Unsupervised kids again!

Hullabaloo

Hullabaloo

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It would appear someone's kids have been playing in our school unsupervised. They've taken the pins out of all the jump cups and buried them in the school. I went to put some jumps up for my friend last night only to find them missing. I managed to track down 4 but there are still 4 missing. Apart from limiting our jump building, I don't want my horse standing on them.
Why can't people keep an eye on what their kids are doing if they let them use the school as a sandpit! I can see the attraction of the school as a safe place to play and as long as no-one is using it I have no problem with it but this is out of order. There is one family who are the most likely suspects. I'm trying to think of a polite way to broach the subject with their mother and suggest that she finds the others but its difficult as we have no proof - just worked out it was them by process of elimination. She's not usually the most co-operative person anyway.
Any ideas?
 
Shotgun?
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My horse is terrified of metal detectors so it'd better be the shotgun. Won't help me find the pins but will be a whole lot of fun!
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hehe, you could always get one of those crowscare things, that sounds like a gun, and turn it on when theres no horses near arena...would keep kiddies out
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That wasn't me being coy when I put the short word for defecate, by the bye; H&H automatically replaced it with four stars. (And in case the d-word is deleted as well, what I'm trying to say is that they process a lot of food, and rather a lot of what goes in the beak comes out the b*m)
 
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Mind you if they'd served their purpose by xmas it would save getting a turkey!

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LOL!

Tell the kids that if geese eat enough little children they get nice and fat for Christmas! It worked for me.
 
Still not sure about the geese - good in principle but too much mess really. How about I teach them a new game - burying small children in the muck heap!

At least you've all made me laugh - which was a long way from my mind as I was digging around the school under floodlights last night!
 
It can be difficult tackling the parents without proof, and I do find people generally tend to overreact if any criticism - however slight - is levied at their kids. Instead it might be easier approaching the kids and explaining what 'someone' has done and point out that its quite serious as a horse could step on the metal and lame itself. Would rec. you mention to parents what you intend to do to check they are OK with it.

Ask them if they would be able to search for the cups and that there would be a reward for each one they find (mars bar or something similar?)

In my expereince (dep. on age) kids respond very well to being given responsibilty for something when they can see the reasons behind it ... plus they love chocolate!! Also if you enlist their help it might tweak their conscience and they may think twice about doing it again!

May be a bit more of a passive solution but at the end of the day you just want the cups out of the school!
 
Can't go along with the passive/reward system - that's what makes them like it in the first place. And the parents are mostly useless. Can I suggest a cheap and discreet CCTV camera - the kids will never notice it, if no one mentions it.
 
Cheap and decent CCTV are two words that don't go together! For a start who monitors it and at the end of the day what will it prove. If you do find that the children have taken the cups off the jumps - yes they've have been a pain in the a*se but it doesn't make them hardened criminals!
To be fair they are probably bored rigid cos the parents have dumped them at the yard with not a lot to do.
I am not in any way suggesting you reward bad behaviour it just might be a different approach that could work?!
 
ive just had to have my school resurfaced (sand and rubber) the hardcore and the underlayer of sand has been put down so it is completely flat and compressed etc just waiting the rubber which is coming this week and someones darling son decided to play football on the new flat surface grrrrr
i'd only just walked away from the school when i saw the light go on and chairs being lifted thru the school fence (gate is locked!!) before i ran over screaming!!!
 
Speak to the yard owner - notice should be put up that if any further incidences occur, unsupervised children will be not be permitted on the yard.

Sod rewarding them and giving extra responsibility - that is the parents job, not yours and you have every right to be able to use the yard and its facilities without having to bribe children as a result.

If the parents don't take repsonsibilty for their kids, then they should be the ones to suffer the consequences and not be permitted to dump their children on the yard to do as they please.
 
CCTV isn't very expensive now, and you can get a recorder that's motion-sensitive, so it records when it needs to. Reckon every yard should have one - trained on the tack room or the rug store or the school. You only have to read the number of thefts, suspicious activity reported on this site. As for unsupervised kids - I'm surprised any YO allows it, in view of the draconian safety rules demanded by insurance companies. Imagine the repercussions is one of them got hurt or killed. Of course it's the parents' fault, but that's probably an argument that wouldn't carry much weight if anything happened.
 
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A dog, Put somthing in the middle of the school thats fairly strong, put the dog on a lunge rope, they wont bother even trying it.

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Hardly fair on the poor dog....
 
Under data protection you have to by law admit that there is cctv about! You don't have to say where but you do have to let people know that they could be recorded!

The YO should have a rule about children being on the yard and that they should not be unsupervised!

Failing that I go with the shotgun idea!
 
I found some little darling had tie my haynet to the rafters of the barn and had been using it as a swing launching themselves of my hay.
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That time I put up a polite note..........next time I'll hang the little so and so, from it's dear little neck!!
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I would legalise post-natal abortion, up to about the age of 12.

As a doctor, I would be legally allowed to "abort" other people's annoying kids...
 
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