I'm Pretty as a Picture!

Hi everyone, the mighty atom is here with the Stables Report for you all!  I know you like to keep up with what is happening here in the Calvert Trust Exmoor Stables.

We've been very busy in the past few weeks meeting lots of lovely groups. I have been doing my bit, showing people what I can do and what fabulous creatures us horses and ponies are! I've also been out on several walks with guests and have noticed there are loads of blackberries growing round here.  I did taste a few but I definitely prefer grass!

Last week I had a very special visitor. You may remember I told you all a while ago that an artist was coming to paint my portrait.  Well, two pictures have now been done and the lovely ladies who painted them came to see me. 

Me with my pictures!

They brought the portraits of me with them, I took a look at them and thought it was just like looking in the mirror in the arena! Now I'm not being big headed, but I do think I look very cute in these paintings! 

New Kit for one Lucky Pony!

A couple of weeks ago a lovely lady called Sarah rang up to say she would like to donate some equipment to the stables. As you can imagine this was very exciting for everyone here, we were all wondering what it would be and which horse or pony would get to wear it!

Well, Sarah arrived with a very smart driving harness set; Hendrix and Duchess are our two driving horses here at the stables so they were both looking over their stable doors with interest. Lucky Hendrix now has a lovely leather harness to wear. He says he is very happy about it and seems to be showing off rather a lot; but then he is a rather a show off anyway!

On a Monday morning all the tack is always shiny and clean too so I think whoever works Sunday must spend quite a lot of the day with a bucket of water and some saddle soap!  We each have our own tack and equipment so there is quite a lot of tack to clean.

Just some of our tack; there's a lot to clean!

The stitching also all has to be checked to make sure the tack and harness is safe to use. I'm very glad I'm the pony who gets looked after and not the person who has to do all the cleaning up! 

My lovely tack looking all clean and shiny

Getting ready for Winter

I heard the staff in the stables talking about the summer holidays being nearly over for school children; I thought that this might mean that it was time for me to go on my holidays, but Teddy has informed me that this is not the case as we work all year round! 

I don't really mind though; although us horses don’t mind a bit of a break, we do actually prefer working as it stops us getting too bored.

Because the summer is nearly over Kerri and Louise have started sorting out the winter rugs, read for all of us to wear when it starts to get a bit chillier.

Even though we do grow thick winter coats (especially me; I've only just got rid of mine!), we can get cold when its rainy and windy,so our rugs give us a bit of extra protection to stay snug and warm. I look especially fabulous in mine of course!

Me looking  fabulous in my coat last Autumn!

It can get wet and a sometimes cold up here on Exmoor. When it does we think of our cousins the Exmoor ponies who live up out on the moor and feel very grateful for our the rugs! 

A week in the life of a Calvert Pony

Our busiest days in the stables are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, when we are working with groups of guests staying in the centre. For this blog post I thought you might like to hear about what else happens in the stables for the rest of the week.  

Teddy says a week is seven days, and starts on a Sunday; this means we get to start our week with a day off! Sundays we get to stay out in the field all day relaxing and eating and some of us also like to have a play. Brin and Bertie especially enjoy this; they are very good friends, but the staff in the stables say they are like a couple of little kids chasing each other around! 

Brin and Bertie (and me!) enjoying a good chase!

Mondays, Wednesday evenings, Fridays and Saturdays are taken up with private riding lessons and carriage driving. We have some lovely regular riders let me tell you a bit about some of them.

Daisy and her mum Lynn who come twice a week on a Monday and Friday all the way from Bude. I don’t know where it is but Teddy tells me it’s too far to walk and they have to come in a car. Daisy does stable management and riding on a Monday then she rides with her mum on a Friday. 

Lynn and Daisy in the arena with Bertie and  Teddy

Jack (not Jack the pony in the stables!) and his mum Michelle also come to us from Bude. I hear it's really nice there with lots of grass! Maybe I will get to go there one day. Jack must be a very popular name as we also have another Jack who visits on a Monday to ride Duchess.

I don’t tend to see the people that ride on a Wednesday evening as usually I'm out in my paddock for the night by then, but Teddy tells me they are all very nice, and even some of the activity instructors join in on the lessons.

They've made me a Logo!

Have you wonderful people been reading my pieces in the North Devon Journal? You might remember I told you a while ago that I was going to start writing for them.


If you've been reading my column you might have noticed, the lovely folks at the Journal have made me into a logo!

I love it, and I'm going to start using it on my blog too; it makes me feel like Leo, the MGM lion! roar!

Yummy! Fresh Grass!

Hi everyone it’s the mighty atom here!  I am just about to go out into my field next to the archery range.  All the other horses will be excited when they go out today because I saw Nicky and Kerri taking electric fencing to the field…

... this means they all get lots of lovely new grass to eat!  Happy horses all round tonight!  

Me in my lovely little paddock

I don’t get any extra grass because I am too small to have too much grass.  It can make ponies get a horrible illness called laminitis which makes their feet very painful. I've never had it, and I don’t want it! So I am quite happy with my little paddock.

Hoist Training

Kerri had a very busy afternoon a few days ago, Nicky was training her how to hoist riders onto horses, this is an important skill for the riding instructors here at Calvert Trust Exmoor to have, because lots of our guests need this kind of assistance.

Preparing to hoist

Kerri had to practice hoisting a rider from a wheelchair onto a horse. Brin is trained as a hoist horse and so is Teddy. Today Brin had the very special job of helping to train Kerri.

Amelia on her way

 I told you about Eilish last time I blogged didn’t I?  She also helped along with Amelia; they both had a go at being hoisted from a wheelchair onto Brin.  As usual Brin took the opportunity to stand as still as possible and have a little nap!

Landing on Brin's back