To ask people to tell everyone they know NOT TO FEED HORSES THAT DON’T BELONG TO THEM

[YeahBabyYeahYeah]

I won’t post the article as it made me cry and may be more triggering for others, but the most beautiful pony is in the papers today. He died because someone ignored “do not feed” signs and fed him a fucking potato.

Why oh why do some people (who in this case clearly know fuck-all about horses if they are feeding them whole potatoes) think it is OK to feed other people’s animals without their permission?

AIBU to think there should be more awareness about this, especially with more people going for walks at the moment. It is never OK to feed a horse unless the owner tells you it is OK and approves the food.

Even double fencing my field didn't work. I caught a dad and little dd in my field, I said careful you will get an electric shock from the fence he said 'oh its ok i just turned it off for a minute'. I said can you please leave, he was indignant 'but Poppy wanted to pat the pony!'

Pony is a 17hh event horse who kicks. Gave me nightmares actually so in the end I locked the footpath gate. I know i know. But it worked. Its open again now and so far no incidents

This was over first lockdown. I ended up putting horse in his stable during the day and out at night to avoid the feeders.

@sbhydrogen

Yes, it is an issue. You teach the horses to expect to fed/that strangers are a source of treats and you start creating behavioural issues- they may start biting/being bolshy including with the owners. Some of whom may be children- with smaller ponies they could be young children. If there is more than one horse/pony in the field they may also fight over it, risking injury.

If it isn’t your livestock/pet, don’t feed it. Admire from afar or stroke it if the pony will allow and leave it at that.

Think of it like a child- would you hand out sweets or crisps to children you don’t know, every time you see them, just because you think they’d like it and you like children? I’d be surprised if you did.

@CleanQueen123 exactly.
Or because you're just stuck up, or in areas like mine it's also apparently because us rural hicks don't like outsiders.

I'd have more sympathy if it was people from impoverished inner city housing estates that had never had the opportunity to interact with a horse, and for whom the disposable income to keep one does represent wealth. However ime it never is, bored skint teens on bikes from the local town are always lovely, polite, and keen to learn. But here the arseholes are nearly always either the type of relatively well off people that have moved to the country so dear Cuthbert can do shit like feeding horses and trespassing on private land, or post covid have driven here in their shiny expensive cars to enjoy their perception of what the countryside should be.

[quote TrainspottingWelsh]@CleanQueen123 exactly.
Or because you're just stuck up, or in areas like mine it's also apparently because us rural hicks don't like outsiders.

I'd have more sympathy if it was people from impoverished inner city housing estates that had never had the opportunity to interact with a horse, and for whom the disposable income to keep one does represent wealth. However ime it never is, bored skint teens on bikes from the local town are always lovely, polite, and keen to learn. But here the arseholes are nearly always either the type of relatively well off people that have moved to the country so dear Cuthbert can do shit like feeding horses and trespassing on private land, or post covid have driven here in their shiny expensive cars to enjoy their perception of what the countryside should be.[/quote]
Absolutely!!

The bored skint boys are always really polite and infact I pay two of them in the summer to poo pick my fields.

I can't believe people still don't know not to feed animals.

I will give a horse a stroke if it's the other side of a fence to me, and it sticks it's head over. I wouldn't approach one if I was walking through its field though, I try to avoid all farm animals (cows are scary!)

I dont tend to feed animals that aren't my own pets anyway, but thanks to this educational thread I never will feed a horse or pony (i probably wouldn't have anyway but can't say for certain). Its horrible thst so many people are difficult even when they have had it explained to them and ignore signs! I still think signs explaining would stop some people (clearly not all it seems) and increasing education can only be a good thing for safety of all horses? People do get a bit entitled about feeding animals they meet outside (some more than others). Cats are probably one of the most common ones, they are sometimes on special diets too or people feed milk when they can be lactose intolerant. Definitely need to improve general public education on this subject!

@Frodont
My friend lives on the edge of urban sprawl, her field borders a really built up estate with nothing for the poor kids trapped in it. Too far from the town centre but too built up for country freedom. She now has a gang of teens that love the horses, and the best guardians for them ever.
I've also got friends that got into them in a similar way and I have two small jockeys I've acquired through encounters.

@FreshFreesias off topic, but anything else to watch out for? We always have to be careful making sure they don't hibernate in places they'll later be disturbed, and I know to only feed them cat food, but as they pinch it I suppose it's possible they could be taking other stuff. I don't leave bird food anywhere accessible because of the cats, don't use poison and keep horse feed secure because of vermin. But as I have a very efficient feral I'm possibly not as careful as I could be and I'd hate to think I was inadvertently harming them with horse feeds, supplements etc left in buckets or when I haven't swept etc

F**cking grass cuttings!

I see the logic, horses eat grass but dumping grass cuttings in a field for them to eat can be so dangerous.

It can cause massive digestive issues (colic) that result in death or surgery costing thousands of pounds or it could cause hoof issues (laminitis) where the bone in the hoof drops through the sole of the foot.

Horses are so badly designed 🙈

@Frodont couldn’t agree more.

Some people have no idea how to respect nature and animals, and it’s just infuriating.

@TrainspottingWelsh and @Frodont

Exactly! I actually don't mind uneducated as long as they're polite when I ask them not to do whatever it is that they're doing.

Funnily enough, I've also found that the bored teenage boys can be the most keen to learn. I've worked with young ex offenders and they were absolutely fantastic with horses, despite having never been near one before.

I'm quite happy to educate but none of us deserve the abuse we all get.

I’ve spent much of this winter feeling really sorry for myself that my current grazing feels so inaccessible (we’re on heavy clay, which becomes a sort of thick soup knee deep in places during wet winters) but now I’ll count my blessings.

I don’t understand the impulse to feed and touch and otherwise molest unknown horses at all. Or run through their field with a dog 🙈

@TheSandman

But if you're not a horse owner, why would you feed a horse, no matter how 'educated' you think you are?

I'm not looking for an argument or wanting to excuse any individual act but as a non horse owner I think it's because it is somehow thought of as a 'nice' thing to do. A friendly and giving act.

Carrying on doing it after you have been asked, or read a sign that says not to, is rude and stupid.

Personally I have never done it (horses scare the crap out of me; they Are HUGE) and, as I said up thread, had to recently educate my son out of feeding a neighbour's.

No I'm not looking for a fight either, but it's the way horse owners are being blamed for this issue by not providing an extensive education by way of signs to any random who walks past. A "Please do not feed the horses" sign should be enough, we shouldn't need to go beyond that.

I like my neighbour, he's a nice considerate guy, he's got a nice car parked on his drive. I know nothing about cars, don't even drive one. Would it be ok then for me to go and put some of the red diesel I have access to at the farm in his tank to be nice? Because you know I know vehicles run on red diesel, And if he objects then say "Well you don't have a sign saying not to, and what the concequences might be, so it's your own fault and I'm just being nice!"

As I said in a pp, it's not up to me to educate people on feeding horses, if they want to interact with them, ask the owner, and not getting all offended and shitty if you're told no. It's not about needing to know anything or anyone thinking they're stupid if not, it's about basic manners and if people need that explained then there's something seriously wrong!

Horses, especially young ones, also play, My horse as a youngster put me in surgery by trying to 'play' with another horse and got me instead.

One of my most disturbing experiences when when on a horse trek in Italy, when another horse tried to mount the mare I was riding.

Fortunately one of the guides was there in double quick time to intervene.

The rider of the other horse was in a panic, too. (Horse was a gelding as it happens - do horses just get "humpy" sometimes like dogs do? I honestly don't know)

No I'm not looking for a fight either, but it's the way horse owners are being blamed for this issue by not providing an extensive education by way of signs to any random who walks past. A "Please do not feed the horses" sign should be enough, we shouldn't need to go beyond that.

Yep, totally agree. You shouldn't.

(Horse was a gelding as it happens - do horses just get "humpy" sometimes like dogs do? I honestly don't know)

The gelding I rode in lessons as a kid was a bastard for trying to hump any mare in season. Tarquin, now I think about it. Maybe the bastard had been reading his Shakespeare.

Poor lightning, hope whoever did this has read that article and feels utterly ashamed.

@whydobirds

Giving people reasons doesn't work. I once put a note through the door of someone bordering my mare's field to explain why she shouldn't be tipping cauliflower over the fence (brassicas can kill horses), and to ask her very nicely not to feed them again. She carried on. Didn't stop until I called her gardener over one day and said 'can you tell your customer that since she has ignored my polite request to not feed my horse, I'm assuming she is happy to accept liability for the vet bill when the stuff she's feeding makes her ill'.

Had people there complaining that they couldn't reach her cos I had put the internal fence so far back from the footpath. 'We can't feed her from here!' 'Yes I know. That's the point'.
'But the children like feeding her'
'Buy them a horse then'.

Someone else messed around with her loose in the field and made her so headshy and aggressive she was nigh on impossible to catch and took to charging at people with her teeth bared. It took months of patience, retraining and nearly getting mown down to get her able to be handled around her head again, and to have her once more behave safely around my children.

Every time you interact with a horse you teach it something. If you don't know what you're doing, you are likely to teach it stuff which is dangerous to its owner, who will be unaware of what has happened until the horse reacts badly to something it'd normally be fine with. Just leave other people's property alone fgs.
That poor lady and her poor beautiful boy.

I honestly think part of it is that people assume horse owners are rich. In reality, many, and certainly all the ones I know, do very ordinary jobs, and just don't do the things other people do. Fewer holidays, new clothes, nights out etc. A fat little native that lives out, runs off fresh air and isn't shod costs less than a few new clothes a month and a half decent couple of weeks away as a family per year to keep, but people think it's a rich person's hobby, they therefore perceive the 'please don't do that 'as coming from a place of intended superiority.

I think you’ve completely got it in one with people thinking you have to be rich (and as another pp put it ‘privileged’) to have horses. It’s similar to people who won’t slow down when driving past horses and complain we shouldn’t be on the roads and are all stuck up etc. It’s well known not to speed past horses on roads, many people still do it. As for being privileged, me and all my fellow horsey friends have normal jobs, we just chose to spend our money on our ponies.

Also I’ve got one of those fat natives that isn’t shod and lives out all year and I swear she gets fatter just looking at an apple! She costs me not much more than my dog, however she’s my 9 year olds absolute pride and joy. I’m so grateful to have a field down a private lane, well away from the general public. It didn’t however stop one woman wandering down our private lane and putting her arm through our very powerful electric fence to feed the horses. She was very badly bruised, and I doubt she’d do it again.

A "Please do not feed the horses" sign should be enough, we shouldn't need to go beyond that.

I agree it shouldn’t be but unfortunately horse owners can’t rely on signs alone to protect their horses.

You can’t control what random people are doing on the edge of your field, you can’t trust people to obey your signs (sad as it is). You can’t watch over your equine pets all the time if they’re at grass.

I think owners need to make fields as secure and as inaccessible as they possibly can even if that’s double fencing with a big gap and high fencing/hedges with double/triple wire electric fencing on the outer fence and signs warning of the voltage. And other deterrents like CCTV.

No matter how much you try to educate, there will always be people who think they’re being kind to bring a bag of carrots/grass/snacks for horses in the field. There will always be foolish people who wander into private property fields to pat cute ponies and give them polo mints!

Protecting your field from these people is protecting your horses. Yes it’s tiresome and expensive and you shouldn’t have to, but it’s better than another tragedy.

I am in a camping group and someone posted about this and there are lots of horses all over the country who have been killed by random feeding. It's horrific

@HikeForward

A "Please do not feed the horses" sign should be enough, we shouldn't need to go beyond that.

I agree it shouldn’t be but unfortunately horse owners can’t rely on signs alone to protect their horses.

You can’t control what random people are doing on the edge of your field, you can’t trust people to obey your signs (sad as it is). You can’t watch over your equine pets all the time if they’re at grass.

I think owners need to make fields as secure and as inaccessible as they possibly can even if that’s double fencing with a big gap and high fencing/hedges with double/triple wire electric fencing on the outer fence and signs warning of the voltage. And other deterrents like CCTV.

No matter how much you try to educate, there will always be people who think they’re being kind to bring a bag of carrots/grass/snacks for horses in the field. There will always be foolish people who wander into private property fields to pat cute ponies and give them polo mints!

Protecting your field from these people is protecting your horses. Yes it’s tiresome and expensive and you shouldn’t have to, but it’s better than another tragedy.

As I explained previously, my horses field IS well protected, but as they can be seen from around half a mile away as you walk down the road, people climb over the locked gate decorated with "Private property" signs into the private yard, and over another padlocked gate (they can't get over the fence because it's got electric tape on top) into the field and then they're in with the horses. We had a strip of tape across the gate too, but as we you know, need access to get the horses in and out, it needed a handle to enable us to open it without being zapped and actually get the horses through. So people just unhooked it, then climbed over the gate. Which actually then broke the circuit and rendered the whole lot useless. As I said, what's my next step? An invisibility cloak? Or perhaps put their health and well being at risk by leaving them in stables 24/7? Because they're my only choices.

Please stop blaming horse owners for this problem, we're not the ones causing the issue.

I’m a qualified riding instructor with 30 years experience and I don’t like walking through a field of horses I don’t know - I never feel quite safe. I know three highly experienced instructors that were killed in the field by horses kicking out with excitement.

That's interesting - that you are confident and comfortable with horses, but still have a healthy respect for ones you don't know.

I'm not a "horsey" person. I'm not particularly frightened of them but I am wary, just because they are big. I don't go on public footpaths through fields which contain either horses or cattle because even if they are gentle, they are often very curious and will lumber over to you and nudge you etc. and I'm frightened of getting knocked over and/or crushed.

I did have a horrible horse related experience when I was in my late teens. I was wearing a shirt dress and was on my way to college. The route took me past a field containing a single horse. There was no gate, just a rope across a gap. The horse would watch me, and I would watch the horse.

Until one day the bliddy thing scrambled under the rope and chased me down the street until it had me pinned against a wall, and bit all the buttons off the front of my dress! I honestly can't remember how I escaped, but I had to run home holding the front of my dress closed.

(It occurs to me that for somebody non-horsey, I have a few horse-related horrors - and a donkey one - in my life.)

Oh and we have CCTV too, but trespass is very low on the list for most forces, especially when we can't identify the person/people involved.

I think someone upthread got it right about the attitude being entrenched in people thinking that anyone who has a horse is privileged and posh, and that we just don't want the unwashed masses touching our horses. That we're just making all these excuses about it being dangerous, just so we can be precious. Well I'm sick of it for one and the answer isn't to lock my horse away from everything and everyone, it's for people to grow up and stop interfering with what doesn't belong to them.

It turns horses and ponies into a right nuisance for hikers too. They see a human and expect treats, and start bickering amongst themselves. If you're the human you final yourself in the middle of a wrangle between several animals far bigger than you are and it's very unpleasant. There's something very weird about parents who think it's wrong to say 'no' to little Olivia who wants to feed the ponies.

Please stop blaming horse owners for this problem, we're not the ones causing the issue

I’m not blaming horse owners at all. I’m just urging you to be realistic and protect your horses as much as possible, because you can’t trust or control random people (other than block access to your land).

It sounds like you’ve done everything you can to protect yours, unless someone else has better advice.