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The tack room

Discuss horse riding and ownership on our Horse forum.

Has someone tried to steal the horses?

2 replies

Qantaqa · 21/03/2023 17:43

So I have a mare and 2 shetlands in a field down the road from home. My mare is a very pretty palomino cob. The shitlands are well shit.

Earlier this year I got convinced to take in 3 minis - also all palomino (I'm a sucker for a yellow pony ..). They are to say the least unhandled, unfriendly, underweight and generally psycho although we are making progress.
I have tried to put them together but grumpy mare keeps attacking the littlest one. So they currently separated unless supervised. The little ones are kept in the yard / stables and let out for 2 hours in the morning when I have someone come and do them and the evening when I do them. All fine.

Except this morning I get a call at work to ask if I had put all the horses together as they were all loose together, all the gates propped open and the horses were loose in the carpark.

Obviously I hadn't and have left work early to go and check on them. They all seem fine although clearly they haven't opened the gates themselves. Now luckily the gate onto the main road is locked with a heavy duty chain and huge padlock so they haven't been able to get out. There are some rails down in the car park area and horse foot prints the other side in the forest but I don't know if that is just the horses milling around or if someone has tried to walk the horses that way.

My initial thought was that some dick disagreed with the little three being shut on the yard and didn't realise the reasons they were, but the gate post looks like its had something hit it in a strike down and it looks fresh. I couldn't guarantee it wasn't there yesterday but my gut feel is it its new.

There is the possibility someone has tried to steal the mare I suppose out of them all but they would have failed as there is no way she would have left the others and would have zero qualms about striking out at you. Ditto with the midget 3 - could luck catching the buggers.

But it makes no sense. Surely if you were going to steal them you'd check you could open the main gate first? And why would you let them all together when you failed, or why would you put them together before you tired the gate?

This is a ramble because I am confused as hell. What the heck do I do now. I'm obviously going to get cameras but what do I do in the meantime to stop worrying.

OP posts:
Eyesopenwideawake · 21/03/2023 17:44

You need cameras up, pronto!

maxelly · 21/03/2023 23:55

My gut reaction was a bit similar to yours, you'd be amazed what members of the general public will do being 'helpful' and/or just wanting to feed/pat the pretty ponies, some of our fields run alongside a busy road and we've had electric fencing taken down or moved around, bags of feed thrown in, all sorts - plus we had a local dad who was convinced we were a free pony ride service who actually took an (admittedly pretty ancient and wonky) gate off its hinges to try and lead a pony up the footpath with his (hatless!) DC on board! He genuinely didn't think of it as stealing as he wasn't going to keep the pony, just a spot of unauthorised borrowing 😂So who knows, maybe you've got an unhinged neighbour like that's or maybe someone was out to steal (although round our way it's far more likely they were after tack, farm machinery (quad bikes v popular nicking target round our way) or tools than the horses themselves, is it possible they thought you might have something like that in your stables or outbuildings? Either way getting a good CCTV set up asap sounds sensible!

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