News
27 March, 2024
Stormi is a true survivor
It's hard enough being left to your own devices to wander aimlessly on a property for eight years, let alone that your owners didn’t even know your gender.
Such has been the life of Shetland pony ‘Stormi’, who, at 28 years of age, is proving nothing if not a stayer at her Mount Mee property.
At one stage the pony had the name ‘Double Trouble’ while it was classified as a male, before it was identified as a female and given the name ‘Stormi’.
After Les and Betty Hyde had a house built at the Mount Mee property in 1992, Les was offered the pony from a Pekingese dog breeder in Gatton.
Les thought the pony was a male, before a neighbour pointed out that it was a female.
‘Double Trouble’ lived in the house yard while horses were in other paddocks.
Les was in a nursing home for four years before he died in 2018, and the pony didn’t receive much attention for about eight years, as it was largely left alone while roaming the 50 acres.
Les’s daughter Myshell said the pony “seemed to wait for dad to come home”.
“She got sick of waiting in the first year being up there on her own, and kicked the fence down and lived happily on the neighbour’s property amongst the cows,” Myshell said.
Myshell sometimes visited the property to check on the pony and feed it carrots.
“This neighbour sold after three years of the horse being there, and the new owner put the horse back in my folks’ property,” Myshell said.
After discovering her brother had sold their property, Myshell visited last year and met the new owners.
She saw the pony was still there, and was “elated” to see they were happy to keep it.
A vet checked out the pony and said it was amazing that the animal was still alive.
One of the current co-owners, Natalie, said they had showered ‘Stormi’ with love.
“We basically treated her as a companion pony for the first six months of living in our home,” Natalie said.
Natalie said one day she was saddling up their other horse, when ‘Stormi’ came and stood in front of her as if waiting for a turn.
‘Stormi’ didn’t flinch after Natalie popped a saddle and placed the kids on her to be led around.
“I think it’s quite incredible to think she had barely been used as a riding pony – if at all – before she came to us,” Natalie said.
