Fell Pony Adventures

The Fell Pony (transcript)

Voice Over by Tom LLoyd

Presented by Paul Metcalf

Fell ponies are native to the north of England and are mostly found in Cumbria and the old counties of Cumberland and Westmoreland where probably they have roamed since prehistoric times. Pony breeders had begun to record pedigrees in the second half of the 19th century. The Fell Pony Committee first described the breed in 1898 and became the Fell Pony Society in October 1922. Its aim was to foster and keep pure the old breed of pony which has roamed the northern fells for years and to circulate knowledge and general information about the pony breed. The Society updated the breed description shortly after the Second World War and the current description and the scale of points were added to the rules in 1966. This centenary video aims to help owners, breeders and judges to understand the pony that we have inherited and to safeguard its qualities for the next 100 years. 

The breeds’ description includes a scale of points. 100 points are allocated for breed type, the general characteristics that distinguish a fell from other breeds of horses and ponies. The fell pony should be constitutionally as hard as iron and show good pony characteristics with the unmistakable appearance of hardiness peculiar to mountain ponies and at the same time have a lively and alert appearance and great bone. Living on the fell keeps the breed hardy. The high environment influences the genes inherited by later generations. The scientific study of this is called epigenetics. Fell ponies bred on low land adapt to easier going. The third generation may lose fell type even though they inherit the same genetic material. We need our herds on hill land to go back to for type and hardiness. 

In addition to the 100 points allocated for breed type, a further 100 points are awarded specifically for aspects of conformation such as head and neck, shoulders, carcass, feet, legs and joints, height and colour and action. We're going to look at these first and after that going on to remark about type. 

Height and colour (Scale of points: 5)

Today the breed standard height limit is 14 hands, 142.2 centimetres. The fell pony height limit has been variable over the years. In the first group of fell ponies registered as fell ponies between 1898 and 1905 all the stallions were 13 2 while the mares ranged from 12 hands to 14 one and a half but most around the 13 one mark. In 1924 the Fell Pony Society set that mares were not to be bigger than 13 2 and later on the height limit for both mares and stallions was set at 14 hands and remains the same today. 

The rules allow for black, brown, bay and grey. Solid colours only. Chestnut and broken coloured ponies were debarred in the 1940s. Although on rare occasions a chestnut fell pony will be the result from two registered ponies, it is a throwback to genetics in their ancestry. In this case the chestnut fell pony will be registered in section X of the studbook rather than the main section.

There are many shades of black and a rusty tinge in summer is not a weakness. Most black foals are usually born with a mousy grey colour, but as their foal coat begins to shed out their black colour will show through. 

Section X

Ponies registered in section X may not be shown at Fell Pony Society, County and some other shows, but may participate in Fell Pony Society performance events and there is no detriment to the pony's abilities for either work or pleasure.

The Walk

The walk should be smart and true. The length of the stride is determined by the movement of the shoulder. 

“A good walk starts at the top of the shoulder and moves down to the point at the front.You see I was always told if they've got a good long forearm, they have a good long good stride. What we're looking for is a good active walk, covering ground. We don't want little steps.

When they're walking you want to be able to see all of the soles.

There must be lift at the hock and knee and some spring at the pastern so the pony can travel up and downhill and over rough ground easily. Movement in all paces must be straight. This is efficient and enables a pony to do well when living on the fell. If the feet swing out it wastes energy. If the feet swing in there's a risk of damaging the opposite leg. “

The Trot

The trot should be well balanced all round with good knee and hock action going well from the shoulder and flexing the hocks not going too wide nor near behind. The trot should show great pace and endurance bringing the legs well under the body when going. Everything moves on it back and forth. The pony must cover ground both at back and front. We want a strong hind leg stride under the body as well as some lift. It must go forward not up and down like a sewing machine. Good movement means the hocks and knees move equally and there is some spring at the pastern. The pony can travel easily up and downhill and over rough ground whether at liberty or working under a rider. Its hind feet should go exactly in where its front feet have left.

The canter must roll on and cover the ground in a comfortable and workmanlike fashion. It should look and feel uphill and not on the forehand. So as with the trot, the pony's profile should not be behind the vertical. The rider must be careful to school forward and not pull the pony's head in too much.

Confirmation

Confirmation refers to the shape and structure of a horse or how it's put together. This will have an impact on the pony's action and the way it moves. When we talk about confirmation we're looking at the pony's head, neck, shoulders, body or carcass, legs and feet, which are worth a total of 70 points.

The top line of pole to end of withers is equal to or longer than the line from end of withers to end of croup. This mare is showing signs of being in foal. The legs are worth a total of 25 points.

Bone

“You will often hear breeders and judges talking about ponies with bone, more specifically flat bone. Flat bone means the front of the knee particularly is flat when seen from the side, although the joint is broad when seen from the front, making the leg appear wider front to back, which helps balancing concussion through the forelimb. A good cannon bone should be narrow when seen from the front and wide from the side, with the tendons clean and not fleshy or puffy. The same applies to the hock. 

A hock is important on a stallion because if they're covering loads and loads of mares they get a lot of strain, strain on the hock, especially when they're young. So if they've got good strong hocks they'll last the test of time and obviously this chap's got reasonably good hocks or else he wouldn't be in as good an order as he is today because he is 17. 

The paston joint is very important because that's the shock absorber or the spring for the horse when you're riding it, gives you a comfortable ride and makes it a nice smooth trot. 

You want a deep foot from there to there and the horn wants to be a blue hard colour. 

Bone is measured below the knee where the foreleg is narrowest. This is the weakest part of any horse so we want it to be strong here, at least eight inches in circumference and preferably eight and a half or nine inches. In both fore and hind legs we are looking for an oval cross-section below the knee, not round like a broom handle that would snap under pressure but oval like an axe handle designed to absorb shock. The angle of shoulder is the same as the angle of pasten. A straight shoulder, 55 degrees from horizontal, tends to go with an upright pasten and jarring paces. A 45 degree shoulder and pasten will usually give smooth paces. 

It's important, really important to have a good laid shoulder because then if you want to ride it there's somewhere to put your saddle and it stops your saddle sliding forwards. You want a nice little bit of withers,

We are looking for a good strong back with good top line, muscular loins and a deep carcass. The pony should be thick through the heart, round ribbed from shoulders to flank, short and well coupled. The hind quarters should be square and strong with the tail well set on. When you hear people say deep, we mean being half the height of the pony. Stallions in working clothes during the breeding season may run up very light in the belly, whilst brood mares will appear deeper. The girth total circumference is frequently around 72 inches, 6 feet or more. It is important to be aware of the pony's condition over its carcass, not to be carrying excess fat. Their weight is designed to fluctuate between the summer and winter, where naturally the ponies would gain weight during the spring and summer months and lose their excess weight during the winter months. It is often said that a fowl pony should lose all its fat once a year. The head profile is straight with open nostrils. The jaw is deep with good level teeth that meet correctly both at the cheeks and at the muzzle. We're looking for open nostrils, width between the eyes, a broad pole and small ears. The throat and neck should not be fleshy or coarse. There should be an open space between the jaw bones to enable the pony to breathe when working, even when flexing to the bit.”

There should be plenty of fine hair at the heels although coarse hair is objectionable. All the fine hair except that at the point of heel may be cast in the summer. The mane and tail are left to grow long. This young gelding has cast his feather but it will grow back. What I can say about this stallion

In the winter the coat is double thickness with long guard hairs in the outer coat and shorter ones underneath that insulate. Some ponies will have a definite moustache all year round and a beard which tends to shed in the spring. Fells also have ear tufts as well as whiskers around the eyes and muzzle which should not be trimmed as they are all necessary for wild living. So far we have been explaining the 100 points that may be given for confirmation. However another 100 points are given for the ponies type which you may be starting to recognise by now. The fell pony should be constitutionally as hard as iron. They need to move athletically over rough ground and that's why confirmation is so important.

To live on the hill in all weather they need the protective hair they carry at head, neck, tail and feet. Their small ears with protective hair help prevent heat loss in winter. We look for well-shaped, hard, round, dark coloured hooves and at least eight inches of bone below the knee. The pony needs to have good strong muscles to move energetically up and down hills. At all paces we want activity but also efficiency, not wasting energy going up and down rather than forward. Fell ponies should show good pony characteristics. They should be lively and alert with the unmistakable appearance of hardiness peculiar to mountain ponies. 

A newborn foal may appear narrow in the carcass but this is normal to allow it to be born quickly. The ears may look too big and there may be a bump between the eyes so that the head profile is not straight. The pastons may appear too sloped and the toes, instead of pointing straight forward, may point outwards at five to one on a clock face. By three days old the legs will be getting stronger and the chest and shoulders beginning to widen so what looked like a fault at first will have improved.

The slope of the shoulder and croup, the definition of hocks and knees should all be correct and the foal should be able to walk, trot and canter with a nice free action. By three weeks the leg alignments should be correct and the body conformation will give a good idea of what the adult pony will look like.

There is an old saying that if you like a foal at three days you will like it at three months and three years. The choices that judges make in the show ring can influence new owners and potential buyers. What owners achieve in public with their ponies at shows and events can influence what other buyers want to buy and what breeders keep to breed from and what they sell.

Whether we own, show, judge or breed foal ponies we must make sure that the choices we make now will be worthy of the last 100 years and form a good foundation for the next century and beyond.