Fife Trainer on trial!

I don't know anything about the charges or this trial, but part of the SSPCA's evidence, as reported read:

"“There were hay bales with plastic still wrapped around them where the horses were eating the plastic. It was a cold day and there was no shelter for the horses, who had ill-fitting and ripped rugs. There were also temporary stables that could have been dangerous to the horses."

The visit was at the end of March, during the daytime. Am I alone in thinking horses being outside without a field shelter but wearing rugs, is not an indication of neglect? Its almost impossible to get planning permission for a field shelter in the UK. Or horses reaching to be able to rip plastic off covered hay bales isn't desirable, but show me the yard where that hasn't happened. As for the temporary stables that could have been dangerous to horses, surely they mean the show stabling, some of which at the back no-one is ever allowed to use because its not up to standard. Were there actually any horses in the temporary stables?

Its not exactly best evidence, is it?
 
They cleared her as she transferred ownership to a friend so claimed they weren't hers even though they were
 
Lots of horses are out with no shelter, they should come around this area. If they were skinny that's different.
Leaving hay with plastic on it???????????? No wonder they were skinny.
 
-Sj- said:
They cleared her as she transferred ownership to a friend so claimed they weren't hers even though they were
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Were you at the trial? How could you possibly know this? I would need to read the case report to be sure, but having read the Courier article, which was brief, its pretty obvious that the acquittal was due to poor evidence as much as any technical issue regarding ownership.

Kingsbarn is a massive equestrian centre which has hordes of people from all equine disciplines visiting and staying for days at a time. Its a bit unbelievable that if there were such a problem, hordes of the same people would not have spotted it.

Theres something very very odd about this case. I don't quite know what it is, but RSPCA cases and to a lesser extent SSPCA cases have a very high level of conviction, but from the judge's comments, it doesn't seem to have been a difficult judgment.
 
'failed to wean foals from two mares' is that actually a welfare issue??... we kept a mare and her foal till the end so i guess guilty as charged lock me up now! god the rspca/sspca really dont do themselves any favours. clueless prats! x-(
 
My friend bought a horse from here when she went to view it , it was in a stinking stable , has zero water, she went to get it water and it downed the whole bucket. She looked in at other horses and there stables were also really dirty clearly not been cleaned for a good while. She actually bought the horse as felt so sorry for it and when her own vet checked it said there was clear signs of neglect. It's skin was also in a mess.

Also I heard so can't confirm if true or not, a horse died of neglect and they quickly got it removed, so people would not report them.

Rumours about this place and the way the horses have been kept have been circling for well over a year. I've heard some terrible things. But as for the horse in question that was bought from there I seen it will my own eyes, thin and covered in untreated scabs. Clearly no one had bothered with her in a good while.
 
said trainer is well known in parts of Fife for borderline welfare issues, she's not always been at Kingsbarn, she was at Westerdeanhead I think?. From what I've heard from people locally,she has a long history of not looking after her horses well-lack of regular checking, overstocking, lack of forage, hoof care etc. not exactly neglect cases but not good practice either.
 
MotherOfChickens said:
said trainer is well known in parts of Fife for borderline welfare issues, she's not always been at Kingsbarn, she was at Westerdeanhead I think?. From what I've heard from people locally,she has a long history of not looking after her horses well-lack of regular checking, overstocking, lack of forage, hoof care etc. not exactly neglect cases but not good practice either.
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Im sorry but i disagree, poor hoof care is neglect as is failing to provide adequate forage for your horses, i dont know the ins and outs of the case, but both of these issues are in my view neglect
 
Marydoll said:
Im sorry but i disagree, poor hoof care is neglect as is failing to provide adequate forage for your horses, i dont know the ins and outs of the case, but both of these issues are in my view neglect
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well it is to me as well, but the horses in question didn't have aladdin's slippers or anything, they were 'just' unkempt and the horses a bit poor. my point is that while most of us would never dream of keeping our horses in that way, it still doesn't warrant a neglect case that would go through the courts and lead to a conviction-as awful as it might seem.
 
Marydoll said:
So now we get in to degrees of neglect, if a vet condition scored a horse with a 0.5 condition score on any scoring system, again in my eyes, thats neglect
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This!


But she got away with it again. The woman is a disgrace and blames everyone else!
 
Marydoll said:
So now we get in to degrees of neglect, if a vet condition scored a horse with a 0.5 condition score on any scoring system, again in my eyes, thats neglect
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Exactly. I wouldn't think it acceptable to leave a pregnant mare with a condition score of 0.5 still feeding a 10 month old foal, with over grown hooves, trying tear through the plastic on a haylage bale in order to feed herself.
Though worryingly, some of you think that's fine.
 
dogatemysalad said:
Though worryingly, some of you think that's fine.
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Personally I wasn't referring to this case-I meant that its more like this woman has been known for years to SSPCA/vets etc and I expect those involved were hoping that this would be the case to stop her for once and for all. Previous evidence wasn't enough to charge her-even though most people couldn't afford that many horses and look after them and it was a matter of time before something worse did happen. I wish that she had been done and its sad that this wasn't enough as I think a body score of 0.5 should be more than enough.
 
Very true MoC.
Has to be a bad crack if the sspca have to be informed everytime a vet is called out to the yard, even if it's a liveries horse. Also... wouldn't want to have your horse on working livery with her as she removes/sells on the horse then claims the owners haven't paid their livery (even though they have bank statements)

The woman is a crook and prays on small business's and vulnerable people. Also bringing horses over and letting the very young horsey-loving teenagers, that that are used as slave labour so she doesn't need to pay the staff (that she doesn't pay anyway) to first-sit/break-in horses that have no history and she knows nothing about them.

Horrible stories of mares found dead in the bogs at KB, others died during foaling and left for days on end with a tarp over it until it was finally removed in the middle of the night. God the woman is awful and causes awful suffering
 
horsemadmum1 said:
This thread is of interest, as this venue runs events of interest to me and my children, but not sure I want to support it given the recent publicity.
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I know a lot of people feel like this.
They were recently dropped from BD as a venue. Hopefully bsja and BS will follow suit. There are plenty other venues that would like to be considered for shows I'm sure. An the yards don't look disgusting!
 
Must admit when I read this article I wasn't surprised. I don't want to go into details on a public forum but she used to have connections to my area and is certainly not someone I would want anywhere near any of my horses. It wasn't really welfare issues back then more the way she went about her business.
 
rowan666 said:
'failed to wean foals from two mares' is that actually a welfare issue??... we kept a mare and her foal till the end so i guess guilty as charged lock me up now! god the rspca/sspca really dont do themselves any favours. clueless prats! x-(
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I was actually wondering this myself. In the wild mares may not send their foals off untill they are yearlings so I don't think this should have been a case for concern. Plus it stated that the age for weaning was a "guidline" not a hard rule
 
I wouldn't necessarily believe the rumours as arms & legs do get added on. The main thing that concerned me was the horses condition being 0.5.....Iv never seen a horse in such poor condition but is it possible the horse is old/sick & had trouble with worms or that it had been rescued in this condition? I don't know- don't know the people involved or anything about the yard. Just playing devils advocate....
 
el_Snowflakes said:
I wouldn't necessarily believe the rumours as arms & legs do get added on. The main thing that concerned me was the horses condition being 0.5.....Iv never seen a horse in such poor condition but is it possible the horse is old/sick & had trouble with worms or that it had been rescued in this condition? I don't know- don't know the people involved or anything about the yard. Just playing devils advocate....
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I think the vet wouldve taken that in to consideration in making his decision, but a score of 0.5 even in illness and age is still a very big welfare concern that needs actioned in an appropriate way, by treatment that if unsuccessful horse is pts rather than being in such an emaciated state
 
BethanT said:
I was actually wondering this myself. In the wild mares may not send their foals off untill they are yearlings so I don't think this should have been a case for concern. Plus it stated that the age for weaning was a "guidline" not a hard rule
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True, but a late lactating mare needs a decent ration (1.75 x maintenance), seems like the poor creature wasn't getting anywhere near enough. Seems daft though that they should cite late weaning as a reason, don't think there is any law against it, I would have thought too early would be more of a welfare issue.
 
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