Royal Wood Win Team Challenge

Royal Wood A Team won the show jumping team challenge today at Norton Heath Equestrian Centre, with East Essex Pony Club taking the tack and turnout title!

The team, consisting of  Chloe Spooner, Hannah Godfrey, Jo Davis and Emily Balloch, fended off competition from sixteen other teams to win first prize in the annual showjumping competition.

Congratulations!

Video of the week

VIDEO OF THE WEEK

The Rising Cost of Keeping Horses in the news today

The business linking equestrian’s in Essex is vast – and includes vets, farriers, etc; it’s a huge economy in our local community. As we all well know the cost of fuel, hay, feed and straw is all going up, and these mounting concerns are having a huge effect on the rural community.

“What goes first – the horse or the second car? What goes first, the horse or some other luxury? Is a horse a luxury?” Dave Monk, BBC Essex Radio.

“A lot of people can’t afford to keep their horses anymore and are abandoning them. Thank goodness we have sanctuaries in Essex who are doing an amazing job. They are absolutely inundated with horse at the moment,” said radio presenter Dave Monk.

On Dave Monk’s BBC Essex radio show this morning, the topic of conversation was the rising cost of keeping horses, generating a huge response from the equestrian community!

The rural community in Essex is based around horse riding, and Essex is the most populated county with horses in the whole of the UK.

Dave and his callers tried to dispel the myth that just because you have a horse does not mean your rich! ‘Usually the opposite’ said one caller.

Another caller, Sheila from Boerham, is a horse owner said it’s a fallacy that rich people keep horses – adding that horse owners keep other people in business including saddleries, shops, farmers etc – what will happen to them if there are no more horse owners? It’s a huge knock-on effect.

It was also reported that more horses than ever are being neglected and abandoned. The credit crunch has affected most, but the equestrian community really does seem to be feeling the pinch.

Sue Burton, from Remus Memorial Horse Sanctuary, Ingatestone reported that their calls are up from five a week to five a day, and this is mostly due to the rising cost of keeping horses.

Jenny Murrell from Shopland Hall riding school in Rochford said “The credit crunch has hit us all hard, the hay is up 75% and the straw 25%. There are so many costs and they are only going one way and that’s up!”

The rural community, including farriers, dentists and vets are all feeling it.

To listen to the full article please visit the BBC iPlayer nowhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/radio/bbc_radio_essex/watchlive

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00dlqrt

EUSPC Mid Week Jumping at Brook Farm TC

Essex Union South Pony Club are hosting a mid week showjumping competition at Brook Farm Training Centre in Stapleford Abbotts, on Wednesday 23rd February.

The event is open to both members and non members, and includes classes such as clear round jumping over poles, up to open 90cm classes.

For more information, to view the full schedule and to enter please click on the schedule below.

CLICK HERE to download.

The Donkey Sanctuary goes on tour…to Essex

International animal welfare charity The Donkey Sanctuary has launched their 2011 tour dates for free donkey care workshops that are highly popular among the UK’s donkey-owning community, including a date in Essex this June.

The ‘D is for Donkey’ Tour covers diets, de-worming and daily checks and will be delivered by experts from the charity, which helps hundreds of thousands of donkeys and mules every year through twenty-nine project countries worldwide.

The date for Essex is Friday 17th June, and t hands-on, practical and interactive workshop will be free and have proven extremely popular in previous years. Early booking is recommended to avoid disappointment.

Please call the Welfare and Advice team on 01395 578222 for details.

The full list of tour dates and destinations are on the Donkey Sanctuary website –www.thedonkeysanctuary.org.uk.

Hundreds of Horses left starving in Egypt

A woman from Wales now living in Egypt is trying to help feed hundreds of horses left starving after the recent political upheaval drove away tourists.

Beth Sartain, 40, from Merthyr Tydfil, said she was shocked to find scores of emaciated animals at one tourist site.

She is working with the Egyptian Society for Mercy to Animals which says horses providing rides at the pyramids have been abandoned by their owners.

Mrs Sartain estimated up to 3,000 horses need help in one area.

A mother-of-two whose husband teaches in Cairo, she has refused to flee the country during the protests which saw President Hosni Mubarak step down. She said it was not safe to travel during the first days of the political protests. Like many expats, she has taken up riding and keeps a horse in stables.

As a result she had to stay away from where her horse, an Arabian stallion called Seren – Welsh for star – is stabled. She said that while she was kept away from Seren, Egyptians who earn a living providing horses rides at the pyramids lost their income as the tourist trade dried up.

Another delivery of food for 500 horses is expected, but Mrs Sartain said she estimated there may be up to 3,000 horses who face an uncertain future.

She said the fundraising, in conjunction with the Egyptian Society for Mercy to Animals (Esma), ensured owners must prove they owned a horse before they could collect food.

On its website, Esma said:

“This period of political transition in Egypt has created an animal welfare crisis, and Esma urgently needs donations to cover the many extra burdens we now have The animal welfare problems remain grave – Mubarak’s resignation did not solve these problems!”

To read more, visit: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-12457420

Equestrian Schedule for London Olympics 2012

THE London Olympics schedule is released today – revealing when our top athletes will be going for gold.

There are a total of 8.8 million tickets available for the 26 sports to be contested between July 27 and August 12 next year. Each will include free travel in the city on the day of the event, to encourage spectators to use public transport. There will also be a host of festivities to coincide with the Games.

Equestrian Competition Dates:

Eventing:

Venue: Greenwich Park
Dates: Saturday 28 July – Tuesday 31 July 
Gold medals up for grabs: 2
Athletes: 75

Dressage:

Venue: Greenwich Park
Dates: Thursday 2 August – Wednesday 8 August
Gold medals up for grabs: 2
Athletes: 50

Jumping:

Venue: Greenwich Park
Dates: Saturday 4 – Thursday 9 August
Gold medals up for grabs: 2
Athletes: 75

Equestrian and Ceremony ticket costs are as follows:

Opening ceremony: £2,012, £1,600, £995, £150, £20.12.

Closing ceremony: £1,500, £995, £655, £150, £20.12.

Each sport’s event will have the same number of tickets in each price bracket. Some events have varying prices for quarter-finals and semi-finals and men’s/women’s events.

Equestrian – Dressage: preliminary £95, £65, £40, £20; final £275, £175, £95, £65.

Equestrian – Eventing (dressage, jumping only): preliminary £95, £65, £40, £20; final £150, £95, £55, £35.

Equestrian – Eventing (cross-country only): preliminary £55.

Equestrian – Jumping: preliminary £95, £65, £40, £20; final £275, £175, £95, £65.

For more information on ticket pricing, and on London 2010, please visit the official ticketing website: http://www.tickets.london2012.com/

Horses in the headlines this week.

Hooked on Horses brings you a round-up of all the news snippets that are about or include horses this week, or we think may interest you!Please read and enjoy – HoH.

Woman charged over police horse ‘dog attack.’

A woman has admitted owning a dog which was dangerously out of control in a public place after two police horses were bitten while on patrol in Essex. The two horses, Bella and Biscuit, were attacked by Staffordshire bull terrier Tyson in the Broomfield area of Chelmsford on the twelfth of January. Thirty-four-year-old Samantha Symonds from Chelmsford, is due to be sentenced in March.

London 2012 Equestrian Caterer

Racecourse operator Arena Leisure has won a contract worth up to £1 million in profits to provide catering at two venues for the London Olympic Games in 2012. One of the venues is Greenwich Park, home to the equestrian events.

The Duke of Edinburgh Celebrates his 90th milestone in style

The first photograph taken of the Duke of Edinburgh has been released to celebrate the opening of a new exhibition marking his 90th year.

The Duke of Edinburgh as a baby with Princess Alice in 1921

In the black and white print Philip is a new-born baby in the arms of his mother Alice of Greece – an image which dates from soon after he was born on June 10, 1921 on Corfu.

It will form part of the display which will chronicle Philip’s life, interests and passions through objects, photographs, paintings and memorabilia.

Sporting pictures will also be included reflecting his passion for sport – polo, horse carriage driving, sailing and cricket.

Keen equestrians will enjoy this latest Royal exhibition, because of Philip’s equestrian pursuits, documneted in photography. Philip played polo until 1971, when he started to compete in carriage driving, a sport which he helped expand; the early rule book was drafted under his supervision.

Philip is patron to some 800 organisations, particularly focused on the environment, industry, sport, and education. He served as UK President of the World Wildlife Fundfrom 1961 to 1982, and was President of the International Equestrian Federationfrom 1964 to 1986. The exhibition will run for much of the year, it opened on February 12th until January 22nd 2012.

Two haystack fires in one day

Two fires broke out within a mile of each other in Southminster, Essex, on the 7th February. Farmers and firefighters have raised concerns about the recent spate of haystack fires in Essex. The Essex County Fire and Rescue Service said they had noted forty-one such incidents in the past six months. In the past two weeks there have been incidents in Woodham Mortimer and two on the same day in Southminster.

Read more on this story here:http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/essex/hi/people_and_places/nature/newsid_9392000/9392177.stm