What an adventure! I have no ideas for you - but I just had to say - how sweet!

Besides the obvious... horse meat, I have no idea either. Nice looking animals tho.
Good luck with them.

GM1

Well Shetlands are small but very strong, I would teach them to drive for sure as a team and even as a three way team, this would mean that you could have nice sized stone boat that could be used in many, many ways to help.. you can pick up a small single peice of harrow and use the team to drag it for breaking up their own piles to help the health of your pastures.

If you encourage feeding in one area during a certain time of the year, the waste and droppings, composted will be excellent for your gardens, or fruit trees, there is also at least two kinds of mushrooms that you can grow in straw mixed with horse pucks, you can order the kinds online and just follow the directions, if you like the idea of growing mushrooms.

And then back to your own idea, yes, for sure they can be turnd into little pack horses and or basket horses.. Shetlands are not mini's, which can still be useful, but A shetland can do alot more work, and with three of them, used correctly, its like having a big old work horse for what they can do for you..

If you ever want to use them for this reason, back in the day, I knew a farmer that had a shetland that they taught to walk around and around for about an hour a day, and it ran their water pump and filled the animal watering trough, I honestly was to young to ask them how they set this up, but I remember being amazed when 'i would go an visit, they didn't have running water but had a deep well, and they could hook it up to a tractor but that cost gas, so somehow? the hubby rigged it, that you pushed this thing round and round and then they trained the pony to do it.. Wish I had thought to learn more about it, instead of going to play with their kids 🙂

that's about it from the top of my head..

how young of pony's, that will make a difference on what you can ask them to do yet, strength wise? They can still learn the basic's of being single and team driven, they can be basket pony's from the size they are now till full grown, and depending on age, they can be used to skid a sled or if they are old enough a stone boat, depending on weight.

I started my calf at the age of four months working with a harness/sled and she hauled feeds and water up and down for me, but I didn't ask her to pull a stone boat till she was bigger and stronger, the first year it was the sled or the packs, or rolled hay.. but you get the idea..

Measure them out with the weight tapes and figure out what they come in as, a horse can carry up to 25% of its body weight in condition for a full day's work, ideally, 20% is better for young bones and up to 30 percent is fine for short working with rests, example, ask them to carry 30% for the hour it takes to get back and forth, is fine..

Pulling weights has their own fomula's and pulling a stone boat is different then skidding a log, pulling a harrow etc, each peice has its own drag, and so you need to look at that when figuring out how long they can work for time wise, based on age and condition..

Lucky girl to get to start with healhty young horses that are blank slates.. it means that you get to train them your way. I love my draft cross but when it comes to training, I find i am doing as much retraining as not, because she needs to learn how to do things my way, where as with the cow, she just does it my way because she has never known any different..

Last bit of advice, watch your pony's, take the time to just sit and be with them, learn who fits where in the herd, learn their temperments, by watching and learning this, it will help you greatly on figuring out how to use them later, who is going to be your lead, who is your follower, horses always have a strong and weak side for turning, and you can match this up ideally with a team..

O and one more quick note, they will help get and keep you in shape with most of the things listed above, because you have to keep pace with them, as you will be driving them from the side or behind or walking in front of them.. so get ready for getting your own workout LOL

like Farmgal said 😆

I have no clue I just wanted to say how sweet they are and hope your task to train them will be an easy one

Just a few photos that will show some of what I said above but let you "see it" the typical kind of baskets used for that, the single pony pulling a single harrow for leveling ground and to show the amazing strength of them as breed, a photo of them as the pit pony.. its amazing how many of these horses where used in the underground mines (I am not saying I like or agree with it) but its part of history and they did the job very well, very strong for their smaller size.. These photos are not mine, are from the web.. copyright unknown to me..

Well, so what do you think....do my nose hairs need trimming?