There is always one in every herd.....

NiceChristmasBaubles

NiceChristmasBaubles

Well-Known Member
Joined
15 June 2009
Messages
7,676
Location
Was Surrey, now West Berkshire
www.facebook.com
..... and it's very often one of the older ones..... the 'Winder Upper'!!

I went outside to get my lot in earlier and the two smaller ponies, both in their mid 20s, were haring up and down accompanied by Arab and Welsh snorting. My two younger horses (both rising 9) were stood rock solid, observing their antics, and no doubt tutting inwardly.

I caught the 'Winder Upper', brought him in and tied him up on the yard. Peace resumed and everyone else went back to munching. Do bear in mind that this is the pony who spends weekends and holidays with children fawning over him at the local RS, and he comes home in between for a bit of R&R. He is the only one out of my lot who HAS to have a canter around the field before grazing every morning. I would love to bottle his joie de vivre and use it when I am lacking energy. When he is away, the yard is a far more chilled place, but I wouldn't swap him - he is a much loved drama llama.

What characters have you got in your herds? :) x
 
is he wearing the easter bonnet in your avatar? what a cutie! Buzz is Mr Manners with people but if another horse so much as looks to long at 'his' Winifred then all hell breaks loose!
 
Biff&Buzz said:
is he wearing the easter bonnet in your avatar? what a cutie! Buzz is Mr Manners with people but if another horse so much as looks to long at 'his' Winifred then all hell breaks loose!
Click to expand...

Ah, no. That is his little Welsh field companion. The one that is made to run up and down with him. Actually, it is very good for him as it keeps him moving. This is the drama llama a year or so ago loose schooling:

ad50385b-6cf1-4a0c-a119-165ae778ba96_zps82ea136b.jpg
 
My Exmoor pony, definitely.

My herd of four go like this...

Elderly arab gelding, CEO of the company, he dreams of retiring to the Algarve and spend his days playing golf and hanging out in the clubhouse with his chums, drinking G and T and talking about the old days.

Equally elderly Arab x Welsh mare, fierce faded redhead, been the CEO's secretary for years, single, should have retired ages ago but hangs on to her job as she's been secretly in love with him for years and can't let go. Spends her evening knitting him jumpers and writing love letters to him she'll never send.

The leggy Standardbred new girl on work experience. Terrified of the CEO, even more scared of the secretary who glares at her a lot and never gives her time to finish her coffee break. She wishes she'd never got the job, she'd rather be down the precinct with her mates drinking cider and smoking fags. Spends most of her lunch breaks crying in the toilets.

And finally, the Exmoor. He's the office boy, oh boy, trouble....cheeks the CEO, hides the secretarys knitting and biscuit tin, keeps peeking up the leggy new girls skirt and photocopying his fat bottom on the photocopier. Spends the rest of the time hiding behind the filing cabinet texting his mates and can never be found when ever work needs doing.
 
I have a winder upper and a moody mare - not a good combination :p The winder upper (9 year old gelding) usually tries to get the mares (16 years old) attention by chasing her round the field or biting her. Her usual reaction is to pull mean faces and stomp her feet until he gets bored :D Funny thing is, she gets very upset if he's taken away! They're good friends really, mare just won't admit it :)
 
gala said:
My Exmoor pony, definitely.

My herd of four go like this...

Elderly arab gelding, CEO of the company, he dreams of retiring to the Algarve and spend his days playing golf and hanging out in the clubhouse with his chums, drinking G and T and talking about the old days.

Equally elderly Arab x Welsh mare, fierce faded redhead, been the CEO's secretary for years, single, should have retired ages ago but hangs on to her job as she's been secretly in love with him for years and can't let go. Spends her evening knitting him jumpers and writing love letters to him she'll never send.

The leggy Standardbred new girl on work experience. Terrified of the CEO, even more scared of the secretary who glares at her a lot and never gives her time to finish her coffee break. She wishes she'd never got the job, she'd rather be down the precinct with her mates drinking cider and smoking fags. Spends most of her lunch breaks crying in the toilets.

And finally, the Exmoor. He's the office boy, oh boy, trouble....cheeks the CEO, hides the secretarys knitting and biscuit tin, keeps peeking up the leggy new girls skirt and photocopying his fat bottom on the photocopier. Spends the rest of the time hiding behind the filing cabinet texting his mates and can never be found when ever work needs doing.
Click to expand...

Oh I love those descriptions. Sad to say I can almost imagine the leggy Standarbred, poor girl. Hope she finds a mate soon so she can moan about the others instead of sobbing in the loos by herself. ;) x

Catherine94 said:
I have a winder upper and a moody mare - not a good combination :p The winder upper (9 year old gelding) usually tries to get the mares (16 years old) attention by chasing her round the field or biting her. Her usual reaction is to pull mean faces and stomp her feet until he gets bored :D Funny thing is, she gets very upset if he's taken away! They're good friends really, mare just won't admit it :)
Click to expand...

And this is why I had to tie my Winder Upper in clear sight of the rest of them. If I had hidden him in his stable, they all would have panicked and wound themselves up. :D
 
My lot are all barking!

One of my liveries said the other day "There isn't really a clearly defined herd structure,is there. They're all convinced that they're No 1"

She's absolutely right.
 
Auslander said:
My lot are all barking!

One of my liveries said the other day "There isn't really a clearly defined herd structure,is there. They're all convinced that they're No 1"

She's absolutely right.
Click to expand...

I must say that reading your daily antics does make me feel a little better about my lot. Well at least knowing they aren't the only bunch of nutters out there is good. You know most of mine - Mills and Raff were literally running from one end of the bit behind the school to the other. No apparent reason. It wasn't even dark, but something had got the wind up 'em! Yesterday, I put Cass in the strip next to her normal paddock while I sorted some stuff out. She plods through this bit every single day, but it was clearly too scary to be in on her own and required full pelt charging around. Opened the gateway to her bit, she went in and 'phew' all was well. I really do wonder about their sanity, or at least mine sometimes. ;) x
 
Yes, we have one! She is 9 now and shows no sign of changing. She never simply walks from A to B.. she bounces everywhere and really enjoys life. We call her the 'eternal foal' and her redeeming feature is that she is a total angel to handle and work with.. I would trust any child with her. Out in the field she is behind every bit of mischief going, she gets on one knee to graze under the fence and when that illicit supply of grass is exhausted she fence hops to where she wants to be; she is always the leader of any charging around and is always plastered from head to toe in mud. If she wasn't so incredibly sweet I am not at all sure we would have kept her!
 
My five year old is such a douche bag! I'm sure that some of the others, especially the older boys, sigh with despair everytime he's put out with them. He's hanging off their rugs/ears, pulls their tails, is constantly rearing at everyone. He's not nasty in any way but just incredibly annoying. Even the other younger horses get bored with playing with him after a while but he just never stops. He a lovely boy but suspect that he might not be the sharpest tool in the box....
 
My retired competition horse fills this box. He's such a pain. Always playing and winding them up. He must be so annoying! Came in yesterday drenched in sweat. He'd held a mock hunt round the field. Totally wired when he came in with a cut on his back leg. My ridden horse is so much less trouble than the elderly, retired, lawnmower!!
 
I am currently listening to squealing, thundering and thudding! Our resident event horse is having a funny 5 minutes - rearing and bucking on the spot, then galloping a circuit, and skidding to a halt in front of Alf, before doing it allover again! He has a face like thunder, as she is disturbing his mid morning snooze...
 
Given that there are 5 stallions in my herd, you'd think it'd be one of them, but no.

The main winder-upper is Solo, a welsh x hackney gelding who barely survived an RTA as a 4yo, which left him on 3 legs for most of a year with his shoulder smashed open. He didn't ought to be able to walk, let alone rear, buck, prance and gallop. Happily he has an unstoppable personality, and if nobody else will play with, the Shetland's always game.
 
My horse is this one. Sadly he is like this in the stables too. Once he was put next to the horses recently, a horse next to him doesnt like new horses and kept making lunging attacks at my horse, but never actually biting or anything, it was just a show of 'stay away from me'. What does my horse do? Sticks his head over the rails to wind the horse up even more and stays there, basically laughing at him.

Yesterday too, he managed to escape from under the solarium (why would a horse leave a solarium?!) he started walking back to his stable, but as he walked past another horse, it went mental thinking he was going to come into its stable and again, never attacked him, just made a show of 'stay away from me'. Harley just stood there, looking at him, didnt give a damn about the attitude.
 
I do have a self harming tb mare, but thankfully her antics are quite rare now..... as

a. after two cut arteries in the field I have anxiety attacks if she more than walks in the field

b. I'm scared my hubby will shoot her if she refuses to be caught by him again...

Fiona
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top