starting in harness

Question
Hi Lana, I have twenty years experience with horses eventing, teaching, and training. I embraced natural horse training ten years ago and have two mares both trained to level three PNH. Now I am keen to explore harness. There are no local mentors available. Using my horse sense and what I have read I have quite easily put my older mare to the cart. Now I am starting on the other who has been the easier to train in everyother regard...until now.She is very sensitive and responsive but this is causing her to be extremely nervous about the blinkers and about the 'makeshift drag shafts' touching her thigh. I cant find the information about why horses need blinkers but I have observed in photos that even in the same team one will have them while the other wont. Therefore I have taken the blinkers off and she has visibly relaxed some but is still, or perhaps as a result of having perservered with them for a few days has developed, a considerable tension. I have made up a concept of fixing suspended 'shafts' off the side of her so that if she panics she cant get tangled and this seems to be ok but I am worried about going back to drag shafts or the cart without blinkers until I understand why they are used or not used. Have you any advise. Thanks.

Answer
Hi Camille;

Blinkers are not necessary, they just tend to be what harness horses are started in, kind of like you starting a riding horse in a snaffle bit.

The reason for blinkers is to cut down the horse's vision, particularly behind the horse.  If you've ever tried to ground drive a horse from behind the first time in an open bridle, the horse generally tries to spin around to face the person, or gets very nervous about the person being behind them, going in and out of their field of vision, and tries to run away.  Then when you add the cart, that's another obstacle that needs to be overcome.  A blind bridle 'usually' prevents spinning around, nervousness or outright panic from happening.

The blind bridle also tends to keep the horse's focus straight ahead of it as they don't see all the distractions around them, and thus they tend to spook less and travel straighter.

Every once in awhile you'll come across a horse that prefers to see everything and gets really nervous in a blind bridle, able to sense things around it, but not see them.  It sounds like this is how your second mare is.  This type of horse also gets nervous when they feel the shafts 'tied' to their sides.  They feel trapped and trapped to a horse means 'death'.

There are other bridles to choose from besides a blind or open bridle.  One of them is a bridle called a kant-see-back which allows the horse vision forward and to the sides, but not behind.  This can also be achieved by adding cheek rolls to an open bridle.   

Nowadays, the Standardbreds don't 'tie' their shafts to the horse.  They have a harness system called a 'quick hitch'.  The yoke of the harness has a hitching mechanism holder while the shafts of the jog cart or sulky are cut short and have the 'mate' to the holder.  The cart or sulky then simply 'clicks' into the holder.  This way the shafts don't touch the horse's sides and the cart or sulky can be clicked on or off in seconds.  Most harness and carts can be switched over to this quick hitch system.  This might be something you want to look into.

I would carry on with what you're doing and just take your time, not going onto the next step until she's become 'bored' with what you're currently doing.  I would also continue to experiment with her to see if you can come up with a system/equipment she's comfortable with.

Not every horse can go to harness. I myself have come across one, an Arab/Saddlebred mare, that simply couldn't handle the set up.  She was also a very sensitive horse.  After I had a go at her, another gentlemen who's trained several to harness also tried and he too had no success.  So, if your mare just doesn't have the mentality for it, don't sweat it as I'm sure she has other talents.

Best of luck!

Sincerely,

Lana Reinhardt