Remember that thing I did?

[which_chick]

The midlife crisis thing?

Yeah.



Meet Finn.



He's a weanling. Just got here this week from the breeder.

Dear breeder: baby horses should be raised OUTSIDE in SOCIAL GROUPS. Delivering a five month old weanling who does not know what grass is and cannot read social cues from other horses is a crime.

On the plus side, he leads and ties once you can get a hand on him and he is improving at grass and social cues via tutelage under Casper, Try's elderly, kind, fond-of-babies mare.

I would have more pictures but he's weedy and narrow with zero muscle tone and does not take a good picture at the moment.

Comments

[which_chick]

A fair amount! As with children, a lot of personality is kind of factory-equipped though education, experience, training and environment then act upon the basic install. You can frequently influence what a horse *does* in reaction to assorted stimuli but it's very difficult to change a horse's essential nature.

A calm, unflappable foal will grow up to be a calm, unflappable horse. This doesn't mean a horse that is dead to the aids, but it does mean a horse that will inherently be more ammie-friendly.

A reactive, spots-all-the-threats foal will grow up to be a reactive, spots-all-the-threats horse. Again, doesn't mean a horse that is insane and unrideable, doesn't mean a horse that won't be able to do a job, but does mean a horse that may take more active, thoughtful riding than others cut from a calmer and less-reactive cloth.

A foal that rears as their go-to when they are upset will, unless *taught* not to, grow up to be a horse that rears as their go-to when they are upset. Doesn't mean the horse will rear with riders, DOES mean that horse will maybe *think about* rearing as their first evasion, might be more prone to head in that direction if things went badly, if horse were in pain, suffered ill treatment, etc.

A foal that learns quickly and is light in hand will be a horse that learns quickly and is light in the hand.

A foal that wears emotions on sleeve and is very easy for a handler to "read" will be a horse that wears emotions on sleeve and is very easy for a hander to read.

A foal with a long fuse and a tolerant approach to handler mistakes will be a horse with a long fuse and a tolerant approach to handler mistakes.

All of these generalizations, obviously, are in the absence of severe environmental or emotional stressors. For an ordinary foal growing up in ordinary, middlingly competent circumstances, what you see as a foal is what you get as an adult horse. If you do have a significant change between foal and adult, it is typically not for the better. *sigh*

But yeah, you can tell a fair amount about them while they're still babies. This is also true of people who raise working dogs, as said people can evaluate a litter as chunky pups and tell you which dogs will be most likely to *work* and which dogs will need to have pet homes.

[crockpotcauldron]

That's very interesting! What's yours like so far? Did you have Bird as a baby as well?