Carriage Harness and Equipment

It’s not only about carriage harness! To take care at the horses we have a lot of equipment. (Having a visit with a baby is much easier!) For example we have bought eight rubber horseshoes! More about that here.

At a short break we put them at a rope and a pin. In the evening we have to apply something, so the have more space to use. After all they do the hard work!

Improved systems are little poles about 59 inches high, connected with electric ropes and a battery of 9 volt. Perfectly easy to use everywhere there is space enough.

A more technical explanation you can find here!

The Harness

Most important, and we put a lot of effort in, was to choose a good harness. We collected and put it together from different systems until it reach our expectations. Pulling a big weight al day will be harmful on the chest. That’s why we choose a “France horse-collar”. This way the pressure will be more on their shoulder.

"A horse harness is a type of horsetack that allows a horse or other equid to pull various horse-drawn vehicles such as a carriage, wagon or sleigh. Harnesses may also be used to hitch animals to other loads such as a plough or canal boat.

For heavy hauling, the harness must include a horse collar to allow the animal to use its full weight and strength. For light work, such as horse show competition where light carts are used, a carriage harness needs only a breastcollar".

Putting harness on a horse is called harnessing or harnessing up. Attaching the harness to the load is hitching . The order of putting on harness components varies by discipline, but when a horse collar is used, it usually is put on first".

Horseshoes

Our horses do not use horseshoes. They walking barefoot sometimes relieved by rubber horseshoes. This choice we did after a course in Natural Horse keeping. Here we get very excited about this principle: Robust horse keeping. We will see how this will work at the long term.

Sidebar: We totally change our mind about barefoot riding. Full report about this you can find here

End of carriage harness back to carriage antique

End of carriage harness back to Homepage

More detailed page about the different Horse Harness Parts