First Steps to getting your First Baby or Yearling Miniature Horse Home

First Steps to Getting your First Mini Home

1. A trailer that is intended for livestock. It can be for a horse, or pig. Pig trailers can be great as they are the preface hight and nearly the same kind of trailer with the same safety features for your animals. 
2. Your own halters and lead ropes. For the A and R registered minis you will more than likely need a medium to large halter size for a horse just weened or older. The small size is more for newborns to 4 months old. 
3. A barn with a stall. When you get your mini home they do not know you, they don't know your horses, and if you have farm animals they are not familiar with they may see them as monsters.  For the first 5 or so days you want to keep them in the stall or barn. They can see and nose with the other animals but the most important part is that they see their stall and barn as a safe place to get away and decompress. I would not let them out into the pastures or pins unless they make a friend. 
4. You can also spend that time just sitting with them and letting them get to know you But don't push them too far! This is supposed to be their safe place. Sitting low to the ground so you don't seem like a giant monster helps them build confidence around you. Also if they want to approach you from behind LET THEM. If you are a predator to them they are not going to approach you from the front where your teeth are. Also letting them see other horses come to you and treat you like another horse will make them curious about you. 
5. DO NOT: Rush them into making friends with your other animals. While minis will bond with anything they will only bond with animals they are comfortable to start with. Other horses are best for them off the bat. But young minis will always gravitate to other hoses no matter what size the other horses are. 
6. DO NOT: Just put your young horses in a filed, pin, or paddock with no place to run and hide or safe place to go. 
7. DO NOT: Just start introducing young screaming children to them right out of the gate. Minis and kids can go together awesomely. But a young frightened mini can not handle the loud noises of a screaming, clapping, or running mini monster humans. Many children do not know how to behave around an animal like a horse and young kids need to be trained just as much as the mini. Even adult minis who have a lot of kid experience need time to get used to their new home. Don't introduce kids and minis until they have their 5 days in the barn to adjust. 

Every miniature horse is different and some adapt faster than others, some even slower. But let them tell you if you want a long happy relationship. You can tell them all you want how things are going to be, that they are going to see your kids within 5 minutes of them coming to your home, they will go into the pasture with the monster donkeys this instant, and they will say that they are going over, under, or through the fence.