Mother/daughter share

[Josettegrey]

Hi I was just wondering if anyone has a mother/daughter share? Up until 6 months ago we had a pony but I found it a bit unrewarding doing all the hard work/spending so much money on something I couldn’t ride.

I was just wondering what the pros and cons are of this set up? DD is nearly 11 and isn’t a beginner, but still very much a novice.

Unless your dd is particularly tall or you’re extremely petite I suspect you’d be better off waiting for a while. Some of my friends do ride their children’s horses but their daughters are mid-late teens so effectively adult sized and the mums have been riding for years so the teens don’t worry that their mums are going to ruin their horse.. Even so, it’s not really an equal share, in that the DC have most of the fun and the mums are ‘allowed’ to hack a couple of times a week or have the occasional dressage lesson. It’s also hard to find a horse which is the perfect match for both your sizes and abilities

Kind of. But I'm extremely petite and the one we got is a large pony. It worked very well in that DD was definitely over-horsed when we got the pony but grew into her within a couple of years and in the meantime I had a lot of fun competing and XC schooling. However, once DD was a good enough rider I rarely got the chance to compete any more (except dressage which was boring). Many years later DD is an adult and we still 'share' the pony. It can work but you need to be a similar size and a similar ability.

Yep echo the above it can work. I shared a mare with my mum in my teens, but we were/are similar heights and both very capable riders who were/are both thrusting types so enjoyed the same kind of (lunatic) horse.
It might be better waiting till she’s a bit older and will “fit” a 14.2/15hh?

Yes DD and I shared a 14.2 pony when she was in her early teens, have to say very rapidly it went from being a shared pony to very much her pony that I was 'allowed' to ride occasionally and privileged to do a lot of the work for (and pay 100% of the costs!) 😂To be fair to her the idea always was it would be mainly her ride until she went to uni/college and then I would take over so we didn't have to sell him, sadly it didn't end up working out like that as poor pony coliced and died when she was 16 but that was the plan anyway! 😥

Like others say it does depend on you being a similar size and weight to fit the pony well, plus at a similar enough level riding ability wise that no-one is significantly over or under horsed - how tall is she? I would have thought an average sized novice 11 year old probably still ideally wants to be on a 13.2-ish max (although as an oldie I'm always surprised by how tall children are nowadays so maybe not?), but she may have a growth spurt in the next few years and be ready for something bigger - you def don't want to spend ages searching for the perfect 14hh pony only for her to shoot up to 5"11 overnight and be needing a 15.2!

We bought my first boy (14.1) to do this job. I'm very petite and when we first bought him my DD was just 6. Personally I don't think that there is an issue with smaller kids riding larger ponies / horses as long as they are sensible and mannerly, you often find that the smaller ponies are more tricky and badly behaved! To begin with I rode most of the time, took him out competing etc whilst she hacked, had lessons etc. Roll on a few years and he's now most definitely her pony - there was a time when we were both wanting to jump the same XC class etc that was a bit frustrating but otherwise its worked very well. I was able to keep him on track with his schooling etc and she gives him lots of variety. We've now had to buy a 15.2 - supposedly for me this time - but DD also rides her too!