It's me....

[Phoebe]

Well, guess I'd better join the crowd...


Born in 82 in Canberra (now there's a fun place to live). We moved up here when I was 7, probably to escape the crazy climate. I started riding lessons when I was 8, my parents thought it would get the horse bug out of my system... how very wrong they were. Poor parents.

I leased one or two horses in my early teens and joined (the now extinct) The Gap Pony Club, firstly competing in gymkhanas etc. Eventually I began riding a 13.3 pony called Moonbeam (Beanie, Beanbag)and moved on to dressage and eventing. We went to a few PC State championships in dressage and combined training, however like many mares Beanie only performed when it suited her... (certainly learnt to keep my bum in the saddle on those jumping courses, after continuously finding myself looking up at the horses face looking at me from the other side of the jump..).

So then I got Aantoinette, a WB (Aachen) mare with a slightly less tempermental, yet still senstive nature. With her I continued for a short time at PC before moving on to the EFA ranks. We reached Elementary level before a hoof injury meant she became unsuitable for competitive riding.

Enter (Glencairn) Dimity 2 years ago (why do I keep buying mares???) I bought her at age 6, trained to roughly prelim/novice level and in paddock condition after having had a 6 month break. She is an interesting one... a fruitloop one day (see my post in the Caboolture ** thread), model student the next. But, she is showing plenty of talent for the more difficult work and we are developing more and more of a rapport as the time passes. Currently we are competing elementary, and just starting out in medium as well.

Meanwhile Beanie and Aantoinette are still hanging out at home. Beanie produced Digger a few years ago (Connemara cross) who is about ready to break in - I'm hoping those adult pony dressage classes will still be around next year (and more of them!) Aantionette has also had her first foal last season, Robbie (by Prince Noir) (see avatar) now 8 months old, and is due to have another by Sunny Boy in November.

Sooo... in my copious spare time between looking after those 5 (ha...) I did a Bachelor of Science at UQ, majoring in Zoology and Marine Biology, with Honours in Zoology (Freshwater fish ecology). Since then, I've worn plenty of different hats - I am currently supervisor at the local pizza shop, riding school instructor, research assistant and tutor at UQ, and am just completing a report on waterway health, commissioned by Brisbane City Council.

Goals... hmm... take Dimity to FEI in the next year or two, or three, and continue to breed some nice foals. I should probably think about getting one solid fulltime job at some point...

so... that's me.

Here's Dimity and I at Caboolture last weekend.

http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a221/wetsawdustdemon/401986e2.jpg

and here's Antoinette and Robbie at 1 day old

http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a221/wetsawdustdemon/FoalplusNellie1.jpg

[ann]

Well, guess I'd better join the crowd...


Born in 82 in Canberra (now there's a fun place to live). We moved up here when I was 7, probably to escape the crazy climate. I started riding lessons when I was 8, my parents thought it would get the horse bug out of my system... how very wrong they were. Poor parents.

I leased one or two horses in my early teens and joined (the now extinct) The Gap Pony Club, firstly competing in gymkhanas etc. Eventually I began riding a 13.3 pony called Moonbeam (Beanie, Beanbag)and moved on to dressage and eventing. We went to a few PC State championships in dressage and combined training, however like many mares Beanie only performed when it suited her... (certainly learnt to keep my bum in the saddle on those jumping courses, after continuously finding myself looking up at the horses face looking at me from the other side of the jump..).

So then I got Aantoinette, a WB (Aachen) mare with a slightly less tempermental, yet still senstive nature. With her I continued for a short time at PC before moving on to the EFA ranks. We reached Elementary level before a hoof injury meant she became unsuitable for competitive riding.

Enter (Glencairn) Dimity 2 years ago (why do I keep buying mares???) I bought her at age 6, trained to roughly prelim/novice level and in paddock condition after having had a 6 month break. She is an interesting one... a fruitloop one day (see my post in the Caboolture ** thread), model student the next. But, she is showing plenty of talent for the more difficult work and we are developing more and more of a rapport as the time passes. Currently we are competing elementary, and just starting out in medium as well.

Meanwhile Beanie and Aantoinette are still hanging out at home. Beanie produced Digger a few years ago (Connemara cross) who is about ready to break in - I'm hoping those adult pony dressage classes will still be around next year (and more of them!) Aantionette has also had her first foal last season, Robbie (by Prince Noir) (see avatar) now 8 months old, and is due to have another by Sunny Boy in November.

Sooo... in my copious spare time between looking after those 5 (ha...) I did a Bachelor of Science at UQ, majoring in Zoology and Marine Biology, with Honours in Zoology (Freshwater fish ecology). Since then, I've worn plenty of different hats - I am currently supervisor at the local pizza shop, riding school instructor, research assistant and tutor at UQ, and am just completing a report on waterway health, commissioned by Brisbane City Council.

Goals... hmm... take Dimity to FEI in the next year or two, or three, and continue to breed some nice foals. I should probably think about getting one solid fulltime job at some point...

so... that's me.
Oh, dear! I suppose all the development drove the horsey people out of The Gap. When I was in Pony Club, The Gap was a very large and successful club.

[Jytte]

Love the little foal Phoebe!! What a cutie!

[Phoebe]

Oh, dear! I suppose all the development drove the horsey people out of The Gap. When I was in Pony Club, The Gap was a very large and successful club.

Thats exactly what happened Ann... the club went from winning the premiership in 1996, to non-existence around 5/6 years later. A bit sad really. You can't ride on the streets around there anymore, because people will yell at you for riding their nature strips and call the council.

Love the little foal Phoebe!! What a cutie!

Hehe, thanks. He has an unbeatable temperament, and a pretty cute belly splash too (the vet thinks I should register him as a paint... hehe).

I thought the foal in your post was pretty special! Don't you love big white socks..

[ann]

Thats exactly what happened Ann... the club went from winning the premiership in 1996, to non-existence around 5/6 years later. A bit sad really. You can't ride on the streets around there anymore, because people will yell at you for riding their nature strips and call the council. I know the type. They move to an area because of its 'rural ambience' and then put up suburban-type homes and act like suburbanites, turning attractive places into urban ghettoes.

[Phoebe]

That's exactly them. Someone I know was actually told off recently, because their horse had allegedly put such huge hoofprints in the nature strip that it made the fellow fall off his ride-on. He went on to point out a few faint hoof imprints in the grass. Never mind that nature strips are public property, as far as I'm aware...

Another favourite is those who buy cattle dogs, or other active working dogs, which they then don't walk but rather allow to roam the streets, and chase my heavily pregnant mare around her paddock...

[ann]

That's exactly them. Someone I know was actually told off recently, because their horse had allegedly put such huge hoofprints in the nature strip that it made the fellow fall off his ride-on. He went on to point out a few faint hoof imprints in the grass. Never mind that nature strips are public property, as far as I'm aware...

Another favourite is those who buy cattle dogs, or other active working dogs, which they then don't walk but rather allow to roam the streets, and chase my heavily pregnant mare around her paddock...
Well, you can always report the dogs to the pound, and maybe even get them impounded.

I once had a residential development put up along two fencelines of my paddock. First the developers let the fence down and my two unbroken youngsters were impounded for being in the middle of the highway at midnight. Cost me a fortune to have them released, but I was lucky because the ranger recognised them. Then the owners who bought the houses they built started throwing their rubbish into the paddock, and one of them set up a steel rope between two trees at horse head height.

I eventually had to stop using that paddock, and retreated to the paddock that didn't border the housing development. That made it easier to sleep at night, but I was constantly burgled by a couple of children from the houses. They would dig a hole in the ground under the walls of my shed, and help themselves to whatever took their fancy.

It was almost a relief when the property was sold for housing. I moved the horses to an agistment place, where keeping the fences up was someone else's responsibility. It had electric light and water that came out of hoses, too!

[Phoebe]

Yuck.. that's nightmare stuff. Makes some of the people around here seem like model neighbours.

There was an incident not too long ago where I came home from work one night around 10.30pm, to see a van parked outside the foal's paddock and a couple of people lurking around him... they took off when they saw me drive up and we haven't seen them since... but the paddock gates now have locks on them.

The dog which was the main horse-chasing culprit was actually impounded a few times (the Dakabin pound seem to spend quite a bit of time cruising around here.. probably very profitable for them) but eventually was hit and killed by the Home Icecream van. Sad really because it was a very friendly dog and only doing what it was bred to do... if only they kept it behind a fence.

[ann]

There was an incident not too long ago where I came home from work one night around 10.30pm, to see a van parked outside the foal's paddock and a couple of people lurking around him... they took off when they saw me drive up and we haven't seen them since... but the paddock gates now have locks on them.
That's pretty scary. I had my horse float stolen once. The culprits used bolt-cutters to get in the front gate, turned the horse that lived in that area out into a paddock, then used the bolt-cutters on the shed door as well, and loaded all my gear into my float and drove it away. They (or their mates) came back almost exactly a year later and cleared out my shed again. The replacement float was stored elsewhere, so they didn't get that. I'd just lost my job, and was devastated. I told all the horse people I knew what these people had done to me, and they never came back.

The dog which was the main horse-chasing culprit was actually impounded a few times (the Dakabin pound seem to spend quite a bit of time cruising around here.. probably very profitable for them) but eventually was hit and killed by the Home Icecream van. Sad really because it was a very friendly dog and only doing what it was bred to do... if only they kept it behind a fence.
Poor dog. It's never the dogs' fault, is it? Just the stupid owners. However. Way back, when Caboolture was more of a country town, I had an escape-artist terrier cross that loved people, and barbecues. I think he went to every barbecue within a radius of half a km for about five years. He was such a happy dog that even aggressive dogs were disarmed by him.

I feel sorry for that poor Home Icecream van driver, too. It's horrible being responsible for killing an animal, even when you know you couldn't help it.

[Phoebe]

I had my horse float stolen once. The culprits used bolt-cutters to get in the front gate, turned the horse that lived in that area out into a paddock, then used the bolt-cutters on the shed door as well, and loaded all my gear into my float and drove it away. They (or their mates) came back almost exactly a year later and cleared out my shed again. The replacement float was stored elsewhere, so they didn't get that. I'd just lost my job, and was devastated. I told all the horse people I knew what these people had done to me, and they never came back.

Agh.. how awful. Assuming since you had to get a replacement float, you never got the original back, or any of the other gear?

I quite often see on the Cyberhorse forum, people posting messages about their stolen horses... it seems to happen more often than I realised. In a recent one, someone had their (very loudly coloured) paint horse stolen... how do you hide/resell that??


Poor dog. It's never the dogs' fault, is it? Just the stupid owners. However. Way back, when Caboolture was more of a country town, I had an escape-artist terrier cross that loved people, and barbecues. I think he went to every barbecue within a radius of half a km for about five years. He was such a happy dog that even aggressive dogs were disarmed by him.

I feel sorry for that poor Home Icecream van driver, too. It's horrible being responsible for killing an animal, even when you know you couldn't help it.

I felt sorry for him too. I haven't been unlucky enough to hit anything yet (a few near misses) but being an animal/wildlife nut I'd feel terrible.

[ann]

Agh.. how awful. Assuming since you had to get a replacement float, you never got the original back, or any of the other gear?
No, none of it. There was a rash of horsefloat disappearances at the time. Lea Bierman lost hers just a couple of weeks earlier, and I heard of about five others stolen from people I didn't know, but were known by people I knew. The strange thing is that I didn't notice the float at first. I saw the cut chain, and looked frantically for the horse. Then I saw the shed door open, and looked inside to see all my gear gone. It wasn't until I'd trekked across the highway to a house to make a phone call to the police and the owner asked me where my float was, that I realised it had gone too. Ironically, the house immediately opposite the gate had a policeman living in it, and one of the houses further down the road, but still opposite the paddock, had another policeman living in it. He was the one who always got the call to come out to take the details, and we became quite good mates after about three visits. After the anniversary break-in, he recalled the three times he'd been called to the property, and said, See you next year! as he left. ;-/

I quite often see on the Cyberhorse forum, people posting messages about their stolen horses... it seems to happen more often than I realised. In a recent one, someone had their (very loudly coloured) paint horse stolen... how do you hide/resell that??
I got an e-mail about that filly. She would certainly be easily identified. Not like your standard bay/brown, maybe-a-star dressage horse.

I felt sorry for him too. I haven't been unlucky enough to hit anything yet (a few near misses) but being an animal/wildlife nut I'd feel terrible.
Yeah. I have trouble killing a cockroach, although I do it when I have to. Fortunately, my house has been invaded by Asian house geckos, and I haven't seen a cockroach for ages.

In nearly 40 years of driving (goodness, that makes me feel old!) I've hit and killed three animals: a wallaby on Witty Road at Moggill, when it jumped into the side of my brand new Mazda, a dog that jumped out of a mini Moke travelling in the opposite direction on the D'Aguilar highway near Woodford (same car) and an Australian terrier that ran out of a house just up the road from here (same car). All were in the early to mid-seventies, and (touch wood) I've never come close since.