You know your a horse geriatric when.....

You use the mounting block to dismount after a ride as well as before to get on...:o

Then start sticking straw and hay under breathable rugs to dry your pony off. (some habits die hard)
 
When you remember "helanca" jodhs finally arriving in Africa, and all the girls just had to have them... Not sure what they called that fabric in the UK though, other than "horrible".
(hot, stretchy polyester... oh the horror!)
 
I remember having three rugs only - A jute rug for indoors, a string sweat rug and a canvas New Zealand.

Not sure I'm geriatric yet though as I was in the coloured Martingale/rein stoppers with matching petal boots era!
 
Oh no - I'm definitely a horse geriatric from reading this... We had a fantastic jute rug and those horrific nz rugs! With just back leg straps, but so heavy they hardly ever slipped! And the plaited cotton reins my sister had that I sooooo desperately wanted to use! I used to swap them onto my ponys bridle when she wasn't looking he he

And the old skull caps with chin pieces. I remember the first skull cap I got without one of those - it felt so horrid and wierd at the time! ;)
 
Abbeygale said:
Oh no - I'm definitely a horse geriatric from reading this... We had a fantastic jute rug and those horrific nz rugs! With just back leg straps, but so heavy they hardly ever slipped! And the plaited cotton reins my sister had that I sooooo desperately wanted to use! I used to swap them onto my ponys bridle when she wasn't looking he he

And the old skull caps with chin pieces. I remember the first skull cap I got without one of those - it felt so horrid and wierd at the time! ;)
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Ewww. I'm going to get spots on my chin just thinking about those horrible things.
 
Remembering making chaff by putting hay in the chaff cutter and turning the handle, stood on a box! Spillers Horse and Pony Cubes in a white bag with a chap in a hunting pink jacket etc jumping his horse over a ?gate. Cycling up the lane with saddle on handlebars, bridle over shoulder and a feed bucket on each handlebar! Hurtling up fields on big pony, no saddle, headcollar and lead rope. No hat. In jeans and wellies and father's old RAF battledress jacket.
 
What a lovely thread, I am only in my early 30s and came to horses very late so I can't share any stories here, lovely to hear all of these memories though :)
 
My first riding hat had a chin part and only a hook to keep it on :eek: and body protectors with just 1 line of thin Velcro to hold them on - needless to say mine rarely did stay on after a fall!
 
I too remember the cork hats, the heavy rugs and the blue wormer (that the sensible horse did not want to eat, I think we had to make him a bran mash to put it in :) ) I also remember the 10p that stayed in the horrid stretch jods pocket at all times. The riding macs that someone put a link to recently (they now cost £100's :eek:) Long rubber boots, that nearly put Dad's back out removing and riding in a hacking jacket, at all times :)
 
FestiveG, that made me laugh remembering trying to remove my riding boots. It was the era of the boot jack! We used to put talc in our boots to help get them off. Horrible cold Loveson rubber boots!
 
I remember setting off in a morning on a hack and not getting back till late afternoon - and hardly seeing any traffic or busy roads! Ahh those were the days :rolleyes:
And helping to get the hay in off the fields, loading the bales on the trailer and then riding back to the farm on top of them.

I still have a saddle cloth I used under my pony's saddle. It's just a cotton sheet with tapes to tie around the saddle underneath the flaps, no shaping so it creased up and pulled down on the withers :o(
 
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What a fab thread! So many of these take me back to the days when learning to ride :) the jute rugs, rollers and turning back the corners! Old ones are still sometimes the best ones ;)
 
Getting 10 shillings pocket money (50p) and walking to the stables across the fields and dual carriageway about 4 miles so I could have 2 hours hacking at 5 shillings an hour the 10 bob note was to pay for lunch and bus fairs but I used to walk and missed lunch to ride a bit longer.
First horse I had because dad promised to buy me one if I could find a field to keep it on and only pay 5 shillings week. I was painfully shy but I did it and he had to buy me one.
Buying a horse because it was wearing shoes first horse was an irish thoroughbred 4 year old recently broken in dad thought it would be more economical to have one already wearing shoes
Farrier bringing a coal forge and spending all day in our garage while everyone in the area had their horses shod. I used to make him tea and bacon butties while he was there never did know anyone who could drink that much tea
 
I'm 15, recently got my reins re-rubbered, spit in the saddle soap and hack everywhere - to hunts,lessons, shows...my father has made it very clear that he wastes enough of his money on horses and the cost of a 5 mile journey in petrol can be avoided. I also ride in fields when other horses are grazing, I put my jackets on jumps to make them spooky and all my christmas and birthday presents are for my horsey - trying to explain to my friends what a 5 point breastplate and a gel-sheepskin riser are is highly commical.
 
bgb said:
I'm 15, recently got my reins re-rubbered, spit in the saddle soap and hack everywhere - to hunts,lessons, shows...my father has made it very clear that he wastes enough of his money on horses and the cost of a 5 mile journey in petrol can be avoided. I also ride in fields when other horses are grazing, I put my jackets on jumps to make them spooky and all my christmas and birthday presents are for my horsey - trying to explain to my friends what a 5 point breastplate and a gel-sheepskin riser are is highly commical.
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:D :D
 
I can remember buying my first quilted rug, I was the envy of the yard, thought it was fab a v warm, think it had about 6oz quilting - poor horse must have froze, he was clipped through the winter, in the days when we were really snowd in for weeks !

OMB I feel old !!!!!!!
 
Wearing a yellow polo neck jumper under my hacking jacket, cavalry twill jods with baggy sides and either jodhpur boots with straps, not elastic inserts, or long leather boots (pre Stylo's being invented) and a (cork) hat without any chin strap - oh and really thick yellow string gloves. If raining, wearing an enormous white gabardine riding mac.
Sitting in the hay barn making a wisp to "bang" your horse with. Cleaning tack with dayglo yellow soap in a tin (pre glycerine bars). Riding in a Barnsby "Pony Club" saddle - rock hard and not a knee roll in sight! With a three fold leather girth that you had to put neatsfoot soaked pieces of towelling in to keep soft. Horse wearing a substantial bridle in 3/4" leather with a giant plain noseband, usually pulling your arms out in an eggbutt snaffle or getting massive blisters from the plain reins.
Feeding straights, cutting chaff, no wormers at all. Dry hay only, no soaked hay or haylage. Horses bedded on straw, or occasionally on sawdust delivered in large hessian sacks.
Sewing plaits in, no elastic bands. Sewing the tapes down on the end of exercise bandages (no brushing boots). Fun times!
 
Zerotolerance said:
Wearing a yellow polo neck jumper under my hacking jacket, cavalry twill jods with baggy sides and either jodhpur boots with straps, not elastic inserts, or long leather boots (pre Stylo's being invented) and a (cork) hat without any chin strap - oh and really thick yellow string gloves. If raining, wearing an enormous white gabardine riding mac.
Sitting in the hay barn making a wisp to "bang" your horse with. Cleaning tack with dayglo yellow soap in a tin (pre glycerine bars). Riding in a Barnsby "Pony Club" saddle - rock hard and not a knee roll in sight! With a three fold leather girth that you had to put neatsfoot soaked pieces of towelling in to keep soft. Horse wearing a substantial bridle in 3/4" leather with a giant plain noseband, usually pulling your arms out in an eggbutt snaffle or getting massive blisters from the plain reins.
Feeding straights, cutting chaff, no wormers at all. Dry hay only, no soaked hay or haylage. Horses bedded on straw, or occasionally on sawdust delivered in large hessian sacks.
Sewing plaits in, no elastic bands. Sewing the tapes down on the end of exercise bandages (no brushing boots). Fun times!
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yup did all those things oh and hay was a few pence a bale and when we could get it we had a ton of draff (left over grain after brewing or whiskey making) dumped in the field for them to eat
 
Diamond quilted Barbour under waistcoats like the ones that are now back in fashion in jacket form except mine was a weird gold/green iridescent colour... Hats with spot creating rubber chin cups and hooks that trapped your cheek skin occasionally as mentioned above... making wisps from straw/thatching under rugs... canvas New Zealands with posh sheepskin patch at withers and leather straps and trigger clips that were so stiff it was near impossible to undo them as a kid... folding hoofpicks for hacking out... no numnahs... having 10p to phone mum to pick me up... rubber sweaty long boots... mucking out with pitchforks and brooms that were so heavy you could hardly lift them... the advent of plastic quarter marker templates... glasses steaming up in the rain and blocking all vision pre contact lenses... Ahhhh so many memories!
 
Haynets were made of tarred rope and were so stiff they could stand up on their own when empty!

If you couldn't afford a leather headcollar the only option was a stripy halter.

18hh hunter I used to ride wore two blankets and then a jute rug, all topped with an anti-cast roller that I could barely lift up there.

Plaits were always sewn in.. rubber bands were very frowned upon.

Barley was cooked in a Burco boiler on hunting days and made the tack room stink! Then linseed was boiled up in same boiler every Sunday for use through the week. Oh.. and warm bran mash on return from hunting.

Longing to be able to have a pair of long rubber boots and then when I got them being so disappointed because they made my feet smell like something had died.

Begging my mother to remodel my baggy batwing jods. She actually did and they looked great and lasted for years.

And, sadly, the fact that laminitis was virtually unheard of and ponies stayed healthy.
 
SallyBatty said:
When the johdpurs you wore only came in beige and bulged out over the thigh. When you always wore a hacking jacket when you rode. When hats were really thin and were held on by a piece of elastic under your chin.
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Ah yes, the good old days when your legs were like pencils and the johdpur bulges flapped around uselessly - now its the jodphurs that are like pencils and my thighs make their own unsightly bulges!
 
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