Do you view looking after your horses as 'a lot of hard work' and 'effort'?

T_K

T_K

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I've recently come across a person who constantly points out how much 'hard work' it is looking after her horses and complaining.

Now I really don't feel this way, I love my girls, they are members of my family and I don't begrudge them the care and attention they need for a second.

If I did think they were 'effort' then I would be seriously thinking about giving up.

How do you feel?
 
No i dont complain about the work - just the money they cost lol, even though mine are living rather cheaply.

My OH doesnt get it though, when he see me pushing a wheelbarrow of poo round the field he always says "do u love your ponies now??"
and the answer is always yes! lol
 
I never used to think of lookng after as my horse as hard work, but after losing my confdence and enjoyment of riding I began to find it more and more hard work and more dfficult to fit in. Although I love my horse very much I felt the best option was to sell him. Which I did to a lovely family who love him to pieces. Its too expensive and time consuming not to enjoy it and I think when it starts to become a chore then you need to seriously think about it. Horses are a way of life
 
Yes quite honestly I do. Looking after my horse impacts on a lot of my life and I find the whole thing a balancing act which I occasionally seem to fail miserably at (not to the horses detriment I should add - more everything else)however I do love my horse and certainly wouldn't be without him
 
Looking after 3 horses in winter after a full days work is hard work, but it's work I enjoy doing and wouldn't have it any other way! If I could i'd be with them all day every day, but somebody has to pay for them.
 
i do find doing horses hard work but i am technically disabled. i say technically disabled cos some days i'm fine then others i can barely move. I do have a great support system in place so my horse will always gets good care!
 
Certainly did when I was lugging buckets of water from the house to the fields/yard when everything was frozen earlier this year!
 
Yes its hard work but not in the sense that its a chore... i love working with our horses even when they are difficult...
I ride 4 horses every evening after school in the summer- thats hard work, but work i enjoy. school work is hard work, but work i don't enjoy much. lol...
 
Yes in the winter I do think it is hard especially when there is snow and I am tired and cold after a full days work. However I don't have a car as it saves money and I have to pay for the train to get to work anyway as I work in London so I would not use a car to get to work. I have to walk for 20 minutes up a big hill to get to the yard then another 20 minutes down to the field if they are in the far field and then do the return journey followed by a short train ride home which is in some respects harder than someone who only has a five minute car ride to the yard. However I am probably saving about £100 a month by not having a car and this I can use on hiring a lorry to go to a show or lessons so it is worth the effort and it is only once a day as he lives out. If I am really exhausted I don't have to go as he is in assisted grass livery and I try to have one evening when I don't go to the yard so I can rest.

However I would rather the hard work than not have him - seeing his little face in the evening makes it all worth while.
 
It is hard work,no squabble there-but it is work I love doing so is not any effort(unlike the easy job of running the hoover round :p ).
I actully miss yard work more then I miss riding LOL!

If you look at how much walking you do,often up and down hill or lugging bales/buckets about,ucking out,grooming ect ect you get a pretty good all round work out looking after them.
 
Yes it definitely is hard work especially over the winter... I sleep well at night because I go to bed tired! But as others have said it's not a chore, and is very satisfying seeing them all happy, healthy and content with life :)
 
It can be hard going,especially when the worst weather was here and temps of -15
I enjoy all the stuff that i do though, i love mucking out and seeing their lovely clean beds. I keep my part of the barn immacualate and everything has to be in it's place. When I am out for a hack in the lovely sunshine and the shine on my horse makes her look shimmery, it just remindsme why I love it all so much.
 
Well yes I do and I will admit that I can start feeling quite lazy and sometimes don't even want to ride :S But the moment I get outdoors I never regret it. I adore my boys and I wouldn't give them up for the world, but I think the main issue is that I always feel I don't have enough time for them really as I am ridiculously busy. It's easier in summer at least. I can't bear to part with them, so I'm terrified that one day I will realise that keeping horses just isn't practical for me and unfair on them :( I will keep going for as long as I can because I love them so much. They are hard work but I don't resent them for it and it's definitely worth it. :)
 
in a word yes, i do think they are alot of hard work and effort and some days when everything is going wrong i wonder why i have them but then they remind me why i love them. i knew when i got them they would be hard work and i don't mind that but i wouldn't say they are easy to look after they are very time consuming.
 
Looking after 8, yes, it can be hard work, but I wouldn't complain, they are my life,
 
Yes it is hard work and sometimes an effort to drag yourself out in the freezing cold again at eleven at night to check them all before going to bed, and yes occasionally like this winter which has been long and hardwork I do moan.

But days like today make up for it and I remember why I love them and do the hard slog, to sit out today and watch them all in the field, rugless have a good gallop round, rolling and just enjoying the first feeling of spring in the sun, you know the hardwork is worth it.
 
I do find it an effort tbh, I feel somewhat jaded by horses just now lol. I mean I love my boy, we've grown up together and he's the perfect horse - I'd wouldn't be without him. However once he's gone I doubt I'd get another.
 
98% of the time i enjoy looking after the 8 shetties and 1 tb but every now and then I get a little peed off cause 2 shetties actually belong to my mother and she picks when she is going to help out. It goes through stages where she will help for a couple of months and then the next couple you don't see her, but she is always there to tell you what you should be doing./ arrrrggg mothers but wouldnt be without her
 
The only time I find having a horse difficult is when I'm on night duty and its like ground hog day, work, sleep, 1/2hr drive to yard, sort horse, drive home, bath, eat and back to work again!! Only because I dont see daylight for a week and its depressing.

Otherwise its great and I could never be without my horse as he's always there and I love him to bits.....
 
Some horses and their lifestyles are harder than others, that's for sure! My mare when she was on box rest, as much as I loved looking after her, was becoming "all hard work and effort" for not much "reward" - riding. And considering that was nearly a year of box rest....gah!

And now I'm horseless, I miss the day to day chores of doing her bed and making up feeds. I'm on a yard tho where everyone is so busy with stuff and trying to keep their horses fit - so I have an empty stable (still looking to fill) but lots of horses to ride (I've got some nine rides booked this week on 3 different horses for people that are away etc).

One mare in particular that I've been sitting on this week is the easiest ever to look after - quite literally I ride for 40 min or so and it takes me all of 10 min to do her bed and another five to do up her net and feeds...so I'm done and dusted in about an hour. If I rode my own girl, I could be there for up to three hours at night!
 
there is one girl at our yard with three horses, and yes it is all hard hard work. She works part time, but does nothing with them, and only acquired the third horse (a five year old unbroken) two months ago. Erm........why ???
 
If I say "looking after horses is a lot of hard work and effort..." the sentence will never be finished there, the next part is "but it is soooooooooo worth it!" or "but I wouldn't have it any other way!"

I love spending time down at the yard, I hate doing any kind of "physical" work outside of the yard's boundaries but somehow this is all forgotten when I enter the yard.

You would never ever see me trying to do wood work anywhere... but when I wanted some more jump wings and a couple of fillers, I made then all (with a little help from Dad), painted them brightly and differently and treated them to be outside before ensuring they were all safe for around the horses.

Sweeping is another example, so is poo picking, mucking out, walking through the "swamp" that is the field and heavy lifting of anything horsey.

I get home from a day at the yard knackered but happy. An almost identical day in terms of work done in any other environment I would hate. But because it is for horses, related to horses or just within a 500m of my pony makes it really, really worthwhile!
 
I am hugely fortunate as our horses and ponies live out 24/7, all year round, and are kept at my parents house about 30 mins away from me. As it is our own land, we save a lot of money and not having to do stables saves a lot of effort! I go there 3 or 4 times a week and my parents feed them on the other days (but I generally do the poo-picking, riding, choosing rugs that sort of stuff).

I realise that I'm very lucky to have parents that help me out like this, though they enjoy having the horses too and my mum and I are actually supposed to share Belle, but even I think "Damnit, why am I out here picking up poo in the cold!?" sometimes. I think I would feel very sad without them though!
 
No I don't find the stable work hard, or begrudge the time. It just feels like cleaning my teeth. It's just something I do.

And I actively enjoy the time I spend with my horse so much, that the hard work part just doesn't matter.
 
Persephone said:
No I don't find the stable work hard, or begrudge the time. It just feels like cleaning my teeth. It's just something I do.

And I actively enjoy the time I spend with my horse so much, that the hard work part just doesn't matter.
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Agree with the above I actually love the time I spend on the way home from work mucking out and haying up I get immense satisfaction from doing the simple things for him and find the break between stressful office and home actually allows me to unwind and be a nicer if somewhat smellier person when I walk in the door!
 
Yes I do...winter has dragged, I am struggling with my lads laminitis and dragging soaked hay and water round to the field twice a day on foot! It will get better again though and I could not be without him!
 
I'm not going to lie, I haven't been all that sorry to be horseless this winter :o Of course they're a lot of hard work and effort - but they are worth it though :)
 
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