Coloured cob population saturation

texel

texel

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Originally posted in 'News' and as requested by Shysmum I have placed it in here and added a little extra.

I drive through Alton (Hants) on my way to and from work every day and over the past year or so I have noticed a large herd of coloured cobs grazing in several very large fields on the outskirts of the town on the New Odiham road. The herd seems to have increased and this year there has been a massive number of foals produced.

I just wonder who owns them and what are they being bred for? Surely the market for horses is rather slack/saturated at the moment especially as there are thousands of coloured cobs being bred left, right and centre.

There are certainly more then 60, I stopped the car to count them once and gave up at about 60 as there were more at the top of the field then I could clearly see to count. The cost of passports for this large herd must run into the thousands !

Does anyone know anything about them?

With the dry weather the grass has been eaten down and no one is poo picking :-)


PS. this is an interesting FB page: https://en-gb.facebook.com/vanah.horses
 
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1000s by us too

Passports? What are those? Authorities to frightened to investigate, poo pick, hay, feed, separate mares and colts? Nope!
 
Loads in my area too. There were welsh ponies grazing on the marshes and someone obviously thought it was a good idea to introduce a coloured stallion into the herd and now the welsh pony line is lost. I am amazed that they were allowed to to this. It saddens me that the extra money made on coloureds while they were 'popular' was more important than keeping the welsh blood lines intact. Now every foal born even if it's not coloured is a stocky, heavy, hairy foal!! NOT A WELSH SECT A!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
Just drive across Dartmoor any day and you'll see poor little runty ponies chewing away by the roadside.

A long long time ago; in the 1960's if not before then, some bright spark(s) allowed coloured stallions onto the Moor to run with the existing well-established (proper) Dartmoor pony herds. They crossbred, surprise surprise.

Now all we've got left is scraggly little creatures who won't even raise a bid at Tavistock market and the meat man is doing very nicely thank you.

The Dartmoor pony was a recognised breed; they were (still are, if you can find one) lovely little children's riding ponies; my grandmother used to drive one on the farm in a pony-and-trap and many kiddies have lovely memories of riding them. Now they've all but disappeared.

It makes me furious. A little foresight, and a great deal more regulation, would have prevented this. Sorry to vent, probably not relevant to the thread.
 
Huge fields full of coloured cobs near me too. One field looks like indiscriminate not too fabulous cobs, the other looks like controlled fabulous looking animals in amazing condition. There is a big traveller population near here who I know have lots of horses in this area.
 
MiJodsR2BlinkinTite said:
Just drive across Dartmoor any day and you'll see poor little runty ponies chewing away by the roadside.

A long long time ago; in the 1960's if not before then, some bright spark(s) allowed coloured stallions onto the Moor to run with the existing well-established (proper) Dartmoor pony herds. They crossbred, surprise surprise.

Now all we've got left is scraggly little creatures who won't even raise a bid at Tavistock market and the meat man is doing very nicely thank you.

The Dartmoor pony was a recognised breed; they were (still are, if you can find one) lovely little children's riding ponies; my grandmother used to drive one on the farm in a pony-and-trap and many kiddies have lovely memories of riding them. Now they've all but disappeared.

It makes me furious. A little foresight, and a great deal more regulation, would have prevented this. Sorry to vent, probably not relevant to the thread.
Click to expand...

I know exactly how you feel as the same has happened with the welsh ponies, it really is a sad situation as coloureds will go out of fashion as sad as that is to think of an animal as fashion. When I was a child if a mare had a coloured foal they were worthless and many would be given away as they didn't want a coloured, they then started selling for inflated prices because they became popular but now due to indiscriminate breeders the market is saturated with poor quality horses which have been bought due to their colour but I think people have become wise and are starting to look for quality leaving the poor ill bred ones fit for the meat man. I feel mad about this too, you are not alone.
 
MiJodsR2BlinkinTite said:
Just drive across Dartmoor any day and you'll see poor little runty ponies chewing away by the roadside.

A long long time ago; in the 1960's if not before then, some bright spark(s) allowed coloured stallions onto the Moor to run with the existing well-established (proper) Dartmoor pony herds. They crossbred, surprise surprise.

Now all we've got left is scraggly little creatures who won't even raise a bid at Tavistock market and the meat man is doing very nicely thank you.

The Dartmoor pony was a recognised breed; they were (still are, if you can find one) lovely little children's riding ponies; my grandmother used to drive one on the farm in a pony-and-trap and many kiddies have lovely memories of riding them. Now they've all but disappeared.

It makes me furious. A little foresight, and a great deal more regulation, would have prevented this. Sorry to vent, probably not relevant to the thread.
Click to expand...

Spot on, & don't get me started about what I pass on Bodmin each day.......:(
 
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