Ye Olde Wives Tales.......Horse Edition!

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Rachel_M

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Do you think old wives tales are just that? Tales? Or do you think that they have some sort of truth and relevance, such as one of the most popular ones "You're not a proper rider until you have fallen off an X amount of times..."? What do you think are the most common myths when it comes to horses? Which do you agree or not agree with?
 
I think they're just that and should be taken with apinch of salt. Alot have been proved to be complete tosh ie, chestnut mares or your example above.
 
I think there's lots of truth to some. All the old sayings work for me...'red sky at night shepherds delight, red sky in the morning shepherds warning' 'Ash before the oak we're in for a soak, oak before the ash we're in for a splash'.

Re. falling off, I think you have to fall off to know how to stay on...equally I don't think people who fall of regularly are bad riders or vice versa, NH jocks can expect to fall off 1 in 10 rides yet they're probably better riders than most of us!
 
Yeah - they are all crap esp the falling off one - good for you if you havent fallen off and unlucky if you have - end of that one
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It was probably made up by someone's mum years ago and they kept falling off their shetland as a child and their mum said 'ah dont worry - you arent a proper rider until you have fallen off ten times'
 
pish posh the whole one about wall eyes keeps changing one minute they are bad luck then good..........

the whole story behind horse shoes on doors [not sure if anyone knows it] the whole hag ridden thing finding your horse sweaty in the morning because hags had ridden them through the night................ turns out thats what we now call colic.
 
The nail test. A lot of us had fun with that one!
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There must have been a smidgen of truth to them many years ago, like the "One white foot etc" one, or the chestnut mare one, all started in the pub over a few bevvies because someone had been kicked by a chestnut mare, or a horse with one sock never went lame.
 
The one about falling off, i was always told that you wernt a proper rider until you had fallen off 7 times, a load of tosh really, I fell off loads when i was small, but only once in the last 5 years, and thats not because im now a proper rider, thats because i have more sense!

The chestnuts one is also tosh, almost all mine has been chestnut and we have had a complete range
 
The white foot one comes from when horses weren't shod. White horn is softer than black, so obviously they had more delicate feet. Doesn't matter now though.

I agree with SM about falling. I just think fallls are another way to learn and gain experience.
 
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The white foot one comes from when horses weren't shod. White horn is softer than black, so obviously they had more delicate feet. Doesn't matter now though.

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Always wondered where that came from...thanks
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Ahh but the nail test is based on physics....don't think they understood physics back then LOL!!
 
One white foot buy a horse
Two white feet try a horse
Three white feet look well about him
Four white feet do without him
 
Think most of them are just tales but I've always found this one to be true:-

Tell a Gelding
Ask a Mare
Discuss with a Stallion
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you should put horse shoes side ways like so lol ) its so that the bad luck can't stay in and the good luck can't go out, not that i have ever put one up sideways lol
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i have always put them up so that the good luck can't fall out
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Ahh but the nail test is based on physics....don't think they understood physics back then LOL!!

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See my post in Breeding!
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How on earth did they discover that anyway? Did someone just wake up one day and think "Oh, I'll hang a lump of metal over my stomach and see what happens?"
 
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What is the nail test?
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The old wives tale suggests using a wedding ring, but it appears that a nail (I just used a bog standard 6" bolt actually) will do just as well. Suspend it from a piece of string (if you read american sites they specify a strand of horse tail hair) Then you hold it over the loin area, if it stays still - no foal which is just as well as I use a gelding as a control when I do it, if it circles then that suggests a filly, and straight lines along the spine is a colt. Lots of us did it last year, mine was right with a filly. Just a bit of fun.
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Tia, Quarab, sounds odd doesn't it? Best of both worlds as far as I am concerned, from talking to people it seems to be quite a popular mix and would produce a very versatile sort, now, a palomino again would be super, and as she has produced one already it wouldn't be impossible.
 
40 falls to make a rider was what I heard, but then I did do a LOT of falling off when I was younger.

In France, horseshoes should be the opposite way around to us to be lucky - our way of doing it is their version of unlucky!

Isabelle
 
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