Are travellers a threat?

rowan666

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Sorry if this sounds daft but travellers have just set up camp right by where we keep our horses, am I panicking over nothing or should I be concerned?
 

skint1

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We've had travellers camp near our farm from time to time, to date, we have not had a problem with them.
 

Walnuts

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Sorry if this sounds daft but travellers have just set up camp right by where we keep our horses, am I panicking over nothing or should I be concerned?
having had them recently drive a pick up truck through my electric garage doors and steal £20k of stuff, I am sorry but I would be concerned for sure. I have never seen them do anything but leave a wake of destruction. The law protects them and not the majority
 

Shady

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It all depends on the type of traveller. My OH grew up in Cornwall best friends with a travelling family and all the kids were taught to go out choring which basically meant grab what you can where you can and they often came back with horse rugs , we were both really good friends with many there later on too.The fact that they are right next to your horses would probably deter them if they did feel inclined to be a bit opportunist, nobody will look very far for the culprit and many/most just want to get on with their lives in peace.
If i had to be totally honest tho i would keep an eye on things and put your best buckets away!!
 

Walnuts

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Sorry if this sounds daft but travellers have just set up camp right by where we keep our horses, am I panicking over nothing or should I be concerned?
having had them recently drive a pick up truck through my electric garage doors and steal £20k of stuff, I am sorry but I would be concerned for sure. I have never seen them do anything but leave a wake of destruction. The law protects them and not the majority
 

Shady

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having had them recently drive a pick up truck through my electric garage doors and steal £20k of stuff, I am sorry but I would be concerned for sure. I have never seen them do anything but leave a wake of destruction. The law protects them and not the majority
That's terrible Walnuts :(
I can't imagine any of the families i knew doing that, how times change eh:(
 

honetpot

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Are people who live I houses a threat? No its not a wind up, I worked in a prison for a very short space of time and a lot of the people in there were local, and lived in houses.
The opportunist thief is not restricted to any community so anything of value I keep in the house. My neighbour got his tools pinched from his van outside his house a 6pm, other neighbours in the village, different part, had break ins when they went on holiday, so I am worried about who you talk to in the pub/FB.
 

millikins

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Sorry if this sounds daft but travellers have just set up camp right by where we keep our horses, am I panicking over nothing or should I be concerned?
Very unlikely to steal horses, more likely to add to the herd so padlock gates. I'd also put my oldest tattiest rugs on them. I've been broken into twice, have since purchased an old shipping container.
 

poiuytrewq

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Are they a long term fixture?
We had travellers rock up right by my little yard a few years ago. I was slightly worried at first because it’s very obvious no one was on he premises over night etc.
I made friends with them, let them call in for water as they had no tap for their horses.
They were great and I felt safer for my horses having them around as I knew they kept an eye on them and would know what to do if a problem arose. I think I even gave them my gate code in the end.
 

Snowfilly

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They can be. There's plenty of travellers in Cornwall and some of them are no problem, they might stop to chat if you've got horses on view especially if they see harness or driving gear around. Some of the local old boys are Romani more than anything and full of old horse law and stories.

Others are a complete nightmare. Stuff will go walkabout, ponies left in your fields and waste and litter will be everywhere. Trouble is, you've got no way of knowing up front so double check locks on everything and make sure they can't get into your land.

Also keep a close eye on dogs, there's probably a better trade in stolen dogs than horses.

You can always get on better terms with them if they're OK, you can't replace stuff that's walked so easily!
 

Clodagh

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Most are violent, dishonest and totally immoral. They are Irish caravan dwellers more than gypsies, and have fantasitc Range Rover Evoques towing their luxury caravans. Now winter is coming they will hopefully go back to Ireland and we can have a break. They are organised criminal gangs more than anything more romantic.
Having said that we have some proper gypsies living next door and they are no trouble at all and thoroughly decent people.
 

exracehorse

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Our yard was wiped out by travellers. They pulled the gates off with a 4x4. They luckily ignored the horses who were in their stables. Took EVERYTHING! The son of the gang was subsequently outcasted by his family. He’s now on the run. He’d not long been released from prison for ram raiding cash point machines.
 

twiggy2

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To be honest I have never had good experiences, on the farms they just take what they want, stables they have been the same, at the primary school 2 young lads got caught with the dinner cutlery in their wellies when they were going home and I have never ever known them to take what they no longer want or need with them- wether it's animal or anything else.
I have no experience of them taking or harming horses though, I have known horses (particularly stallions) added to fields though.
 

rowan666

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Are people who live I houses a threat? No its not a wind up, I worked in a prison for a very short space of time and a lot of the people in there were local, and lived in houses.
The opportunist thief is not restricted to any community so anything of value I keep in the house. My neighbour got his tools pinched from his van outside his house a 6pm, other neighbours in the village, different part, had break ins when they went on holiday, so I am worried about who you talk to in the pub/FB.
Yes, I actually said this to a few people already that I would be just as concerned if a posh new housing estate popped up on there as it only takes one bad egg, maybe they will be good and law abiding and deter the cretinous teenagers that usually hang about there causing trouble, fingers crossed! I have nothing against them, they need somewhere to go I was just concerned my cob mare would suddenly go missing but having read the other replies I'm now more concerned she'll end up pregnant 🙈
 

Surbie

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I know lots of groups of travellers are absolutely fine. And we don't know if it was travellers, but my RDA has been broken into twice this year the night after travellers arrived next door. The first time they came for things to steal. But it's not just theft. The second time they went for the horses - they hurt 3 of our horses and one had to be put down as a result of his injuries. One of the other two is still very traumatised.
 

Walnuts

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Our yard was wiped out by travellers. They pulled the gates off with a 4x4. They luckily ignored the horses who were in their stables. Took EVERYTHING! The son of the gang was subsequently outcasted by his family. He’s now on the run. He’d not long been released from prison for ram raiding cash point machines.[/QUOT
I know lots of groups of travellers are absolutely fine. And we don't know if it was travellers, but my RDA has been broken into twice this year the night after travellers arrived next door. The first time they came for things to steal. But it's not just theft. The second time they went for the horses - they hurt 3 of our horses and one had to be put down as a result of his injuries. One of the other two is still very traumatised.

That is truly sickening in every way. Dreadful
 

conniegirl

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Tbh, ive never had a good experience with them and there are a lot round here (Hull).
They have a tendency to rock up to areas of empty land, cause tens of thousands of £ worth of damage to the park, cause mayhem and a sharp spike in crime, cost the land owner £20k to get rid of and then leave with some truely horrific threats to anyone even close.
All our local yards and farms have an agreement that as soon as they are seen in the area at all, the person who sees them phones everyone else and all gates are locked and alarms activated. Even means we cant go for a hack and leave the gate unlocked, we have to lock the gate and then mount the other side of it, though we had the mounting block nicked last time they were about.
 

Scarlett

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Tbh, ive never had a good experience with them and there are a lot round here (Hull).
They have a tendency to rock up to areas of empty land, cause tens of thousands of £ worth of damage to the park, cause mayhem and a sharp spike in crime, cost the land owner £20k to get rid of and then leave with some truely horrific threats to anyone even close.
All our local yards and farms have an agreement that as soon as they are seen in the area at all, the person who sees them phones everyone else and all gates are locked and alarms activated. Even means we cant go for a hack and leave the gate unlocked, we have to lock the gate and then mount the other side of it, though we had the mounting block nicked last time they were about.

Same here in Surrey. Each time we have had something stolen/damaged at our yard it's been within a day or two of them appearing locally. Dogs go missing. Rubbish gets dumped.

I had a run in with one in a petrol station a few weeks ago where he walked up and rubbed himself against me with his hand on my inner thigh. He was about 12. Got a shock when I told him where to go. There were travellers round the corner who had taken over a public park and were causing havoc as they moved around from place to place. Let one hell of a mess too. He had a thick Irish accent so I am assuming he was one of them.

Conversely we have a traveller family up the road who run a livery yard, we were there a few years and they were nice, hard working folk who had settled on the land decades before, and next door to our yard is another well known family who never cause any problems and have nice, happy horses. My vet attends the horses and says they are very well looked after and the family are respectable folk who pay their bills.

As with everything it's the bad minority that give all the others a bad name.
 

Shay

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Travellers are just people - some are nice, some aren't. I suspect Scarlett & I are fairly close to each other than those permnant sites are no problem. We have more issue with the ones who are repeatedly moved on from site to site. We tend to know when there are likely to be big groups on the move and take extra precautions. On the whole they don't tend to trouble the horses (other than to take rugs off them), but you do need to take care with other stuff.
 

meleeka

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We get them every summer near me. Even the travellers near me who have a permanent pitch don’t like the Irish travellers and keep their gates locked when they are about. I’m more worried about them gaining access to my land and stealing things (my child’s quad bike went a few years ago. It didn’t work and I hope they were disappointed). They’ll trespass anywhere to get water and leave their rubbish where they feel like it. The worst thing I’ve ever experienced though was when they camped on a field with a public path nearby. They dumped a load of human excrement on the path, presumably to stop people using it and bothering them. 😡
 

Mule

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Ime the travellers who have a permanent site with facilities tend to be fine. Smaller halting sites are more peaceful than larger ones.

The ones who move on aren't bothered about getting on with neighbours so I would expect rubbish dumping. (They also don't have refuse collection, which explains the dumping)

I would lock up/move everything that could be taken (especially things with good resale value). For example, horseboxes, saddles, machinery (electric tools and trailers are very popular. The best thing is to move anything you don't need to another location. Hopefully they'll move on soon.

I've never heard of them hurting horses. I think that would be very unusual. A group of traveller kids did try to steal one of my horses once, but she was extremely suspicious and hard to catch so she out ran them 😁.

A poster above alluded to Roma gypsies being less trouble. 😱Not in my experience unfortunately.
 

LaurenBay

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I'd be suspicious. The ones that pass through are a nightmare. The last lot set up pitch on a green and left an awful mess and they drove into a locked gate and broke it, they quickly turned around when they saw people. The person had cctv and managed to pull off the number plate. The same Van was spotted several times on the green with the rest of them. I was so nervous for my Horse and I was relieved when they left.
 

holeymoley

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Er on the side of caution. We have a bunch which seem to like to move about from set areas once the council have 'moved them on' and end up back in the same places. Thankfully not near the horses but when they were near our house there were reports of people in back gardens at night time and bogus workmen chapping on doors. We're right out the way of the main road too so they were obviously coming through fields/tracks. They also seem to like to 'trash' the areas once they get told to move on. Again on the other hand at an old yard in a different area they came up to offer 'tarmacing' and they had it done in 2 days. I was very cautious of them but they were a decent bunch. Nothing ever went missing!
 

atropa

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We've just had three dogs stolen by travellers from our yard last week, in the middle of the day. They dumped two of them which have luckily been found, one poor pup still missing.
 

LegOn

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To be honest, anyone randomly deciding to move in to a space/field/side of the road that doesnt belong to them, makes me uneasy. I dont really care who you are or how you label yourself, but you are living outside the rules and laws of the country by not paying to have your rubbish removed, not paying taxes, water charges, council taxes etc - then even if you dont 'steal' anything, you are still choosing to live outside the laws the rest of us abide by.

I think then you are entitled to feel uneasy.
 

The Fuzzy Furry

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I've had travellers ponies stay at my yard a few times, last time was 2 summers ago for almost 3 months. They looked after their ponies v well, even poo picked the paddocks and removed a dangerous oak that was threatening to come down and mending a couple of fences too. I even got a lovely card and bunch of flowers the day they left. The family had pitched up at a site locally to see a very sick family member but had no room for the ponies except to go in sheds, which they didn't want to do.. They in turn looked down at the Irish intinerants calling them scum.... the ones that rock from playing field to council park etc etc, thieving anything on their way.
In past years their parents stopped over on the way to Derby week, and there would be assorted quality ponies in one of our fields for a few days.

OP, yes I'd be worried about an encampment v closeby.
 

essex_rider

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They stole everything from our stables except the horses, including going into the stables, letting the horses out and taking everything in the stables too.
As non-pc as it may be to stereotype, whenever they rock up in my town, at least one yard gets cleared out. So be very careful and take everything home!
 
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