Since moving to America the pressure to specialize in culture here has really stood out. There is pressure on kids to specialize in sports early on, and know choose subjects for specialize careers much sooner than in most other countries. So no surprise that I have found the equestrian scene a little different since I moved here from the UK.
I remember early on being asked what discipline I rode.
“I’m not sure? All of them?”
Horses are put on a track early on in life. A dressage horse is a dressage horse. Riders too. A dressage rider only rides dressage. I’ve had dressage riders look at me aghast should I suggest they take their horse out on the trail. “But he’s a dressage horse!”
No, he’s not. He’s a horse. He doesn’t know he is a dressage horse. He just thinks he is a horse.
Hunter Jumpers can be just as bad. Arena only never ending jump drills. Try suggesting to some Hunter riders over here that they actually go foxhunting …
Creating discipline specialized horses in the USA is generally where the money is. I get it. But the issue with this is that these horses are not versatile. And should anything happen that means they can no longer practice in the discipline that was chosen for them, they are suddenly useless.
What if that jumper sustains an injury rendering him flat only? Do you expect him to retrain as a dressage horse at the age of 12, or does he get dumped at an auction?
What about that dressage horse who mentally checks out after year and years of arena work?
The versatile horse can switch disciplines and most importantly, the versatile horse can hack. No, I don’t mean hack as in ride around the arena on a loose rein (H/J definition of hack). I mean hack as in go out on the trail.
I’ve known a number of horses in their teens who have been unable to continue in the discipline chosen for them. Their owners, desperate for them to have some sort of value, try to turn them into trail horses. If a horse has only been ridden in an arena for 14 years, suddenly expecting it to be okay with going out on the trail is a big ask. Most of them are not. Most of them lose their minds and are terrified, simply because they have never had experience outside of an arena.
What happens to these horses? The ones who were put on a specialized track and have only known this but are unable to continue in their discipline. Nothing good.
Most horses in the UK are more versatile than horses in the USA simply because the equestrian culture is different there. Most horses in the UK hack out from an early age regardless of what discipline they are intended for. The beauty of this is not only a more enriched life for the horse, but it means that the horse can always have value. A trail horse has value. A horse that has value is a horse that is safe from slaughter or neglect.
The Irish Draught was literally born out of a need for extreme versatility in a horse. Strong enough to pull. Fast enough to foxhunt. Athletic enough to jump a gate out hunting, or pop down to the local show and showjump at the weekend. For those of us who love this breed, the versatility is one of the primary reasons, along with the soundness of body and mind. For those of us who want variation and to have one horse that we can hack out on one day, ride dressage on the next, and go jumping at the weekend, the Irish Draught is just that.
Breeders are just as much to blame for the lack of versatility in American horses as trainers and competitors are. Breeding very discipline-specific horses can set the horse up for failure in later life when they can no longer be competitive. Horses are expensive to keep and most owners are not willing to pay board for a horse that they can no longer ride in their chosen discipline. At least if that horse has the soundness of mind to be versatile, a good home can be found for him doing something.
