Wow, I was shocked. I could not have guessed that the average age for riders is over 40. There are so many reasons for this but still, it shocked me.
When I was growing up, there were 20 or 30 kids to every adult at the barns I rode at. Actually, I only knew a couple of adults that even rode at all. It was all of us crazy horse kids.
The classes at the shows for the juniors were 20 - 50 per class, which were usually grouped in 1 or 2 years per group. For the adults, it was 18 - 35 and 35 and over and they only had a maximum of 20 in their classes for the huge age range.
Why are kids not riding any more? I would love to hear your thoughts and if there things we can do.
Here are my thoughts:
1. The kids these days are really into the electronics. Our granddaughters were here and mostly played on youtube and creating their own videos (which is amazing!). I had one that wanted to come feed but really didn't want to spend a lot of time with the horses. I would have spent every minute with the horses when I was her age.
2. Horses cost more these days then they did when I was a kid. I worked to save up and bought my first pony when I was 5 and I was able to work to take care of some of the bills. I worked and worked to pay for the horses. I am not sure kids these days will make it happen like I did.
3. There are so many organized sports that take up a lot of time and they don't have the time to just enjoy horses.
Are there things we can do to engage the kids more? What if a bunch of us created a facebook group, to encourage kids to have those horse crazy pony dreams again? What if we partnered with local youth centers?
I don't know the answers but I know I was shocked at the average age being so high.
What do you guys think? I would love to hear your thoughts if you would like to reply.
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