Gypsy Cob Society Passport Woes

I've had this problem with them too. After 5 months of trying to sort it out I gave up and bought a new passport for the pony.

Nobody wanted to know, or seemed to know what they were supposed to do about it (he's a 4yo Welsh x Standie, passport says he's 6, NED says he's a 2yo grey female donkey!)

My advice is don't waste your time.
 
Lippizaner Society - I can see my rather common (but fab temprement!) pony getting ideas above his station if that goes ahead! Do hairy ponies do airs above the ground?
 
Hi,
I have just joined after reading threads about GCS passports and i am mortified. I bought my mare on the 7th September 2010 and i sent her passport off 3 weeks ago with the £20 fee, and i have just read that the GCS no longer exists as from the 2nd September 2010. Please could you give me some advice as to what i should do now?
I will be contacting Defra and Cumbria trading standards on monday morning.
I have not got the passport back either!

Any advice will be greatly appreciated

Thank you
 
You sent your passport off about the same time as me.
The things to do are:

1) Stop the cheque.
2)Check if it recorded on NED online.
3) Report to trading standards & DEFRA (although DEFRA are as much use as a choc teapot!). I shall pm you an email address for a specific person at Cumbria TS that Cuffey sent to me.
4) Keep phoning GCS. It took me all week to get through but I did eventually. They told me they are holding on to any passports to pass them on. Despite confirming to OH on Monday that they had received my passport & would deal with it on Tuesday, on Friday I was told they haven't even opened the envelopes if they have passports (X ray vision I presume). Ask them to send your passport back so that you can deal with it when DEFRA finally make arrangements. I've got the Vet coming for 2nd jab on Wednesday & told them I want it back by then. TBH I shall be surprised if I don't have to keep chasing. Don't accept any offers to back date the amendments.
5) Keep a record of all your contacts with GCS
 
Hi people. As a TGCA committee member (showing) I have been asked by the rest of the committee to put an official TGCA comment on all the concerns regarding the GCS and Gypsy Cob passports.

Firstly the TGCA is well aware of all the concerns and problems you are all facing with either current passports or applying for new ones. The TGCA is working flat out to try and provide a solution to all of this. We are in contact with DEFRA. As founders of one of the most extensive Studbooks for the breed in this country and abroad we truely believe that this breeds PIO needs to be studbook based with DNA profiles for registered animals. The breeding and history of these horses must be documented and recorded and to have a non Gypsy Cob Society hold the passporting will be hugely detrimental to this breed.

As you may be aware there are masses of requirements that we need to satisfy DEFRA to gain approval and it cannot be an overnight thing. We are 99% there but we need all the support we can get from breeders and enthusiasts alike.

We would advise the following:

If you have a GCS passport firstly check with the National Equine Database that your passport is registered with them. This is a legal requirement and if it is not registered your best advice is to contact Cumbria Trading Standards (as they regulate this matter not DEFRA) Then email Defra with the details of the complaint you have made.

If you are waiting for a passport or change of ownership then email GCS and copy to Cumbria Trading Standards and DEFRA.

There should have been no payments for anything passport related processed by GCS since 2nd September 2010. If they have then they are not valid by law. Again contact Cumbria Trading Standards and DEFRA.

Owners of 2010 weanlings etc. you are required by law to hold a passport for your horses you should email DEFRA and enquire their advice on how to proceed especialy those of you who require verified parentage on your horses as with a general PIO this will not be possible and your horses breeding and heritage will be lost. Even a TGCA overstamp is just that an overstamp we cannot put your horses breeding into your passport through a general PIO.

We are always available to answer (as best we can) your concerns and quieries so please email us at the TGCA www.tgca.co.uk you can also discuss this matter on the TGCA website (top right hand side) ;)
 
rushyj said:
Hi people. As a TGCA committee member (showing) I have been asked by the rest of the committee to put an official TGCA comment on all the concerns regarding the GCS and Gypsy Cob passports.

Firstly the TGCA is well aware of all the concerns and problems you are all facing with either current passports or applying for new ones. The TGCA is working flat out to try and provide a solution to all of this. We are in contact with DEFRA. As founders of one of the most extensive Studbooks for the breed in this country and abroad we truely believe that this breeds PIO needs to be studbook based with DNA profiles for registered animals. The breeding and history of these horses must be documented and recorded and to have a non Gypsy Cob Society hold the passporting will be hugely detrimental to this breed.

We are always available to answer (as best we can) your concerns and quieries so please email us at the TGCA www.tgca.co.uk you can also discuss this matter on the TGCA website (top right hand side) ;)
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Thank you
Your organisation is the obvious choice and would suit all owners of coloured cobs which an ID only passport would not.
My concern would be you taking on what appears to have been left as a ''shambles''
I hope you will be able to produce a passport of the quality people expect for their £20 or thereabouts and one which will be impossible to alter by traders without it being obvious.
 
Only the organisation which holds the offiical studbook for the breed should be the passport issuing authority recognised and authorised by DEFRA. I am a long time breeder of gypsy cobs and want the ancestry origines on my passports where these are known. This is why I have joined the TGCA as they have a programme now of DNA profiling, essential in todays world and for the future of this unique breed.
 
We believe we can. The whole ethos of the TGCA is to protect the breed and give it equal standing with the rest of the UK breeds. The gypsy cob has been downtrodden for too long in the UK and the only way we can gain all of this is through professionalism in all areas. It is a vast amount of work but we are getting there and we have had some fantastic support from everyone.
 
Good luck Rushyj it looks like big job you want to take on. When I looked there were over 7,000 GCS passports on NED. God knows how many they have actually issued as there are so many stories of them not being on NED.
 
lol isn't it just but we have got to get it right from the outset. To give you an idea our vet (very well respected in good eventing, hunting country) was up the other day and chatting away to him and the closure of the GCS came up in conversation. He didn't even know it had been stopped. He then followed that up by saying "yeah but it was only ever just a money spinner anyway" you tell me any other breed that would get that response?!? Would the closure of a sport horse or warmblood PIO get that response..... mad me really angry actually,.
 
It’s an absolute disgrace!

I am in a terrible dilemma. I bought a fantastic little piebald colt and paid a fair bit for him. His sire is a stunning cob and my colt is true to type. My long-term plan was to keep him entire and possibly breed.
He arrived with a ‘Pet-ID’ passport and no mention of his breeder, sire or dam. I am gutted to say the least! I don’t want to lose this valuable information. I contacted Pet-Id but they informed me they don’t include these details, as they are not a breed society. Aaarrrgghhh!!:mad::mad::mad:
Is there anything else I can do Rushyj??
 
For the DNA side of things Sunshine, best bet is to contact Andrea Betteridge [contact details up on TGCA website], as she is in charge of the studbook and DNA profiling and can parentage/DNA test horses.
:)
 
Binky is right re contacting Andrea. This is exactly the sort of situation that owners are finding themselves in. The TGCA can verify parentage and give certification to that effect obviously we cannot alter or adjust passports.
 
Lioness said:
The Gypsy Cob needs its own worldwide breed passports with Studbook, dna database, verified parentage etc etc. the only people with any of this in place already is the Traditional Gypsy Cob Association.
We don't need the cobs stuck in the with the 'general' passport issuing agencies.
Defra need to either, re-instate GCS, with provisions for added administration, or get TGCA to do it pretty quick !! already 6 weeks plus without passports, plus outstanding ones, and this years foals needing to be passported by the end of the year, what a mess !!
L
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*Bangs head on wall* Cobs whether Gypsy (black and white) or otherwise are not a breed, they are a type!
Why would anybody want to have a passport issued by the Gypsy Cob Society is beyond me anyway, there are dozens of reputable PIO's why choose these?
 
Baggybreeches said:
*Bangs head on wall* Cobs whether Gypsy (black and white) or otherwise are not a breed, they are a type!
Why would anybody want to have a passport issued by the Gypsy Cob Society is beyond me anyway, there are dozens of reputable PIO's why choose these?
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Though I agree with the head banging part may I please enlighten you. The Gypsy Cob has been bred for tens of decades through selected breeding choosing to build the ultimate all round work horse. Descended from fells, dales and heavy horse breeds to gain the unique qualities of the breed we seen today. Colour was introduced to the breed to stop the horses being drafted into the war. Many of the top breeders can trace their herds bloodlines back 5 or 6 generations gypsy cob to gypsy cob.

Not too dissimilar to the thoroughbred who I believe were decended from 4 arabs?!? It is just a question of the time involved.
 
I understand your point entirely, however how can 'anybody' apply for a passport with such a society given that the vast majority of people who a) wish to have passports and b) are most likely to never breed from or sell their horse, are unlikely to have even a dam and sire listed, let alone a 3 or 5 generation pedigree. It makes a bit of a mockery of the idea of the 'breed' theory, no?
FWIW I have nothing against anybody setting up or issuing passports called whatever they like, but with the amount of very ignorant (and I make no apology for the use of that word) people who now have access to horse ownership and care, I find it quite disturbing that even the basics of type v's breed escapes them.
Personally not really a fan of coloured horses per se, but to each their own, just don't call a spade a shovel an' all that!
 
The TGCA has been established for 3 years now collecting DNA from herds up and down the UK and abroad we have the DNA profiles of in excess of 500 horses. (DEFRA requires 17 stallions and 50 mares) All our horses before being accepted onto our main studbook must be DNA tested to prove parentage. We work on a 17 point marker sytem with our profiling done through Animal Genetics also with feeds from the University of Kentuky. We also offer a colour testing so people can prove unique colour markers. In fact we recently did some work with the scientist at the Animal Health Trust due to the decendancy of our BREED from Fells and Dales into Foal Immunodeficiency Syndrome that effects the Fells and Dales to see if it had come into the Gypsy Cob breed. As our studbook is still open we can allow for horses to be entered only after grading this is done by a panel of experts on the breed after a full vetting of the animal.

To be blunt many of these horses are exported to the USA and Australia to name but a few countries. I am pretty sure that if people can arrange to have their horses flown out of this country and pass all the DEFRA exporting laws and rules they can manage to satisfy the basic requirements of filling out a passport.
 
Yes but that is the exception rather than the rule. I commend highly what you are doing, but my point is that the umpteen thousand coloured cobs that have been sales fodder in this country for the past 50 years or so, are not a breed, you are making the right steps towards identifying a breed with your testing and research, but 500 horses in the grand scheme of things is a drop in the ocean.
Well done on your commitment in what must surely be a mammoth task.
 
Thank you and yes it is, but it is the same for all breeds. How many ex racers get binned just because they can no longer cut it on the track? I in fact bought a national hunt horse from ascot sales who still had his racing plates worn and twisted into his feet, a sub clinical infection in his throat where he had been turned out in a field and left for weeks before the sales after having had a tie back.

The prejudice this breed suffers is exactly why we are doing this. We know it is a mammoth task but it has to start somewhere.
 
I have two such 'rejects' who serve me perfectly well as hunters/pointers! Please continue to educate folks in the difference between a breed and a type though, pedantic, Moi?
PS and please be very stringent with your grading, mediocre breeding beasts is another of my little bugbears!
 
Having experienced this with my cob and my ex racer all I will say is RushyJ is correct in what they say and yes, this is an ongoing issue which will be rectified.
I'm with you all the way on this one RJ..................................
 
It's no different to the same start of any breed, just with more discrimination, hate, biased unknowledgable opinions and predujice going against them.

That reply Baggy, take this in no offensive way, is the EXACT point of the society. Your first [and probably firm] opinion on the breed shows the distinct lack of knowledge on the breed from outside people looking in. These are NOT 'fodder cobs' or what most are used to seeing. These are £££££'s worth of stallions and breeding heritage. For showing and breeding side of things, the TGCA has allowed a showcase for UK breeders now to get their stock in the public eye....some of which are stallions/mares/youngstock the public would never see the likes of before.
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The value of these horses can put other breeds to shame. If anyone classes them as 'fodder cobs' still, then quite frankly, wash your mouth out! ;)

Just like every single recognised breed, there are crap examples for all. You get the crap bred welshies, and the stunning top class welshies. You get TB's/warmbloods/etc which have all the conformation of a donkey...still classed as their breed, but just poor examples of the breed! Can still get a passport for them as the breed, but won't necessarily pass a grading! No disimiliar to the TGCA.

With so much unpublished information on the breed, it is just the start up of a studbook a few decades on from when all the other breeds started. Call it 'late starters' if you must! Surely if there's all breeding and the heritage proved and documented for years, why shouldn't there be a stand made to get the breed, just that,a breed. It's absolutely NO different to how any ther breed society is formed and based on. Yes it's hard work and determination, but everything worthwhile is.


Sorry, this is NOT a personal attack, but that low grade opinion on the breed is exactly what we're fighting against.

ETA - edited photos to lins as were clogging up the page. Andthanks all if your photos are on there!
 
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I agree that a show hunter or a show cob is a type as it has no specific breed guideline. Ie a show cob could be a connie/id cross. Hence shown as a type.

The gypsy cob that we allow into our stud book has been bred gypsy cob to gypsy cob for generations and can prove it that makes it a breed. If it can't prove it then it will have to be shown in front of a panel of experts to prove it has the true to type qualities to allow it's bloodline into the breed. It is like saying a connie is not a breed if it did not have a studbook.

Let me ask you these cobs your referring to do any of them have all of the following.

Height:

The height can be any height from 12hh – 16hh or over.

Head:

Neat, small, noble and in proportion to the body . Broad between the eyes, which should be bright, and alert displaying a large, kind eye. Blue eyes are acceptable, Small neat ears slightly incurving. Long foretop of straight hair down the face.

Neck:

Strong, well arched and of ample length. The neck to be well set onto a good sloping shoulder, Stallions should display a bold outlook with a well-arched crest. Long, flowing mane.

Shoulders:

Well-laid, long, sloping shoulders with well-developed muscles. Withers not too fine.

Body:

Short-coupled and deep through the chest, with well-sprung ribs. Strong loins.

Hindquarters:

Deep, lengthy and powerful. Second thighs well-developed and very muscular. Tail well set on, not high, with plenty of long, straight hair reaching the ground.strong muscled hindquaters displaying an ‘Apple shape’


Hocks:

Broad, Flat and clean. Well let down with plenty of dense flat bone below. Ample hair being displayed

Forearms: Set square. Short and very muscular, with broad, well-developed knees. Displaying an abundance of hair around all the leg.

Feet, Legs and Joints

The very best of feet and legs, with flexible joints, showing quality with no coarseness. The cannons should be short and display a minimum of 8"(20.3cms) of flat flinty bone and well defined tendons. Pasterns should be nicely sloping and of good length. Ample silky feather surrounding all of legs and feet and joints. Large, round feet open at the heels, with well developed frogs.

Colours:

All colours acceptable

Markings: All markings acceptable

Action:

Clean, high, straight and true. Going forward on “all fours” with tremendous energy. The knee and hock are lifted, the hind legs flexed well under the body for powerful drive.

Character:

True pony character. Alert, loyal, courageous, intelligent and placid and genuine sociable outlook


These are the requirements to pass TGCA grading.
 
I have to agree with BaggyBreeches. Coloured cobs are a type not a breed as by your own admission they are a hotchpotch of breeds, not just a simple cross but several crosses, no wonder they are so many different shapes.
The majority of what you see at sales and advertised as gypsy cobs are usually what would be rejected as downright ugly if they were a solid colour and many people that buy them are buying them for their splodges and hairiness (in other words their bling in what is becoming a trashy society and even gives Essex a bad name) alone which unscrupulous traders are trading on and rubbing their hands in glee especially with the novice buyers that are found today. The traders are on a money spinner and meanwhile you have every coloured hairy mare being bred from, the only criteria being the hairier and more coloured the better.

I applaud those with their commitment for the new society and wish them well but I fear it will be very unrepresentative because of the sheer amount of people that haven't a clue, even more care less what the parentage of their horse is, it's just another blingy hairy yak to get onto the market.

I know I'll get a lot of stick for what I've said, I'll take it all on board but I won't be coming back to this as those pictures were huge and mean every post I read on this I have to scroll all the way across and back to read, it's too painful.
 
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