Well, things have been interesting. When Barolo arrived, I thought he was rather shorter than the horse I had thought I was buying! In fact, it turned out he was a whole 10 cm shorter. My friend Lesley from the UK Knabstrupper Association even came and verified this. This was rather a large disappointment as I thought I would never be able to ride him as he would only ever make around 15.3 hh, not the about 16.2 hh I would have expected! However, Lesley said she thought I'd be fine to ride him and said this breed is late maturing - around age 7.
Trouble is, by this time I had already fallen in love with him and really didn't want to send him back or sell him on. He has such a wonderful personality - one of the reasons I decided to wait and get a Knabstrupper was because they are famous for their easy-to-do nature and intelligence - this is why they are often used as circus horses! Of course, not all of them are going to be that way despite it being a well-publicized breed characteristic, but I had my fingers crossed! And sure enough, Barolo definitely fits that description - he is just lovely. Terribly fidgety - probably even more than I have experienced before with a youngster (who are always somewhat fidgety) and into everything - nothing much seems to spook him and I spent several days doing "hazard training" getting to the point I could rattle and rub a plastic bag over him with no problems.
So I just decided I'd keep him and see what happens. Things were all a bit disastrous because the insurance company wouldn't accept the German vetting and Barolo's value meant he needed a 5 stage vetting. So in fact he was not insured for around 3 weeks after I had him! Once I decided to keep him, a 5 stage vetting was done (no problems found) and I had him micro-chipped and now the insurance is fine - phew! Then there were problems in that there were supposed to be a couple of rugs and a bridle with him. These didn't turn up when he was shipped so I had to go and panic-buy a fly rug and a stable rug and a lightweight field rug. When the stuff did turn up, there was no rug at all and the bridle was so manky as to be unusable. The only thing I have kept is a sweet little hood with gold-braid!
So all's well that ends well - he will stay with me!
Trouble is, by this time I had already fallen in love with him and really didn't want to send him back or sell him on. He has such a wonderful personality - one of the reasons I decided to wait and get a Knabstrupper was because they are famous for their easy-to-do nature and intelligence - this is why they are often used as circus horses! Of course, not all of them are going to be that way despite it being a well-publicized breed characteristic, but I had my fingers crossed! And sure enough, Barolo definitely fits that description - he is just lovely. Terribly fidgety - probably even more than I have experienced before with a youngster (who are always somewhat fidgety) and into everything - nothing much seems to spook him and I spent several days doing "hazard training" getting to the point I could rattle and rub a plastic bag over him with no problems.
So I just decided I'd keep him and see what happens. Things were all a bit disastrous because the insurance company wouldn't accept the German vetting and Barolo's value meant he needed a 5 stage vetting. So in fact he was not insured for around 3 weeks after I had him! Once I decided to keep him, a 5 stage vetting was done (no problems found) and I had him micro-chipped and now the insurance is fine - phew! Then there were problems in that there were supposed to be a couple of rugs and a bridle with him. These didn't turn up when he was shipped so I had to go and panic-buy a fly rug and a stable rug and a lightweight field rug. When the stuff did turn up, there was no rug at all and the bridle was so manky as to be unusable. The only thing I have kept is a sweet little hood with gold-braid!
So all's well that ends well - he will stay with me!
