Sunday 17 January 2016

Schooling Screenshots

Just some screen shots of our jump school today.

Buy what I really want to talk about is agistment drama.

I really hate agistment drama. I agist on an old racehorse facility, and because I've been there for quite a while we have yards down the front close to the barn. There's a racehorse trainer, B, who has about 9 racehorses in work and a few more just doing bits and pieces On the books, she pays the same amount as me each week, doesn't pay extra for any facilities and the rules are everyone has full use of the whole property, no special treatment.

I'm constantly butting heads with her because she thinks she runs the joint.

First it was because I drive on the grass to keep my car close to the stable while I make feeds each morning (because I have my daughter napping in the car, so I've got to keep it close). Apparently the grass doesn't look pristine and she wants to keep it nice for when her owners come to view the horses. However, she doesn't actually do any lawn maintence. Bob, the property manager (who loves me and I would do anything he says because he looks after me) does. So, I continue to drive on the grass, because Bob doesn't have a problem with it.

Then, I had my dog out there once and he had rolled in poo. So I was hoping him off, which he hates, and he was yelping and whining. Apparently this upset a horse she had out across the yard and he injured himself and she blames me. By the way, dogs are allowed there, mine is never off leash, and her dogs are always running around causing trouble.

She doesn't move off the road when I'm driving on it, makes me wait until she's past or makes me drive through the mud or on the grass to get past, when all she needs to do is move her horse across, like any normal person would.

Now, she doesn't want me using the racetrack when they use it, for no other reason than my horse isn't a racehorse, even though I do exactly the same type of work on there. No, B, fku.

Now, the other day, I was trying to get Allie worked by trotting her while leading her out the window of the car. I do this quite often and the racehorse people hate it even though I'm courteous and slow down/stop if they need me to and I try to keep out of their way. I've NEVER upset any of their horses doing this, ever. Anyway, I was leading her up a lane near the racetrack and I stopped because B was riding a horse that was looking a bit scared so I thought I would give her space til she passed. She started yelling at me that there are stallions and colts in that lane. I yelled back "ok!" and she repeated again "there's STALLIONS!! Don't go down that lane!" as she galloped past.

Ugh.

My mare doesn't even flick an ear to any other horse while I'm working her, there's very little chance that she would get upset at a colt trotting or cantering up to the fence as she went past. So I thought maybe B was just warning me incase Allie would get upset as some mares do.

So I asked Bob if he had any issues with me doing what I was doing and he said no. The so called stallions did what any other horse in any other lane does when I ride/lead her past - they trotted up to the fence, whinnied, trotted or cantered away. That's it.

Well, apparently I upset one of B's horses so much that it had to see the vet as it got injured. B had to send her husband M (who is lovely with much better people skills) to talk to me about it. He basically asked me not to take my mare down that lane. She couldn't even talk to me herself, she had to send M to do it for her.

I was trimming another agisters horse today and she told me that B was ranting and raving that I should pay the vet bill because I upset that horse and that the bill was up to $3000. Mind you, none of the horses I led Allie past the other day looked like they did anything to injure themselves to the tune of $3000, so I highly doubt it had anything to do with me.

Fk u B. I'm sick of your drama. You keep blaming me for your horses getting injured when I have nothing to do with it. So I'm not allowed to ride or lead my horse down a lane incase another horse in a yard decides to bolt around like a lunatic and hurt itself? No. These are racehorses. They see far more shit at the racetrack than just little old me trotting my horse out the window of my truck while my baby sleeps.

Far out. I'm just trying to get my horse worked. I swear, she thinks she owns the joint.

I'm just going to keep doing my thing and make sure Bob is OK with it all. I refuse to be bullied by another agisters, I don't care if she's trying to run a business, that's her problem, not mine.

2 comments:

KateRose said...

Lovely schooling pics! Sorry to hear about the barn drama :(

OneHindResting said...

Gah! Sharing space is always fraught with difficulty. There is always some drama. It's hard to be 'on side' with everyone... and when there's conflict is makes things so much more difficult. Maybe she is under pressure from the horse owners? I have a friend's horse at the moment, and my friend is making no trouble, but I feel the pressure to make sure nothing happens to her horse... very stressful!