Keeping horses in Brisbane

[virtual]

Me and OH have accepted jobs near Brisbane, Australia to start in 6 months. I won't be taking my horses from the UK but will want to have a horse (or a few!) out there. I've searched the threads and there seem to be a few people here who've had horses in Oz but most of the discussion is about transporting horses there.

Really I'm looking for information about horsey life near Brisbane. Are most horses 'at home' or at livery (aggistment?) how much does it cost to keep a horse? If we bought a house with land what sort of land is best considering floods/droughts/flies/dams?

What's competitive life there like? I mainly show here but would change disciplines if needs be. Can you go out hacking? There don't seem to be bridleways as such.

Are there any good Australian/Queensland horsey forums?

Also has anyone built a house in Oz? Any advice?

 

[Adelaideandie]

Hi, just typed a long reply and it disappeared

Anyway i'm not much use for Brisbane as i live in Adelaide! But i can say that the flies are awful! For agistment of my little mare i pay $50 week for individual turnout 24/7 plus a stable, arena with lights and jumps, tack /feed store, lucky to have amazing trail riding (hacking) that go out for kms in the forests. My hay costs around $12 a bale from a fodder store as have no storage for more than 4 at a time! I also feed hay 24/7 adlib as we have absolutely no grass. A bag of oaten chaff costs me $16 and calm performer pellets are $12-14 depends on the fodder store!

Bring what you can over as there is not much choice in the tack shops and its expensive too, compared to the UK

Check out www.myaushorse.com.au, for all things horsey to purchase. Havent found as good a forum as this here but a good migration one is poms in oz and they have a queensland section too. Also EA for competing and there are PC and RC here as well.

Good luck and i think the east coast is a rather horsey area too as is NSW and Victoria.

 

[Lambkins]

Ooooooo this is what we are thinking of doing ...I have been to Perth , Adelaide , Melbourne , and Queensland ..and I just love Queensland !! (OH is an Aussie) Queensland has huge rainforest .. So more tropical weather ..Melbourne is more like here (u get lots of rain and snow ) Perth is like a sandpit how exciting can we help u house hunt ? Pleaseeeeee (oh an Australia is very competitive !! Look on horse deals au ) x x http://www.horsedeals.com.au/index.php?p=view-horse&horse=283142-Price-Reduced
http://www.horsedeals.com.au/index.php?p=view-horse&horse=283399-Egmont-Park-Stud

 

[virtual]

Thank you Adelaideannie, that's really helpful, especially the prices of things. We've been for a look round the area and there were quite a few horses but it's difficult to know much without speaking to people. It sounds like pony club is the place to meet people according to someone I spoke to. I was thinking of selling all my horse equipment but it sounds like it might be worth shipping a bit over.

I had a look at poms in Oz forum which looked really good for general stuff like shipping and visas but there wasn't much relevant horsey info. What's EA?

Lambkins, thanks for the links. I'm not sure we need 600 acres (!) but there is one with 40 acres that looks fab! Horse prices don't look too outrageous, which is good.