subject: Tips For Buying Your First Horse [print this page] Starting your look for horses for sale can be hugely daunting because there are so many factors to consider. It requires a lot of research and much knowledge on your part about why you want a horse and what for. There are a few major uses that people focus on when buying. The first is racing and competitions. The second is for breeding. The third is for pure recreation. The fourth is to help with labor.
Horses live for about twenty five years--thirty if you are lucky. Their prime years are between three and fifteen years old. Of course, some can peak earlier or later, but show horses especially should fall in this range if you want them to perform well. There are many ways you can check the age of a horse.
The most commonly known one is teeth. Wear on the teeth is one of the few things an owner cannot disguise to make a horse look younger. Wear on the hooves is the same. Check for cracks or evidence of poor shoe placement. If the horse is dark, look for any gray hairs around the nose, mouth, and ears. This one obviously requires your judgement, as many young horses can have gray hair in places.
If you are going to use it to compete or breed, knowing the age of the horse can help you get it in the correct category. Not just any horse of any age can enter any competition. If it is a male, see if it is gelded. This has an obvious effect on breeding, but can also determine race or competition entries.
Training an animal yourself is very important when it comes to having a good bond between rider and animal. The younger the horse, the easier it will be to make your impression on them and teach them habits you want them learning. Some buy horses young to breed them as much as possible, but you should never breed a horse until it is three years old. If you can wait until it is six, that is even better.
A horse's skeletal system keeps growing until the age of six, so premature breeding will put a lot of strain on the animal and cause problems with the foal or ruin the grown horse for both physical and breeding purposes. It is also important that nothing take away from this valuable training period. Pregnancy could certainly do that.
If breeding is your goal, you need to make sure you understand everything about horses, including their genetics. It can be a full-time job and a very expensive one that sometimes pays huge returns. The purpose of breeding as an occupation is to accentuate traits and create horses suitable for certain things. When one powerful horse mates with another, they could produce a very strong offspring good for labor. Breeding two horses with long legs could make a foal that will be a star at jumping.
If the goal is just to buy a horse for your recreational use or for beginner lessons, you can afford to be a great deal more lax in your standards. You may want to know the pedigree and you certainly want to know the age and temperament, but apart from that almost any horse will do. Learn of health problems beforehand and practice riding it before you sign any paper work to make sure it suits you.
