I am looking for recommendations for videos on teaching horses to drive.  I'd like to teach my pony gelding to drive, so he can earn his keep (nothing irks me more than a pasture ornament that has the ability to work!!!).  He ground drives pretty good, though we can certainly work on improving that, and I'm looking for some sort of DVD out there that will teach me how to safely get him to pull something, working our way up to the cart.

I started with a book by Doris Ganton called Breaking and Training The Driving Horse, was able to find the video by the same name that went along with the book. This was the only book I ever used. It is very informative, everything from fitting a harness to learning to use your hands.

There is a great video called,"Teach your horse to Drive, lessons one & two", by Mary Ruth Marks. I have seen it for sale on the Carriage Association of America web site store.  

 i remember that book by doris ganton.  wow, that's an old one.  i read that when i taught my pony to drive--too many years ago to count!!

I would also recommend the Doris Ganton book as being very informative and having good photos of what is being explained in the learning steps.  It is always the first book I recommend to beginners.  If you can locate the video as well, it is also helpful.  Some folks like video over reading a book to understand things better.

The main thing with Driving training is to make sure the animal is totally understanding and obedient at each step of training.  They MUST respond immediately, CORRECTLY, to commands given.  As the Trainer, you need to ask and GET the correct response the FIRST time.  If you ask and ask and ASK with wrong response or no response, you are training horse to be bad!!

Your WHOA command has to be instant, and pretty much a loose rein, because that is your emergency brake.  If something happens, horse must be stopped, the WHOA word will help you bunches!  Second in importance is Stand training.  I actually time these with a watch, so we get standing still longer and longer times.  I have a Stand started in the ground work, then when we get hitched.  Driving animals usually spend quite a bit of time standing about, so they need to be GOOD at it.  They stand for hitching, then with vehicle attached, they stand you to get in or out.  They stand while you talk to folks on your driving routes, waiting for classes, waiting for others to get stuff around.  Stand is about the BEST GAIT on a Driving horse!!  Often practicing the Stand when horse is a bit tired makes it easier for him, and maybe facing a wall at the beginning.  Stand practice should be done in various places, so he will Stand wherever you ask him to as he gains experience.

Get a whip, learn how to use it as the tool it is meant to be.  You have no legs in Driving, so whip touches on sides, shoulder, work like a rider's legs would.  Light flick is all the touch most animals need as they understand what you are asking.  No rump whacking, rein slapping on the rump top, tends to make them kicky behind!  TV horses are NOT good examples of what you do driving most animals.

Do your ground training until horse is bored and obedient, accepting of things you ask.  Then you hitch and repeat all those things again to the bored stages.  You don't want horse surprised or worried.  A kicking strap over the hips is recommended these days for beginner horses just hitched.  It can PREVENT some problems from ever happening.

Stay safe, make training enjoyable for the horse and we will be waiting to hear about your progress.

Thanks, I will look into those.  Is there such a thing as a horse (or pony, in this case) that cannot be taught to drive?  Mine is very spooky and can be hard-to-focus at times.  I've tried calming supplements and they had the opposite effect, so I won't do that again.

Ground work, ground work, ground work. You almost can not do too much. I start in the round pen and my horses must walk, trot, walk, stop, walk, stop, trot, etc. on my voice commands before we leave the round pen. I want them to do this both on a lunge line in in free lunging. I also have them wear a circingle with a crupper. Then, I go to long lines and get them to learn to turn and stop, again primarily with voice. When we are comfortable in the round pen we go out to a larger arena so we learn to behave in a larger space. Slowly, we venture out and down the road.

Sure enough, it would be really interesting to see how the horses are going to keep up with the idea of learning how to be drive and actually the more that they are open to the idea, the more that they are going to like and rave about it. Very useful if you are going to take your chance and jump trains to a different thing but more importantly to see how they are going to work well to your advantage.