The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Pets & Working Animals => Horses, ponies, donkeys & mules => Topic started by: SallyintNorth on November 21, 2011, 09:23:33 am
-
Mind, his eyes widened when we brought their mum round!
-
Looks like he can't work it all out but he is definitely interested
Sally
-
now sally that is not strictly scientific they are both on the same holding so relatively used to each other bring a strange horse on that has not been used to pigs then see the action
but yes they can coexist perfectly :farmer:
-
Oh Sally - they're so chunky looking :love: :pig: :love:
Mind, I reckon he's thinking hmmm :yum:
Karen :wave:
-
Great pic ;D Who could dislike such cute little wanderers :love: :pig:
-
Oh Sally - they're so chunky looking :love: :pig: :love:
Err... do you think they're too chunky? In "show condition"? ;) By which, of course, I mean, do you think they're too fat? (I can take it. If they are, I cut their feed and save money! :))
-
it all depends on who is looking at them they are not at the size to layer fat on it also depends on what and how much you are feeding also if they are freeranging as opposed to wandering about what size are you wanting them to go at and do you want to maintain there present growth rate
personally i don't think they are chunky they are saddelback crosses :farmer:
-
No Sally, they're not too fat ! Like Robert says they don't get fat at this age - just convert all the food into growth. I mean chunky in the sense that they look really healthy, growing well and have a good covering - no apparent runts or skinny ones, all just good & chunky :thumbsup: (but maybe chunky's not the right word ???) If I thought they were fat, I'd tell you ;) They (and you) are doing a grand job Xx
-
That is such a lovely photo, the piglets look beautiful, they look like they have been polished!
-
out of 20 ponies, we only have one that cannot tolerate pigs, and goes bonkers to get away, even tho hes seen them all his life.
lovely foto :D
-
We were discussing this the other day. A friend was telling me how her horse saw a pig and stood rooted to the spot for a full 24 hours. They had to bring him food and water and put a warm rug on him until eventually he forgot about the pig and started to move again.
-
We were discussing this the other day. A friend was telling me how her horse saw a pig and stood rooted to the spot for a full 24 hours. They had to bring him food and water and put a warm rug on him until eventually he forgot about the pig and started to move again.
:o wow, that is scared!
-
OH did a treatise on this for her HND having noticed that her Selle Francais x TB was petrified with fear by half a dozen small pigs near the yard. And 650kg of petrified takes some handling.
She did a series of control experiments with a dozen horses on the yard to test for general spookiness. These involved things like opening umbrellas suddenly, making noises and so forth. Each horse was led on a lunge line and the distance of deviation from the straight path measured. Then she did some tests using combinations of piglike dummies, genuine pig poo and finally genuine pigs.
The horses could spot the genuine article and all but one made a large diversion around the pigs, larger than any other disturbing event. The exception, an 18hh fellow, was completely imperturbable. Nothing including the pigs moved him, but he was scared of people. Any new person entering his box would get th full ears back retreating to the far corner treatment.
-
That's so interesting!
But why should they be so scared of pigs?
Oddly, when my parents were fostering two donkeys, folk riding down the lane the other side of the hedge reported having great difficulty getting horses past the donkeys and when I asked if it was because they wanted to 'chat' was told 'no, they're scared of them'.
-
That is fascinating, waterhouse. We've two Dales and two Fell ponies here, and the TB that lodged for a while - and none of them has been in the slightest bit frightened of the pigs; certainly not any different to how they are with any new thing.
Horses being so very empathetic, one wonders whether the handler's expectation induces or at least encourages the reaction. It would be hard to eradicate that element from your OH's experiment, but you do hear of people riding horses past pigs where the rider was unaware of the pigs until the horse started reacting to them.
As to the 'why?' - I don't know, most people seem to think it's some deep-rooted memory dating back to when the horses would have been wild and possibly hunted by wild boar. But the fact that our natives seem unperturbed would suggest it isn't that.
-
the general opinion is the horses are scarred because when horses were small millions of years ago pigs hunted them if not it is a good story :farmer:
-
We've only just got our pigs but my cob and shetland seem fine. The cob ignores them and the shetland seems keen to make friends. I guess that might change when the pigs get bigger.
-
The pigs in question were evil-looking little black things - Vietnamese pot-bellied, i think - rather than proper pink pigs (no offence meant, not my area of interest)
The whole thing arose because the Ag college where we kept the horse at the time (15 years ago) brought them in as an experiment and installed them in some pens 10m from the main entrance to the horse yard. OH's horse literally took one look and reared, then bolted. There were a lot of problems with other horses, and the side entrance to the yard had to be brought into use.
OH horse is generally reliable and sensible, though we bought him as a 12yo and have no knowledge of his youth. He reacted similarly when confronted on a local road with a driving horse pulling a cart. And a well-known local hazard is the group of alpacas who live on a lethal bend. But the reaction there is a spook rather than fear. Other friends' horses have trouble with curious young cows who tend to charge over to the fence for a look.
-
My 13.2 is fine with my Kune Kune luckily but did see a 16.2 grow to 18 hands whilst puffing like a steam train lol
-
I have a couple of pet pigs and mine are fine with them, I'm sure it would be a different matter if I didn't have any and we met them on a hack! Horses and ponies just get used to what they live with - my horse spooks a mile if she meets a sheep on a hack - but at home, happily shares her hay with them ... ::) ::)
-
I wonder if it is that pig are omnivores and hence smell of something that eats meat, and also smells disproportionately in regard to its size
I often keep pigs but only when I need to, so a lovely cheeky little Shetland pony 8hh, who had obviously never come across pigs in his life was very perturbed by the smell in the barn, when he was in his stable.
I thought the best thing would be an introduction ------- I wouldn't have ever imagined a "horse" of any description could have fainted, but by the time I had got him near enough to open the barn door, he was nearly on the brink of it. Of course once he actually saw the pigs he quickly re-gained confidence.
My interpretation is that an equine has a nasal overload of something that eats meat and imagines and "enormous elephant size" predator.
Although I feel horses and pigs may rarely become firm friends once they are properly and calmly introduced things calm down.
-
What a brave horse you have. My boy would of legged it before they'd even got that close! Mind you he is scared of his own reflection ;)
I think horses have a natural fear of pigs in general but some adapt to them better than others. I've known of horses living in fields near pigs with no problems.
I used to ride a TB who was fearless and the best mannered horse I've ever ridden. Never put a foot wrong. There was a field of pigs along one of our hacking routes and he would walk past it no problem but if I asked him to stand still there was no chance in hell he was stopping anywhere near the pigs! Only time he ever refused to listen to me. Think it was just his mindset that they were a predator and he had to move away from them.