Joining the 'bought unseen from Ireland' club...

[dapple_grey]

Not sure how I ended up here! I've been searching for months for something between 6-10, ideally a mare, been there and seen the world a bit. Didn't want another grey (despite the username, ha). So obviously it makes sense that I buy a rising 4yo steel grey gelding unseen, subject to vetting

The vetting was supposed to be this afternoon but the vets have asked to push it back to Friday, which is a bit annoying and more time to get nervous about my decision

Sire is an Irish Draught and dam is a cob, so at least I stuck to the breeding I was after if nothing else. Argh, the nerves are kicking in now!

 

[cauda equina]

How exciting, we will need photos when she arrives!

 

[SEL]

Well I hope the vetting goes well and when he arrives we definitely need photos!

 

[Squeak]

How exciting! Often the best ones are the ones that are the complete opposite to what we thought we wanted!

Good luck for the vetting on friday.

 

[dapple_grey]

How exciting! Often the best ones are the ones that are the complete opposite to what we thought we wanted!

Good luck for the vetting on friday.

Thank you! I hope so I was sifting through an awful lot of rubbish and everything that fit the bill was either £15k or lame, and not much in-between! He's a homebred direct from the stud. Had basic handling, but I'm quite happy spending the summer playing with him and enjoying the youngster process again

 

[catembi]

Yay, well done! I was going to get a dapple grey gelding and ended up with a ginger mare!

Hope it all goes well & that you have lots of fun

 

[Midlifecrisis]

Looking forward to pictures!

 

[AShetlandBitMeOnce]

Yaaaay! Welcome to the club!
You must post photos once all has the go ahead - good luck for the vetting Friday

 

[fredflop]

Irish vets always appear more “relaxed” with their vettings than the ones in the uk

 

[spacefaer]

Irish vets always appear more “relaxed” with their vettings than the ones in the uk

I've had much better. more accurate and genuine settings from most of the Irish vets I've used over the last 20 years than I have from UK ones. There are some exceptional and knowledgeable horsemen who are vets over there. Not many vets over here are horsemen. (Excellent vets but not horsemen!)

 

[Cortez]

Irish vets always appear more “relaxed” with their vettings than the ones in the uk

Ireland in general is more relaxed than most things in the UK

 

[ihatework]

I've had much better. more accurate and genuine settings from most of the Irish vets I've used over the last 20 years than I have from UK ones. There are some exceptional and knowledgeable horsemen who are vets over there. Not many vets over here are horsemen. (Excellent vets but not horsemen!)

I agree with the concept for sure.
The only thing I would caution is if you are vetting for insurance purposes, especially xray interpretation, then you need to be careful. Admittedly xrays are the work of the devil, but the Irish vets are far more lenient on what they consider an issue which can come back and bite you with insurers!

 

[dapple_grey]

Yay, well done! I was going to get a dapple grey gelding and ended up with a ginger mare!

Hope it all goes well & that you have lots of fun

Looking forward to pictures!

Yaaaay! Welcome to the club!
You must post photos once all has the go ahead - good luck for the vetting Friday

I will definitely post photos! Having to sit on my hands so I don't post them yet, in case I tempt fate

 

[dapple_grey]

I agree with the concept for sure.
The only thing I would caution is if you are vetting for insurance purposes, especially xray interpretation, then you need to be careful. Admittedly xrays are the work of the devil, but the Irish vets are far more lenient on what they consider an issue which can come back and bite you with insurers!

He is below the price threshold so insurance don't require X-rays but thank you for the word of caution nonetheless.

 

[Cortez]

I agree with the concept for sure.
The only thing I would caution is if you are vetting for insurance purposes, especially xray interpretation, then you need to be careful. Admittedly xrays are the work of the devil, but the Irish vets are far more lenient on what they consider an issue which can come back and bite you with insurers!

How so? The insurers would have to dispute the credentials of the (qualified) veterinarian, otherwise it's just one vet's opinion vs another vets'.

 

[Lucky Snowball]

Good Luck. How exciting!

 

[ihatework]

How so? The insurers would have to dispute the credentials of the (qualified) veterinarian, otherwise it's just one vet's opinion vs another vets'.

That’s exactly what can happen.
All vets (including the insurers vet) can have a different interpretation of the clinical significant of minor X-ray findings.

Insurers IME generally lean more towards excluding things from X-ray that some vets would advise clients are unlikely to be of clinical significance.

 

[Rowreach]

I must remember to tell my vet he's too relaxed next time he's driving to all points Ireland doing vettings for people.

 

[ihatework]

I must remember to tell my vet he's too relaxed next time he's driving to all points Ireland doing vettings for people.

Why? No need to be sarky.
This is a thread about bringing a horse into the UK from Ireland. How many horses have you imported from Ireland and insured with a UK insurance company?
This is not a criticism of Irish vets, it's a valid alert to the UK buying/insurance situation

 

[dapple_grey]

Can we keep this as a happy thread about a potential new horse please, don’t want it turning into an argument about Irish vettings

 

[Ambers Echo]

Yay welcome to the 'unseen from Ireland' club! I have never regretted it for a second.

 

[spacefaer]

Yay welcome to the 'unseen from Ireland' club! I have never regretted it for a second.

It's a lot of fun! And so exciting when that lorry arrives and the ramp comes down ......

 

[Rowreach]

Can we keep this as a happy thread about a potential new horse please, don’t want it turning into an argument about Irish vettings

Apologies, I was not intending my post to appear sarcastic, I just wouldn't want people to make to much of a generalisation about our great vets

I wish you the best of fun with your new purchase.

 

[AShetlandBitMeOnce]

It's a lot of fun! And so exciting when that lorry arrives and the ramp comes down ......

Its quite heart stopping when the one closest to the ramp is a 15hh cremello mare when you've paid for a grey/roany 16.2hh gelding (who was thankfully on the other side of the stallion partition of course, just a split second of f********ck)

 

[dapple_grey]

Deleted - realised Google would answer my question.

 

[rescuearacehorse]

I bought unseen from Ireland last year (Irish Sport Equine), a four year old dapple grey Irish Draught. Absolutely beautiful. It turned out he was a wobbler and was eventually put down last month. He'd passed the Irish "vetting". Would I do it again? Not a chance. It was utterly heart breaking, not to mention an extremely expensive mistake.

 

[Mrs. Jingle]

I bought unseen from Ireland last year (Irish Sport Equine), a four year old dapple grey Irish Draught. Absolutely beautiful. It turned out he was a wobbler and was eventually put down last month. He'd passed the Irish "vetting". Would I do it again? Not a chance. It was utterly heart breaking, not to mention an extremely expensive mistake.

What a great pity you did not put Gerty Tynan into the search function on here, or even posted a thread before your purchase. I don't think you would have bought from her sadly. In fairness though I have to ask did your horse even have symptoms of wobblers at the time of sale? I am not entirely sure that any vet doing any vetting without extensive tests would be able to detect a horse that is not showing any symptoms from one that might go on to show evidence of wobblers at a later date. I could be wrong, I am not a vet. Did you use an independent vet or one of her choosing?

I am so sorry for your experience she is far from typical of reputable dealers we do have here and we have many highly reputable and extremely diligent vets too. Again a request on the forum would almost certainly have given you reliable recommendations for vets that cover that area.

 

[rescuearacehorse]

What a great pity you did not put Gerty Tynan into the search function on here, or even posted a thread before your purchase. I don't think you would have bought from her sadly. In fairness though I have to ask did your horse even have symptoms of wobblers at the time of sale? I am not entirely sure that any vet doing any vetting without extensive tests would be able to detect a horse that is not showing any symptoms from one that might go on to show evidence of wobblers at a later date. I could be wrong, I am not a vet. Did you use an independent vet or one of her choosing?

I am so sorry for your experience she is far from typical of reputable dealers we do have here and we have many highly reputable and extremely diligent vets too. Again a request on the forum would almost certainly have given you reliable recommendations for vets that cover that area.

I did plenty of googling of Gerty, and deliberated over it for about a year before I went ahead. The bottom line was that I believed that they would be honest and sell a healthy animal given it's their job and livelihood. Looking back, there were some small signs in the videos actually, a resting of a back foot when the front foot was picked up, a slow to move off hind leg, a swishing tail continually when in ridden work. I didn't pick up on these before buying sadly - again, naively thinking the best in people. Whether they knew or not I don't know, but it was odd that he was not put on her website as sold, as they are usually. He just disappeared off her website.

It was an Irish vetting of her choice. My vets think they would have picked it up. But you don't expect a three year old ID (as he was then) to be a wobbler do you.

 

[Red-1]

Congratulations and good luck! I am another member, including buying a grey when I didn't want grey I am very happy though, mine was as described and lovely. That is him on my profile pic, as a 5yo,doing a photoshoot at 5am on the beach as part of a group.

I was satisfied with my vetting. It was thorough and practical. My own vet tried to pull him apart the week he arrived and could not.

 

[Rowreach]

I did plenty of googling of Gerty, and deliberated over it for about a year before I went ahead. The bottom line was that I believed that they would be honest and sell a healthy animal given it's their job and livelihood. Looking back, there were some small signs in the videos actually, a resting of a back foot when the front foot was picked up, a slow to move off hind leg, a swishing tail continually when in ridden work. I didn't pick up on these before buying sadly - again, naively thinking the best in people. Whether they knew or not I don't know, but it was odd that he was not put on her website as sold, as they are usually. He just disappeared off her website.

It was an Irish vetting of her choice. My vets think they would have picked it up. But you don't expect a three year old ID (as he was then) to be a wobbler do you.

Not wanting to derail the thread but there are unfortunately a large number of people on here who have similar experiences to you with this dealer. I've no idea how she is still in business.