Rural Heritage April/May 2026

One final example. I have a 9-year-old mare named Dutchess. I have also had her for about three years. When I brought her home, I knew she had experienced a few mishaps in her life, but in a short visit with her I thought we could work together. She has a lot of skills. She is agile and quick to move in any direction we ask. She stands well while we hook or work around her. She is just a little anxious and a little angry. She usually seems unhappy. She pulls a little too hard on a load, and she tends to pull on the bit. She sort of fails at my one great goal of relaxing while at work. Along with gently bringing her into a working life, we have done plenty of tests to make sure there weren’t other physical factors contributing to her distress. So far, we haven’t found any. Like Rock, she has improved a lot while she has been here. She is quite usable and even helps us teach beginning teamsters from time to time. While they learn to drive, they also learn what they might not want to buy. A horse like this also tires more quickly when working at a serious task like hay making where the hours add up.

I have taken blinders off and put them on her several times. Taking them off might seem to help while she is working at a simple task, but, eventually, with things behind the forecart — like manure spreaders, rakes, or tedders — she has been proven to work better for me with the blinders. A friend and good teamster used her a fair bit last summer ( I was trying to sell her) and thought she did well open faced, and they did a good deal of mowing. In the end, the horse came back to me as she was acting up while doing simple things and not getting along with a pasture mate. This just confirms for me that taking blinders off a working horse will not usually be a solution to a “problem.” To sum it all up: I work horses without blinders because I like it that way. They easily do anything I want them to without blinders. Starting young horses without them is about the same as starting a horse with blinders. It is not always easy or a good idea to take blinders off a horse that is working well with them. As always, feel free to contact me with questions about things I do, or things I write.

Donn hooks his forecart to a camper and pulls it with a draft horse team with open bridles.

Rural Heritage

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