of the cart, people and stuff is placed on the breast
collar.  So all those harness with a SMALL narrow breast collar should be thrown out.
The breast collar should be wide, padded and fit between the horse's points of shoulder and below
the wind pipe/esophagus.  There are many materials a harness can be made out of.... leather,
biothane, nylon to name a few.  The type of material is not as important as the thickness and fit.

If the breast collar rides up too high it will restrict the horses ability to breath.  If it rides down
too low then the movement of the shoulders as the horse strides forward will be impared.
Now the collar is held up by a single or double strap that crosses their neck.  Again this should
not be too narrow or it could cause discomfort to the horse's neck.  The single strap is meant for
pleasure harness and generally the double straps are for driving with more speed or cross country.
Each are good but the double helps keep the breast collar from rubbing or moving too much when
pulling over uneven ground or changing gaits quickly. 

Lastly the breast collar is attached to the cart with the traces or tugs.  This should be a
well cared for attachment with no tears or nitches.  This is the ONLY item truly pulling you and
your cart.  It is the main attachment point between horse and cart.  TAKE CARE OF IT.

The trace should be long enough that when the horse strides out the cart is not too close to
the horse's rear legs.  If your horse has a LONG stride and clips the cart when its legs move
you will probably have an interesting first trot.   Hopefully it does not end in a bolting horse.

Traces should also attach in a safe manner not too low to the ground and certainly not flopping
sloppily when the cart is in motion.  Trace holders are a nice addition if your cart's attachment
point is low.

Ok, watch for more!

Lessons at Top of the Line Farms

Many people ask how our summer has gone and I would like to show some of the fun things our friends at TLC horses (  http://www.deonahorsetlc.com/ ) have been up to.  As many of you know Deona Madsen is dedicated to teaching people to ride and ride SAFELY>  She has lessons for adults and youth and has been using new and old games and fun events to help her students to ride or drive with confidence.  Here are a few pictures of her at work!   http://picasaweb.google.com/topofthelinefarm.com/LessonsWithDeona 

Looking to work with your horse or one of ours to learn to ride?  Stop on by and meet Deona.  You will learn and ENJOY!

Endurance Riding with Haflingers

Just an update so everyone can see where we have been and where we are going with our Haflingers.
This year both Socrates and Lilly are competing in AERC rides.  Both are doing 50 mile rides with ease.  We have slowly worked up to this but now are looking at expanding to two day 50 mile rides as both horses are FULL of desire to move out on trail.  Anyone out there wanting to join us with their Haflingers?  PLEASE let us know and we will help you train your hafy for this wonderful sport.