To wonder why people see large animal as public property?

[lastqueenofscotland]

I have two ex racehorses. Both slightly institutionalised, if you understand horse behaviour they are fine, but they aren’t docile or all that tolerant. They are also huge.
Both can be quite aggressive over food so we do not hand feed them at all.
They live with a family member of mine ina field on the edge of town. We’ve had a lot of issues over the 2 years they’ve been there of people trying to feed them anything and everything, ham sandwiches, and very concerningly on one occasion, a binbag full of grass clippings.
As one of them is VERY aggressive around food and the other has turned into a hugely fat blimp since his retirement from professional sport we put up signs on the field asking them to not feed the horses. This was largely ignored so we got some electric tape fencing and put it about a meter inside the post and rail. (With signs pointjng out this was electric)

Today someone has knocked on my aunts door fuming that her daughter has had an electric shock trying to feed the horses.
When my aunt politely pointed out that the blimp and the thug really don’t need anymore food this woman goes off on one about how we are stuck up snobs and her daughter enjoys feeding the horses so she will continue to do so.
What the fuck is wrong with people

Buswankeress - yes I had forgotten that When I used to ride through a certain place I would get a pack of children who ‘play out’ following me and the pack gets larger as we go along, and DHorse would get more and more anxious, and I feel like the pied piper. They all used to keep trying to grab or touch him. And ask for rides. And yep again, if you stop they swarm round and it’s even more dangerous and I am worried they will get trodden on or even a tail swish across the face is painful. But if you say no and keep going you are branded a ‘stick up bitch’ by the parents 😩

I think again some people only ate used to petting zoo horses or police horses and don’t understand that these animals are specially training to tolerate that behaviour from humans and most horses are nervous and when they are nervous they are unpredictable and dangerous. Like you say even a calm chilled gentle horse can cause damage to a child but just shifting it’s weight or turning its head to look

Turn the electricity up or switch to mains.

Would seriously annoy me too. Some people are so stupid when it comes to animals and just don't care, they think they are right and you are wrong.

On the cat thing, I've seen loads of cats around here. Some come running up to you for attention, most run away. But never feed any, they all look healthy and they aren't mine. It's simple nothing complicated about that. Just people are thick.

I was once took dds pony into school when she was in F1. Was pets and animals that half term and teacher asked me if I would.

Agreed with a strict H and S plan in place. I would give a little talk, children would draw her, then they could have a little stroke or brush her in 2s with a teacher strictly supervising while I held dpony.

Dpony was an angel (as I knew she would be). Proper old fashioned kids pony.

As I left one side of the school to go up the drive the entire f2 class came streaming out along with the teacher and TA asked if they could all have a little stroke. As I am trying to intercept 30 sets of little hands and stop dpony standing on small folk the teacher is trying to convince me to 'just 5 mins they are so excited, they have been watching you through the fence, we have promised them'.

Was not amused but the safest thing was to say yes, but I would bring her around, off the car park and they needed to read the H and S plan first.

Dpony was an absolute star and I wouldn't have taken her if I didn't trust her but small children plus ponies/horses is never a walk in the park. I have enough on watching ds (4) around his pony never mind other dcs.

Not that this makes feeding other peoples animals acceptable but.. I keep seeing this concept raised...

"Feeding horses by hand makes them bite"

No, no it doesn't. I clicker train horses sometimes and we use food rewards and those horses do NOT bite or mug people and are not dangerous.

However, feeding horses by hand WITHOUT TEACHING THEM MANNERS..... will cause a problem, yes.

It is the lack of correct training that is the issue, not the feeding by hand.

Or other riders ploppy 😉

Frouby - DD pony lived at one point within riding distance of her primary school, and all through preschool I fantasised about the day she would go to primary school and I could collect her on DPony. Until I went there at home time and realised there was no way I could keep all those children and Dpony and DD safe, as they would ALL rush over and mob her (understandably, it would be unusual and exciting), but I was a bit disappointed.

Wasn't there a case a few years ago where a child lost a finger through feeding a horse over the fence and parents tried sueing the horse owner despite the signs warning not to feed the animals? I too get frustrated when I find people in the field feeding the horses -quite apart from the health risks to the horses and the impact on their behaviour (my bolshy cob will regard you as a human slot machine if he thinks you've got food and will try and push and pull to find the right lever to get it out of your pocket and into his gob) it's also really dangerous if the group start getting jealous and kicking seven bells out of each other while these people are there or try mugging every human who comes into the field.

@buswankeress yy plus there's always the possibility that plants outside the field have been sprayed with pesticides. Or had dogshit and all the potential lovely attendant parasites on them.

And then there's the people who have no idea about how to approach a horse and who go straight in for the bang on the forehead and then wonder why the horses react badly. (I'm looking at you, dp...although to give very nervous dhorse credit he didn't do much other than look at me in a 'this idiot's with you?ffs' way

And wrt people wanting to pet them when you're out with them oh god...dpony had a bad accident on a hack once so had to be gently desensitized to going out again. So the first time we went out I was out walking him with a very steady old horse on a quiet dedicated horse riding track . He was incredibly nervous and uptight, was really struggling to keep him calm, when some parents decided to ignore the walkers path and take their small kids on the horse track to run at and pet my pony...fgs.
And then it's always the cries of disappointment when you tell them to back off (on the grounds that a) you'd rather not end up on the ground and b) you'd rather their kid didn't get a hoof to the head)

And yes I do think some of the attitude you get from people is because they think horse owners are rich and stuck up. (I'm neither.) They may be expensive animals to keep but I, and most people I know with horses go without an awful lot of stuff to afford them because frankly we would rather have the horses than the stuff.

To the pp who said hand feeding horses doesn't make them bite...no, not if you do it correctly. But since every interaction with a horse teaches it something then if a load of people walking past who know nothing about handling horses decide to feed that horse and they allow the horse to push at them for food then in time they will cause negative behaviours that the owner will then have to fix.

Bottom line though is it surely comes down to 'if you don't pay for it don't fuck with it'.

Not that this makes feeding other peoples animals acceptable but.. I keep seeing this concept raised...

"Feeding horses by hand makes them bite"

No, no it doesn't. I clicker train horses sometimes and we use food rewards and those horses do NOT bite or mug people and are not dangerous.

However, feeding horses by hand WITHOUT TEACHING THEM MANNERS..... will cause a problem, yes.

It is the lack of correct training that is the issue, not the feeding by hand.

Yes I agree with this, I use treats as a reward, and the horse is taught manners. However I know when he's being fed by other people because they don't use the same structure I do and he becomes demanding, and I have to reenforce training/manners. Horses are pretty good at 'living in the moment', so where the horse learns with one person certain rules are in place before a treat is given, it learns with others (for example a person walking past the field every day) that those rules don't apply, and the food is forthcoming regardless. Worse still they can also learn that intimidation works as well, and become unruly - because the behavior is being rewarded.

YABU letting your family member live in a field. Don't you have a spare room?

I used to have this issue with my old pony who was so laminitic he had a hay only diet, he lived in a large sand pen round the back of the stables and he would always be fed by parents who came to watch lessons (most people on the yard knew better!) I had to put signs up all around him and luckily it stopped as he was incredibly sensitive and the consequences could have been disastrou. He also got very nippy when he'd be fed too much! It was a constant battle as people felt sorry for him in his set up (he was perfectly happy) but he was incredibly friendly and always came to say hello!

Horses are big, heavy, dangerous animals. I’m living proof and I’m a horsey person. They are unpredictable and can really damage you. I lost part of my calf in a horrible accident and I know what I’m doing around horses. I could list loads of horrible accidents that have happened to mates.

Feeding horses in a field causes mayhem, I’ve seen it happen, a filly was nearly squashed. I had to get up close and personal to bollock the entitled twats who thought it was ok to carry on when I had politely requested that they stop because they were causing huge issues with the bigger mares kicking shit out of the filly.

The paddocks near us have electric fencing, and one of the riders explained that it was more to discourage people from feeding the horses than to discourage the horses from exploring the fencing! They put up signs saying, 'a please don't feed the horses', which got more and more detailed, ending up with full explanations about laminitis.

There are still muppets feeding the horses. :/

I guess it isn't just horses...I used to have a rabbit. A particularly vicious rabbit with massive trust issues who hated children and would attack anyone who wasn't me. And only wouldn't attack me because I had taken hours and hours to win her over. Landlady (who lived next door) was cooing over rabbit and saying that her granddaughter would love to pet her. I vetoed the idea, told them rabbit would most likely growl, pounce on the child's hand, pin it down and sink her teeth into it.

Fast forward a couple of weeks...Landlady not happy. She had taken her granddaughter into my garden without my permission to open my hutch and pet my rabbit and guess what...yea that'd be right. Rabbit attacked her granddaughter.

People are really fucking stupid unfortunately.
I was in Cape Town earlier this year and down at a fishing dock there was a MASSIVE seal out of the water hoping for some dropped fish.
Some utter moron of a parent sent her kid who looked about 5/6 to go ‘pet the nice animal’ honestly it was the biggest bloody seal I’ve ever seen.

It’s not just randommers after rides either.
Example comments - at a meal out with other parents from one of the dcs sporting activities
One woman discovers I have a horse, “ oh, I’ll come and ride it “ wtf did i offer?, she would have had a fit if i had said “can i come and drive your range rover then”
Another parent who i met years years earlier at toddlers but never really known her. At a party of mutual friend, someone ( unhelpfully) tells her one of my dc is doing well ridin “ oh, well little prince will come and be your dcs frined and he can ride the pony!” 😳

Widdlin don't say that - the last thing you want is members of the public thinking it's OK to feed our horses as long as they "train" them. We don't want them bloody feeding them at all, but we especially don't want them batted around the head if they get pushy. !

@TERFMcDuck

I was once hacking out my (bonkers, but very friendly) 16.3hh TB eventer along a local cycle path (we don't have bridleways in Scotland, just shared access off-roading), when a family stopped me to ask me if their very smol could have a sit.

Let's just say they were less than pleasant when I politely said no, and why.

People are stupid.

@ploppymoodypants

I've never met a biker I didn't like! All of them seem to be madly nice, kind, considerate people.

Often some very good beards, too.

Goat you may think it’s unfair to prioritise an animal's health and welfare over your child’s desire to feed it. I do not

Where the hell did I say that?

It’s sad that after all of the useful info given on this thread that there are still parents saying ‘we won’t feed carrots then...’ or ‘but we wanted to do something nice’ rather than simply ‘thanks for the info, we won’t feed ponies anymore

Errrm that’s exactly what people were saying. Please read the posts properly.

My reading skills are fine thanks Goat - in response to my comment to another poster who had consented merely to no longer feed her local ponies carrots rather than not feed them at all:
Your DS’s desire to feed the ponies is not more important than the potential health and welfare implications for those ponies

You responded:
This comment as well as the accusations of ‘entitlement’ are unfair.

This would indicate that you think it is unfair to prioritise the animal’s heath and welfare over the child’s desire to feed it. The point is that posters shouldn’t be feeding strange horses/ponies at all, regardless of their motivations.

There are also several posts where people aren’t saying ‘thanks for the info we won’t do that any more’ - it’s what triggered my original post that you thought was ‘unfair’

This would indicate that you think it is unfair to prioritise the animal’s heath and welfare over the child’s desire to feed it

No, that indicates that I believe you are projecting your anger and misinterpreting the reasons why people feed horses. I clearly stated in my first post that I was not discussing people who willfully ignore signs or knock on doors to argue with owners.

You also said that “I may think MY child’s desire to feed an animal is more important that than their welfare” when I hadn’t said anything of the sort. My disinterested teen has zero desire to feed a horse and I was talking in general terms. I resented the personal tone of your post.

Widdlin that is a really misleading post.

When you clicker train any animal the first exercise you do is to teach them to move away from food and wait for permission to take it. Any time the animal forgets himself and becomes pushy you go back to this exercise.

The general public and not trained in using this exercise, nor do we ever do it with multiple, loose horses all at the same time.

All that is aside from the many health issues everyone has mentioned.

WiddlinDiddlin Don't give people ideas.
The standard advice is 'don't feed horses' because it needs to be a short sharp message. People who don't have the background info can't understand nuance.

You also said that “I may think MY child’s desire to feed an animal is more important that than their welfare” when I hadn’t said anything of the sort. My disinterested teen has zero desire to feed a horse and I was talking in general terms. I resented the personal tone of your post.

Are you sock-puppetting under a different name then Goat since that comment was clearly in response to LitteredHouses and marked as such. You should probably try not to take comments not remotely directed to you so personally.

And you suggest that i’m Projecting my anger and not reading the thread properly...