A new life begins

Second Chance's Ochre, a 7yo Anglo Arab gelding is coming to me tomorrow (April 6th). He was surrendered to us at the end of February and was gelded shortly thereafter. Until now he's been with a temporary foster carer, recieving correct feeding for the first time in many years and also recovering from his castration.

Now he comes to me to take the next step - learning to become a model citizen of the equine world.

I thought I'd record his progress on here for everyone so they can see what sort of work we regularly do with horses. He is the 4th entire, barely handled rescue we've had in and he needs a lot of work.

So, here we go - starting stats:

Name: Second Chance's Ochre
Age: 7yo (rising 8)
Height: Approx 15.2hh
Breed: Anglo Arab
Colour: Chestnut

History: We were told that as a foal Ochre was bottle raised. We believe this to be true as like many bottle raised babies he has no fear at all of people, is very in-your-face and is quite a friendly boy most of the time.

He came to us through a lady who worried for his future. He used to belong to her neighbor who kept a group of approximately 12 horses in a paddock. These horses were mostly left to their own devices and did not recieve adequate feeding, were not wormed, never got dental or hoof care and bred indescriminately for many years. We have been told Ochre was owned by the same person from birth.

Eventually the person who owned them all left the property and abandoned them there. She did come to take away her two favourites but the remainder were signed over to the neighbor so that she could home them. All but Ochre were rehomed by kindly experienced locals and as there was nobody else prepared to take a mature aged, mostly unhandled stallion it looked as though Ochre would get the bullet.

Handling: Ochre is halter broken and ties up. He can be easily caught and led however he has no concept of personal space and frequently tries to walk on his handler. He has been washed and seems to have no undue fear of the hose and water being squirted on him.

Bad habits:
Ochre has a strong survival instinct. Because he is used to periods of starvation, he will behave contentedly with abundant food at his disposal however if he runs out of grazing or hay, he will repeatedly test fencing until he can break through to find food. Ochre does not trust people to provide him with food and looks after his own survival.

He also will rear and strike if overfaced or if he feels threatened and he has bitten a handler once before.

Good habits:
Ochre is very friendly and approachable. He likes a good scratch and will happily follow a person around his enclosure to see what they're doing. He is well socialised and gets along with other horses well. He is very calm and doesn't appear to be frightened of much. He is intelligent and learns quickly.

Needs to learn:
- Personal space and to respect human handlers
- Pick up hooves for trimming and cleaning
- To have no fear of being touched all over
- Float loading with confidence
- To accept having legs bandaged, wormers, immunisations
- To lunge comfortably
- To accept saddle, bridle, rugs, lunge rollers etc
- Mouthing
- Starting and training under saddle for walk, trot and canter.

This is a lot of work and will be undertaken over several months to ensure that Ochre is happy to do as asked and has no fear of us and the things we will be asking him to learn and do.

Photos:
Ochre the first day he came into SC's care.


A more recent photograph after 2 weeks of good feeding and worming. Also after castration - showing a large improvement in his condition.