The Playful Pony - Paddock Paradise Agistment

Behold, the bodywork tree! 🌴 I spoke about this particular tree on my interview with Track Talk: A Podcast on Horse Track Systems Trees are tasty, sheltery, shady sometimes oh-so-good at getting that itchy spot - but on the flip side they might also poke eyes, fall down, can be toxic in large quantities or do any number of other antisocial things to horses. This means that trees are often excluded from horse pastures ... but to me, the benefits outweigh the risks 🤗🍃 And without simplifying it too much - I feel like that's kinda what it all boils down to. Granted, our nature-based, enrichment environments offer more potential for harm than a sterile, traditional, horse-safe property - but they also provide an interesting & joyful quality of life 🤗 And back to the podcast... I've just binge-listened to a few more episodes and f**k it's cool to hear about all the other wonderful ways that species appropriate living is picking up around the world 👌 If you're interested, I'll dig out my favourite one and drop it below 🤗

Every now and then we have a food stakes winner...

Never EVER does our resident 18hh make it to the feeds the fastest...But today he did.

The stampede never gets old.. but it's so much better when the little'uns lead the charge 😎

'Behold the brontosaur-horse'.... A few weeks ago this recently retired OTTB was so bucket focused he had no idea that he was surrounded by a food forest... Enter one brumby, a track system and some spring time inhibition... and VOILA 🤣

Well then... Tonight Anth said to me "Do you want the drone footage of the track?" Which apparently he took in Summer and was worried about rattling the brumbies...But you know what? Even if it looks ghetto from the ground -this track looks boss from the air 👌

This arvo I was listening to Active Horse Agistment plus's new podcast and I thought it was a good time to do an impromptu vid of my track. It's shaky.. and I say the F word... and the wind is pretty hectic. Sorry not sorry 🤣 That's what happens in these parts. If you haven't given her a listen yet, check out Toma's podcast.. The production quality is a bit 'how ya going' as you'd expect for a first podcast (says me, who's faaar to chicken sh*t to even try) but the content is terrific! Plus, there's something cool about listening to something at the beginning and being part of it through the growth stage. Track Talk: A Podcast on Horse Track Systems is where it's at if you're interested in what this weird track system stuff is all about👌

You know that feeling when you want to share something huge but Average Joe will have no idea what you're all juiced up about? Well here goes...🤷‍♀️ The horse in this video is somewhere between 12 and 15 years old. He's got two testicles, one and a half ears and came from the wild in September. He is also the scariest horse I've ever worked with. Once, in early days he pinned his ears and charged at me, so I alley-ooped over the fence like an Olympic athlete. It was pretty rad if I do say so myself...It was like pole vaulting, except instead of a pole, I cleared the 8ft fence using just my stumpy legs and sheer terror... And with that, I admitted defeat and never went in his yard again… And a few days later he was shunted off in a stock crate with another stallion - to be trained by someone with skills far greater than my own... And over the next 7 weeks they were trained by an incredible horse person in Ballarat. During that time the other stallion progressed amazingly... By week 5 he was being ridden and week 6 he was poking along on suburban streets and cantering through the bush like the ultimate trail boss. Meanwhile, my little mate with the missing ear was kinda going nowhere... He did a bit more of the chargey stuff and eventually tolerated a halter but would barely lead and some days it took 40 minutes to catch him in a 6m x 6m yard... And on the fateful day he came back here, he gifted the trainer a broken rib and prickles in her undies as he towed her through the paddock on her back. So as you can imagine I was not exactly thrilled to have him here again… But not knowing what else to do, I chucked him in a paddock and went inside to ruminate on my terrible life choices. And to be honest, having him out the window has been like a big, brown reminder of how badly things can go wrong with horses. And while all our other brumbies are the coolest little dudes, this is one complicated mofo... But over the last few

Childhood re-activated 👌

Four flavours were finished and two were untouched... What's your pick for what happened next? 🤓

How cute is Little Milton's second go at halter training? 🤓 It's a pretty big deal because if you remember, the halter he arrived in had grown into the back of his head.... I can't even imagine the pain it would have caused... but I can tell you that it created the unholiest stench I've ever known. I legitimately thought the wafts were caused by a dead animal until I discovered what was actually causing the stink 😷 Anyway, according to him it's a no harm, no foul situation and now the scabs have healed - he doesn't seem too fussed 🤣 Here we're (imperfectly) demonstrating a rad little exercise taught by Dr Shelley Appleton Calm Willing Confident Horses... and while it wont go winning any awards for edge of your seat equine entertainment, it's really effective at developing feel, focus and softness. Because just quietly, prior to this we were demonstrating some dirt yard waterskiiing... (It's a new sport, for which I am an Olympic hopeful 🤣) Anyway, today I also used the same exercise with our new OTTB and the anxious brumby stallion... It's a ripper tool and a great little 'trick' to know... I apologise for not having any dirt yard waterskiing footage but please enjoy his theatrical interpretation of a yield at about 28 seconds 🤣🤣... and just incase the warriors are coming - his halter was loose on purpose, for further information read the post from the top 😬🤦‍♀️ Have a lovely break everyone and I hope you're squeezing in as much horse time as possible 🙌