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

A hack at the local riding school was 6 shillings an hour. I had 1 shilling pocket money so had to save for 6 weeks!
 
redheadkelj said:
Oh my God... I'm only 27 and my first pony had New Zealand's and Jutes and had duvets under his rugs with rollers holding them in place ... Does that make me a horse geriatric at 27?
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I don't know. But i'm only 21 and I've definitely taught several people how to put a duvet under rug on...

I don't remember jods being beige only. But i do remember them being beige, white, black or navy. Then one time we went to the tack shop and there was a rack of dark green ladies jods - my mum made me try a pair on just because they were so exotic! :)
 
puss said:
Oh another one hessians sack for horse food please tell me someone else remember these cant be the oldest here
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And hessian sacks were so useful afterwards. We used them for the outer covering of a poultice long before disposable nappies and duct tape were invented!
 
Main ring blue and main ring red!

Also jods were definitely not stretchy!

You would hack all day and not contact anyone to say you were ok and they didn't get worried till late at night when they'd find you cleaning tack in the dark lol
 
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When the only feed in a bag was Purina Horse Chow. Corn, oats, barley and covered in molasses. I used to ride at a place where horses ate corn only in the winter and had to eat it off the cob! With those regimes all the horses looked well, also ate grass at all times of the day, and none died of laminitis. Or we're even affected. Salt lick in the field was the only supplement. No horse was fat.

Actually you could look at horses, see a hint of rib and that was a horse in good health. Shiny coat, muscled, ect. Nowadays that's a call to the animal authorities and you are starving your horses. I saw a pic recently of a horse like this and people were up in arms. A horse that's overweight is seen as healthy. Even moderately. We have all sorts of issues with IR and lami nowadays even though we know more and have more access to "better" ways of doing things. Nowadays we all have a "fat eye".

Rugs. No horses had them. They worked all winter. On really cold nights we rode them down to a cow barn. Ponies and horses mixed, geldings and mares. It just worked. The rest of the time the lived out. But in fairness it was never very wet.

Terri
 
I'm in my twenties but, I had the jute rug, nz turnout, blankets and duvets! (In fact I still have a duvet for when it gets mega cold)

But what about the white body protectors that tied up with string? Had one of those for pony club!
 
fantastic thread, cackling away to myself laughing at the memories, just off to order my coffin i feel so old does anyone remember when a rising trot was like a gymnastic feat that had you about a foot out of the saddle and you had to fall off 7 times before you could say you could ride. breaking ponies in in headcollars bareback, riding over other competitors to get to your sack in musical sacks. CHILBLAINS in the winter no themal socks or boots he he it was great ! :)
 
confusedmum said:
fantastic thread, cackling away to myself laughing at the memories, just off to order my coffin i feel so old does anyone remember when a rising trot was like a gymnastic feat that had you about a foot out of the saddle and you had to fall off 7 times before you could say you could ride. breaking ponies in in headcollars bareback, riding over other competitors to get to your sack in musical sacks. CHILBLAINS in the winter no themal socks or boots he he it was great ! :)
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Again remember all these things hessian sack that weighed in a a hundredweight roughly three times the weight of feed sacks now took two to lift it out of the car boot.
four old pennies for the phone which was a black Bakelite version in a red box with liittle windows. push button a to call and b to cancel and get the pennies back
getting extra riding money taking back lemonade bottle to the pub and collecting jam jars to go to the cinema
 
Ladyinred said:
And, sadly, the fact that laminitis was virtually unheard of and ponies stayed healthy.
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This is so true. I had heard of it, but never knew a pony that actually had it. It was very rare, and all the kids had native ponies.

I used to hack out all day from the age of 12, often meeting up with friends, no adults. Getting up to all sorts. No log or bench was left unjumped. We had no arenas, no trainers, actually, no lessons at all once you got your own pony. We hacked for miles to the little local shows. It was fun!

If I could have my NF gelding again, just 2 hands bigger, and easier to load, that would be just perfect.
 
Wasn't one of the wormers that looked like blue polystyrene granules called astrobot? I remember that virtually no horse would eat it and we used to recommend putting it in the freezer before feeding it!

What about jumping lanes? I remember the riding school had one round the outside of the indoor school and it was great fun. Sometimes used to go down no stirrups or arms outstretched - probably elf and safety would frown on that nowadays.

It used to be quite unusual to have your own trailer or lorry. Horse transport to local shows was big business and so was trailer hire. We used to have two trailers at work that were hired out every weekend.

All you really needed in your first aid box was some wound powder (black if you were very adventurous), green oils and BR and MR liniment!!
 
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jodie3 said:
All you really needed in your first aid box was some wound powder (black if you were very adventurous), green oils and BR and MR liniment!!
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And a colic drench. Sometimes wonder how many got pneumonia after a colic drench ended up in their lungs.
 
There was no such thing as a rug with neck. It's no wonder my little tb struggled to put on weight, I doubt she could stagger far under the weight of her canvas nz rug with the sheepskin wither pad! I had a navy blue Barbour jacket and hunter wellies when I was 10 (I'm 36 now) and I pmsl at my sister who thinks hers are the cutting edge of chic now.

My favourite thing from yesteryear was my blue and green striped Puffa jacket. That and skull cap with chin guard and I was equestrian perfection! :D
 
A set of shoes was £4, yes, £4, I am that old.

You cantered along grass verges.

Shops were closed on Sundays, and Wednesday afternoons.

Riding hats fell off before you did.

You show jumped in the summer and did xcountry and hunted in the winter, there were no indoor venues.

You fed straights.

New Zealand rugs weighed a ton when wet.

Your riding mac weighed a ton when wet!

I could go on but I must don my Goretex and go out to put in my horses who are wearing their hi tech, all purpose rugs!
 
Oh dear, all of the above, I've just turned *&%$52*)&%$!! Used to set off to gymkhanas at some unearthly hours, thought nothing of hacking 10 or 12 miles there, galloping about and jumping all day then hacking home. Posh riding clothes came from Jacatex, I even had the rubberised cream riding coat at some point. I do actually still have my childhood riding hat, it's now lined with chintz curtain and used for in hand showing...I chose an new half panel Barnsby saddle which was £72, over a school trip to Dorset, and it's still in my tack room now, good as new almost, it replaced the serge lined one that came with my pony, he cost Dad £60 and came with two old saddles, a bridle with no noseband and one of those driving snaffle bits that has two sets of bars, except someone had taken one set off so it was wonky, and 20 bales of hay!! He was two years old and had been jumped etc by the farmers daughters, Dad knew nothing about ponies and thought he was a bargain!

Mind you, life was simple then, no supplements, bad backs, bad teeth or traffic!
 
Gosh, I remember Jacatex - it was the only shop you could buy your flappy thighed non-stretch beige jodphurs, hacking jacket, jodphur boots and cork hat.

The riding school I went to was run by an ex cavalry officer and I can remember that our jumping lessons involved a line of cavalletti to start with, then larger jumps which we had to jump round once and while cantering round to start again we had to take the saddle off, drop it on the ground and then let go of the reins before jumping round again.
 
Slightly Foxed said:
You cantered along grass verges.

Shops were closed on Sundays, and Wednesday afternoons.
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Before Sunday opening we used to canter along the grass verges on the A road :eek: it was so quiet traffic wise.

I too remember those awful rubber riding boots, freezing cold in winter and sweaty in summer. Used to take the chin cups off my hat strap :D
 
Oh yes,Jacatex! Advertised in Pony magazine! First hat was cork with the elastic in knots, had red and white halter, never a head collar. Nickel stirrups that bent, and I think they were called "never rust". Being out on ponies with friends for hours on end in a forest called Highwood near Blackmore in Essex, and had riding lessons at The Orchards which is now Norton Heath Centre! Saddle had half panel serge lining and bridle had no noseband and a horrible flat ring nickel snaffle, and was bought from local gypsies. Always rode to gymkhanas and never ever won anything! My dad decided one day to clean my saddle, apparently I didn't do it well enough. (Yellow saddle soap in tin, made by Carr Day and Martin, or was it Vanner & Prest?). He cleaned it with shoe polish, so boy, was it slippery and did I fall off! I went home from the show in tears! My dream was to have a Barnsby pony club saddle, but no such luck!

Phone boxes only needed three old pennies, and we always carried a hoof pick and some string. Baler twine was twine, and not plastic! I can remember the mess that boiled over linseed made!

I could go on and on!
:D
 
aw this is just bringing back sooo many memories!! i remember everything that health and safety has now spoilt -riding bareback with no hat ,yes the one with the awful chin thing ,galloping on verges, never coming home at night and having to be fetched in the dark ,everything was repaired and had to last FOREVER. making haynets from twine ,chaff cutting ,rolling bag fulls of bandages after the big horses come back from competing -no travel boots back then!:)
 
Can't do the quotes, but remember so much of this! No Hi-viz, hacking 15 miles to shows, riding behind a cob pulling a wagon to get hay, and then harnessing two or three more up to pull it back laden, and sitting on top of the hay if our pony was pulling! We rode the rag and bone man's pony to shows - a fantastic gymkhana pony that would go faster the louder we shouted and then stop immediately when we said Whoa. Learning to shoe from the old chap whose ponies we rode, and herding them up for water twice a day from the 500 acres of common land he had grazing rights on. i am 59 now, but it doesn't seem long ago, until i look at the way we keep ours now.
 
i remember so much that has already been said and it's brought a smile to my face remembering them all. :)

i also remember hacking to the blacksmiths to get shoes put on, at a tiny sum of £5 a set, then hacking back cantering along all the grass verges on the way.
 
oh so many of these things....

riding my 3yr old wearing a flat cap on the roads after dark:o

flip flap over reach boots with a buckle, we used to buy two pairs and change them over so we had stripey ones, they made fantastic noises as we cantered along
 
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