It’s National Love Your Pet Day, so we thought it would be fun to come up with a few things that only we as horse owners will get. How many of these can you relate to?

  1. They like to keep us on our toes
    Everything, and we mean everything, can be spooked at: a patch of grass that’s the wrong colour, their shadow, you, a hedge, other horses, etc… However, send a fire engine with a load of sirens past and they’ll not bat an eyelid.

  2. The struggle is real
    You fill up the wheelbarrow, you push it to the muck heap. Then you’ve got to get it up the ramp/plank of wood/whatever you use to try to pile up the never-ending mountain of manure. Also, there is nothing more gutting than filling up the wheelbarrow and having it fall over on the way to the muck heap.

  3. What smell?
    You will always smell of manure. That thing you non-horsey people can smell in the supermarket – if someone’s wearing jodhpurs and boots, it’s them. We don’t even notice it anymore.

  4. Money can’t buy happiness…but it can buy a horse
    We know, they’re expensive. It’s sometimes best not to even tally up how much has been spent, and the reality is all of your money goes towards the horse fund. But the truth is you don’t really mind all that much.

  5. Odd jobs
    Picking out hooves is oddly satisfying, and there is something really rewarding about a freshly swept yard. It will only stay clean for about two seconds, but still.

  6. Withdrawal symptoms
    A few days without riding feels like a lifetime, you start to have dreams about being back in the saddle again. You see pictures of horses, drive past horses in a field, hear people talk about horses and are just filled with this sense of longing. Then you ride again and everything is right in the world.

  7. The only way is Equestrian
    You get the weirdest tan lines, and your legs will never match your arms.

  8. One day you might just turn into a hay bale
    Hay and straw gets everywhere. No matter how tidy you think you are, you will always find some in your hair (or down your jodhpurs!)

  9. It’s all worth it!