Topsy and Peter's Triumph

Today Topsy and Peter had their own little triumph.  Peter offered Topsy some small pieces of apple and she took them very gently from his hand.  For Topsy this was a big thing - although she's accustomed to accepting cow parsley, dandelions and a variety of hedgerow plants from the hand (and she'll hoover up rosehips from your palm etc) she would never take a piece of apple or carrot.  She does love them in a bowl of food, so it's not that she doesn't like them.  We're pretty sure that somewhere in her past someone tried to "trick" her (or what Topsy perceived to be this) by tempting her with an apple or carrot and then probably tried to grab her.  Today was another step on the way to her leaving those past memories behind and knowing that she can trust people.  She can be so calm and chilled out in situations now that people ask if she's been a ridden pony all her life and how many shows or competitions she's done!  It was nice to see Topsy looking in the kitchen window looking to see if Peter was on his way back, and woofling to him as he appeared in the yard!

In other news...We're pleased to report that Trading Standards had a very good, clear announcement at the Exmoor Pony Society AGM about ear tagging and notching - and this statement was endorsed by the chairman who made it clear that it is not acceptable and if anyone is doing this they must cease...breaches of the law will not be tolerated.

We discovered this week that The Brooke show won't be running this year, which is very sad as it's one of our favourite fundraising events and has been a great way of promoting rescue animals.  We're researching alternative events for our fundraising stall this year.

And finally...We send our thoughts and "get well soon" wishes to Catherine and her husband Edward - poor Edward's in hospital so we hope he feels better very soon...

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Frodo Has A New Trick!

We've been having a very busy week with some rather epic efforts in terms of activity.  Today Margaret came an extra day to help us get a head start on some of the jobs we want to get done before our course in a month's time....so spring cleaning has commenced!  Tidying up the back of the barn, which will transform it from store area into classroom/teaching area.  All the rubber mats that were down in the winter to help us navigate through the mud have to be extracted, dried and cleaned off.  Margaret's done an impressive job with sorting these out.  The mats are quite heavy even when they are dry and mud-free so the easiest way of moving them is in the link box of the little tractor.  After having a break for lunch, we came out to find Frodo standing in the link box on the back of the tractor and he seemed to rather enjoy playing with the mats that were in it!

We've been able to start cleaning up the tack room as well so we've managed to achieve quite a lot today.

We've also managed to find a buyer for our Strada saddle this week.  A lady posted on the Strada forum searching for the exact size and type of saddle that we had been donated.  After email exchanges with information and photos, the lovely lady has agreed to buy it and has enabled us to raise £500 for the ponies.  The only slight difficulty was that it needed to be sent to France - the buyer has been happy to cover the courier cost too.  After some initally scary quotes of over £500(!!) for shipping, making us worry that we'd lose the sale (!!) we found a much more reasonably priced courier and the saddle will be going off to it's new home tomorrow.  We hope Charlotte and her pony have many happy hours together riding with their new saddle!  A huge thank you to Jenny for helping with the epic task of packing it up...we never seem to have a box big enough so end up having to merge boxes together.

Topsy's continuing to enjoy her walks out and has seen all manner of traffic, trailers, dogs and walkers and is doing brilliantly.  The boys are enjoying lots of time playing together.  This evening they were galloping circuits around the field before dinner!  Last week Faye came out of the barn to find Frodo fast asleep on the mats in the yard - they're really nice and warm in the sunshine.  He was so asleep he didn't even wake up when she went across the yard and his front legs were moving - he was dreaming...obviously about running!  It didn't make a good photo though...he was so asleep he looked dead in the photo!  We should have taken a video but he'd have almost certainly have woken up if we'd gone to get the right camera!

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Illegal Ear Tagging Of Exmoor Ponies

A recent report commissioned by Exmoor National Park revealed that some breeders of Exmoor ponies within the National Park are continuing to ear tag their ponies (as well as microchipping and hot branding them) - the breeders admit that they know the practise is illegal.  We have already been in contact with Devon Trading Standards to report that this breach of the Animal Welfare Act.

We worked very hard back in 2010 to make sure that illegal ear mutilations on wild ponies were stopped (with the help of BEVA and the BVA) and it is part of our charity aims to make sure that the law is adhered to and enforced.

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May's Calendar Photo

After the exciting, entertaining photo of April, we now have a much calmer and "cute" photo for May.  This is a photo of one of the many foals born to the original herd in the "herd field"...we believe this little colt foal is Rosco who is being temporarly looked after (or perhaps that should be foalsitted??) by an "aunt".  This quite often happens in herds of ponies so that mum can go and have a rest for a while or attend the watering hole etc.   

Our ponies were very lucky to be rescued as a whole group together and Rosco is now one of our loan ponies.  The youngsters had the best start in life with sympathetic handing and no mutilations, making them much more well rounded individuals ready to take on their futures as domesticated family ponies.

Foals are very cute but we most certainly have a no breeding policy here at p4p and steps were taken very swiftly once the original herd was rescued to stop the breeding.  Overbreeding is one of the biggest issues facing equines in this country at the moment and it's a situation that needs to be taken much more seriously.  For years we've seen large charities prepared to sit back and do nothing to attempt to stop the impending crisis.  The answer isn't to start eating horses...it's to stop the irresponsible breeding in the first place...which means gelding colts and stallions and removing stallions from the moorland areas.

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Longer Days Means Busier Days

With the longer days and better (but still rainy!) weather with us we're getting lots done!  Ted's been busy tractoring - moving the huge winter manure heap and chain harrowing and rolling the hay field.  Pete gave us a hand by clearing out all the the guttering alongside the barn - it was stuffed full with decaying moss that's been washed off the roof and stopping the rainwater tanks from filling up.  The sheep have returned too and they are very itchy!  They keep rubbing on the gates and trying to get into the tractor yard.

Topsy's been continuing her adventures (although yesterday we deemed it too wet to go out in torrential, monsoon style downpours) and is finding lots of delicious patches of vegetation that need "strimming" along the driveway and beyond.

The grass has been growing like mad for the last couple of weeks, so laminitis prevention procedures have been in place for a while.  For those ponies who spend more time in during the day we try to keep things entertaining with obstacles for Horse Agility practice or walks out.  Frodo needs to start walking out to get ready for his long walk to St John's Fayre!

Thank you to Margaret for her purchase of a new "snow" shovel for the ponies...not that we're expecting snow exactly, but more that they are a great, durable, lightweight design for stable yard duties!  The photos below show we've had a busy day!

Topsy and Margaret are becoming good friends!
I couldn't decide which photo was nicest so I've posted them all!

 

Country walks

April weather...lovely between the showers 

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Muddy Update

Cilla sent through an email from Tasha who has p4p pony Muddy and included with it is this photo.   Tasha says "He is such a wonderful pony and we love him to bits!! And yes he is a very strong little chap n very forward going".     She's been able to go out riding with her partner (who rides their other horse) and have obviously been making the most of the lovely weather!

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Jeremy's Super Jumping...And Agility Plans

Jeremy and Rowan have been busy this Easter holiday developing and practising their jumping skills...now with a triple!  Well done Jeremy and Rowan.  I'm sure that lots of you are following their blog now too!

The better weather means that our ponies have been able to start doing some agility again too so it looks like there's quite a few of us hoping to do our first starter course this month...Jeremy and Rowan, Peter and Frodo, and Victoria with one of her ponies (Silver, Baby and/or Willow).  We had to measure Frodo to see whether he would qualify for the small pony or "big" pony class.  After 2 measurings, we had the same reading of 10.2 + 3/4 of an inch...which just takes him into the "big" pony class.  I think Frodo would probably be quite pleased about that as I don't think he ever considers himself as being little!

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Time To Roll (Take Two!)

Today was our second attempt at rolling the pony field.  Our first effort a few weeks ago did fairly well but was followed by lots of rain...so the mud had been all churned up again.  The good news is that we didn't get the tractor stuck this time! Last time we discovered where the deceptively dangerous parts are and on experience it's still too wet to roll those at the moment...but by the end of the week they might be OK.  The field looks great and now that it's flat it's much easier to manoeuvre across.    Margaret made two special visits to the farm today, inbetween her busy schedule of appointments, to help with mucking out and moving the fences...she also donated a new lightweight broom!  Jenny helped with the fences too - there's quite a lot to move and we have a technique to "walk" them to certain positions so we don't have to take everything down and then reinstate it afterwards.

Topsy's looking gorgeous

Another beautiful sunset

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Topsy's Adventures

Topsy approves of Jenny's decision not strim the grass here!

We're really enjoying the spring weather and to celebrate the arrival of the cow parsley, goose grass, dandelions (and the delicious patches of lush grass that Faye's not supposed to notice!) Topsy's been having excursions the last two days.

Margaret's been helping today so she's been enjoying time with Topsy too!

The ponies' coats are changing fast now with handfuls of hair coming out. No matter how much you brush there always seems to be more hair!  Sara gave Bobby a brush yesterday.  She was hoping to see Peter but unfortunately he couldn't come as he has a cold so we hope he feels better again soon!

Lovely weather at last!

Yum!

Lovely Dan looking very handsome

Sara brushing Bobby

I'm not sure whether we did a proper update about the diatomaceous earth...but we can report that it did indeed do it's job to get rid of the dreaded lice that were immune to everything, and quickly too, thank goodness!

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Peter and Frodo's Obstacle Practice

Peter's been doing horse agility obstacle practice today...it's still too muddy in the field to set up jumps, or bigger obstacles so we focussed on poles and obstacles in the yard.  We set up an "L" shape out of poles to pass through, a single pole to step over with the front feet and wait for 5 seconds before backing over it, a tarpaulin to wait on and then pass across, and a hula hoop obstacle where horse and handler have to wait in each designated hoop for 5 seconds.  We did lots of waiting exercises because patience has not really been one of Frodo's best skills...but actually he was very good!  There's just snapshots in the video but hopefully we'll get a longer video made.

Peter said that he thought the most difficult obstacles were the hula hoops and the single pole.  He found that sometimes Frodo would step into the hoop and sometimes it didn't quite work...but he found that when he was more positive and decisive with his energy and thought exactly about what he needed to happen and where Frodo needed to put his feet (even by pointing into the hoop for instance) that it worked much better.  Peter did really well for his first attempt and he wants to work towards doing a starter level competition with Frodo.

Beautiful sunsets in the evenings again!

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