Armitt Talk Series 2024: A Year in the Life of a Hill bred Fell Pony with the Fell Pony Heritage Trust

watched the working partnership the farmhands had with the farm horses, which were still doing most of the jobs on the farm in the early 1960’s. By the time I was 8 we were living in Cumbria, and my chosen breed was a Fell Pony for their working versatility and clever nature from growing up on the wild falls. They learned common sense from the herd, that helped them to be a working friend you could trust when trained to ride and drive and work the land which was my interest in the breed.

From 1979, I have had a Fell pony or two in my life, making my living for over 10 years with them. Working with my partner on an organic smallholding with pony power, Carriage driving instructor, Curator at The Black Country Museum to establish a working carters yard, showing the public all the different jobs the ponies did in the year 1900 in Dudley as a living Museum in the West Midlands. From there, I went on to farm for 20 years in France on the Charente Limousine near the mountains of the Massif Central region with sheep and Breeding Fell Ponies under the Globetrotter prefix. Fell ponies get their name from the Cumbrian fells that they live on and need to stay there for their wilder side, that makes them the breed they are. In 2018, we came home to Cumbria to help the declining hill breeders and hill herds who look after the core of the breed and to work with them to give a strong voice to their cause to keep the Fell Pony on the Fells.