Hair Hunters

Prince and Benji

In my mind I was convinced that Prince and Benji ought to be related and that got me digging through their pedigrees. It was all rather fanciful, but the histories of both of them made me think it would be another amazing coincidence if they were. In fact there were no direct connections between the two of them, but they were both connected to my ponies - and my ponies to each other - in some distant way.

Fritham Nell (Nelly's) sire, Knightway Billy Boy is Hawkhill Safari (Benji's) grandfather. Benji's Great, Great Grandfather, Bright Spark of Wootton is the same as Mockbeggar Yellow Hammer II (Patsy's) Great Grandfather whilst Wellow Aretex (Jack) and Brockenhurst Romany Prince (Prince) share the same Great, Great, Great grandfather, Cedar Sunrise. Knightwood Spitfire is the Great Great Great Grandfather of all of my Forest mares, Marchwood Perky (Blue), Nelly and Patsy, as well as being Prince's Great Great Grandfather twice over. Patsy and Prince also share Penny Farthing as her great, great, great grandfather and his great, great grandfather. 

Goodenough 

The most distant link of all is that Jack, Nelly, and Patsy, Fritham Nell are all the great, great, great, grandchildren or in Jack's case the great, great,great, great grandchild of Goodenough who is also the great, great, great grandfather of Prince three times over (3/32). Goodenough was one of the few stallions left after World War II and perhaps it should be no surprise that he appears in so many pony passports including Lucky Lane Rollo who has been a Forest-run stallion at Woodgreen for the last three seasons.

Lucky Lane Rollo

Of course the higher up you go through a pony's lineage the more likely they are to have something in common with one another, or indeed to have the same stallion appears in their pedigree a few times. Slipper is Jack's great, great, great grandfather as well as his great, great, great, great grandfather.

Fritham Nell

Knightsway Billy Boy was a very solid and stolid stallion, known for being kind with his mares who all queued up for him the moment he arrived - and followed the trailer when he was taken away again. Apart from his calm temperament he passed on his strength and big ears.

Peveril Peterborough

Blue is related to the stallion Peveril Peterborough (Grandsire), considered to be New Forest royalty, who was a regular winner at all of the top shows. 

Warren Play-A-Way

Jack's sire is perhaps the one that looks most like Prince - Warren Play-A-Way.

Breeders of New Forest Ponies usually know the entire histories of the ponies that they breed and many more. They would ask that anyone who owns one of the ponies that they have bred mention the pony's registered name whenever the pony is successful at something. I watch out for Nelly's only surviving son, Sherekhan Cello, who is the son of Bakeburn Jethro whose own great, great, great grandfather was also Knightwood Spitfire. 

Bakeburn Jethro

Knightswood Spitfire

Sherekhan Cello

I would like to than the NF Stallions Page and Sukuposti.net for making this an interesting and fun investigation. 

Ups and Downs

Dave seems to have fully recovered from any suspicion of laminitis and was happily galloping up and down the fenceline to find Nelly and Blue who had only changed fields.

Theoden too seems to have improved but is now properly lame on his right fore. David removed a decent sized stone from close to his frog a couple of days, so it could be bruising but I am worried that it might be signs of his navicular disease rearing it's ugly head. He is now on Bute and if he hasn't recovered by the end of next weekend we will have the vet out.

He was mildly pleased to see that the Cadets were back again although only one of them had a packet of Polos. This group came last time and are now supervising the next. Once again, they are polite, intelligent and funny. I wish I felt the same as I seem to be grumpy, forgetful and cynical right now.

Jack and his girls came in to check that they didn't have any signs of laminitis. They were then separated so that Jack was on longer grass with Pie and Patsy next door. I have some fascinating information about their breeding that I shall share with you in a Pony Productions episode of Who Do You Think You Are?

All Kinds of Everything

Just over a year ago I donated a plaiting set made by Heavy Horse Crafts to the Ellingham Show which takes place at Somerley each year. I asked for it to be created in the colours of the Ukraine as the war was well underway by then. The set was won by a friend of mine, John Kerswell, although I can swear that it was not a fix.

This year he took his new Percheron Mare, Kelly, back to the Ellingham show wearing the same set of ribbons and won the same class. She looked beautiful. 

Meanwhile, little Cinders at Hampshire Spirit Horse Rescue has worn her first proper headcollar. Unfortunately I haven't been able to help them since I had surgery but I love receiving such positive news.

Just visiting

For a long time now I have been hoping that I could arrange a meeting between Hilary and Ruth as their ponies' stories are so similar. Bought originally in the hope that they would be good riding school ponies but both completely wild and determined to stay that way. In each case the ponies were befriended by kind women who happened to be there because they had another pony at the school. Each lady made some progress with taming the ponies before the inevitable happened and they fell in love with them, and eventually asked if they could take ownership of them. 

Unlike Hilary, Ruth had little experience of horses, whilst Hilary had no experience of wild ponies. In each case I helped as much as I could by showing how to make the first moves towards touching them and catching them and building a bond like no other; the ponies' progress depended on complete and utter trust. 

Benji was much younger when he started his journey and now seems like a normal domesticated pony but occasionally he will still show that his trust is dependent on Hilary being trustworthy - a critical link in their relationship. Hilary has to respect what he was and what, underneath, he will always be. 

Ruth went to see Benji with me yesterday and it was great to see Hilary too. We hope that Hilary will come and meet Prince towards the end of this month. 

Back at his yard, Prince is making great progress in being led back and forth to his field.

He also stands to have his hooves picked up, front and back. 

Bit bored

Eight weeks down and eight more to go before I can increase my activity. I am however able to visit the horses and groom them right-handed only, and luckily they are all very quiet. Here's a selection of the photos that I have taken recently.

These eight hooves have given us a nasty scare. After a seven week gap during which David was concentrating on looking after me and getting the priorities done, he gave Dave and Theoden a thorough trim. Although their hooves looked marvellous, both of them became very footsore on the gravel as they went into the barn. After fifty-three years of horse keeping, and over twenty at this farm, it looked like we had our first two cases of underlying laminitis, exarcerbated by the recent trim. David has been trimming our horses for almost five years without a problem and has been complimented by the Vet (married to a farrier) and our qualified barefoot trimmer. 

Unbelievably, we are keeping ten equines on only five acres but therein lies the problem. If we put them in the other four acres of grassy, harrowed fields they will get very fat, whereas in the present fields they short grass is more sugary even though it is Forest quality. The seventy-five Fallow bucks that frequent our fields have ensured that we have no really long grass which would be better for them and I can't walk them over to the fields at Brune's Purlieu. There were five equines in the top paddock - Nathalie's two (also on laminitis watch but doing absolutely fine), Theoden, Dave and Henrietta. 

There were no other signs - no bruising, no event lines, no indentation above the coronet band, no stretched out or indeed elephant-on-a-drum stances - but a real reluctance to go on the stonier part of the access to the barn.

Fortunately, it has worn off very quickly as I was being tormented by the radically different advice given by vets, and by barefoot gurus; mention the word 'laminitis' and forceful suggestions flood through the stable door. I have had to hold my nerve. 

Whilst box rest was an option with heavily soaked hay, Bute and shoes, I didn't want them to have to be restricted their movement for what could be rest of their lives - eventually substituting the barn with ever decreasing plots of bare land. Nor can I create any sort of Paddock Paradise on land that I only rent. I may have 'got away with it' until now, but I have always put a lot of thought into testing my horses' metabolism so that they live more naturally. I have always been highly suspicious of foods that claim to be suitable for 'laminitics' because often it is not, and I have always supplemented horses with good quality hay. At the moment mine are on a little bit of last years' which I am only giving them to top up their fibre; I don't want my horses to get ulcers next.

So there's a great deal of waiting and seeing going on, but after one week they are significantly better than day one. Vets are saying that the weird weather conditions - very dry and hot, then wet an warm - have brought on more cases of laminitis than they have ever seen.

Both Patsy and Pie are receiving a little feed and are looking their absolute best. Pie as you will recall is missing a lot of teeth and both of them needed to gain weight after their adventures in the reserve.

Jack too is having a feed as his ribs are always visible on one side or the other! Nelly and Blue aren't pleased about missing out but they do have a little bit of hay as consolation. 

We are still keeping the panels up to stop Nathalie's ponies from flirting with Jack over the fence and breaking the rails. If you look at Blue carefully, you will see that she has equidistant fine black lines running down her tummy. Dave is the same. This is a sign of  liver problems and so I have tracked down a supplement for that.

Tuscany and Fleur are both doing absolutely great and all the flirting and prancing around after the boys has been good for their physique. 

You can understand what they see in Dave!

To be honest these two could do with a lot more prancing, but they do their best. As soon as I am able to provide room service, Henrietta needs to spend time in the barn in order to lose weight and trim her hooves. 

Box rest

 

I am still on box rest but thankfully I am in far less pain and optimistic that this operation may have made a huge difference. I certainly won't be picking up bags like this for a while! 

Healing Process

It's been a while since I saw the horses, ponies and mule but I get daily reports from David and Nathalie. Talk about things happening at the right time, Nathalie came back just as I went into hospital and with her ponies settled on our poor quality, dry grass she has kindly volunteered to help out with the chores every day. Luckily she also lives just across the valley and can see a lot of what is going on even without binoculars. She does the morning shift while David does the late afternoons and they share the poo-picking between them. They're both angels. I am hoping her girls can stay and take advantage of a greater area and herd dynamics in which to move about, but Nathalie has to be careful whenever it rains and the grass grows quickly. 

Meanwhile, I have a long road ahead, trying to get better. I am still in an awful lot of pain although my range of movement improves every day.