OK someone said, Icelandic!! Can't help myself I have to post.
Have owned and Ridden Icelandics for 15 years off an on.
Unless you are an Icelander competing, you would sit like you would on any other horse. There is a lot of miss info out there on the Icelandic horse.
The difference is in the saddle. Can ride any saddle so long as it is short enough, and doesn't pinch their shoulders. My Icelandic mare and many others need a saddle no longer than 23" in length.
My American flex saddle is border line to long at 23". The Aussie saddle fits her much better.
But I am getting ahead of myself.
Icelandic's are like any other breed. Most of the ones I have dealt with are not for the faint of heart or beginners. Many are very hot and very sensitive.
My mare is very sensitive, but not hot... she still can be a lot to handle at times.
Icelandic's come in Natural Tolters,, anyone can get tolt. Those are harder to find and normally cost a lot more.
Then you have three gaited ones, if you want to stay away from them, I will give you the lines to stay away from, but only in PM.
Four gaited horses are normally the easiest to deal with but not always.
Five gaited ones are normally hotter, however again,,they are not always hotter.
Then you have the flyer pacers. They are also fairly rare.
I had a hot little flying pace mare. She was taught to race in Pace. She had two speeds, sort'a walk and fly... not something most people want.
If you want to raise a young Icelandic, it is best to keep them in a herd until they are around two years old. If they don't have others of their age to play with, they can get over bold with people.
Best place, and the most trusted people I can recommend of all the Icelandic breeders I know of is Phil Pretty and Robin Hood up in Canada.
http://icefarm.com/
They by far have the best, most level headed Icelandics out there. If you let them know what you want you have a 98% chance you are going to get what you are looking for, when the animal is older.
They also have excellent clinics for learning how to deal with Icelandic horse from foals to advantced training. Their methods are nothing like what you are seeing in Iceland, though it looks like the way they train in Iceland is slowly changing for the better.
Best thing to do is shop, look around a lot. If the Icelandic is cheap in price, that Icelandic has major issues. From Bolting, to so sensitive you can't handle it among other things.
If you do not buy a foal from the above people (no I do not get paid for giving their names out, they are just good honest breeders).. make sure you see the foals parents handled, and ridden. This will give you the best idea of what the foal is like when it grows up.
They can be the most wonderful horses, but at the same time some blood lines can be the hardest to handle.
Here are some web sites to check out.
http://www.eidfaxi.is/eindex.php
http://toltnews.com/
If you want to buy from Iceland, one of my friends has very good connections over there, to some very honest folks to deal with.
She also knows a couple of excellent trainers too. Just let me know.
Opss added....
They are trained like any other breed of horse. But you have to take into account, they are very smart, just show them something a couple of times, and they never forget.
Well at least most lines, anyway..had one mare and I swear she had mild Downs or something
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They also like to think things over. So Parelli and TTeam methods of training do well with Icelandics.
Gait training comes much later, but by that time, if you go to clinics you will get the hang on how to ask for gaits. Is pretty much like other horses, except you have one or two extra geers!
