Judge Rinder - horses and pigs

ROG

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It was stated as a fact on the programme that horses are generally afraid of pigs - is that correct ?
 

The Fuzzy Furry

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'Generallly speaking' yes.
However, if they (horses) live or work adjacent to them & meet them on a regular basis, then they usually become accustomed to them.

Summing up - anything new to a horse can make them afraid.
(air brakes, hot air balloons, litter in a hedge, wheelie bins (especially if they don't usually get ridden on bin day!) and many other things )
 

Damnation

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As a general rule horses are wary of pigs, as TFF (still not your friend btw!! :p ) has said, if they are kepy in close proximity horses usually get over themselves and overcome that wariness.

I believe it comes from wild boars being an predator to horses back in t'day!
 

ihatework

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I've only ever had one horse that was genuinely afraid of pigs.
All the others have accepted them pretty readily
 

meleeka

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I watched it as I have both horses and pigs. The horse owner was incorrect in stating that a horse would have to have grown up with pigs not to be afraid. My three had never seen pigs before I got mine. The herd leader, the biggest of the 3 took a few days to get used to them. The other two went straight over to say hello. I think it's the noise they make that alarms horses.
 

hibshobby

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Pig farm on a local bridleway closed down and pigs left. It took my horse two years to be able to hack down that bridleway on her own again. Latest horse doesn't really care about pigs. Tricky one, but I would reckon that horses are generally bothered by pigs, or their smell.
 

rhylis

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I have 5 ponies and a pair of pet pigs the pigs arrived after the ponies. All the ponies bar one are mildly curious of the pigs but mostly ignore them and have never been scared. The odd pony out is absolutely petrified of them to the point were he has attempted to climb out of a stable purely because he can smell them 4 stables along from his. He and one of the others have been together since birth and hadn't seen pigs prior to ours, yet one pony is pig friendly and likes to watch them and the other is sent into a blind panic by them. My haflinger who sadly had to be put down last autumn was different again. She had a burning desire to kill the pigs and I'm fairly certain she would have managed it given the chance.
 

Annagain

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A friend's horse is petrified. She found this out when on a hack in a new area she had boxed to. They were 90% of the way round a circular route. After an hour of trying they had to admit defeat and go all the way back round. She borrowed some pigs from a friend to try to desensitise them and they had to go back after 10 days as he was in such a state with them. The final straw was when he jumped out of his field and ran 2 miles down the road to the other end of the village before he was caught. Getting him home was quite a challenge, lots of planting and rearing. He's generally a very sensible horse so for him to react like this is genuine - almost primal - fear.
 

horselady

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I saw this on TV and felt that the woman got given the money she should of but I do think maybe she should have been payed for loss of value.
 

MyBoyChe

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I was told it goes back to the days of wild boar as they were a natural predator to the horse. We had 2 pigs to stay for a month (friend of the YO) and my TB initially didnt seem bothered. He was in the field next door to their pen and he stood close to the fence watching them and even touched noses through the wire. However, the minute I took him out of his field towards the stables and he couldnt see them, but could obviously still sense and smell them, he became positively hysterical and dangerous to handle. I assume that whilst he was loose and could see them he could assess the danger, the minute he couldnt see where they were and didnt have his life in his own hooves, he panicked. The day they left he settled down completely so I would have to say I agree that, in the main, horses are designed to be wary of pigs.
 

pennyturner

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We had Kune Kunes for a bit, and the ponies tied outside their stall would lean in and touch noses with their piggy friends. It was very sweet.

At one point we had 15 piglets running around the yard like loons, under the ponies' legs as they were tied, and squealing. Not worth looking up from a hay net for, apparently.
 

Sparkles

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Never had an issue with them with Coblet. The B&B we go to each year has pig's on it where we unload.... Didn't treat them any different to any other livestock.

Known a few to hate them though.
 

Pearlsasinger

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Our first horse was a bombproof gelding who had worked on the Golden Mile in Blackpool in his previous job. One of our hacks went through a wood at the back of a pig farm. He genuinely tiptoed through there, although one of his hobbies was to snort at young cattle and watch them run away.
A couple of years ago a local farmer had a sow and a litter of wild boar crosses, my Draft made, who takes most things, including tractors moving ring feeders, in her stride, grew a good two hands, when she tea!used where their were and that we were going past them!
 

lilly1

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My otherwise level headed mare is really scared of them. So much so she would not venture into half her field due to a neighbouring piggy. In the end I moved to a different yard as she was constantly in a high state of alert and never improved. My friend's spookier mare is not too bothered at all.
 

shellonabeach

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I was the Lady today on judge rinder whose horse got injured, there was a lot of information on the day edited out. I have been a member here for a long time and if you search my posts will find that around 9 years ago I posted about my old boy (who was not so old then) being afraid of pigs. I was surprised about how my grey mare reacted as out hacking past pig farms and pigs in fields she has never shown any issues with them.

The statement I made about all horses being afraid unless they had grown up with pigs was quoted from Monty Roberts.

The neighbours pigs were escaping into my field at night over the course of a month, my horses were almost unhandlable during this time, even the little one. The pigs were not only trespassing into my field but into open crop fields beyond and it was the direction of those fields the horses were terrified of and which is why I had no idea until the day the pigs were caught in my field that it was them which had been causing the problem.

From a personal level the whole thing has been horrible my old lad aged 26 never lame a day in his life has torn a front suspensory and damaged a hind tendon sheath, he was before his injuries still sound and successfully competing in veteran showing and is unlikely to be ridden again. The injury occurred end of November 2016 so he still has a few months and a couple more scans before his prognosis will be clear.
 
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horselady

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I was the Lady today on judge rinder whose horse got injured, there was a lot of information on the day edited out. I have been a member here for a long time and if you search my posts will find that around 9 years ago I posted about my old boy (who was not so old then) being afraid of pigs. I was surprised about how my grey mare reacted as out hacking past pig farms and pigs in fields she has never shown any issues with them.

The statement I made about all horses being afraid unless they had grown up with pigs was quoted from Monty Roberts.

The neighbours pigs were escaping into my field at night over the course of a month, my horses were almost unhandlable during this time, even the little one. The pigs were not only trespassing into my field but into open crop fields beyond and it was the direction of those fields the horses were terrified of and which is why I had no idea until the day the pigs were caught in my field that it was them which had been causing the problem.

From a personal level the whole thing has been horrible my old lad aged 26 never lame a day in his life has torn a front suspensory and damaged a hind tendon sheath, he was before his injuries still sound and successfully competing in veteran showing and is unlikely to be ridden again. The injury occurred end of November 2016 so he still has a few months and a couple more scans before his prognosis will be clear.
I am so sorry that they don't think he can ever be ridden again. Having ridden a 28yr old I know that sometimes the older horses are amazing to ride and really enjoy work. Your horses all look lovely though. I think if anyone's animals did anything to harm my mare because they didn't keep them properly secured I would be angry with them. I really hope it doesn't come to euthanasia with your older horse.
 
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rachk89

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Mine seems to have gotten over his fear of them after some were put in a field next to his. We walked past them the other day with no issue at all and had half expected to be heading back to the yard at a gallop once he saw them. Thankfully we didn't.
 

Dry Rot

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The Horseman's Word was a secret trade union for the men who worked heavy horses before tractors. They came out on strike in the NE of Scotland in the 19th century, so the farmers tried to work the horses themselves. The union was similar to the Free Masons with secrecy, strange ceremonies, and a pact with The Devil. A blind folded stable boy would have to swear an oath of secrecy while holding The Devil by the hand (in fact a goat's foot!) before he could learn the secrets of handling horses. The horsemen were reputed to be able to calm a panicking horse by whispering "The Word" in it's ear, hence the name of the society.

The horsemen used various tricks (all secret) to defeat their masters. One of these was to smear pig dung on the inside of the horses' collars and the door posts of the stables. So the farmers had problems tacking up and leading the horses out to work. The strike was eventually successful in getting them better working conditions. Google would probably bring up more information. But, yes. horses don't like pigs!
 

Boulty

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Strangely mine is mortally terrified of cows (dairy cows mostly) but pigs are merely worthy of mild interest. YO got some and made them a little pen on the edge of some of his woods near the field entrance... a couple of the other horses WERE hysterical about them at first but mine just had a look and a snort and tried to sniff them thru the fence. He is normally the biggest drama queen in the world and spooks at logs and flowers... (Although he has lived with sheep, goats and a donkey and we have deer come in the field sometimes and he did have a couple of cows in the field for a bit so they were the only farm animal missing really!) I pray this continues as he's off in a paddock adjacent to them for a few months. It's large enough that he can go totally out of sight of them if he wishes though.
 

silv

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Where I live in NZ we often come across wild pigs in the forestry we ride in. I would say that 75% of horses do react to them, some more so than others. Thankfully they tend to stay out of the way of people and horses but often the horses can smell them and on "high alert".
 

vam

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Some horses hate pigs and never get better .
Others get used to them .

This. The yard I moved to neighbour has pigs, when I moved they were in a pen away from the drive I have to use to hack out of the yard. Over winter they where moved to a pen right next to the drive behind large bushes. My mare goes past them every time I leave the yard to hack and then when I come back, 3 months on she still doesn't like going past them. I even take her past them before riding in the school as they are next to that as well which makes one corner the piggy corner of doom. She is a bit better but a few weeks ago they where squealing while she was in there and she lost the plot and off I came.
She is just not getting used to them and doubt she ever will, it makes getting out the yard hard work.
 

Jenni_

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Mines hadn't seen a pig before she came to our yard, was chucked in a box next door to our old, noisy, pet pig.

Sniffed, blowed through her nose a few times, and now he doesn't bother her in the slightest and they'll share the odd carrot etc from the yard kids

pig2_zpswqnfkwgx.jpg

pig_zps4rjpqoaf.jpg
 

LegOn

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I think the correct statement of fact is; Horses are afraid of everything and nothing at all times. :lol:
 

milliepops

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Millie is one of those that remains permanently terrified of domestic pigs.. oddly enough the wild boar that we meet in the woods seem to be less frightening, even thought they crash through the undergrowth in large groups making a right racket!

I moved to a yard which had 2 small pigs in a field adjacent to the stable block. After 6 weeks she still hadn't come to terms with it and had given herself a sore neck from craning around the door to keep an eye on them. We moved to a yard with cows... she was initially rather afraid but soon settled as long as they keep their distance.

Kira would be best buddies with any farmyard animal, in complete contrast.
 

irishdraft

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I ride past a small area of scrubb on one of my hacks that is a favourite place for wild boar if they have been around or indeed are in there my gelding lets me know as soon as we approach 13 came out about a month ago thankfully they all went in the other direction as i had trouble staying on with all the high blowing leaping & prancing it's the smell horses react to
 

hopscotch bandit

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A friend had a horse who she showed a pig to whilst between jumping classes at a showground.The horse had always been good to load to that point and it took her over an hour to load it as he was convinced it was in the trailer.From that day she had problems loading himafter nearly a decade of him being good to load.He was trembling in front of the pig and everytime he was confronted with the sight of a pig after that he was a nervous wreck.She thought she was doing the best thing by showing him the pig and wasn't to no he would have such a massive negative reaction.Shame really.even now aged 20 his legs will buckle and she can feel his heart thumping when he sees/hears or smells one out hacking.
 

Apercrumbie

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I don't think I've ever had a horse who liked pigs but my current boy is terrified. He just has to smell them and then he starts shaking and can't go past them. I'm not sure he would benefit from living near one either - his reaction is so extreme I think he would just get himself into a complete state.
 

chillipup

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It used to be an offence to transport horses and pigs within the same vehicle. Not sure if this still stands but quite likely due to the effect it has on some equines. My nearest neighbour keeps a few Mangalitsas (look like sheep x pigs!) They have a warning notice to riders on the bridlepath about them.
 
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