Toys for a playful horse!

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Wan2bEventer

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My new mare is very playful! She picks up everything and pushes everything around in her stable to great delight! She currently has a horseball (one of those rubber ones) which she likes to play with, and this morning I gave her the hexagon thingy that dispenses nuts... but she has pushed it all around the box to play and not eaten any of the nuts!
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She isn't really a tit-bit horse.
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Any ideas for things I can give her to play with?

xxx
 
My stallion used to love a traffic cone, make sure you take the sand out and the high visible band off. He used to love throwing it round the stable and over the door when people were around so you would throw it back.

He was a bit cheeky like that
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An empty paper feed sack with all string removed.

A welly boot.

Traffic cones in various sizes - dont get the ones with a detachable rubber base though.

Dog toy of a large football with cotton string attached - my boy loves galloping around the field swinging his!

Large water type container with stones in - dont leave unattended though as they can break.
 
My youngster - in the field and school - did have a space hopper until the dog got it
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He now has a big silver pro fitness ball which he loves. He also has a traffic cone, various logs and the latest thing is long thin branches with long twigs which he reduces to a barkless stump in a very short space of time. He is teething and wants to chew like mad.

He loves ropes, feed bags - basically anything he can steal and run off with.

Just had the council cut back the lane so plenty of elder and blackthorn and oak sapling branches for me to grab for him.

Old Cairo also enjoys a good chew on the branches.

In the stable he has a lickit tongue twister, a lickit ball with a rope from the ceiling, salt lick and another branch to stop him chewing the stable. He has a snack ball with high fibre nuts and SS feeds which take him a while to munch his way through along with ad lib hay.
 
Ooh Perissa I love your ideas thanks so much! I happen to have a pair of wellies ready for the bin so I'll give her one later and see what she thinks! I'll investigate large dog toys too, judging by the way she was throwing her grooming brushes out of her stable yesterday she likes to swing things around!

Unfortunately I really don't think the swede or apple ideas will work, she isn't hugely food orientated. Takes her an hour to eat her breakfast! She is more of a fusspot than a titbit girl.

Thanks for your tips! xx
 
Decahedron Ball, priced at around £9.00 from any good tack shop, stick some pony nuts or your horse's favorite treat in and they roll them around and it trickles feeds them, there hard wearing and you can get them in different sizes and funky colors...I've got pink one! and my horse loves it, he wangs it around his stable like mad man, also there great to rattle about if you loading or free schooling/playing with your horse over jumps and stuff.
Bad side is your horse has usually turned his stable inside out, most of the straw has been churned up so as long as you don't mind skipping it all out the next day then you'll be alright!
Hanging an apple over the door on a some bailing twine (knotted at the bottom) and thread a carrot through it, however you horse might get clouted around the head a few times so it depends where you hang it etc.
Plastic dengie feed bag with a bit of food in the bottom (providing your horse is not the sort to panic over bags or getting them on there feet etc....wouldn't do it with my current horse but my other cob would of loved it!
Plastic milk carton with holes in so they can rattle it about and food can drop out if you want a cheaper version of above.
 
I have a very playful arab geling - in my sig pics, who was on box rest for 18 months so I had to keep him entertained. Luckily he is vey food oriantated so that helped a lot.

His favorite toys are a 5 ft traffic cone (in the field) and he pretend attacks it and gets cross at it because it is very hard to make it fall down. Once it has fallan down he loses interest.

His other favorite toy for in the field is one of those giant blue food barrels, he really goes after it so much so he doesn't have it often because I'm worried he will hurt himself!
 
My mare hates those decahedron things, she just stamps on it until she breaks it (I've given up after 2). We had one horse who loved to have a wellie suspended from his ceiling on baling twine. My little ponies like to apple bob - put enough water (2" or so) in something shallow (like a washing up bowl) and cut the apples into pieces and float them; hours of endless wet fun. One just won't play though; she just tips it up and eats the apples. Another one likes me to hide squeaky dog toys in her shavings and then she likes to go round and dig them out. She occasionally gets a shock when she rolls on one but it keeps her happy! One has a stable mirror which she loves, she spends hours gazing and kissing herself. The best though has to be our stable cat who sits on their backs and wraps herself round their legs, and they love it, one actually whinnies when the cat comes towards her. Golly the things we do for our animals eh?!
 
We used to fill up big water bottles (with water) and leave them in the stables, they loved chucking them about haha. Apple bobbing and carrots in hay keep them occupied too, but you said she isn't much of a food type.
I used to have a likit hanging thing (y'know, with the likit, then the ball with a little likit in each side...) but i kept hitting myself on it when i mucked out *idiot haha* and after i while i decided it probably wasn't doing his neck/back much good either.
 
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