Myths About Miniature Horses and Shetlands
The main question and comment I seem to get is...." ohhh I remember those horses , they are mean and they bite!" That could not be farther from the truth. What these people are remembering are the little chubby cross bred Shetlands of our childhood that definitely bit people and I think it was because they did not want our great big selves on them! :-)
Miniature horses are not those horses. This is a completely different horse. Minis are not Shetlands. They are miniature horses. They do not have a hateful nature unless they have been mistreated or not handled at all. If they have not been handled at all they may hurt you or themselves trying to get away from you. If they have been beaten or teased or generally treated badly then they very well may not trust humans and do anything to get away from them. A large horse would do the same....
But for the majority of your happy healthy miniature horses , they are sweet natured and very very affectionate and adore people. I have two who nip me. One was mishandled and I do not trust him with children as I believe children hurt him because of how he reacted to a child after I purchased him. But he does not mean to be mean to me. He truly seems to have a preference for me over everyone else. We seem to have a bond. The other horse that nips me is my little Bonnie. She is still a baby. The reason she nips is to get me to pet her if I am not paying enough attention to her! She gets jealous of the others. She is just a mess. She mainly nips my jeans or my sleeve. She is just silly! Ya gotta love her, she won't let you not!
The rest of my miniatures I would not think twice about whether they were going to nip me or not. They have never offered to and mainly just want to be petted and fed. They come up to me for affection even after they have just eaten. So I believe it is true affection and not just because they want food. Some people even allow their pet minis to go into the house. My husband draws the line there. No fun is he?
The Shetlands I have are not the typical Shetland of the past either. The ones I have are shapely, muscular , small horses. Have a look on my Shetland page and see for yourself. They do not have a nasty nature. They too , are sweet as well and have never offered to bite me at all. Ever.
The second thing I always hear , which you can see by looking at the sale page when I have horses for sale , is that they are expensive. That all depends. It depends on what you want. Miniatures without registration papers are between 600 and 900 dollars. You can pay that for a dog very easily or a parrot. A registered horse of pet quality can be between 1,000 and 3,000. Show quality goes up from there. But you never know if you may see a diamond in the rough in a 2,500 dollar horse and wind up with a show horse when it matures. But then again, maybe not. No matter the price , they are all good pets and are well worth the money. You get out of them what you put into them , just like with every other animal you could have. In my opinion there is nothing like the wag of a dog's tail and the look of love in it's eyes , the kisses of a puppy , hearing your parrot say " I love you " at just the right time or laughing hysterically, a cat rubbing your leg , and a horse coming to you when called and nuzzling you for a scratch or watching your horse run and run with mane blowing in the wind.