To have just shouted at a horse rider outside my house

[BigRedBall]

Have namechanged for privacy.

I am so angry right now. We sometimes (twice a year at most) get horses going past our house as we live around the corner from a small private farm. We live in a city, so it's quite a novelty when we hear the sound of "clip clop" outside.

About 20 mins ago we heard the sound of clip clop and I took DS to the front room to look outside. As we watched the horses go by one stopped and kind of turned around and SHITTED RIGHT OUTSIDE MY DRIVEWAY. Not a small bit...a big arse full of horse shit. And the rider laughed at her other horsey friends.

As soon as I saw it I put my shoes on and ran outside and the rider was going on her way again. Her friends had gone up ahead. I ran up to her shouting "excuse me" and she wouldn't stop. I shouted at her if she was going to clear up the horse poo outside my house and she replied "stop shouting at me" without even turning around to see I had a toddler in my arms.

I couldn't go any further because I was holding my DS and had left a sleeping baby inside.

Now I have a pile of horse shit outside my house, and I want to actually KILL this horse rider. Our road is a school route and I don't want children stepping in it but why the fuck should I have to clear it up? I am so pissed off. I want to get into the car and hunt down the fuckers and pull them back by their ears and tell them to clean it.

Am I being unreasonable to think that to be an adult in this world one should know certain facts of life? Such as the fact that all living creatures shit and that animals are not machines whose behaviour can be precisely calculated and one should be quiet around them around them.
And that if we live in society we have to accept that we cannot expect everyone to organise themselves for our convenience.

There is a great organisation called Neurotics Anonymous that might be a good starting point

YANBU. This is actually a real problem. I ride a motorbike- responsibly and safely, and we often take scenic routes. I don't know the legality of horse shit but I do know its illegal for a farmer to not remove mud they drag over roads, between crossing fields.

One of my friends actually had a very serious accident after coming off their bike, on a corner, where there was a big pile of mud and gravel about three inches deep from a tractor. I have two dogs- if they shit in the road I pick it up- why any different for horse riders? It really pisses me off actually, I'm a member of a bike group and if we do see riders up ahead we often will wait till the rider signals us to pass, and use to accelerator (that's what makes the exhaust louder) so as not to spook the horses, because I realise that the roads are everyone's to use. A big pile of horseshit could also cause a car accident.

Nobody should be above the law when it comes to leaving hazards on the road.

Innisglas- so you're cool if my dog shits on your road/pavement then and I don't bother to pick it up because animals are unpredictable?

It's a lot less hazard than a horse shit too,considering the size, my dogs are wormed monthly too, so it's not a health hazard.

Shona they're not 'above the law' there is no law to pick up horse shit.

And the tractor mud and gravel wasn't horse shit was it?

A letter from a council I found

It says: "The council will continue to clean the highway...as part of our continuing working schedule". But adds: "We would like to point out that you have a duty of care to clean up after your horses."

Director of community services for Oswestry Borough Council, Dave Jones, said this has always been the council's policy, and the round robin letters dispatched in early September were provoked by a complaint made on behalf of a local wheelchair user who had struggled to pass down dirtied roads.

see above, stables in Oswestry have received a letter form the council telling them to clean up the road after their horses

Shonajoy: Not nice, but really I find there are much more serious issues to get worked up about

"Duty of care" isn't the same as "legal requirement" though. Just to be clear.

Also, horse poo is mostly fibrous in nature, so wouldn't be as slippy as mud or dog shit.

The reason as a rider I "flap" (which by the way is the legal signal of slow down- read the Highway Code) my hands at drivers too fast and too close is not anything to do with my horse being scared of traffic.

We have to ride by law on the road alongside all sorts of gardens/hedges etc on the left. Horses are easily spooked and can dart sideways if there is something in those gardens they don't like, into the path of a car. It's impossible to predict and horses can't be trained for every eventuality. Even police horses spook at silly things. Anything can spook them, such as a bird flying from a hedge etc and the horse will naturally go sideways away from the 'danger'. If you are going slow enough there is time for both parties to avoid eachother. I thought this was common sense to be honest, it's not because the horse is scared of the car but rather that horses are not machines and don't always stay exactly where they are put on the road!

Luckily I rarely have to 'flap' as the majority of road users are considerate and not as entitled as some on this thread.

I actually can't believe that peoples lives are so busy and important that they can't slow down for 2mins to pass other road users safely. I would slow down for anyone I felt necessary not just horses, such as small children alongside the road or cyclists or even dog walkers. It's just part of living in the country and I always get a friendly nod or wave. I certainly wouldn't just think it's a 60mph road and I will do that speed.

What happens when you walk down or live on a road that a herd of cattle or sheep have just walked down? Then you may have grounds to complain... But one shit really?!

It was on the road
Someone cleared it up

Now I think you should take a long hard look at yourself OP

The horse dung was in the road? And you ran after a horse, shouting? Unbelievably stupid and entitled.

No wonder you nc'd.

I reckon her Neigh-bour picked it up for the garden.

27 pages on Horse Shit. Just when you thought you've read it all. Mumsnet proves you wrong! .

It's a lot less hazard than a Horse shit... Yeh I've heard several kids being blinded by horse shit because the owners were too bloody lazy to pick it up A poopascoop and a dogshit back is. Lot easier to carry around than a black bag and a shovel!

This is a genuine question rather than an arsey one to all horse riders on this thread. Why, if horses get spooked by little things like 'birds flying out of hedges' or indeed 'things in people's gardens' thus causing them to verge sideways towards traffic would you choose to ride a horse on a road? My sister and mum are both horse riders and they've never really been able to explain to me why they don't just ride in fields or on bridleways if riding an unpredicatable animal on a road can be so potentially dangerous?

How do you get to the bridleways nat?

Why? Because sometimes you have no choice to get from one place to another. A lot of bridlepaths connect up to roads because up until about the 1930s, walking, bicycling and riding horses, and trains were the main ways most people travelled. Not cars.

Roads were originally bridlepaths, IYSWIM.

Fair enough but my mum and sister seem to go on long horse rides just on roads. It would be a very short clip clop up the road from their stable to the bridlepath but they seem to prefer moaning about how dangerous it is to use the roads. To be honest my family are a bit weird so I'll conclude it's just them.

Unfortunately accessible fields and bridleways don't always conveniently link up to form a seamless off-road right of way. It would be fab if they did (and there is a huge livery yard near my parents' house where they have sufficient land to provide this, but it's very expensive to keep a horse there)

It's the same as if you're on a long country walk, inevitably you often at some point have to walk along public roads to get to the next off-road footpath.

Sorry x-posted with others

God I wouldn't stand behind a horse, shouting at it, holding a child. What a bloody silly thing to do. If the horse kicked out, both of you could have been badly hurt.

And you could have caused an accident to the rider as well.

It's a shame the rider didn't reply but she may been busy controlling her horse because some numpty was running up behind it shouting at it and she was trying to calm it down.

I have been reading this from the first post and cant believe how its gone. Just for the record, not all horse riders are rich/posh. My DD who lives with us in our Xauthority house works 2-3 jobs to afford her horse. She has been to college to learn about looking after him. She has no choice but to ride on the road to get to places which are safe. I try not to worry when she is riding but I can say that not a week goes by when she doesn't come home. (sometimes in tears ) because she has nearly come off because a car driver raced by. It will add about 30 sec to your journey by slowing down.

Try living outside town and trying to complain about cow- or sheep-muck on the road.

You will be laughed at.

Would still like to know why my answer was deleted for saying "is this a wind up?" . My answer was extremely mild compared to the names OP has been called since