Why are we in such a hurry with horses?

I have just read this excellent article by Nic Barker at Rockley Farm on why we shoe horses. Basically the answer is that shoeing a horse is a quick fix. if you don't shoe, you have to put a lot more time and effort into getting the horse's environment, feed, exercise etc. right so his hooves can function as nature intended. I have heard more than one person say "I'd love to go barefoot, but it would take too long to transition and I need to do x, y and z with my horse this year....."

This got me thinking. It's not just shoeing that we do to hurry along what we want to do with our horses. Let's take rugging. Another thing people do because they want a clean horse, don't have time to brush him, don't want him to get too hairy or want him to look "nice" and clean. I have heard convenience used time and time again as a reason to rug. Not the horse's convenience, when it's 25 degrees (like it is today) and he's sweltering under a rug though.

We're also in a hurry to get on the horse's back. Can't have him standing around in a field doing nothing for too long. People apparently find it normal to back them as three year olds. But they don't finish growing until about 6 and a half. So why do people feel the need to have a four year old jumping over a metre high (something I saw regularly in France) or going eventing? Why rush getting them backed and potentially ruining them, physically or mentally, for the rest of their lives?

Because we are in a hurry, we can't wait, we need to feel we're getting our money's worth out of this animal that many of us are just too busy to bother to find out about properly. How many people spend time hanging out in the field with their horses? Not just popping down to stick a rug on, or grabbing him to bring in to tack up (if he's lucky enough to be turned out, that is, and not kept in a stable for our convenience) but just being with them, watching them interact, giving them a good old scratch, letting them sniff our clothes, nibble our hair?

Cartoon by Fed Up Fred

How many people have time to spend training a horse correctly? Why spend months and years building up her balance and muscles working on the ground before ever getting on when you can just get her used to a rider and away you go. If she doesn't move how you want her to, stick a gadget on, that'll do the trick (draw reins seem to be the favourite in France). And if it still doesn't do he trick, if she can't canter a circle after you've had her for a few months, just decide she's not the right horse for dressage and get a different one.......

But to me, horses are not disposable commodities, they do not "need" to be stabled, rugged, shod, bitted, or even ridden. I do not need to get my daughter a "proper" horse for eventing or jumping, we have the horses we have and we try to enable them to do the best they can for us, taking as much time as they need to be able to do what we ask of them. Some things are just worth taking your time over.......

Why I'm happy to have dirty horses......

Since moving back to the UK there is one thing about the horses that I see here that is really noticeable. They are pretty much all rugged, all of the time. Even when, as it was this last weekend, the weather is sunny and mild and in fact temperatures have been as high as 18 degrees C. We haven't had a cold winter at all, just a very wet one, and that I suspect is a large part of the reason for the extra layers.

When it rains and we get wet, we get cold. Horses don't though. Mine have nice thick waterproof coats that prevent the rain from actually getting through to their skin. You can see in this pic of Gandalf that the white clean bit near the skin is actually dry.

This was taken after weeks of rain. They don't have a field shelter, if it gets really windy the go and hide in the hedges. At night they have to come in to a yard with an open sided barn attached since the landowner doesn't want the horses on the land 24/7 in winter. They are always wet in the morning if it's been raining overnight so clearly don't take shelter in the barn. Unlike the cows they share with!

The other thing about the rain is, well, the mud. Here's how muddy our field has become this winter....

And I reckon this is the real reason for that nice waterproof jacket people seem prepared to spend sometimes hundreds of pounds on. Cos underneath that rug, he'll stay "nice" and clean. Nice for the owner, that is.

But do these owners stop to consider how that horse must be feeling under his rug when the sun is out and the day warms up? When he's losing his winter coat and would love to roll as it's so itchy? Or how he must feel when it's been raining so long the rug is saturated and he can't dry out once the rain stops?

 

Horses don't care how dirty and muddy they are, in fact for Gandalf it would appear the muddier he gets, the better......

 

It's just the humans who care.

 

Someone (who clipped, rugged and stabled her horses) once told me I shouldn't call myself Chevalblanc on the forum we used to frequent as my horses were never white. It would seem that for some people appearance is more important than a horse's wellbeing. Spending a load of money on rugs with pretty patterns on them must make these people feel better, same as tucking their horse up into a nice warm stable at night does. Shame it doesn't make the horse feel better. If you still doubt that, check out this article......

 

Oh, and my horses are white, but only in the summer ;-)

 

 

 

Getting to know the girls

Spent a bit of time with the pones today. They weren't too sure about my dog at first, but then she was running round like a loony growling for no readily apparent reason......once they realised she was actually more scared of them than they were of her they stopped worrying!

Ebony is starting to trust us already, Ali spent ages grooming and scratching her and generally being nice to her. We picked up her feet, no problems, hope it'll be the same for the farrier on Friday...

Got some more ticks off her too, and bot eggs......and tried Kinna's old rug on for size, although she doesn't need it yet, very mild here again.

So mild in fact as I was amazed to discover there were about 20 mouches plates under poor old Ruby!! Rubes reminds me of Chester when he arrived, she makes the ears back "I'm cross back off or I'll bite you" face, but within half an hour she'd stopped doing it as nothing bad had happened to her. She stood with her top lip wobbling whilst I removed all the mouches and a fair few ticks.....

When we picked her feet up she wasn't so keen but she did it without too much protest. She was giving everything a good looking at, even people walking along on the far side of the river, I guess they didn't have a lot going on in the last place, their field was down a private lane so there wan't a lot passing by! They haven't met the SNO yet, that should be interesting ;-)

Soggy Kinna.......

I don't know what the girls got up to last night in my neighbour's field in the snow, but poor Kinna was soaking wet this morning and actually shivering, she obviously didn't spend the night in the field shelter......Sky was a bit wet but absolutely fine.So I brought them both back to my place, much to Chester's delight, and dug out the cooler and rainsheet I'd bought for her when she first arrived.......

She looks very cute

and they're only a little bit too big for her now, not like when she first arrived!

The Saga of Seraphina

Well, today was interesting......

Got a phone call before 9am, immediately thought 'the bloody horses are out again' but it wasn't mine, it was Seraphina!! Started rushing the troops out the door to get straight down there, but then got another call to say she'd been found. Interestingly, the pony belonging to the neighbours had also got loose during the night, so did something scare them, like a sanglier?

Anyway, made our leisurely way down to Rochelle's. Had a fantastic Mexican lunch. Got Seraphina in, groomed her, tacked her up, took her out to the round pen for some free lungeing. She was as good as gold, despite the Small Naughty One being noisy and trying to get under her feet all the time.

 So Ali hopped on, all OK, until I went to adjust the stirrups. Was it because Ali shifted her weight to one side, or did I inadvertently knock her with the stirrup? Whatever it was, she took off, initially at a trot but then she got faster as the weight on her back shifted more to one side. Then Ali screamed, which made it a whole lot worse. By the time I got to her to stop her (and bashed my face on her side, people keep asking me if I've been in a fight!), Ali was on the deck, but she was luckily just shaken, not really hurt.

So that's youngsters for you.....after that, I took her for a walk in the woods in hand, no probs. Took her into the paddock and tried her with a cooler rug, no problems. She didn't like the rustly winter rug though, we eventually got it on her back all folded up after she'd run away from it a few times but when she was OK with that we called it a day.

She's still a sweetheart. We're hoping to go down the next time the trainer comes so Ali can see how she goes....

Oh, and we measured her, she's only 13.2hh. She's got some growing to do if she's going to get as big as mum and dad!