You've all heard people say "Wild Horses couldn't keep me away from xxxxxxxx!" Wild Horses are Mustangs; a light, medium-sized animal of 14 hands and 800 pounds, and are never used for heavy draft work, but are broken and used as Cowboys' ponies. What these people should be saying is "Clydesdales or Belgians or Draft Horses couldn't keep me away from xxxxxxx!" This is an important distinction! Cordially, Harold Pollner
Love those HUGE Clydesdales...we used to have many here pulling beer barrel wagons for the pubs... here's a short video of some in Fairfield CA ..they are so beautiful..
Only breed of horse I've ever owned and used was an American Quarter Horse that was also a Red Roan (color) He was a gelding when I bought him, rope trained and loved to run after cattle in the arena. IOW, he was a great "roping horse".
I think this is what they have in mind when they say wild horses. He might not keep you away but he is surely won't take you to.
That's not what they have in mind when they say "wild horses". They mean horses that have "pulling strength", like a Clydesdale. Hal
When we moved to the east coast in '63, we would vacation across the bay from Assateague Island, Maryland. There were wild horses there, as well as on neighboring Chincoteague. Every year they have a roundup, where "they" round up the horses and ponies, drive them across the bay, have vets check them over, then drive them back. Part of the festivities included raffling off a couple of the horses and ponies. A friend's daughter won a pony one year. (They make sure the owner is capable.) Getting over to Assateague Island was relatively straight-forward from the campgrounds. It was close enough that when there were strong storms, you could stand at the campgrounds and see the swell of the Atlantic over the opposite side of the island. There were a couple of sandbars in between, and strong swimmers could make it at low tide when the sandbars were exposed to rest on. We would take our boat and run the labyrinth around the sandbars. Back then, there were hardly any other people around. The horses were habituated to humans, and would walk right up to us, but just out of reach. Seeing them just wandering around in the wild was quite the experience. In fact, there is a recognized breed born of those feral herds (Chincoteague pony.)
There was a great book about the Chincoteague ponies, called “Misty of Chincoteague”. Written by marguerite Henry, and illustrated by Wesley Dennis. They also wrote and illustrated the wonderful book , “King of the Wind”, about the Godolphin Arabian, who was an ancestor of the famous thoroughbred, Man O’ War. I loved both stores when I was growing up, along with the whole Walter Farley Black Stallion series.
That 11 year old girl I know who won the pony was a big fan of Misty of Chincoteague. That's why they were at the event in the first place. The funny thing was that it rained the day of the raffle so there was no live drawing. The winning numbers were posted where folks could walk up throughout the weekend and see if they had won. So it's pouring down rain, and this girl pestered and pestered and pestered her mother to go look at the winning numbers. Just to shut her up, her mother finally relented and ventured into the downpour. The rest--as they say--is history. She named it "Star" because of the shape of the mark on its forehead. They lived in North Caroling and had a place where they could board the pony...the girls was already into riding. As it turns out, the girl was average size, and those feral horses are pretty small, so Star got ridden very little early on, and then not at all. I guess you can imagine being that 11 year old girl and winning a Chincoteague pony. It's storybook stuff.