Individuals looking to buy their first horse should purchase a mature horse. This is the recommendation made by many experienced horse trainers. While young horses can be charming, you may find they can easily become problematic, unpredictable and hard to control
The very young horse (less than a year old) is considered a foal. As a prey animal, the horse is born with the inherent first response of “flight” from anything it perceives as dangerous. This can be just about any new experience it encounters or anything that moves suddenly.
Because of its high sensitivity to the immediate environment, it is important that the foal becomes familiar with humans and begin to trust them. The concept of “imprinting” is often used to describe the horse-human bonding during this period. Dr. Robert Miller in his book, NATURAL HORSEMANSHIP EXPLAINED, suggests that imprinting is predetermined learning. He states that during this phrase of early learning, the foal will attach to its mother, and any other thing that is it sees moving around it, including you. The intended outcome is for the foal to accept humans, not fear them.
Given an ideal situation, the horse should attain key training milestones in its early years of life. As a yearling, the horse reinforces the skills learned as a foal, and is exposed to new experiences that he will accept without fear. It takes many man hours over a two- to three-year period to properly train a horse. Depending on where you purchase your horse and its past experiences, it may be difficult to assess how well your horse has achieved certain milestones until you have worked with him horse for a period of time.
A mature horse, one in the range of 2-3 years old or older, is usually trained in the basics. It may be easier to determine the temperament of the horse to determine if it is suitable for your purposes. The following lists some of the training milestones a horse should have achieved during the first couple years of life.


You should devise a rating scale to assess the skill level of a prospective horse that you are considering, or in planning for the training of a horse you recently purchased. The following list uses a basic scale of:
· No Training
· Complete Task with Resistance
· Complete Task without Resistance.

You want the horse to consistently perform a task without resistance.

• Allowing you to touch to the various parts of its body (face, sides, legs, rump, tail)
• Responding to your voice and basic commands for walking and stopping
• Allowing you to pick up its feet
• Allowing you bath and groomed him
• Allowing examination by vet and furrier
• Allowing to be caught haltered and tied
• Can be lead into a trailer without much resistance
• Longed in a round pen with commands to walk trot or canter
• Responding to your commands while being led, walk trot
• Backing up in a straight line
• Desensitized to blankets and other objects
• Will not spook at items such as plastic bags or leaves blowing in the
  wind or the roar of an engine nearby
• Will not resist a bit, bridle or reins
• Responses positively to teats and other reinforcements

At age three the horse can begin to receive more disciplined training that will prepare him for the style of riding you intend (English or Western). You can also begin setting a training schedule if you intend to show your horse or compete with him. While you want your horse to be disciplined, be careful that the training pace is you set is not too strenuous. A three-year old horse may be near maturity, but they are still growing. You want to avoid any injuries to tendons or ligaments. Once your horse reaches four years of age, training can become more refined toward mastery of skills. In considering training guidelines, remember, each horse is unique. Your horse has his unique temperament, physical endurance, and mental maturity. Assess his skill mastery based on a baseline level that you have previously defined. This will make the training experience more rewarding and your expectations more realistic.