Bought a horse

[ppine]

Tentmom,
You don't mention how much training the horse has had, or the experience level of you kids. Somebody has to know what they are doing. Get the horse checked out by someone who knows horses.

[Marshmallow]

My niece got a horse for Christmas. She is only 11, but she has convinced her parents she will take care of it. It's housed at a friend's house with the friend's horse. We'll see how long this lasts. I don't think they're going to take very good care of it, to be honest.

[ppine]

Tentmom,

Make sure you have someone you trust ride the horse and see what his "holes" are. Nearly any horse that is for sale will have some faults. As a parent you need to know what those are and work around them in the interest of safety. It is a lot cheaper to hire a professional to do this for you and maybe do a little foundation training than to hurt someone because they "didn't know the horse was afraid of...." fill in the blank.
Skateboards, goats, cars, minature donkeys, plastic bags, lightning, chickens, gunshots, gophers, llamas, men in black hats, etc. Horses are prey animals and are afraid of everything until you teach them not to be.

How old is this horse? Has he been around kids a lot? What type of training has he had? Does he buck? You get the idea. Best wishes.

[DMan]

When we owned horses, we started off boarding them out. It wasn't long before we had fencing put up and the barn spruced up. It is a lot of work to own a horse, but it is a labor of love. The advantage of boarding out a horse is if you can't get there on a particular day, the facility is there to make sure the horse if looked after. You won't have this luxury if you're keeping your horses at your own place.

[Grandpa]

I have a couple of neighbors, both excellent outdoors/horsemen. One is a school teacher and the other has a very robust business. Each maintain 2-4 horses. Since the business man has to travel a lot they have a deal. Business man buys the hay for both and the teacher feeds and generally cares for the horses. When the teacher leaves, the businessman takes over the care. They get along great and also have the advantage of using each others horses when the need arises. another win win