Newton Stud slurry death

[Frumpoon]

The news article I found about it said it was a July evening about 7pm-ish

When it is light for at least another 2 hours.....????? Clearly this place is well supplied with young stock running into the hundreds but possibly the most (financially) valuable horse on the premises goes heading off towards a death trap and nobody goes after it and there is no physical evidence of mortality???? Nope I don’t believe a word of this story....

 

[JaneSewell]

This whole situation is horrendous. Heart goes out to all those who’ve lost horses. Legal cases won’t even consider the emotional losses.

I must admit that I wouldn’t expect an animal waste slurry pit to be part of the offering described below (from their own website).

The stud is run by Lorna Wilson and Eddie Hosegood as part of a large beef, sheep and arable farm. Due to our farming activities the horses have access to the best possible quality pasture and forage. In addition, we are in the fortunate position of being able to provide the horses with hard feed where a high proportion of the ingredients are grown on site. Not only are we comfortable in the knowledge that our stock has the best grazing, feed, forage and bedding possible but also have the added assurance that it does not contain any artificial or potentially harmful additives.

I also would expect the best and speediest vet attention from somewhere that actually owns their own vet company.

The learning for us all has to be to look beyond the glossy image and ask to see risk assessments and safe systems of work.

So sad, and so needless. Surely it costs less to have robust risk assessments and training and safe systems of work than to resolve legal disputes...

It is frankly horrendous ... and there are so many unanswered issues... At Newton Stud the horses do indeed seem to be being 'farmed' ... and that is not what most people think they are paying for for their beloved horses...

 

[AGDENHALL]

What were they doing with the tractor?

Looks as though it is firing straw bedding into the barn

 

[Red-1]

Looks as though it is firing straw bedding into the barn

I must admit, that video would have put me off sending a horse there at all. The bedding is dusty, could contain stones. Far from being 'proofed' of th tractor, as they claim, the horses took terrified.

There are too many horses, for me, in that area. I would also worry about the posts within the running area, too easy for an accident from running into a post (horses are like that) or being kicked. Too much likelihood of dust inhalation.

I too hate the idea of horse farming on this scale. How on earth would they spot thrush?

As for the slurry pit, the fencing on the more recent photo looks even worse.

I did see somewhere that the horses were turned onto the lane. The tracks to the pit do go from the lane to the pit, through a field. I dare say the person who operates the machinery for spreading slurry on an industrial scale is not a 'horse person' and so has been lax with gates.

The whole set-up looks shoddy. Money spent on the top dressing - yes. Time spent on the details and individual attention - no.

 

[Tiddlypom]

Drone footage. There's a huge barn with hole in the roof so that must be the one with the fire. What looks like the lagoon is in the distance at 12pm with a big bank to one side??

Yes, and that tallies with the Google maps aerial shot.

And the video that the stud proudly posts of the bedding being blown into the youngstock barn, by a huge tractor, with frightened youngsters milling around .



No competent outfit would do such a thing. Terrible and dangerous practice. The airborne dust and spores flying around within the barn, the huge tractor in a building with youngstock, the danger of foreign bodies such as stones being fired at the horses.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

 

[rabatsa]

Anyone who has been near a straw chopping/bedding machine will know how much dust is thrown into the air. It does not all land immediately and certainly triggers my asthma. To have youngstock exposed to that on a daily basis for weeks on end does not bode well for their ongoing respiritory health.

Having the tractor in with the animals is very bad practice, everywhere I have worked where machine bedding down happens the tractor has been driven along outside the pens.

 

[COldNag]

Golly, the tractor thing would be enough to put me off. That's awful.

 

[GoldenWillow]

I had read this thread with horror, there is so much wrong and in so many different ways.

I do feel qualified to comment on the tractor video, these produce so much dust and spores it is common for the tractor driver to wear a mask, and like rabatsa, everywhere I have been with them being used the tractor drives along side the pens, never within them.

 

[meleeka]

It seems to be it’s all down to marketing. People are sending their horses there because they perceive they are the experts. The reality seems to be very different and I’m surprised people don’t go and see things like that barn crammed with youngsters.

 

[Rowreach]

It seems to be it’s all down to marketing. People are sending their horses there because they perceive they are the experts. The reality seems to be very different and I’m surprised people don’t go and see things like that barn crammed with youngsters.

That barn video was 5 years ago. Even if people don't bother visiting somewhere before sending their competition horse/broodmare/youngstock to a yard, surely you'd do some research online, and that video alone would make me cross them off my list.

A few years ago I saw some footage from the yard of an Olympic rider (and a favourite on this forum) and it showed the inside of the stables - deep clean bedding and the most disgustingly filthy feed mangers imaginable! And that told me everything I needed to know about how the yard was really managed.

 

[tristar]

I'm not sure the mass production of horses sits well with me if I'm honest.

(I also hate the mass production of other animals and I would hate for horses to end up the same way).

it takes a brilliant set up to do it decently, i lived next door to world champion of show jumping for four years, he had 200 horses, a top rider and the right set up for his valuable breeding stock, but then of course he is a horseman and specializes in horses.

diversification into horses on farms always sounds dodgy, and needs a severe upgrading of knowledge and dedication and attitude to be successful, horses are a highly specialized area with multiple needs

commercialization is not for me either, i see horses as less rather than more and time put into the few really good horses that you might breed or buy where their training is concerned as the best commercial investment ultimately.

so sad for anyone who has lost a horse, but surely on some level could you not see through these people?

 

[tristar]

That barn video was 5 years ago. Even if people don't bother visiting somewhere before sending their competition horse/broodmare/youngstock to a yard, surely you'd do some research online, and that video alone would make me cross them off my list.

A few years ago I saw some footage from the yard of an Olympic rider (and a favourite on this forum) and it showed the inside of the stables - deep clean bedding and the most disgustingly filthy feed mangers imaginable! And that told me everything I needed to know about how the yard was really managed.

exactly, i have a five second evaluation button

 

[Chinchilla]

Our local farm has a machine like that for bedding down their cattle, and to use it they shut the animals into the yard area and then the tractor drives down the central track between two barns and sprays the fresh straw pellets in. The operator wears a mask to do it. This is a mass production farm - arable and beef across circa 1000 acres iirc. And these are beef cattle worth about £400per head, not sports horses worth many thousands.

 

[INDIA1999]

Found this on BSJA

 

[Arzada]

I must admit, that video would have put me off sending a horse there at all. The bedding is dusty, could contain stones. Far from being 'proofed' of th tractor, as they claim, the horses took terrified.
...
The whole set-up looks shoddy. Money spent on the top dressing - yes. Time spent on the details and individual attention - no.

Great post Red-1. The mares in the background are also very concerned by the straw etc firing. There appears not to be a great deal of ventilation in that barn so I imagine that the vile diesel fumes hang around for ages.

 

[Arzada]

so sad for anyone who has lost a horse, but surely on some level could you not see through these people?

I've been taken in by people. Naturally, I think we want to believe the best of others and eg is how scams etc succeed. Witness good people being taken in by online and telephone scams etc. It would surprise me if most people haven't been taken in by something/someone at some point in their lives. I was taken in by a couple of 'natural horsepeople'. I use the word 'horsepeople' loosely. Luckily not for long. Shame means that I've never spoken of it to anyone. Others thought they were amazing. Maybe this thread will enable other clients speak about their experiences of Newton Stud. A bit like the #metoo movement. Once one person speaks out others may follow.

 

[Gingerwitch]

Golly, the tractor thing would be enough to put me off. That's awful.

But the owners of these were commenting on it.... oh look is that one mine .... anyone else would have been that had not better be happening with mine.

 

[Tiddlypom]

Tbh, the video of the straw being fired within the barn of scared foals is something you’d expect to see on a Newton Stud exposé page, not one put up by the stud to promote itself.

Someone comments about the dust. There isn’t any, apparently. Though the dust arising from the straw throwing is clearly seen on the video in the atmosphere in the barn.


Someone else muses that they’d thought of doing similar themselves, but were worried about the danger of stones. No one replies to that.

 

[milliepops]

Tbh, the video of the straw being fired within the barn of scared foals is something you’d expect to see on a Newton Stud exposé page, not one put up by the stud to promote itself.

Someone comments about the dust. There isn’t any, apparently. Though the dust arising from the straw throwing is clearly seen on the video in the atmosphere in the barn.


Someone else muses that they’d thought of doing similar themselves, but were worried about the danger of stones. No one replies to that.

yeah one of OH's friends sells a machine that is similar but designed in a way that happens to avoid the issue of stones getting fired through the air. he said that there have been examples of stones going through barn walls

When i first showed him the video he chuckled and said oh they won't be afraid of machines, then I said that's a barn of sports horse youngsters at a stud that takes them for livery etc and... yeah... no more chuckling. I can't imagine what they were thinking doing that (let alone posting it).

 

[Gingerwitch]

Tbh, the video of the straw being fired within the barn of scared foals is something you’d expect to see on a Newton Stud exposé page, not one put up by the stud to promote itself.

Someone comments about the dust. There isn’t any, apparently. Though the dust arising from the straw throwing is clearly seen on the video in the atmosphere in the barn.

View attachment 66802
Someone else muses that they’d thought of doing similar themselves, but were worried about the danger of stones. No one replies to that.

My last bale of straw had a metal spring and a pretty big stick in it. Hopefully that would have stopped the machine before brong flung out. I was shocked at the number of youngsters in that barn it was more akin to food production than the nursery of young well bred horses.
Lets hope when anyone posts that hirse needs to go to youngstock livery its added to with the tag line, but I will pm you a place to avoid.

 

[JaneSewell]

I saw this on Facebook, bit disappointed that the BD page took it down and implied she was mud slinging and unjustified.
I felt she was quite reasonable in what she said. It's a terrible tragedy for her - slurry disposal is a huge danger; I remember when I first loaned a horse we rented stables on a dairy farm and the muck heap was a case of tipping your barrow off the top in to the slurry below, I was often up there alone and the thought of falling genuinely terrified me

Thank you. I believe the controller of Unofficial DB where it was taken down is Kelly Jewell ... as part of Equidance they have worked closely with Newton Stud and Elite Dressage and are clearly financially involved with them... not surprising that it was taken down several times!!

 

[ycbm]

That's my problem with the 60+ weanlings (?) in that barn. It simply isn't possible to check whether each one is healthy and sound.
.

 

[sherry90]

[Content removed]

I am so sorry Jane that you’ve had to endure this and not once but three times in the case of another lost youngster and one sick one as a result of their clearly inadequate care.
It’s utterly appalling that no body was ever recovered - what is NS reason for this? Did they just not bother?
Surely after this, no one will be sending horses there in the future? How can they ever be trusted?

 

[doodle]

Surely after this, no one will be sending horses there in the future? How can they ever be trusted?

Which is why they wanted Jane to sign a gagging order which she quite rightly refused to do.

 

[CanteringCarrot]

Yeah, like I said I don't get the NDA's/Gags...unless you're shady and have something to hide. NDA's do have their place in various industries (as I previously mentioned) but don't quite fit here.

If you don't like the consequences of your own actions, that's on you. People are free to speak the truth.

 

[ycbm]

I thought they looked older than weanlings.
Horrified at the thought of ET recipients being subjected to that too - sometimes they are only on loan to the stud - so people may have sent their unrideable mares there to carry embryos hoping for a peaceful idyllic retirement for them, if they believe the marketing spiel on the website, and they get treated like that. Very sad imho.View attachment 66814

They are charging £750 for the temporary use of a mare they have been given for free, plus livery, or £1500 if you take the mare away to foal.

Nice money if you can get it!

 

[Chinchilla]

They are charging £750 for the temporary use of a mare they have been given for free, plus livery, or £1500 if you take the mare away to foal.

Nice money if you can get it!

Wonder who pays the vet bills when aforesaid mare gets r. Equi or is shot by flying debris from one of their machines?!?!

 

[Gingerwitch]

Wonder who pays the vet bills when aforesaid mare gets r. Equi or is shot by flying debris from one of their machines?!?!

Dont be silly. It's the person whom has paid for the foal.....and they probably will charge the owner of the free mare too. They seem to be an organisation that us only interested in kerching. They probably put an uplift and admin charges on the vets bills too.

 

[CanteringCarrot]

They are charging £750 for the temporary use of a mare they have been given for free, plus livery, or £1500 if you take the mare away to foal.

Nice money if you can get it!

Was wondering if I read that right!

 

[Chinchilla]

Dont be silly. It's the person whom has paid for the foal.....and they probably will charge the owner of the free mare too. They seem to be an organisation that us only interested in kerching. They probably put an uplift and admin charges on the vets bills too.

I was being sarcastic ffs, not 'being silly'. Just pointing out that NS are making copious quantities of money on mares they have been gifted and they won't be paying when their own negligence leads to them coming to harm.