The Eggsy Pony Diaries on Ko-fi

 Just to let you know if you'd like to hear more from Eggsy Pony, every week we publish an extract from Eggsy's personal diary on his Ko-fi page . 

Ko-fi is a site that enables us to post photographs, blog posts, videos etc, a bit like a blogging platform, but, with the added extra that readers can donate a little in the form of buying Eggsy a coffee.

Of course Eggsy Pony doesn't really drink coffee, the coffee money goes towards the cost of his keep and and Ko-fi don't take a penny or a cent of that coffee money!

Some of the content we've been putting on Ko-fi is free for anyone to see but Eggsy's Diaries are for supporters only. Supporters are classed as those who have bought Eggsy a coffee in the past 30 days and those who have become members of Eggsy Pony & Friends by signing up to buy a monthy coffee or two. Offering sponsor only content is a way for Eggsy to give back to those of you who contribute financially toward the cost of his care, a special thank you.

We'd love it if you'd pop over to Eggsy's Ko-fi page Eggsy Pony & Friends and take a look, maybe follow him there. We're aware that you won't be able to read his diary entries so we have taken three of them and posted them over on his new blogger blog Eggsy Pony and Friends so that you can decide if you'd enjoy reading the musings of our little rescue pony. You'll find them here The Eggsy Pony Diaries Eggsy Pony and Friends 

About  Eggsy Pony:

 Eggsy Pony was abandoned with locking stifles when he was just a foal, you can read about his abandonment here, his care is funded via donation.

If you'd like to you can help Eggsy in the following ways:

Follow Eggsy Pony and Friends on Ko-Fi  where if you choose you can also buy him a coffee, which isn't really coffee, the coffee money goes towards his feed.

Follow, like and retweet @eggsypony on Twitter

Follow, heart and share eggsypony on Instagram

Follow Eggsy's new blog:  https://eggsyponyandfriends.blogspot.com

 Make a donation of any amount, it all helps via Eggsy's Paypal : eggsypony@gmail.com

Take a look at Eggsy Pony's Redbubble store, he gets a small % in commission on any item sold which goes toward his feed.

What's been happening since Eggsy Pony last blogged

 It's been awhile hasn't it?

Sorry for the radio silence here on the blog, but, as you all know only to well, the world turned upside down a few weeks after the last blog post in 2020.

Covid & lockdowns were the theme for many and for us. 

2020 saw the family business shut for much of the year. No government grants as the business premises, including Muddy Bottom, were rented and the grants were paid directly to the landlord. 

Eggsy was lucky to have so many loyal supporters who kept him in feed during those devastating months, you know who you are and we hope you know that we will always be grateful for the help you gave Eggsy.

2020 also saw the death of a human family member, not from Covid but from that terrible disease cancer, this was equally devastating for the family business as he was the main character behind it all, beloved by customers. Fortunately many of those customers supported the rest of the family as we tried to take up the reins and run the business in his stead. For a few months all went well, then further lockdowns closed us again.

2021 The business was closed for 5 months, reopening in May and once again customers supported us and things ticked over. During this time we were finally able to get Eggsy gelded as for once sufficient finances and suitable weather conditions coincided before the dreaded fly season. Things were briefly on the up.

Then the bombshell hit us, the landlord wanted the horses off Muddy Bottom and would not allow us to put them anywhere else on the 8 acres we rented from him along with the business premises. We were given 6 weeks, which included the Christmas and New Year holiday period to get the horses, Hansel the goose & Gingee the cat off the land.  

Have you heard that idea about never being more than 6 handshakes away, 6 degrees of separation, well thank goodness that worked, an old school friend was able to find us space on the livery yard she's been on for 10 years. The downside to that is of course the expense, the cost of keeping Eggsy there is adding an additional £125 a month to the cost of his care in rent alone.

So 2022 is all change for Eggsy Pony, his companions and his human family. 

Eggsy has moved to the new yard, Hansel and Gingee have moved to the human house and the humans have lost the family business. Unfortunately it just wasn't profitable enough to continue paying the same rent without the land. 

2022 sees a new start for the Eggsy Pony family so it seems appropriate to end this sadly neglected blog, "Overcoming Adversity a Pony's Tale" with this post. 

But we're not going away Eggsy will have a new blog "Eggsy Pony and Friends" where we can regale you with his adventures and not just Eggsy's adventures but also those of his friends.

Having discovered that Ko-Fi don't take any money from much needed donations you make to help with Eggsy's care we're opening a Ko-Fi page where you can buy Eggsy a coffee. Of course the money won't be spent on coffee, ponies don't, or shouldn't, drink coffee, it will all go toward the cost of Eggsy's care. 

The exciting thing about Ko-Fi is that soon, if you'd like to, you'll be able to join a, I suppose you'd call it Eggsy Pony Club. It'll be a monthly membership club with exclusive blog posts, essays, behind the scenes stuff, videos, tutorials and things we observe about the natural world throughout the seasons. There will be more about that on the new blog when we're ready to launch. 

About  Eggsy Pony:

 Eggsy Pony was abandoned with locking stifles when he was just a foal, you can read about his abandonment here, his care is funded via donation.

If you'd like to you can help Eggsy in the following ways:

Follow Eggsy Pony and Friends on Ko-Fi  where if you choose you can also buy him a coffee, which isn't really coffee, the coffee money goes towards his feed.

Follow, like and retweet @eggsypony on Twitter

Follow, heart and share eggsypony on Instagram

Make a donation of any amount, it all helps via Eggsy's Paypal : eggsypony@gmail.com

Take a look at Eggsy Pony's Redbubble store, he gets a small % in commission on any item sold which goes toward his feed.

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Eggsy Pony 's Catch Up Post

Howdy there strangers it's been awhile

I'm not 100% certain why it's been so long since I blogged but I am blaming it on cats. That's right felines. 

A neighbour persuaded our "mad cat lady" to take in a tiny kitten that they had picked up from the side of the road, of course it turned out to be rather poorly and required much nursing and regular medication. Then one of the ferals got injured in a road traffic accident and required much nursing and medication. They say everything comes in threes and it did, the kitten she rescued earlier in the year developed an ulcerated eye which required much nursing and medication. What with horses and cats there has been little energy for blog writing so this is my catch up post.

Now let me see, where did I leave you, oh yes I know, I left you with my portrait by Emma Louise Ornsby on Redbubble

Well we made some sales and as you can see the recipients were very pleased with their purchases.

Another new design featuring me went on Redbubble before Christmas. It's available on lots of different products, not just the mugs I'm showing you in the above photograph,  with lots of different colour backgrounds. I will have to show you some of the other products later but what I'm attempting to get to here is that commission from Redbubble sales made £21 during 2019 so that's 4 bales of hay. 

Thank you to everyone who made a purchase.

I need to get my Eggsy Pony entrepreneurial hat on this year so that I can buy a few more bales of hay for myself. I already have another design in the pipeline for my Redbubble shop, a portrait kindly given to me by the very talented Krystal Dales. I will let you all know when products are available.

What else has been happening while I've been away from the blog?
Well I reached 5,000 followers on Twitter which is rather amazing for one little pony.

I hit my 2019 target on GoFundMe thanks to a very generous anonymous Christmas donation, which actually enabled us to "pay it back" by organizing a collection for Christmas gifts for rescue ponies. Our anonymous friend kicked off the fundraiser with another kind donation and in the end we were able to send £10 donations, on behalf of the #Twitterherd to 19 different equine rescue organisations from all around the world which was really marvelous. Something we'd love to be able to do every Christmas.

My GoFundMe target has been raised again with a view to my getting that essential gelding operation done during 2020, mud and flies permitting! 

The mud is dreadful at the moment and I don't know whether you've noticed but round here the weather has not been cold enough this winter to see off the flies. Climate change is very worrying indeed.

Now to my Thank You notes, I'm sorry they are late. One thing that I'm never quite sure about is if I should say thank you by name to those who donate to me by Paypal eggsypony@gmail.com I know Joe doesn't mind, thank you Joe, but others may wish to remain anonymous. So I'm just going to say a huge thank you to everyone who donated either to myself or to the Christmas Gifts for Rescue Ponies fundraiser via Paypal without mentioning any names, please know that we are very, very grateful.

GoFundMe gives donors the choice of displaying their name or not so I know it's okay to say thank you on the blog to Graham & Edith, Philomena, Helen Last and Helen Goodman, Candice, Leighton, Elizabeth, Amy, Diane and Cheryl who is still selling Eggsy Pony cards and donating 50p to me from the sale of each card and of course a big thank you to our anonymous friends. 

Thank you everyone for your continued support it means the absolute world to us. 

About Eggsy:

Eggsy is a rescue pony he was abandoned and left to starve by his owners as a foal. His care is funded by donations.

You can read the story of his abandonment here: About Eggsy Pony

Would you like to help Eggsy? 

Eggsy has a Ko-fi page where you can buy him a "coffee" the coffee money actually goes towards his feed etc  we'd be really grateful if you'd go take a look, share it far and wide via your social media and of course if you can spare some money please donate.

https://ko-fi.com/eggsyponyandfriends

Thank you, Eggsy and I really appreciate it x

Emma Louise Ornsby Portrait of Eggsy Pony now on Redbubble and other news

Twitter friend Emma Louise Ornsby painted my portrait, thank you Emma, and she's allowed us to use the painting in my Eggsy Pony Redbubble store so

 it's now available on lots of different items, bags, cushions, phone cases, travel mugs, water bottles, cards, stickers and my personal favourite

an Eggsy Pony artboard portrait so you could have my face hanging in your rogues gallery!

Please do pop over and take a look at the Eggsy Pony Redbubble store, we need to make some more sales as Redbubble only pay out when we've achieved £20 in commission and we're only up to £7.55 at the moment! So if you're in the market for any of the above a purchase would be very much appreciated.

Also if you like to shop early for Christmas, my Christmas cards are available, actually if you're sending cards abroad I suppose the last posting date for surface mail will soon be upon us!

Now for those all important thank yous, thank you Graham & Edith, Helen, Joe, Philomena, Cheryl (who is still selling "Moonlight Adventures of Eggsy" cards here ) and our anonymous friends for your continued financial support toward Eggsy's care. We couldn't do this without you.

Thanks are also due to all of you who share Eggsy's tweets and blog posts on your own social media platforms, that really does help to let more people know about not just Eggsy but the sad fact that many horses and ponies do get abandoned in the UK. 

About Eggsy:

Eggsy is a rescue pony he was abandoned and left to starve by his owners as a foal. His care is funded by donations.

You can read the story of his abandonment here: About Eggsy Pony

Would you like to help Eggsy? 

Eggsy has a GoFundMe campaign to help raise funds for his care, we'd be really grateful if you'd go take a look, share it far and wide via your social media and of course if you can spare some money please donate.

Help Raise Abandoned Foal Eggsy ~ GoFundMe

Thank you, Eggsy and I really appreciate it x

So that was August

What a month August was with some of the highest recorded temperatures around the world, we enjoyed (or suffered depending on your point of view) a heatwave and the contrasting cold and wet that resulted in thoroughbred friends being rugged as if for winter.

We had a visit from the farrier and I, this is Eggsy speaking, according to the horse's boy, was "an angel" ~ how's that for well behaved then!!! 

Of course good behaviour can't last forever and I'm somewhat ashamed to say that I might have let myself down a tiny bit when I had visits from Nurse Moreland and a few days later Norfolk Bea. I tried to engage in horsey fisticuffs with my half brother Pip. I mean honestly, you can't really blame me, people came to see ME not him and he was trying to get in on the action.

Can you guess what my favourite thing about visitors is? Yep, you've got it ~ carrots! I'm rather fond of a carrot don't you know. That's Nurse Moreland proffering carrots and this is me showing my appreciation:

I'm always very appreciative of all the help every one gives me, so, thank you kisses to Philomena, Graham and Edith, Helen, Joe and to my anonymous friends for your kind donations 

and to everyone who shares my tweets. 

About Eggsy:

Eggsy is a rescue pony he was abandoned and left to starve by his owners as a foal. His care is funded by donations.

You can read the story of his abandonment here: About Eggsy Pony

Would you like to help Eggsy? 

Eggsy has a GoFundMe campaign to help raise funds for his care, we'd be really grateful if you'd go take a look, share it far and wide via your social media and of course if you can spare some money please donate.

Help Raise Abandoned Foal Eggsy ~ GoFundMe

Thank you, Eggsy and I really appreciate it x

The Honeychop boys

Our boy likes to lick his bucket, and anyone else's he can get his muzzle into, clean, Eggsy sure does love his food! 

We've talked before about feeding Eggsy on this blog and one of the constituent parts of every one of his hard feeds is, and always has been, Honeychop chaff. It's made from oat straw and we all know how much horses love the taste of oats. We usually just feed the regular one pictured above but on occasion for example if the flies are really bad we will switch to Honeychop plus Garlic. 

We add Honeychop to his mix of beet, alfalfa etc for extra fibre and to encourage him to chew his food, very importantly for a greedy pony like Eggsy it helps to slow his eating down. We don't want him to eat his feeds too fast because he might end up with choke, a very unpleasant experience for a horse, and of course if he finishes his food too quickly he's off to nick someone else's! 

Considering we feed Honeychop chaff day in day out we were delighted to be the winners of some money off vouchers in a little giveaway run by the award winning blog EquiPepper. Thank you Ruby a little money off a staple is always appreciated. 

One really nice thing about this little win is that it brought back happy memories of Tipper, who along with Boo featured in a Honeychop advertising campaign nearly a decade ago. You may well have seen their chaff covered muzzles in equestrian magazines around that time.

For a while there we called them The Honeychop Boys.

Guess Eggsy is an honorary Honeychop boy now!

As well as thanks to EquiPepper we have lots of other thank yous to say for all the very kind donations made toward Eggsy's care. So here we go, big thank yous to Graham & Edith, Philomena, Margaret, Diane, Elizabeth, Philip, Sissy, Joe, our anonymous friends and to Cheryl who is selling Eggsy Pony greetings cards at craft fairs and on her website. 

A word to the wise: If you're in the market for some cards you can get 10% off your order by signing up to Cheryl's newsletter here.

About Eggsy:

Eggsy is a rescue pony he was abandoned and left to starve by his owners as a foal. His care is funded by donations.

You can read the story of his abandonment here: About Eggsy Pony

Would you like to help Eggsy? 

Eggsy has a GoFundMe campaign to help raise funds for his care, we'd be really grateful if you'd go take a look, share it far and wide via your social media and of course if you can spare some money please donate.

Help Raise Abandoned Foal Eggsy ~ GoFundMe

Thank you, Eggsy and I really appreciate it x

Moonlight Adventures of Eggsy by Cheryl Nosworthy

Look what came in the post a portrait of Eggsy  by artist 

Cheryl Nosworthy

it's called 

"Moonlight Adventures of Eggsy"

As we all know Eggsy Pony can be a bit naughty getting out of his field at night and here's the evidence captured for posterity in paints Eggsy out and about in the moonlight. 

There can be no denying it now Eggsy!!

Have you noticed the little picture propped up against the painting?

 Well that is a greetings card,

 Cheryl has very generously added "Moonlight Adventures of Eggsy" to her range of cards and is donating 50p from the sale of each card toward Eggsy's care.

Aren't they super, and they're even nicer in real life.

If you'd like one, or more, they are for sale on Cheryl's website here and if you sign up for her newsletter you'll get 10% off them. 

Thank you Cheryl for kindly coming up with this idea to raise funds for Eggsy, it's very much appreciated. 

Cheryl Nosworthy is a mixed media artist working from home in Cornwall, she has a dog and a horse and used to be a jockey. You can see more of her work on her website fairyhorses.co.uk

and

if you're in Cornwall she'll be at the following 2019 events:

10-18 August ~ The 20th Annual Arts & Crafts Exhibition, Parish Hall, Upton Cross  open 10am -6pm

August Bank Holiday weekend~ Great Trethew Vintage Rally, details trethewrally.uk 

8th December~ Alternative Christmas Present Show in the Carnglaze Caverns near St Neots, Cornwall.