# Horse Contacts urgently required in Charente?



## Louieleterriersmum (22 May 2017)

Hi, I am moving myself and my horses to Poullignac in Charente in July and am not having much luck finding the essentials I need to keep the horses happy - please can anyone give me a few pointers?  These are the most pressing issues.......Firstly I need to find a good farrier who will shoe 2 of the horses and keep the retired one trimmed.  I use haylage in the UK but any advice on a good hay merchant would be fab too.  I have come to the conclusion that I will have to spend a fortune on using imported UK horse feed, can anyone recommend someone? Any recommendations for third party insurance so I can ride on the road?

Lastly would love to make some new horsey friends out there......


----------



## ycbm (22 May 2017)

Why don't you feed straights instead of importing extensive food?


----------



## Nici (22 May 2017)

If your French is all right, take up contact with the nearby yards. 
The one I found which is nearest to Pouillac is called "Centre Equestre Du Barbezilien".
Then there is one with its own website, about 30 minutes away: http://www.centre-equestre-equilibre16.com/fr.
They will know which farriers make good deals and you might perhaps even bring your horse in when their farrier comes.


----------



## sunnyone (25 May 2017)

For 3rd party insurance approach your house insurer. I have 5 insured this way, bank insures house and tags on up to 5 even though the horses are 6 kms away. The fifth horse is not mine but is kept  on my land, adding animals like that to a policy is quite normal here and the premium does not go up.

When we moved here we put 2 on grass livery, then bought a couple of extras. Bill for all 4 was &#8364;500 a month and that included hay and hard feed as well as all facilities. The only job not done for us was showering our newly purchased and cut gelding. When we left for our own facilities we had made friends, and been pointed in the right direction for vet, farrier, dentist, etc. I'd recommend anyone to do that.

Horse feed comes from strange sources such as garden stores, ending with VERT e:g; Gamm Vert, some diy stores e;g; Bricomarché; and general animal shops such as Animal Factory. The latter  is one of the few in our area to sell sugar beet. Straights are not popular unless its avoine (oats). We bought a small ration of general feed with us to avoid colic but was soon onto the French mix without incident;

 Supplements, salt blocks and tack come from sports shops such as Intersport, Decathlon, or Leclerc Sport; Aldi sells nothing horse related by the way;

Tip: bring good fly ointment most of the French stuff is rubbish. Wormer is the same but cheaper and obtainable on vet prescription either from the surgery or certain village pharmacies. Bute is practically banned, you can't now get a maintenance prescription for an arthritic oldie.

Hay is too cheap generally to go to a merchant, ask around or look on leboncoin.fr  cheval/charente/animaux The norm for hay at the moment is &#8364;2 a small bale. Big round bales are about &#8364;25. There is a lot of evidence lying around the fields that there was a surplus last year which farmers wrapped and then left to go rotten it was worth so little. Lucerne is available but twice the price.

I'm not in the Charente but  the general principles above  apply throughout Nouvelle Aquitaine. Hope all goes well.


----------



## Lauren18 (21 July 2017)

Hi,

I don't know if you have already moved and if you have found all the contacts you need but I used to and my parents still live in Poullignac so maybe I could help. What sort of horses do you have? are you looking for stables?

Lauren



Louieleterriersmum said:



			Hi, I am moving myself and my horses to Poullignac in Charente in July and am not having much luck finding the essentials I need to keep the horses happy - please can anyone give me a few pointers?  These are the most pressing issues.......Firstly I need to find a good farrier who will shoe 2 of the horses and keep the retired one trimmed.  I use haylage in the UK but any advice on a good hay merchant would be fab too.  I have come to the conclusion that I will have to spend a fortune on using imported UK horse feed, can anyone recommend someone? Any recommendations for third party insurance so I can ride on the road?

Lastly would love to make some new horsey friends out there...... 

Click to expand...


----------



## Lauren18 (21 July 2017)

Hi,

 I don't know if you have already moved and if you have found all the contacts you need but I used to and my parents still live in Poullignac so maybe I could help. What sort of horses do you have? are you looking for stables?

 Lauren


----------



## Louieleterriersmum (21 July 2017)

Hi Lauren, 

I arrive next week (26th July), I have one retired TB, a MW Hunter and an ISH.  Am looking to compete hopefully in dressage and maybe some le trec.  I am in the process of getting the fencing and stabling in at my place for horses but am still looking to establish contact with horsey people out there so I can perhaps ride out with them and get some advice on where to source things.  Perhaps I could contact them when I am settled...?


----------



## Fidgety (21 July 2017)

The best way is to join your local riding club.  You will make friends and establish your horsey network more easily (which vet to avoid and they generally use the best/most reliable farriers).  There is often a very social side to riding clubs and if you wish to compete, they will often do your entries for you if a few riders from there are heading to the same competitions as you.  You can't compete without a Licence and the appropriate 'Galop' level for the class (Club or Amateur) you wish to enter.   If you join a club, they will organise your licence for you (which also incudes public liability cover) and most clubs offer 'Stages' in the Galops during the school holidays.   The instructors also have the discretion to list you at a certain Galop level after having watched you ride when it comes to applying for your licence, which they would do for you.  It really will pay dividends to do it that way rather than hoping that somebody reading here lives close by - you've nothing to lose other than mixing up cheveux and chevaux when you are admiring somebody's horses. .

If you've not already found it, this site is very useful https://www.ffe.com/toutsavoir/Cavaliers


----------



## Keith_Beef (6 March 2018)

Louieleterriersmum said:



			Hi, I am moving myself and my horses to Poullignac in Charente in July and am not having much luck finding the essentials I need to keep the horses happy - please can anyone give me a few pointers?
		
Click to expand...

I'd love to know how you got on with the relocation to Poulignac. We have a small holiday home about an hour and a half to the east, at Jumilhac-le-Grand.

There's some really good hacking around there; I go out every year or so for between an hour and two hours at a time along paths, across fields, fording rivers...


----------

