THE BRUMBIES OF THE TINDERRY RANGE • AN AUSTRALIAN STORY

foreign horses about 15 years ago there used to be quite a large mob running freeing in my family property in the High Country of New South Wales they were strong and healthy horses thriving in the rugged Mountain Country then one day most of the mob disappeared [Music] [Applause] thank you [Music] ever since the first horse was ridden thousands of years ago the relationship between man and horse has been a special one as a horse Handler my life revolves around building Partnerships with horses I have tried all my life to develop that relationship in an attempt to understand the secrets locked inside the horse's mind [Music] it was a long time before I saw any of the wild horses again then one day the old Stallion and three of his mares returned to their favorite stomping ground the rest of the mob were nowhere to be seen but the remaining horses were in good spirits celebrating life as they came down out of the mountains they were having a ball and I got a kick out of just watching them a gorgeous white man with a matted Mane caught my attention she stood out from the rest of the horses exploding with enthusiasm and exuberance for life it was just awesome this little horse was simply enjoying being alive I can only guess as to what happened to the rest of the wild horses foreign [Music] Master is part of Australia's folklore and tradition wild horses are often rounded up and sold off for pet food the best of the best are broken in and put under saddle the horses are an introduced species in Australia and feral horses are seen as a pest in most parts of the country wild horses do need to be controlled but the methods used must be Humane in recent years the culling of wild horses in Australia's national parks hit front page news as reports are wounded and dying horses became public feral horses are not a native Australian animal when they breed in the wild their numbers can increase rapidly horses hooves are hard and designed for Speed and durability and in large numbers can do real damage to the Australian bush as I watched the mob I was fascinated by one horse in particular the white mare with the matted Mane the same horse that had caught my attention weeks before she appeared to be in control and I began to realize that she must be the lead mayor she seemed to be in charge of the wild horses even more so than the stallion the lead mayor defines the pecking order within the mob and is usually the most assertive and spirited member the reason I was so taken by the lead mayor was because in all of my experience with domestic problem horses I as the horse Handler am effectively assuming the role of the lead man I communicate using similar body language the problem horse respects and understands helping to solve all sorts of issues without physically or mentally harming the horse quite often by simply driving the horse away in an assertive manner which is mimicking the behavior of the dominant man dealing with a disrespectful member of her mob I can establish a new pecking order with myself as a leader problem horse is a follower once this pecking order has been well and truly defined the partnership can begin based on mutual respect and understanding I was completely fascinated by the lead mayor of the tindery herd as she demonstrated this kind of behavior in the wild [Music] the tindery horses were quite vulnerable out in the bush because nobody owns wild horses in Australia to some people they may be seen as pests eating food Best Kept For sheep and Cattle to me they are the last great survivors of a bygone era worthy of respect and admiration the future of the wild horses in my area was uncertain and I couldn't bear to think what might happen to them if I left them unprotected out in the scrub it was then that I began to develop a plan to round up and relocate the remaining Wild Horses of the tindery ranges foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] the wild horses came down out of the Mountain Country to graze on a spring flat where there was plenty of feed it gave me the perfect opportunity to round the horses up and put them through into the safety of a fence Paddock [Music] a bit sooner yeah without some of the stuff in the stallion and the other horse hub [Music] it's dying's thinking about moving feeling a little bit threatened I think you're right the Palomino and Chestnut horses went through into the fence Paddock and the old stallion followed soon after the lead mayor was a different story altogether she wheeled away calling to her companions to follow her back to the bush I was impressed with the way she moved a solid confirmation and the strength of character she displayed it was then I decided to call this great little horse snowy [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] thank you [Applause] [Music] whatever [Music] [Applause] [Music] nobody likes to be left out of the group on their own and snowy was no exception with a little more convincing snowy finally joined the others and I had my wild horses all right that's a bit closer right alongside the Australian felt like going right [Music] foreign [Music] I went to work with my good mate John short and began the construction of the round yard and holding pens for the wild horses we lived out in the bush for about a month and put together a post and rail yard in the tradition of the Australian Old-Timers it was tough going considering we needed 20 posts and 60 rails for the job but it was well worth the effort [Music] everything was going along great guns until we discovered a granite Boulder in one of our post holes the only way we're going to move that rock would be to blast it out of the ground I called in Owen a mate of mine who reckons he knows a thing or two about explosives I love working with horses Owen loves blowing things up right before we've done is the rock which is uh probably almost a foot deep and we've put some explosives some high exposures in that hole and what it's going to do the rock is blast the face off it what I'll do is unravel a piece of fuse then we'll tape a dead motor onto the end and um foreign [Music] with a rock successfully blasted out of the ground all that shorty and I had to do now was finished building the round yards it's like five six seven snake 10 11 12. 19. five done five panels done and that's 14 to go yeah so I think we'll be back here for quite a while for a couple of weeks all right let's go finish this one a few weeks later and many man hours of hard work the round yard and holding pins were ready everything was in place my journey was snowy one of the last Wild Horses of the tindery ranges was about to begin [Music] [Applause] [Music] the wild horses settled in well to their new Temporary Home up until now my main motivation had been to remove the wild horses from the bush to the safety of the family property calanden now that I had the wild horses in I became acutely aware of the huge responsibility that I'd assumed snowy is a mature dominant mayor who has never felt the touch of a human hand deep inside her mind is the greatest learning experience known to any Horseman snowy could teach me so much as long as the methods that I used in developing a partnership with her we're not based on fear and intimidation I intended to use the same body language that she'd used within the mob by assuming the position of the leader I hope that snowy would follow if she was willing to follow me it was possible that I could take her right through to the saddle without destroying any of the free spirit within her My ultimate dream was to ride snowy through the High Country as a willing partner by building a partnership with the lead mayor it would also give me more confidence that when the time came to release the wild horses onto our property they would be happy to settle in and follow snowy's lead the first session was really exciting as snowy locked onto my body language with real understanding I was looking for signs of submission respect and Trust she showed these signs by lowering her head licking her lips and chewing and tuning in with her ears focusing on my every move so now he had an incredible temperament and unspoiled willingness to explore the possibilities are presented to her it was definitely happening [Music] [Applause] where did you get up to yesterday Mike um sort of got to say she just sort of started to lock on a little bit she had a little bit of a habit that was forming where she'd come into a point and then she would then she'd start to sort of back up and try and get away from the pressure I've got to say now she'll sort of lock on take a few steps forward so if I start to sort of get a yield here there she starts to sort of there we go and she's looking straight away so she's kind of starting to come towards me instead of always trying to get on the outside of the rail and she's relaxing pretty well hmm yeah she's looking there straight away she's dropping the head pretty well yep yep so hopefully she'll um just keep coming forward and stay relaxed and eventually work her into the rope and then we'll get a desensitized to that and should be cool just keep poking around so she um she can do a little bit of work [Music] yeah I didn't want that to happen shorty I think we uh we better get this ground plowed up or something because uh she's had a few little slips down here yeah no she um because that one man she could have bought him oh she could have hurt herself then I checked Snowy out to make sure she was okay she seemed fine but I decided to give her a break for a couple of days just to be on the safe side well I'll go and get the tractor and we'll just uh get us something to get a purchase on I plowed up the round yard to soften the surface reducing the risk of snowy slipping over again as I worked I began to wonder about snowy's Heritage and history her Bloodlines seemed to indicate a strong heavy horse influence possibly a throwback to the style of horse replaced by modern day tractors I could imagine snowy being a great asset to the old timers working the gold fields of the High Country although we'll never know for sure snowy's history could well be tied to an old ghost town in the back country called Cara Creek close to my family property to Landon Cara Creek used to be a gold mine in the late 1800s a bustling little community of about 200 people it's very much Wilderness country now the wild horses are drone free in the area for many years Barry McGowan is a well-known Australian historian who has written books about the Lost communities of the tindery ranges Barry was camping at Cara Creek with my brother Darren and his wife Sarah Darren was asking Barry about possible gold deposits because some people reckon there's still quite a lot of gold to be found I was more interested to find out about the history of horses in the area and Barry was definitely the man to ask seeing as I was giving snowy a break for a couple of days I organized a ride through the back country to cowra Creek to have a Yarmouth Barry I invited some friends of mine to come along for the ride shorty my mate who built the round yard with me bought his faithful old mayor Millie macca and Sharon bought their ex racehorse Jake I'd be riding Sam my Arab endurance horse so everybody had a horse except for macca he's a good Horseman so I thought I'd get him to put some miles on a new horse I'd picked up cheap this horse had bucked his previous owner off a few times and I'd bought him for a dollar macca was Keen so we threw a saddle on [Music] [Applause] send him out a bit fresh [Music] [Applause] foreign [Applause] [Music] do something different get a wild one [Music] Maca and my one dollar warm blood hit it off famously and we're all set for our trip out to see Barry and find out more about the history of horses in the area the ride out to cowra Creek to catch up with Barry was sheer Bliss the native animals the remoteness is just the best seeing the diversity of Australia's native animals out in the bush makes you realize not only how lucky we are but also why it's essential to have a policy on introduced and feral animals in Australia wild horses are an introduced species and they do need to be controlled they compete with Australia's native animals for food and territory and we need to have a responsible attitude towards all introduced species there are no easy answers or easy solutions but that doesn't mean we should quit trying to find that delicate balance [Music] [Music] I always like to break up a long ride for the horses and give them a chance to cool down by letting your horses have a role in the play just adds to the enjoyment of getting out here in this great country [Music] [Applause] [Music] right [Applause] [Music] the horses came from several sources we're not just talking about what happened in the gold Fields period but bury him on this area not necessarily just here but there's generally are the tinnary ranges will settled many many years ago the the Clark gang for example the infamous bushrangers had their hideouts in the tenderly ranges they used to steal other people's horses the horse is a very valuable commodity and when the land didn't pay for this was small selectors they would walk off their properties or the banks would resume them or they'd be Amalgamated or other properties the horses would become redundant so many horses were free grazed as well and it didn't take much for free grazing horses to join the wild mob now you're just moving from an earlier process to a later process when there were more horses free grazing that were owned by gold miners they would have also linked up with the mobs and it wasn't just a case of them all being released when the Goldfield died I believe it was a continual process over many years and then when the Goldfield finished that was the last phase if you like sure so in your mind like I've noticed out in the bush here there's lots of wild goats wild pigs and of course Wild Horses yes um it's possible that these animals escaped or were released absolutely from the the remnants of this community that's my feeling there is an excellent story Barry that comes out of bread bar about horses in the area there's a guy named Charlie McKinney it was turn of the century stuff and he was a legend Horseman he used to be able to jump both Railway gates at bread bow when they were closed in one Leap and he didn't have a stop for a gate he was he always jumped the gates he was just a very very good Horseman in one evening he was riding back to the bread bow station which was a central part of the community there at the time and his horse slipped on the frost and he came off the horse the horse died and they took Charlie to the bread bar hotel which is still there on the side of the highway there yes and back at the hotel he died three or four days later The Story Goes that Australia's famous poet banjo Patterson who appears on Australia's 10 note was at the breadbo hotel at the time of Charlie McKinney's death and shortly after he wrote the classic Australian poem The Man from snow River and some people say that Charlie McKinney was indeed the inspiration for banjo's poem it's a good story a bit of local Legend [Music] okay you can see some specks in there and that's what you're looking for hello there you go there we go thank you [Music] after finding enough gold to barely cover the cost of lunch fossa King for the afternoon was abandoned and we headed up with Barry to the ruins of the main Township of Cara Creek I was looking forward to finding out more about the history of horses in the area [Music] most people here had horses because that was their main form of transport and there were several carrier teams here particularly in the 1900s when it became obvious that the The Ore the gold had to be transported out to the Railhead of bread bow yep then you had two or three carriers resident on the field for a while and they were definitely horse tombs at that stage this is the way it's shapes yeah it's 1890s 900 years at all we spent the rest of the afternoon with Barry checking out the ruins of the Cara Creek Ghost Town the remnants of this once Vibrant Community are slowly but surely been reclaimed by the rugged Aussie bush one of the stories Barry told us was about Mrs Murray and her piano which was carried through the Gully across the creek and up the hill to the Community Hall four of the strongest men were employed for this job families would come from all around to join in on the song and dance evening you could almost hear the ghostly sounds of the past in the peace and the quiet of that afternoon [Music] [Music] thanks Barry okay my pleasure Greg yep certainly yep see you later [Music] foreign I took a ride to check on the wild horses and was in for a big surprise [Music] that is amazing I hadn't counted on the old stallion catching the scent of my neighbor's mares quite a distance away this is the first time we've left the gate unlatched without a secure rope around it and uh the stallion and the little Palomino have shot through fortunately snowy was separated in the round yard and the chestnut mayor chose to stick with her it turned out the Palomino Philly wasn't far away and soon came back to hang out with the companions but the old stallion had gone Bush which caused me real concern he already had a reputation for knocking down fences and stealing Mares I hope the old fell I hadn't gone and got himself into trouble [Music] if he was hung up in a fence somewhere it would take a long time to track him down and by then it could be too late I had to find him [Music] by the time I got to the stallion he'd already reached the fence and was looking pretty worked up the only thing I could do was to get between him and the Mayors and hopefully driving back to the round yard [Music] as he pranced around the bush I maneuvered Sam into position and stood my ground had one of two choices he could have a go at us to get to the neighbor's Mares or head back to his own mob waiting for him at the round yard [Music] fortunately he decided that the mayor's next door weren't worth the effort and with sample so Asian he took off back to his own mob [Music] after a feed he settled down [Music] it was about this time that one of my Arab Mayors came into season it was a great opportunity to begin the breeding program with the old stud he showed off and obviously impressed her with his fancy moves after getting to know the mayor he successfully better I was Keen to introduce the old stallions tough Wild Horse Bloodlines into my Arab endurance Mayors I can't wait till next spring to see whether we end up with our first wild horse cross Arab super endurance horse I believe that the wild stallion's toughness can only add to the delicate Bloodlines of my Arab endurance horses the old stallion has survived out in the bush for decades without any help whatsoever and this is a truly remarkable feat I'm hoping that the wild cross Arab Falls will inherit his strength and stamina and become world-class endurance horses endurance riding is one of my favorite sports it combines my great love of the outdoors with the best aspects of Horsemanship you get to camp out under the stars and mix with people who share the same passion for horses [Music] to me this is the ultimate partnership covering immense distances while staying in tune with your horse's well-being and monitoring any signs of fatigue [Applause] the rides are anywhere from 40 kilometers to 160 K's in one day uh vet checks along the way make sure that all horses are in good condition or withdrawn before any damage is done it's an exciting sport that I share with my purebred Arab Sam [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] foreign [Music] [Applause] 18 K's after that Sam's lapping it up [Music] [Applause] foreign [Music] he loved it sorry oh egg great I was going through a bit check my egg on my face lovely excellent now you got my face yeah 48 heart rate and he's coping really good very bad [Music] after successfully completing the endurance ride it was all hands on deck for a quick pack up of the campsite I was Keen to get back home and continue working with snowy [Music] my time was snowy in the round yard was teaching me so much using comfort and discomfort I assume the role of lead Mare and asked snowy for her acceptance of this role reversal thank you causing discomfort by driving her away to the outside of the round yard I was then able to allow her to find comfort in coming towards me always looking for signs of understanding and respect she lowered her head licked her lips and generally softened [Music] it was time for the Rope I hope she was ready I had to be really careful not to allow the Rope to become a negative experience we'd come so far together and this would certainly test our partnership I let the Rope fly [Music] she read my body language perfectly and quickly accepted the Rope as nothing more than an extension of my arm it was amazing to see how far she'd come we're not too long ago she was stamping her feet and giving me the kind of body language which was quite uncomfortable at times having accepted the Rope she was willing to have the halter put on it was time to get up on her back by keeping my energy levels up rather than being sneaky and causing snowy to become suspicious I was able to convince her to stand still and allow me to stand by her side watching Snowy out in the scrub I remembered times when her body language was quite aggressive and although this was just played I had to be aware that in the round chart it could turn into a defense mechanism she was quite reactive at times but to her credit she never once lashed out by allowing her to find Comfort when she was willing to stand still and accept me and causing her to do some work when she refused it wasn't long before she allowed me up on her back and that was a very special very fulfilling moment [Music] it's interesting comparing snowy's responses to this type of handling with that of a domestic horse recently I worked with a beautiful racehorse who wouldn't bury a load reliably he'd get all worked up and stressed using the same methods of comfort and discomfort I was able to help that horse deal with issues that had caused him to have these problems by taking time to show that the barrier could become a comfortable place in comparison to a work Zone outside the barrier he submitted eventually and has since raced and I believe doing quite well [Music] [Applause] snowy was coming along beautifully she was relaxed and focused there was a real Bond forming between us demonstrated by the fact that she would lock onto me whenever I asked her to in the next sessions I worked on picking her feet up and continued to develop the trust I needed snowy to be looking to me for support and direction I made sure she was still totally comfortable with me on her back I was hoping that the foundation work was fully understood and would help her cope with the biggest test so far it was time for the saddle snowy was charged she knew this was a big step [Music] I secured the girth it was now completely up to snowy to come through this and hopefully look to me for support [Music] [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] she came through for me better than I could have hoped all of her attention focused on me as she looked at me for guidance and support I was so proud of her as I went rubbed her head for a while it was time for her first ride thank you I settled into the saddle and asked snowy to take her first steps forward she was just about perfect [Music] foreign [Music] I think I may have moved a bit too quickly the next day a term came to mind the second ride syndrome where a horse has had some time to think about what happened the day before and may choose to test the partnership [Music] snowy decided she did not want me to use my right reign I want to put it bluntly she just said no she danced around a bit but she wasn't being too bad [Music] foreign [Music] this was the last thing I wanted to do I decided to Dismount sent snowy around the yard I needed to return to the comfort and discomfort groundwork to help snowy come through this misunderstanding I worked her around the yard until once again she was looking to me for Direction I allowed her to come back in and she forgave me [Music] I swung back into the saddle and I knew then that my partnership was snowy one of the last Wild Horses of the tindery ranges was complete [Music] the wild horses now Run free in the safety of our family property calanden calanden is 1 000 Acres of rugged Australian Bushland in the tindery ranges of New South Wales [Music] or property to themselves the wild horses are very content realizing my dream of riding snowy through the bush is a true partner I'm filled with a sense of anticipation I hope one day I can help more wild horses in Australia but right now I'm happy looking out for the ones in my own backyard foreign [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] thank you foreign

Channel: HorseTV Global

Views: 351,400

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Id: 3RifazyJQUU

Length: 46min 50sec (2810 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 20 2022