Feral pony on my land

[Pennina]

I own a small DIY livery yard. My own horses are also on the property and I have someone that looks after them for me on a daily basis due to my work commitments.

One of our fields is adjacent to a small wood and on the other side of the wood is a 5 acre field with caravans that is a traveller site

One of their ponies has made its way through the woods and got into our field. We're not using the field at the moment because we are now resting it.

The problem we have is that the pony is completely feral and nobody can get near it. The bloke that apparently owns the pony is away until sometime next week. Various men from the site have been over a few times to catch the pony and have been unable to get anywhere near it. The pony is about 11 hands and young i.e. about two. She is very frightened and clearly not used to being handled at all.

My own groom and several of the ladies who keep their horses with us have tried for hours to catch her and nothing works.

The man who owns the traveller site says there's nothing he can do and it will have to wait till the pony's owner comes back on Tues/Wed.

The pony is so completely feral I am concerned that nobody is going to be able to catch it (ever?!) and it will spend its time running around my 10 acre field demolishing my electric fencing! Its owners don't seem that bothered about the situation as they can see the horse has plenty of grass and water. In fact the bloke that apparently owns the pony doesn't even answer his phone or respond to text messages.

Does anyone have any ideas as to how we can catch this pony? I have never ever been in a situation where I have come across a horse this feral!

[Babymamamama]

Just bumping this for you- I'm a city girl but has hopefully the knowledgable horse owners will be along soon. What a dilemma. Could you get RSPCA advice I wonder?

[ragged]

Need to wait until the owners are back?
I think you're catastrophising if it's been there (how briefly? sounds like just one week?) & you're convinced that you're now stuck with it forever.

Sometimes problems take a little time to work out.

[Pennina]

I hear you ragged !

It's really useful tips on catching the seemingly uncatchable pony I'm after! Everyone has spent so many hours on this already! Plus my clients don't really want to share the grazing with this unknown pony, and she keeps tearing all the electric fencing down that's dividing winter grazing up. Poor thing. She looks like she needs a lot of TLC.

[user14572856389]

Your TLC comment - do you mean she looks neglected?

You're responsible for her welfare while she's on your land. The link below suggests calling the vet out to document any neglect/injuries she arrived with (vs what happened since).

www.bhs.org.uk/advice-and-information/the-law/abandonment-and-fly-grazing

[Pennina]

Yes I'm aware user, (this is also a concern) can't get near enough to her to get a proper look but she seems okay. She's not lame. No rug but she has a shaggy "native" coat. She has plenty of grazing, water, hay.

[Booboostwo]

A friend's DD fell of her pony cross country schooling and then it took them three and a half days to catch the pony! It was a nightmare.

I assume you have tried food, bringing a very calm companion next to the pony and trying to walk it loose into a stable, sitting with it in the field until it comes to you, join up, etc. If it goes through electric fencing anyway you can't corner it using electric fencing as that would be very dangerous for the handlers.

Can you shoo it back towards the travellers? If they have other horses it is familiar with, it should stay there.

Failing all else some vets have tranquilizer guns and can shoot to sedate. This is what my friend had to do with her DD's pony.

[Booboostwo]

I assume you've tried sedative in a bucket of food and it's not had enough of an effect...

[NeedingCoffee]

Can you subdivide the field and make it as small as possible so that at least she only ruins a small area? I know you mentioned she doesn’t respect electric fence but hopefully she’ll learn that soon enough especially if it’s possible to put up double stranded- thick tape stuff. Then leave an open trailer or similar in there and put all feed in it.
But I’m fully aware that process will probably take weeks.
Otherwise, RSPCA? They must be good at catching the uncatchable?

[Pennina]

Boobs I wondered about sedative in feed! Just had text from one of the travellers but not the owner of the pony he says they are coming back tomorrow when weather quieter. Fair enough - it is pretty bad out there today

If they can't catch him tomorrow I'm going to give my Vet a call to see if he can assist with sedative.

It's very annoying as I'm pretty sure they won't be willing to pay for overtime for my groom and vet fees.

Needing The problem with that is that the field she is in is 10 acres and any fence tape that we put up she just charges through.

Thank you for your help, we'll see what happens tomorrow.

[crazyciarastorm]

We have this issue arise in my area. Unfortunately a lot of the ponies also end up on the main road
RSPCA won't help at all I think they are too scared to help in this situation.
Vets may be your best bet if nothing else helps but it will definitely be at your cost.
I personally would be careful about who has access to your land as well. Unfortunately have many a tale to tell from these kind of situations.

[wibdib]

When you’re messaging/talking to the owner and others from the site and say that they are responsible for the costs that are tracking up including the replacement of the electric fencing and that the longer it takes the more it’s going to cost and that they accept they will be responsible for the costs.

Might not work but then they can’t complain if you do try to recover your costs.

[Pennina]

Crazy i'm very worried about the situation for those reasons too. I'm certainly not allowing them access to the land so we have to meet them up there to let them in through the locked front gates.

I'm going to get the fencing seriously beefed up so straying doesn't happen again. Pony got in this time through pushing her way through a hedge and electric fence.

The pony's owner cannot read or write which is why he isn't answering texts (apparently). He's also seemingly unable to speak as his phone is turned off.

[Pennina]

Wibdib yes, I've told them that they are responsible for paying overtime to my groom. I'm going to send a longer text to the owner with a tally of costs so far. Although he says he can't read (!). My groom has spent hours up there trying to sort the situation out and she needs to have her time paid for. The bloke who owns the land where the pony lives has said he will sort it (ie money) but when he came up to try and catch the pony yesterday he was unable to and said I would have to wait till the owner comes up so I suspect I will have to try and get the money from the pony's owner.

[Booboostwo]

Try some ACP in a bucket of feed before you try to catch her next time. It won’t work if she’s already wound up but you never know.

You may have to call around to find a vet with a dart gun, maybe one of the big equestrian practices if there is one near you.

[FridgeOffal]

Is she charging through tape even when properly put up and she's very definitely not in any way feeling chased?

[FridgeOffal]

Id ring the BHS tomorrow and ask five advice regarding serving an abandonment notice. Or Redwings for advice, who ar such experts in catching feral horses that the other charities ask them for help!

[crazyciarastorm]

OP Tread very carefully. They often can't read and so the owner maybe telling the truth. Do not make demands it could seriously backfire on you or worse your family. If I was in your shoes I would swiftly pay a third party to get the pony off of your land and let that be the end of it. You'll also need to get security surrounding your land be that in the form of a ditch or farmers round our way use large tree trunks or anything that prevents both vehicles and animals onto their land.

It is nigh impossible to get any authority to help in this situation.

[villainousbroodmare]

I would wait a bit, be a bit less aggressive, and see if the owner does retrieve her next week. He is likely to be more successful than you.
If you want to catch her yourself - but what exactly will you do with her if you do? as she will likely neither lead nor load - then turn out two other quiet and greedy animals with her for a few days. Feed them all in the field each day and make no attempt to catch her. See if you can get some Domosedan gel from your vet. Stronger and more effective than ACP. Lace the feed heavily with it once she is reliably coming to eat and you are sure she'll eat from her own ration. No point sedating your own ponies. Then herd them all in together into a barn or biggest stable you have. Let her settle for a bit before you try and catch her. Use your quiet pony to help you.

[Pennina]

I'll see how things go next week and also have a chat with vet. With sedation we might be able to lead her back the way she came and then repair the fence** behind her. I don't want to go down the Abandonment route and either ending up with a) upsetting the travellers or b) them saying, right you keep her!

Our own horses/client horses not co operative enough to "help" villainous. They're all a bit fizzed up by this!

New line of fencing to go up as soon as I can get fencing man in and meanwhile more electric fencing to cover things until then.

[villainousbroodmare]

Best of luck! Just be careful with that white electric tape. Imo it's the most dangerous fencing material out.

[Booboostwo]

If she doesn’t respect the electric and runs through it, things can get very dangerous. I had a young horse panic once and he run through the electric right next to me. It was wrapped around him and as he took off it wrapped around my legs and knocked me over. I was really lucky that somehow my legs untangled because he just took off and he would have dragged me and quite possibly killed me.

[Pennina]

I'm not keen either. It's just til I can proper fencing put up/repaired

[Pennina]

I'm not keen either. It's just a temp repair til I can get better fencing put up/existing repaired.

[Pennina]

After five days they caught it! five days!Goodness knows how, I went up there this afternoon and it was gone. They took her back through the woods which is where she came through from their land. we all kept polite and pleased to report that we parted on good terms on a "no harm done" basis (other than having wasted a lot of my and my groom's time). Temp fencing repairs in place and once lambing has finished, I should be able to get a more secure fence line in place.

[ragged]

Thanks for update.