Fell Pony Podcast

On todays show I’m talking with a man who’s journey from very humble beginnings has taken him to the pinnacle of horse culture. You may know him from the image of him standing on the Long Walk at Windsor castle  with Carltonlima Emma paying his respects to the late Queen Elizabeth

So I would like to introduce my guest Terry Pendry who for the last 28 years served as head groom to the Queen and was awarded the title of Military Knight.

This podcast was recorded in May 2023.

Being made a military Knight •

Riding a cow as a farmers boy and riding bareback •

The importance of breeding native ponies

Becoming an apprentice jockey aged 15 •

Joining the Blues and Royals •

Basic Training •

Trooping the Colour with Centennial •

Stabling 200 horses for the Golden Jubilee •

Breeding at Hampton Court •

Irish Draught Horses for chargers and the Canadian Mounted Police •

Getting horses used to traffic •

Meeting the Duke of Edinburgh’s Fells and finding a fell for Queen Elizabeth II •

Meeting Tommy Capstick and Carltonlima Emma •

The Queens funeral procession •

Becoming stud groom at Windsor castle •

Starting ponies at 3 years old •

Driving ponies and the Bowmans •

Hampton Court breeding and grading program •

Horses for courses and breeding for temperament •

Queens favourite horses •

Being invited to work as the groom by Queen Elizabeth •

Mary Longsden and the Queens birthday parade •

Grey ponies •

Bringing Silage down in a black cart with a Shire/Dales cross

Greenholme sixpence

Pauls yard and the grazing regime

Getting ponies fit for showing and attracting the judges eye

The sport of carriage driving and driving Fells

The Duke of Edinburgh’s team of Fell ponies

The 3 phases of a Carriagedriving competition

Col. Sir John Miller

Welsh cob Flying Comet

Call the herd home

Making the best of your pony for showing

Hunter horses and looking the part

Horse of The Year, Olympia and the Fell Pony Breed show

Mares v geldings

Fred Todd master horseman

Grooming for Anne Varley pony tandem

The role of a groom

NW driving club in the 1980s

What makes a good driving pony

The importance of dressage in a 3 day event

Fools breed horses for wise men to buy

Choosing a stallion

Deep bodied ponies for long legged jockeys

Duke of Edinburgh award for carriage driving

3 quick questions

The Townend Legacy, Carrock and Haltcliffe semi-feral herds on Caldbeck Common

The early days of Eddie Wilsons father to the current 6th generation of breeders.

The Townend type

The show season and the Royal Show

Stockmanship

Ring-craft and show preparation and catching the judges eye

Judging

Stock judging

The future

Charlie describes the Roandale stud and farm and the rarer colours of Dales that they breed.

Gina was brought up in Kirkby Lonsdale with working Gallowa’s.

Charlie started his working life working machines in forestry but took a turn when he went on a course to learn snigging (extracting timber with horses).

Learning the ropes with George Read and getting a pony broken to pulling timber.

Starting a breeding herd of Dales ponies and Wharfedale Prince Regent and their bay-roan strain.

The roan strain in Fell ponies.

Movement rather than action - a ground-covering and economical trot.

The differences between Fell and Dales

The history of the Dales pony

The war horse

The formation of the Dales Pony Improvement Society

F.I.S Foal Immunodeficiency Syndrome

Hardiness and the future of the breed

60 Dales ponies join The Presidents Ride to Barnard castle

Keeping ponies in work

To begin with Walter talks about travelling with donkeys as a young boy, and how he got into breeding the Hades Hill Fell ponies in the 1950’s.

The late 1940s and early 50’s saw the demise of the working pony but Walter started breeding ponies when everyone else was getting tractors

The subject of the fate of the semi-feral herds is something that came up time and time again.

Here he is with children at Settlebeck School in 2012 talking about the problems that need addressing.

The children at Settlebeck wanted to know what’s the most important quality of a Fell pony?

What is it about keeping Fell  ponies that you like the most.

Walter was passionate about ponies living out on common land and open fell.

But what are the advantages?

Since the late 1970’s Walter had driven a bow top waggon with a couple of Fell pair of Fell ponies from his farm outside Rochdale to Appleby Fair - one in the shafts and a sideliner and this journey was probably the thing he looked forward to most every year. Here he is describing what it feels like to make the journey horse drawn.

Mountain Leader, Wilderness Guide and adventurer Eliza Brown undertook a month long journey with one my own mares, 9 year old mare Hades Hill Pansy travelling over 300km of wilderness to the most north-westerly point of Scotland.

This podcast was recorded in May 2022

Eliza loading the packsaddle onto Pansy at the start ion their journey

“Walk On” starring Eliza and Hades Hill Pansy will be at the Kendal Mountain Festival 2022

There have been Fell Ponies at Lownthwaite since at least 1889, when Thos Wales and his mother Mary moved to Lownthwaite at a time when equines were the “power house” of agriculture. Today the Lownthwaite ponies are one of the last semi-feral herd of Fell Ponies to roam the Northern Pennines and are managed by mother and daughter who are the 5th generation of the family.

So I would like to introduce my guests Christine Morton and Alison Bell, Christine is President of the Fell Png Society, and Alison site on the Fell Pony Society Council.

In this show Tom talks about the history of Lownthwaite, ponies forecasting the weather, Clydesdale v Shire horses, Pit Ponies, Gallowas and Jaggers, the cycle of the seasons, and asks “Why do we do it?”

Sarah Charlton who has been around the Linnel ponies in one way or another for the last 45 years. The Linnel ponies are one of the very oldest Fell Pony studs with a legacy as long as you arm.

Sarah talks about her early days with an old pit pony, a Welsh and a Dales, Jillarooing in Australia, working for Roy Charlton in the 70’s and 80’s.

We move on to the Linnel heritage, R B Charlton’s book “A Lifetime With Ponies”, the Dales Pony Improvement Society, pit ponies and milk floats.

Sarah talks about rebuilding bloodlines, Highland ponies, and exporting Fell ponies to the Spanish ministry of Agriculture.

Bob Charlton was chairman of the FPS at the time of the Foal Imunodefficiency Syndrome, and talks about the next generation, the custodians of the herd, fashion and the decline of work ponies and returning to hill breeders for hardiness.

Performance Trials, Fell and Highland Pony Camp, British Eventing horse trials

and then asks What about the future?

We’re going a little off piste to talk about to just Fell ponies, but also some of the other less well known native breeds that my guest has spent the last couple of years photographing in their native habit.

So I would like to introduce Ruth Chambelain who many of you will know trough her Instagram account Ruth On the Hoof

Ruth talks about being a cowboy in Montana and learning the Pirelli natural horsemanship and herd behaviour .

Ruth talks about growing up near Caldbeck Common and the Waverhead stud, starting out with a camera and documenting native ponies for her project “The Hidden Hoofbeats of Britain and Ireland”.

We learn about Eriskay ponies, the Carneddau ponies of Snowdonia and how ponies adapt o their environment. The Highland deer ponies, Garrons and Ghilliesand the Highland ponies at Balmoral.

We finish by talking about Dales ponies, Exmoor ponies and conservation grazing.

On todays show we are talking all things ecology, conservation grazing and bringing ponies on ready for the outside world with my guest Nicola Evans whose Helmside ponies graze on The Helm outside Kendal, Nicola also sits on the Fell Pony Society’s Conservation sub group.

Nicola talks about the ups and the downs, problems and pitfalls of conservation grazing , combining ecology, agriculture and business and producing riding ponies for the big wide world

Nicola talks about the Helmside prefix, breeding without owning your own stallion, handling un-handled youngsters, the Fell Pony Display Team, Fell Pony Camp and managing the dynamics of a herd