AIBU - Horse riders pick up poo?

[kaz2810]

First time asking on here so here it goes!

I'm bloody fuming, we live in a fairly large town but are lucky enough to live by a lovely canal. First 1/4 mile or so is a concrete path wide enough for 2 people to walk side by side. I'm walking along this afternoon and in the distance there are some horses & a women with a buggy feeding ducks. One of the horses poo's and as normal keeps going leaving a steaming pile all over the path meaning that anyone with a pram, wheelchair etc cannot get past unless they lift over or roll straight through it. ( bushes one side & water the other side of path) this is a daily occurance and I'm totally fed up of dodging it. Surely when on a concrete pathway the riders could show some consideration to others?

Happy gardening : ok so we can agree that all horse poo should be shoved to one side unless the horse has been spooked to the point it's a bit of an emergency and you need to get him out the situation . Meaning poo on paths is massively reduced.

I get that unspooking a horse is a wip, but if it's that easily spooked you don't take it on a busy road and you don't take it on a busy footpath where people might accidentally spook it.

Your dinner plate sized turd in this scenario could have been moved into the shrubbery that was next to canal path in ops scenario or into canal itself if really necessary . I understand on a bridle path it just becomes part of scenery though!

It’s horse shit, it’s so inoffense it’s a complete non issue. I refuse to believe it gets “stuck” in the threads of your wheelchair

Believe what you wasn’t, it’s fucking unpleasant to have shif of any kind on your wheels and as I pointed out, it comes off on my hands and clothes.

Frankly I reserve the right to choose what kind of shit is offensive to get on my clothes.

But you go ahead denying your sense of entitlement

Horse shit is harmless and will wash away after adding nutrients to the ground.

Dog shit is toxic and might blind you.

We have ponies. Are as working class and as hard up as anyone else. I don't ride on the roads anymore because cars are driven by cunts. But if I had access to off road hacking I would use it and any shit would stay where it fell. Because it's neither safe or practical to do anything else about it.

I find those plastic energy pouches dumped everywhere along cycle tracks, the road, the trans pennine trail near us more offensive and they will be around a lot longer than horse shit. As will the rubbish and drinks bottles and dog poo bags hung in trees. Horse shit is the least offensive, most harmless shit you will find in towns, cities and the countryside.

Roads weren't built for cars. Bikes, horses, lorries, tractors all have a right to be there. But I expect you know that deep down. There's something about horse riders that brings out chippy rage in some people.

Rucksack with this in it...

A rucksack full of sharp pointy metal bits, that will be a pleasant cushioning if you were to fall from your horse!!

OP has said it isn’t a bridle way...

I agree with you op but I haven’t rtft...if there hasn’t been yet, there’s sure to be some along soon who say they eat horse poo it’s so clean.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/2015408-To-have-just-shouted-at-a-horse-rider-outside-my-house read this thread as an example (and laughs)

Horses have full rights to be on bridleways. Tough luck if you get some in your buggy wheels. I own three horses and manage not to get poo on my hands as a rule, I suggest you check your personal hygiene

happy

Are we talking about muddy paths? That would be extremely unreasonable imo. Horse poo is basically just mud... someone that walks through mud really shouldn’t be worried by a bit of a horse poo

@Bearsinmotion No, I’m not suggesting that you carry water and other (unnecessary) tools around.

As I’ve already said, horse manure shouldn’t be on concrete paths or pavement anyway.

I really don’t see why we shouldn’t at least try to train horses to walk with manure bags / not be spooked by them.

I don't think this is a town - v - country issue

I live in fairly central London. The Household Cavalry exercise their horses in my local park every morning - probably 40 of them being ridden at once. Plus we have a lot of police horses wandering the streets

And despite the much higher incidence of cyclists, wheelchair users and pushchairs than in a village or town, no one is complaining.
There aren't any calls for the army and police go around with shovels and poo sacks and no one appears to be suffering with all these imaginary health conditions picked up from horse manure either

I do love it when the good old 'horse riding is for rich people so they get to do what they like' argument gets trotted out. When I had a horse I was a student in a minimum wage job. And my friends with horses are all normal folk with jobs on the lower end of the pay scale.

Horse poo is harmless.
Yes, some riders could hop off, kick it into a bush and get back on, but not all. I can't mount from ground level because my knee is screwed and it's harder on the horses back to haul yourself up from ground level. Some riders have a tall horse and couldn't reach the stirrup. Some riders are disabled.

To sum it up. It's harmless, get a grip. It's no worse than mud, or grass on your wheels.

I'm not sure why it's so acceptable to leave horse shit actually!
The horse is a pet....you don't need to own one yet it's fine to leave mounds of shit everywhere?
I suggest any horse owner whose horse shits on a public footpath can call the council to come and remove it and they can pay a fee for the costs of that.

Bearsinmotion

You’re just being precious - if it were considered in any way dangerous it would be legislated in the same way as dog shit.

I can be as entitled as I want - I don’t ride on public roads after an accident a few years ago. Whilst we have a “right” to be there, I think the level of traffic on the road makes it dangerous. But I realise for a lot of horse riders they don’t have the choice like I do.

I really don’t see why we shouldn’t at least try to train horses to walk with manure bags / not be spooked by them.

Jesus.

As I said. I'm glad I'm not this unreasonable. Life must be bloody stressful!

Roads weren't built for cars. Bikes, horses, lorries, tractors all have a right to be there. But I expect you know that deep down. There's something about horse riders that brings out chippy rage in some people.

^
Of course they bloody are. Otherwise councils would save a fortune not having to retarmac them all the time. Some of the original routes were originally made for horses but I'd guess 90% of roads were mapped and built with cars in mind as primary user. Obviously all others have right to use them to but the world doesn't revolve around what has become a minorities hobby.

Tough luck if you get some in your buggy wheels. I own three horses and manage not to get poo on my hands as a rule, I suggest you check your personal hygiene

Can you read Scabbersley? I don’t have a buggy, I have a wheelchair. Which I push with my hands.

Roads weren't built for cars. Bikes, horses, lorries, tractors all have a right to be there

Um, that's wrong. Bikes and horses have a right to be there. Lorries and tractors (and cars) are tolerated under licence

I'd much rather roll through a giant horse poo with my pram, than trundle over what must be a thin coating of dog shit that covers every pavement. Even after it's been picked up residual still remains, so spreading bacteria and parasites onto pram wheels, wheelchair wheels, fallen toddlers etc. I generally assume the pavement has one solid covering of dog shit.
One large relatively messy, horse shit I couldn't get upset about. Particularly as it sounds like a towpath rather than a pavement.

I can't mount from ground level because my knee is screwed and it's harder on the horses back to haul yourself up from ground level. Some riders have a tall horse and couldn't reach the stirrup. Some riders are disabled.
^
So are some dog owners, should they be exempt from cleaning up dog poo?

I have ridden and owned horses my whole life, firstly you can absolutely tell when they are pooping. In fact I can tell when they are about to go as the rhythm of their walk changes slightly.
If I’m riding along a narrow path or on a private road, which I have permission to be on and they poo I’ll get off and do my best to kick it out of the way. The ponies seem to like saving it up to deposit in these locations.
If someone can’t get off their horse and hold onto it while they do this then I’d question their suitability to be ridden in such an environment.

Even if it was illegal to let your horse shit on the road () I would enjoy flouting the law.

Perhaps if people were less worked up about harmless horse poo and mud they'd be healthier generally!

Thedrift a horse in the wild is prey, so it it is a fright flight animal, their intrinsic reaction to something they don’t like is to run away, they unlike cattle for example have the confirmation and speed to do this. You cannot change this, it’s how they are. You can train a horse to accept all sort of weird and wonderful things some will always be better than others, like humans some are more anxious than other but this is done by exposure and trust in the humans riding them. But when the chips are down when very frightened a horses hopefully in the first place will look to it’s rider or another horse for reassurance but eventually if it doesn’t receive the reassurance the primal response will eventually take over it will want to run away if it can’t it will try to e.g. jump around etc.

@Frillyhorseyknickers pad it out with a towel

You’re just being precious - if it were considered in any way dangerous it would be legislated in the same way as dog shit.

I didn’t say it was dangerous, I said it was fucking unpleasant.

Oh and it's lovely to see some horse riders explaining to a wheelchair user that she doesn't know what it's like to roll a wheelchair through horse shit. Because you obviously know a lot more about wheelchairs than she does!