Horse Behaviour Info

Hendra Pony Club is a shared paddock between horse Agisters, so Agister's need to take this into account that horses are unpredictable.

The committee will not tolerate or way into personal grievances or petty squabbles between Agister's trying to use horse behaviours as an excuse to have a dig or pick on someone as this is more like bullying, which is also not tolerated.

Dominate Horse:

Horses have a pecking order of dominance in a herd and this horse can be called an Alfa horse (boss horse).

An Alfa horse can boss other horses around especially at feed time. To avoid a confrontation at feed time, put your horse in the yard first then prepare your feed.

As people offer to feed other people’s horses in times of holidays etc, the horses think any feed going into yards is theirs and this creates confusion for the horse. This is why multiple horses will come at feed time expecting they will be feed by whomever. Horses like routine and when other horses get feed and they don’t get feed they get upset and can get aggressive as food is a routine and can help keep a horse disciplined. Even a fat horse requires placing in a yard and given a token, light feed. (A horse is mostly fat from little or no exercise and too much feed).

You can also put the Alfa horse in a feed yard prior to feeding or riding to eliminate any confrontation around feed time or when riding on the grounds.

Geldings:

Geldings are boy horses that have had their baby making boy bits cut out. This is why they are called geldings. Geldings are mostly cut when they are just over 12 months. Some are left till they are a few years longer for different reasons and once they reach the age of 4 years they are called a stallion. Sometimes the stallions are used to breed with to make foals. Stallions can be very territorial and in the wild they fight to win mares to breed with or they can be mean and steal mares from other stallions by beating that stallion up, then herd the mare away. When the gelding jumps on a mare it is called “Mounting”

When stallions get gelded after they have made foals with mares they lose the urge to mate anymore but they don’t forget. When mares come into season they still remember and if they are cut late (after 12 months) they may think they are a stallion again and try to jump on top of a mare when she is in season. You can call these geldings “proud cut “as they look stallion like eg: thick joules solid build.

If a gelding is gelded properly and early as preferred they should not get any urges to mount.

Mares in Season:

It is natural for mares to come into season a few times a year. They can also come on when introduced to a new gelding. Some mares can get a higher level of oestrogen in which can make them Bully (Bossy). There are needles to give them to stop them coming into season but this can also make them sterile and unable to have foals in the future so may do not take up this option. The mare in season often hangs around a proud cut horse and urinates a lot as this stimulates the boy. It can last from 4days to weeks depending on the mare and this can occur mostly around Mar/Apr or Oct/Nov. Every situation is different.

Proposal for Issues:

Aggression at feed time: Lock the aggressive horse up prior to feeding your horse.

Put your horse in feed yard before you bring your horse feed out of shed.

Aggression on grounds when riding: Lock the aggressive horse up prior to riding or ride in an arena.

Mare in season and gelding is mounting: Owners take turns at locking each horse up separately until the mare is out of season.

This is the only time touching other persons horses is allowed and over rides the Agistment rules as passed through at previous meetings to be able to lock a horse up if creating an issue but must be let out after.