Tamsin talks about her life and horses as well as her latest
book, Budget Horse and Pony Care
I come by my absolute love of horses honestly since my Irish
grandparents bred very successful hunters and showjumpers, and
dramatically bad race horses. My mother was brought up in and
around horses and donkeys, rode brilliantly all her life, and
was the person who got me started.
My riding began properly when I was five, on an unruly ex racing
donkey (winner, apparently, of 21 gold cups) who my parents bought
on a whim from a sale in Wales, while on holiday. It wasn’t
so much learning to ride as generally just learning to ‘hang
on’. I think I can attribute my pretty sticky seat to that
donkey, who was rather randomly, called Johann Sebastian Bach.
I progressed to Rosie Roan, a 12.2hh pony of dubious temperament
with a vile temper, who I adored. She taught me that its ok not
to win a show class, and its even ok to come last as long you
enjoy yourself, but it’s really not ok to jump out of the
ring.
As a child I competed a lot in working hunter pony classes
and had the most fantastic coloured pony who was part Arab, part
Welsh Mountain, and part something else. He had the heart of
a lion and once won an informal puissance class run by a local
stables, beating all the adults and clearing a cracking 4ft 2.
I was definitely a passenger and not the driver. Unfortunately
I had him back in the day when coloured ponies were still rather
frowned on in the show ring, so despite our best efforts we were
often pipped to the winning post by a bay or a flashy chestnut.
I started affiliated eventing and showjumping when I was
about sixteen, and was very fortunate to have a truly dedicated
mum who spent hours and hours trudging round cross country courses
and huddled against the wind watching me career round the dressage
arena.
My ‘horse of a lifetime’, (everyone has one) came
along when I was around eighteen. She was four and a little wild
but jumped like a stag, we called her Crazy Daisy, 
but in the
nicest possible way. We evented to intermediate and won a little
money show jumping before an old injury came back to haunt us
and she was retired as a broodmare. Some years later I ran off
to America and married a cowboy, and then flew my lovely old
mare over with me. She came back into work and lived out her
days as a ‘cow pony’, as well as raising a further
two foals in the States.
I rode a great deal of quarter horses for people (western
style riding) while over there and worked on an Arabian stud
farm preparing the youngstock before they went off for their
formal show training.
As the saying goes, ‘all good things come to an end’ and
I moved back to the UK in 2006 bringing one of the youngsters
bred from my old mare with me.
Sadly my cowboy husband found
England a little tame for his liking and hoofed it back to the
US, and I had to sell my horse during the divorce proceedings.
There is always a silver lining though, and not long after losing
my own horse, I met a wonderful lady who offered me her advanced
medium dressage horse to ride. What a horse! He had bags of character
and ability, and was so patient with me.
About a year ago I moved from Norfolk to Kent, and quite
by chance met another lady who offered me the ride on her gorgeous
ex racehorse William. (Horses have a habit of finding me!) William
has the illustrious pedigree of being the half brother to My
Will, ridden to third place by Ruby Walsh in the 2009 Grand National.
I am also currently riding a couple of three year olds before
they go back into training in a few months.
Somewhere in amongst all that horse stuff I have managed to
bang out a few books and forge a career as a writer. For more
information about my books please visit www.tamsinpickeral.com.
About Budget Horse and Pony Care
Funnily enough many of the ideas in this book came to me while
I was living in the US. I was based in Wyoming in a particularly
remote area, and without much money.
I had two young sportshorses who I wanted to show in sports
horse classes, and a motley assortment of Quarter horses and ‘range
ponies’. Living in a remote area has its perks, but getting
to horse shows certainly isn’t one of them. I spent days
trucking up the dusty highways to get to suitable shows, and
the costs involved with fuel, overnight stays and equipment really
added up. It frustrated me that I couldn’t get hold of
equipment and bits and pieces that I wanted easily, and when
I did, they were really expensive. I did use to order things
on the internet, when the server was working, but so often things
bought by post don’t fit, or are not quite what you expected.
With all of this in mind, I started to make quite a lot of my
own products and found that the end products were what I wanted. 
I derived a sense of achievement through making them myself.
I also worked for a number of years at the local veterinary hospital,
and I have to credit some of my veterinary recipes to the wonderful
vets who I worked for, whose ‘common sense’ approach
to illness and injury was without equal.
The book does have an ecological theme to it as well. I am far
from an eco-warrior, and I do think that issues need to be sensibly
addressed, obviously always with the welfare of the horse as
a priority. That said it’s really important to consider
the effect on the environment of horse management, and to try
and be as clever and ecologically aware as possible.
The aim of the book is to try and help people to save money
through clever sourcing of products, making one’s own products
and sensible stable management, while at the same time considering
the environment.
