Owners and Breeders of Drafts and Draft Crosses, What areYou and Your Buyers Using Them for?

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Carrie Bergles on July 12, 2009 at 12:36am

One of my horses is a full Percheron.
I got him when my dressage horse retired and I just wanted a low key horse to do some fun stuff with. Things that I never had time or an appropriate animal to do it with while my focus was competing.
We have done parades, charity events (cancer ride-a-thon, collecting food for the food bank), going through the Tim Horton's drive thru, basic dressage work and miles of trails. Almost forgot his latest skill, entertaining summer campers and being the arts and craft project. Next year we will add dressage shows to the calendar. I will upload pictures soon. I love my draft, he is a great horse!

Permalink Reply by Ann Hatfield on July 12, 2009 at 12:49am

Isn't it wonderful to have a breed, or individual horse, it is always hard to tell if it's really one or the other, that you can do all this with. Why did you choose a Percheron over say a Clyde?

Permalink Reply by Carrie Bergles on July 12, 2009 at 1:57am

I didn't set out to acquire any specific breed at all. I liked/got him for his temperament and the rest is just packaging to me. I found him through a friend of a friend. I was never a "draft lover" before, didn't even consider draft breeds before him, but now I certainly am reformed.

I have been told that Percherons are more sensitive and spirited than most other draft breeds, I guess due to their ancient purpose of being knights horses and the fact that they have some Arab blood a few hundred years back... I haven't really looked into the truth of any of this. I have noticed that with any breed there are certain common characteristics but also many variances. I buy horses not breeds. I can say that my Perch is quiet enough to walk through traffic in downtown Uxbridge but also sensitive enough to respond to the lightest of cues.

I must warn, I have discovered a pretty substantial downside to them too (full drafts anyway). Get ready to open your wallet... WIDE! Custom everything, hard time finding a farrier, boarding... not to mention that people react strangely to them. When I take him some places he gets swarms of adoring people trying to wrap their arms around his giant neck. Then I go somewhere else and feel shunned and overwhelmed with rude comments. Meh, I guess that's the downside of never being able to blend in.

Curtains for me! Talk later!

Permalink Reply by Ann Hatfield on July 14, 2009 at 1:14am

Carrie, In your previous post you mentioned rude comments by people. When does this happen? At shows or in competitions? What are people saying? I am tryng to understand why people would do this. I was under the impression we need more people in shows, not fewer.

Permalink Reply by Debbie Hoye on July 12, 2009 at 12:49am

i just recently bought a draft cross and the reasons for that choice were that I wanted a horse that had some dressage movement but wasn't limited to the dressage ring. He has a wonderful mind and a willingness to do almost anything I ask of him without drama. I've had him for a little over a month and we've been on the trails as well as in the dressage ring and he has been such a good boy. He's young yet so we'll have many miles to cross together and I think he's going to do very well...

Permalink Reply by Ann Hatfield on July 12, 2009 at 1:01am

What cross is your horse? How did you find him? Did you go to a breeder, talk to people who are in dressage, watch the equine websites that sell horses and specify a breed to find a cross? It is interesting to know how people find their horses.

Permalink Reply by Donna Humber on July 15, 2009 at 9:50pm

Well, thank you for this thread and this group !!! I own a Perch X Morgan mare, just 9 yrs now, and we competed in hunter when she was 7 [ baby hunters], as her canter needed work, and I hack alot & wanted her steady over obstacles. She went to a Mock Event and popped over EVERYTHING very nicely...and even cantered downhill.
Last few yrs, I have concentrated on dressage, and have the priveledge of a wonderful coach from the U.S. who summers here [ she is grand prix ].
I have had my horse referred to as a "cart horse" and worse, but you know, when an out of Province judge awarded her a 9 for her free walk in her very first show....I felt vindicated. She is no Olympic mount, but I am no Olympic rider. We struggle still with counter canter, but oh the lovely lateral work !!! We work on second level now, showed last year, and am gearing [ gulp ] for the first show this year. I have been asked if I will breed her, but have no plans to do so. Her temperament is sweetly bossy, and she will behave for anyone. She is a hair under 16H2", chocolate in colour....too big, really for me [ 5'3"], but we fit in other ways. She is a stellar trail horse, spooks in place and just for fun. She is smarter than most horses, and LOVES to play.

Permalink Reply by Ann Hatfield on July 16, 2009 at 11:24pm

Interesting that cart horse is being used as an insult when people are paying the earth for say Gypy horses, Oldenburgs and Freisans.

With the shrinking gene pools (inbreeding) of purebred dogs, horses, and goldfish, for all I know, the crosses may very well make the best horses for performance.

My farrier certainly thinks so, and he has looked at thousands of feet, many hundreds of legs and dealt with hundreds of personalities. Through all the years he has shoed he had developed a mild dislike for Warmbloods and a strong dislike for Quarter Horses. And this man was a working cowboy for years before becoming a farrier!

As through the decades I watch people buy horses that don't suit them, or don't fit what they really will use the horses for, I heartily wish people would consider draft-crosses more often. One can take a breed or type one likes and tone it down or modify it, to suit all sorts of disciplines, in general, or even sorts of riders.

I love Arabs, always have, rode them lots as a kid and came back to riding them in my twenties. I made some pocket money retriing 'bad' Arabs and selling them on. Now, at 56, a fresh young Arab is probably too much for me. So, as a broodmare and, I hope, a show horse I have Evangeline, a registered half Arab, with paint, Percheron and Arab, too, on her sire's side. She is a big strong two year old with lovely action and some jump- a six bar fence panel when a yearling being chased by a persnickety pony. I will show her in the half-Arab classes in the future, road hack, a bit of ow jumping, and a couple of others. I don't expect her to be looked on very favourable by those who love the Arab type. But I think she will excell at performance, and I cannot wait to have some young rider, better and bolder than I, ride her in show jumping some day and pehaps dressage.

Permalink Reply by Donna Humber on July 17, 2009 at 7:38pm

I agree. When it was said to me, I replied "thank-you" . Most warmbloods started out that way. Modern warmbloods are full of TB, to fine them up. I think a nice, kind, sturdy draft X is one of the best things on earth.
My farrier agrees with yours, by the way. Why do they dislike QH's so much....mine positively hates OTSTB's..but his biggest peeve is mini's. He says they are rarely trained, too low to be good for the back, and will kick,bite & half kill you, just for the entertainment.
I would LOVE to see some Arab X Perch. pics. Bet they are lovely. Arab blood was used to develop Perch.'s many moons ago, so I wonder what the cross would be like. Pics anyone?

Permalink Reply by Sherry Cassetori on September 21, 2009 at 10:22am

I am new to this site. However I am sooooo glad I found it. I just bought a belgian draft/thoroughbred horse 17.1 he just turned 6 in May , I board and take lessons at a barn with olenburgs . My trainer breeds and trains them. There is a woman at the barn that has one of my trainer horses, When I brought Moe there she said I had a plow horse and asked if I was serious about show him. My trainer told her she had picked the horse out for me and it was a great match.
That is just one comment you hear with a draft cross. However I do have to say Moe and I are learning together I feel very safe with him and would buy another in a minute.

Permalink Reply by Ann Hatfield on September 24, 2009 at 1:24am

Remember the old saying, "Handsome is as handsome does"? Don't let people put you off with unkind remarks!

It flabbergasts me that someone would make the effort to be unkind within the small community of a barn, where everyone sees one another all the time. It would have taken the same number of calories, as it were, for that person to have said, Nice horse." or "You look really happy and comfortable on your horse."

Stick with your trainer and those who have larger hearts. There is karma and one can hope there is reincarnation and she comes back as..what? An earwig possibly.

Permalink Reply by Sherry Cassetori on September 25, 2009 at 11:04am

Thank you for the support. I did remind this women that our trainer has a warmblood that is as big as my draft horse. I do not have a push button horse but I am learning and so is Moe, I feel it will make me a better rider. I also told her it takes a special person to ride a draft cross.

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