The Lingfield Instructor Group

July
My 13 yr old, who'd been riding since age 5, had had various pony loan and was promised a horse when she proved she had the commitment to look after it. When we decided to move to Yorkshire we bought her a 15.3 hh Connemara/ID mare.

Lesson no. 1 – don’t let people ride the new horse too soon after arrival!

I do wish I’d read the course Study Pack 2 before I let my 10 yr old ride the new horse within the first 48 hours.

My daughter was leading her 10 yr old sister round. Soon she thought she could ride off the lead rope – BIG mistake!! The horse started to canter and the youngster wasn’t quite up to it, the horse went faster and faster, she fell off, the horse jumped out of the ménage, and took over an hour to catch. It was a couple of days before she really calmed down. What a stupid thing to do! The horse had just moved home – must have been feeling apprehensive, knew no one & needed at least 7-10 days to settle in to a new home before being ridden etc. Horse and owner needed build mutual trust and confidence on the ground in the first few days.Things didn't get off to the best of starts.

Lesson no. 2 – pick your livery stable with care.

In hindsight, I’m really glad we went to a livery stable instead of having our own field & stable. No way did we know enough to look after a horse on our own. But livery stables aren't always perfect either. We were on DIY with help with turning out/bringing in. Although she was fine with us, with others she bombed off, dragged lead ropes out of their hands, was impossible to catch, was described as a “bad horse”, “bad tempered”, “unpredictable” – it even came to the point where someone at the yard was seen leading the horse up to the electric tape to deliberately give her an electric shock, to “teach her not to barge or break out of fields”. In Winter the horses would break out of the field if the electric fences were off to get at more grass (obviously some were not having enough hay). Ours became a repeat-offender and some were scared of her. Our daughter was given a hard time about her. We changed yards.

February

Lesson no. 3 – get the feed right!

The new livery yard owner bought ex racehorses & fed “cooked breakfast” of linseed and barley mash,to improve condition. I hadn’t yet read Study Pack 5 on feeding. The implications of getting the feed right hadn’t yet dawned on me!! Soon the bad behavioiur was being reported to us again.

On completion of Level 1 course & BHS HOC several light bulbs went off in my head, I knew where we had been going wrong! The diet was wrong; too high in energy for the work – all that fizz with nowhere to go, particularly in the winter, when riding was restricted

We moved now to a BHS approved yard. Your notes about you can tell a good livery yard from the state of the muck heap is bang on!

We changed her diet to a low-energy high fibre feed, which was no more than 10% of her daily diet with a magnesium calmer.

The course was so helpful and gave me the confidence to know what I was looking for on the feed packaging, and to be able to give my daughter a clear yet comprehensive analysis on what we were going to do, and why – it earned me great street cred with her, instead of being the one who “didn’t know anything” about horses!!

We still have the horse on DIY, but we do the turning out and bringing in now, and she settled in beautifully, getting on perfectly well with the 3 other horses in her field.

Name withheld.