Thistles.

No but my first pony loved them she would spend hours carefully nipping off the purple flowers and munch away never once prickling herself and she lived to be 44.
 
I don't know either but I don't think they would be bad for them if they choose to eat them themselves.
My boy loves them too have to laugh at his rubber lips trying to eat them without prickling himself !!
 
Beau jangles said:
I don't know either but I don't think they would be bad for them if they choose to eat them themselves.
My boy loves them too have to laugh at his rubber lips trying to eat them without prickling himself !!
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Yes mine did too. He would nimbly as if they were some delicious delicacy(& thats when they were dried out).Ouch but he seemed to enjoy them.
 
Last year we saw our mare nibbling the tops out of them. Pulled them out for her and she ate them whole (root first!). Cleared her paddock
 
One year we made hay on a field with a bit of soar thistle in in, I spent hours and hours going round the cut hay when it was drying picking out these weeds, stacked them in a couple of piles round the field - I intended to go back and collect but never got round to it, 3 weeks after baling I turned the horses out on it and one of them raced over the the now 3 week old piles of dried soar thistle and scoffed it like it was haylage !

Current horse will drag reins out of my hands to pick head off them!
 
I used to love watching kenny snap then off at the base and eat them base first so he didn't get prickled. So clever! My old pony used to delicately pick the purple heads off but not touch the prickley bits :P
 
A few of mine have loved to eat them. One was very careful to not get prickled while eating the tops, the other just ate them regardless! Mind you she also ate live nettles & had a gob like iron ;)
 
Ours learnt to stamp on the thistles and mash them up so that they could eat them without getting spiked, even those massive crown of thorns type. They did it too well in the end as we have no thistles any more.
My pony loves live nettles too, especially the young ones that are coming through at the moment.
 
They are good for the digestive system. Isn't milk thistle meant to be good for humans?

This is one thistle I don't think would be too tasty though - although I think it looks fab and makes me feel very patriotic :D
 
I used to have a lot of thistles in my fields until I got my current pony. Now there isn't a thistle to be seen. He loves them and eats them prickles and all. He also eats gorse so he too must have a mouth like leather.
 
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