Tell me about the horse you ended up with, that was nothing like

LOL .... wow, thank you all so much for sharing ... daft question then? Do you believe that your horse found you? or that you have found the one you needed, (who is here to teach you), rather than the one you thought wanted ? ... I am looking/window shopping and so far nothing has quite been right, and people keep telling me "your next horse will find you when the time is right" ...

So is it more that the "right" horse is the one that we can`t leave behind, no matter what our shopping list is?
 
Was looking for a safe sensible cob around 15 hands aged 7 or over - bought a 4 year old unbacked 14.1 highland pony. Only got him last week so still to find out if it was the right choice but looking positive so far. I think you just know when you see them and make your mind up fairly quickly. Good luck in your search.
 
Went to buy anything but a bay mare - returned with you've guessed it a big bay mare who I wouldn't be without.

Second time I went shopping I went to buy a 5/6 yo bay mare did not want any Arab blood at all - I wanted a TB x I'd that was backed something nice and easy. I came back with a chestnut 3 yo Arab x ID colt who was pretty much unhandled and I love him!!
 
I wanted a big (about 17hh) hunter type to do dressage and a bit of low level sj if my nerves held.

Got a barely 16hh 3/4 TB who adores xc and dislikes schooling. He's got me over my fear of jumping, that's for sure!
 
The only time I was actually looking for one (the others have seemed to have been aquired or was browsing ads and fell in love), I wanted a safe, sensible allrounder to hack and have a bit of fun doing local comps having moved from home and mum wouldn't let me have either or my girls with me. Ended up with a 3 year old, unbroken, in foal, chestnut TB mare who was the most stubborn, quirky, opinionated diva I had ever met.

8 years later, she is still here and I still question my judgement at times!
 
I didn't even want another horse! Had enough with the 2 i had. And if i was going to get another horse i would of wanted a school master jumping 1.20-1.30s. And i defo wouldn't want a boring bay..
I was browsing facebook one night and a vid of this mare came up, i fell in love with her (stereotypical i know) and couldn't stop thinking about her, she was getting lots of interest and i thought she would be snapped up real soon. The next morning she came up on my time line again, advertised on the UKSJ or bsja page i can't remember, i showed her to my dad and my dad said yeah we will go look at her,so i said okay ill arrange it for the weekend and he says no she will be gone by then we will go now! Rung the owner and it all went from there. Thats when i got my 2.5 at the time year old KWPN mare, she is perfect :)

Her advert pic
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Her first day at home
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A few months later, starting to break her
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First sit

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Riding away
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Before she got her winter coat!
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Shes my dream horse, shes having a little break atm but i cant wait to get on and crack on with her!!
 
Merlin11 said:
Was looking for a safe sensible cob around 15 hands aged 7 or over - bought a 4 year old unbacked 14.1 highland pony. Only got him last week so still to find out if it was the right choice but looking positive so far. I think you just know when you see them and make your mind up fairly quickly. Good luck in your search.
Click to expand...

Oh I love Highlands, thay made it onto my short list lol ... i`m sure it`ll all work out for you as well :)


Loving the photos to ... LJ she is gorgeous, I can see why you got her
 
Did not want: a mare under any circumstances. Or anything coloured. White hairs on black and vice versa make me cross. But most definitely, no mares. No sir.

Got a coloured mare.

She IS very sensible and fits the bill in every other respect though! Best purchase ever.

Ets I was really drawn to her advert when I hadn't been to any others. I'd looked at 1000 ads and found nothing, then she popped up 20 miles away. I was amazed that she was still for sale, which I think was due to bring only on preloved, and her price had reduced to just my budget. She found me, she's my teacher and my friend. You know when it's right, I think it goes wrong when you think you SHOULD buy a particular horse, not because you want to.
 
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Wanted a well bred black 15.2 Sec D and ended up with a grey 16.3 ID x something with no breeding history! His temperament was exactly what I wanted though and am glad I did. With hindsight, I was trying to replace my old boy with a new version of him and that wouldn't have been fair to the new one. Even being massively different from him, poor Archie still gets compared (usually unfavourably) to him 9 years on! If he looked similar too, it would have been even worse. I have a serious case of rose tinted selective memory when it comes to old boy. Have to remind myself frequentlyhe was no saint!
 
I was never going to buy a grey horse, and I definitely didn't want anything over 16 hh. Ended up with a 16.3 hh grey hippo. In hindsight I should have taken more time and definitely got a bit pressured into it as someone else was trying her seriously at the same time, but as she was the first nice thing I had seen in over a month of searching I let my heart rule my head.

Still, love her to bits 12 years down the line although our dreams of eventing ambitions never came to anything due to injury then my work levels, but next time I'm never going to buy another grey ...
 
I was looking for 1 16hh+ Friesian, an all rounder who I could do a bit of everything and mainly dressage.

Ended up with a 15.2hh 17 year old ploddy cob and his side kick companion 28 year old thoroughbredX off the side of a Welsh hill in a neglected state. Cob has no idea of what a school is let alone dressage (way too clumsy for that). In 10 months-ish we've just about mastered walking forwards instead of sideways, backwards or suicidal napping. Wouldn't change them for the world though (well I will change the napping!)
 
I searched for a 15.2 grey gelding who could teach me, done the rounds and I found the perfect one. Sadly he failed the vetting and so I locally bought a 16h boulshy, sensitive, with multiple issues bay mare!?

She's taught me so much more than I could of ever learned from the grey boy. We've built an unbreakable bond built on trust and we adore each other. Not bad really for the wrong choice?
 
I was looking for = no pony

I ended up with = Small grey wussy pony with allergies and a tendency to drop weight like a stone. He is my pony of a lifetime and I utterly worship the ground he walks on
 
Wanted: schoolmaster type 7yrs+, evented to BE Nov to give me confidence and experience, 16hh max

Bought: 5yo TB, backed approx 6 months previous, done one or two SJ rounds, and XC schooling once, 16.3hh. Also failed vetting due to heart murmur.

Still have him 12yrs later, and haven't regretted buying him for one second! :smile3:
 
Mine found me via a wanted advert, they weren't advertised. In hindsight they have been brilliant for me. One was a total confidence giver on the ground (I was a wreck by the time I got them, long story) and the other pushes me out of my comfort zone and tests me but I believe I am a better owner / rider than if i'd taken the easy option
 
DCJACE said:
LOL .... wow, thank you all so much for sharing ... daft question then? Do you believe that your horse found you? or that you have found the one you needed, (who is here to teach you), rather than the one you thought wanted ? ... I am looking/window shopping and so far nothing has quite been right, and people keep telling me "your next horse will find you when the time is right" ...

So is it more that the "right" horse is the one that we can`t leave behind, no matter what our shopping list is?
Click to expand...

I had three fail vettings before I bought my boy, I was disheartened and about to give up looking for the winter. I had been looking for almost a year at that point. I just thought the horse I was looking for wasn't there at one point. I'm a firm believer in fate and the way I look at it going through the misery of failed vettings and hopes being dashed made getting my boy all the more special.

I'm not sure enough people set much store by the bond between horse and rider/owner. The partnership has to be right and I think that's probably why we end up with things that may not be what we wanted initially but have, by and large, worked out.

Bit like men.. I could tell you who I thought I'd marry, and what my "type" was. My OH barely ticks any of the boxes on my "type" list, he's perfect all the same. Although growing up I thought I might marry Ronan Keating ;)
 
I was looking for something sensible around 16hh and a gelding, a been there and done it all sort and after having a horrid accident a few years ago I wanted something a bit ploddy that I could just potter on, definitely didn't want a mare as a mare I owned in the past put me off then for life, wanted a bright bay and nothing grey! ..... Ended up with a 15hh, coloured (with a lot of white!), Mare! Who is spooky as hell and like speedy Gonzales, she was feral up until around 14months ago (she's around 7yrs old). Love the bones of her, even though she's nothing like what I need!
 
Wanted: 15-16 hh, 8-10 yr old gelding, pref grey or coloured, ISH type that had done a bit of everything
Bought: 15.1hh TB 4yr old, ex racer

Couldn't be happier as he is now the horse I wanted initially and probably better than I would have bought and he taught me an awful lot along the way (mostly about box rest lol)
 
I bought a cob after having a nasty but safe IDxTB. I wanted to hunt, and he seemed perfect. Said spotty cob is now 18, has done (and won) everything from handy pony to be intro. He's hunted more days than I can remember, field mastered and whipped in. He's also open team chased. He's now semi retired, hunting twice a month and teaching my youngster about life. He's the kindest, safest cob in the world - but no one else can ride him, he broncs them off :-0. So, far from buying a quiet cob I've got an eventer trapped in a cob body, he is my horse of a lifetime and an absolute legend!
 
After my lovely old mare was retired from jumping I started looking for a 15hh-16hh sensible cob x, preferably around 10yrs old that had done a bit of everything that I could progress with. Nothing that bucks, bolts, rears and definately no thoroughbreds.


I bought a 7 year old ex racer that had been out of work quite a while.....unseen! Turns out he's got a pretty buck in him when he's having a paddy and a tremendous vertical rear when you push him past his comfort zone.


Wouldn't change him for the world, he's taught me to sit up, enjoy life now while your living it and that I'm capable of more than I give myself credit for. Definately fate that he appeared in my life!
 
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Haha, we're all as bad as each other!!
Having spent the past 20 years or so (yikes) buying youngsters & backing them myself, I decided that, while I wait for my home-bred 2 yr old to be old enough, I'd buy myself something that is to me 'ready made' for a change!! My criteria was:
16.2hh +
Gelding
5 years old
Broken & seen a little bit ready for me to have some fun educating

I ended up with:
16.1hh
Unbroken 4 yr old
Mare!!

So far she's been fab!! :-D
 
I love cobs and natives. I was not even looking. I had a cob. I ended up with a 14.3hh Argentinian polo pony who was on his way to the knackers yard. I felt sorry for him. He is fantastic ,he has taught me so much .He has repaid me countless times. I also have Standard bred who is brilliant. I love coloured horses, Bays are boring! I now have two bays.
 
Went shopping for a bombproof, 14.2hh max Welsh cob

Ended up buying a very green 15hh grey Connemara who could be quite nappy on the roads and was only schooled on one rein!
A year with my second cousin doing all RC activities and he has turned out to be a real little superstar - we've been hunting, showjumping, ODE's, hacking everywhere and anywhere and he will remain with us forever because we love him! :)

My advice would be if you end up with a horse that's not quite right for you stick with it for as long as you can because he or she might end up being the perfect one!
 
Well I wanted something pref over 4yo, min 15h and not grey.
Ended up with a 2 1/2 year old, 14'2 grey colt

Nothing like what I was after, but I named him Chance for this very reason.
He's a sweetheart though - plus he's got time to grow (and to reach 4 years old) haha! ;D
 
Wanted pretty bay or grey 15hh about 10, good in traffic, jump a small fence, nice to school.
Got appaloosa - my first comment was spots yuck!! 8yrs 14hh, could do all the things I wanted and more when I tried him, went through a stressy naughty period and I thought right hes going! but took him back to basics for both of us and nine years later he is a star, and my best friend and I am a spotty convert! The only problem is there aren't many around so if something goes tits up, like him getting loose at a show a few years ago, people always remember!
 
I wanted a 15hh, medium-heavyweight teenage schoolmaster.
I came home with an 18.1hh clydesdale 6 year old! Luckily he had seen a lot for his age and wasn't green but if I'd been flicking through adverts I'd have passed straight by him. I'm so glad I did find him as 5 years on he has taken me everywhere I could have dreamed!
 
Oh ive had a few
Wanted
15.2 Gelding 8-13year old id x schoolmaster to get my confidence back on after a nasty fall

Got 17.1 gelding 5 yo id x tb only ever hunted... turned out fab on flatwork jumped me off over poles!

a few in between and now my current one
Wanted 16-16.2 id 8-10 year old again to get confidence back after (another) nasty fall

Got 14.2 coloured gelding - (very) heavyweight traditional cob, mainly white with full mane and feathers 8years old, no idea what hes like to ride as only hacked him 200yards on a country lane and back. Only got tack for him last weekend and with the terrible weather we've not had any joy in getting out. :-)
 
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