Dartmoor Pony Training Centre
"The DPTC would like to say a huge thanks to Moretonhampstead Riding Club for letting them use the riding school for their open day in October. The day went really well with lots of people turning up to meet the ponies, watch the clicker training demo and have a go at the Horse agility course with the ponies. We managed to rehome one pony from the event and have got more people interested! Thank you again!
We have just finished a 5 day semi feral foal handling course that we run every year with Sarah Weston from Intelligent Horsemanship. We teach the students how to work with wild foals using gentle and ethical training techniques; feather dusters are used to get the foals used to touch and we use scarves when first teaching the ponies to lead. These gentle tools help the students to stay extremely light and soft with the ponies and not to pull and push them around. This means the students learn to be extremely sensitive and aware of the ponies and when they give a small "try." We'll be running the course again next October to get in touch if you're interested in attending or being a spectator.
We are currently helping some local farmers to rehome their ponies; there are around 350 ponies that will probably go for Zoo meat this year and we're working with some of the farmers that want to avoid this. If you know anyone who is interested in taking on a pony then please get in touch; we can give you lots of advice and support on training them. We're also hoping to be involved in the Pony contraceptive injection pilot and are working with a farmer who is trialling putting geldings out on the moor. Hopefully with things like this going on the numbers of unwanted foals being produced every year should start decreasing.
For more info on the work we do or to get involved in any way please contact us: Natalie 07802 218169, Sarah: 07846 254682 Jenny: 07964 923211 Email: dartmoorponytrainingcentre@yahoo.co.uk."