Welsh cob loses weight with the help of Horse & Hound forum users
We may have found the new face of Weight Watchers. A 12-year-old Welsh cob has shed 33% of his body weight in two years — something even the strictest of calorie counters could only dream of.
Steve Dawson’s 14.2hh Top Rock Pomelli (Mally) has gone from 560kg to around 375kg — with the help of H&H forum users.
Steve admits to being a “total novice” when he bought the pony for his girlfriend Ellen, mistaking the excess weight for muscle.
After posting a picture of Mally on the H&H forum (www.horseandhound.co.uk/forum), he was inundated with advice.
“The forum was a bible,” Steve told H&H. “The secret has been to exercise him every single night — Ellen has even been lungeing him in the dark.”
Steve has also stopped feeding Mally haylage, uses a “Trickle Net” for hay and puts on a Greenguard Grazing Mask to restrict grass intake when he’s turned out.
And with her pony’s new trim figure, Ellen is hoping to take Mally to some shows this summer. “I’m not sure he would have fitted in the horsebox before,” Steve added.
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H&H advises you consult your vet before embarking on any equine weight loss plan.
This news story was first published in Horse & Hound magazine (9 May 2013)
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A graduate from Durham University, Madeleine joined H&H in 2011 and became Features Editor — producing content across the magazine and website, including the popular inside back cover article ‘The horse that made me’ and the weekly ‘The best of my fun…’ interview. She has written on topics as diverse as hay making and headcams, to hot totty in the horse world and circus horses. Madeleine now works as a freelance feature writer for Country Life, The Telegraph, Horse & Hound, cntraveller.com, The Spectator and The Field, as well as writing obituaries for The Times.