Witches Have Been Attacking Horses And Braiding Their Tails
Witches in Sussex have been secretly braiding horse’s manes and tails under cover of darkness for the last two years, and no one is doing a thing about it. From Horsemart.co.uk:
If you’re a horse owner who has found your horse’s mane or tail has been plaited, it could have been done by a white witch, according to Sussex Horse Watch.
“We often get reports from horse/pony owners that they have arrived to attend to their equine to find them with a plait in its mane or tail. All kinds of theories have been put forward, mainly ‘it has been marked for stealing’ well, let me say right here and now that there is no known or reported case of any horse/pony being stolen that has had a plait put in its mane/tail,” said a statement on the Sussex Horse Watch website.
“After studying the various reported cases of plaiting we found that two things stood out.
WELL THEIR MANES AND TAILS STOOD OUT I BET
“Fact one, after having gone several weeks with no reports suddenly it was found that dozens of reports came in within a few days of each other, then die down to nothing again for several weeks.
“Fact two, again studying dates when the plaiting takes place it was discovered that they fitted in with White Witchcraft Festival dates. So one of our members contacted a friend who lives in Somerset and who is a White Witch and put this to her. Below is her reply.
“The first festival is Imbolc on Feb 2nd, Spring Equinox on 20th March, Beltane 30th May, Summer Solstice 21st June, Lughnasadh 31st July – the latter two are masculine festivals and generally honour gods rather than goddesses.”
According to Sussex Horse Watch, the next big festivals on the Pagan Wheel are Samhain 31 October and Winter Solstice on 21 December.
“There may also be other dates when the plaiting happens that are personal to a particular ‘witch’. Full moons may also be used if she is performing a particular piece of magic,” the statement said.
“I understand that it’s worrying for you all but I honestly think that horses are very special to these people and that they would do anything to protect them. Hope that helps. She had already told me, when I said, ‘Why couldn’t they just ASK?’ that to them it weakens the spell if they speak about it. So – I know it’s very, very worrying but if it IS this reason, then the intentions are never ever malicious.”
This is the best thing I have ever heard of. “You can’t ask us,” she said, repeatedly braiding an invisible mane as if by compulsion. “It’s something we have to do on our own.”
Readers in Sussex are invited to share any and all witch-braiding stories they may have heard.
[Image via Unbridled Bliss]
Tags: animals, news, the word from sussex, witches attacking horses and braiding their tails
PLEASE NOTE THAT THE LINKED ARTICLE IS TWO YEARS OLD BUT THERE HAVE BEEN NO UPDATES ON THE SUSSEX HORSE WATCH BLOG, VERY MYSTERIOUS
<img src="http://previously.tv/m/2014-01-06-bobs-burgers1.jpg">
Dammit, anyone know how to get this to actually show up? (I did the img tag correctly as far as I can tell, and at first it showed up, and then it was like, NOPE PSYCH NOT GONNA WORK. And that braiding girl from Bob's Burgers is so perfectly creepy.)
Your img tag is fine. It looks like the people running the website that has the image have set up a thing to stop people from displaying their images on other sites, because bandwidth and stuff. You could copy the image somewhere else, if you have somewhere online to copy images to, and then it would show up.
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/KA4tkKd.jpg">
(Thank you!)
i didn't even add anything to this, i just copy pasted the entire blog post and made two jokes, because it's THAT PERFECT
None of the Norfolk witches mysteriously plait horse tails. They just tie coloured ribbons to trees.
I just said to Mallory "um, do you want to see my horse's fake tail?" BECAUSE WE USED TO DO AQHA EVENTS AND THE BREED STANDARD IS TO HAVE A WEAVE. So now Mallory is sitting next to a fake horse's tail.
Breed standard is to have a weave?!
You literally will look like a GODDAMN FOOL without a stupid big ol broom tail at an official AQHA show, and at least once a show one comes loose and falls off and then all the others horses spook at it. It is so dumb.
This website is a trip. Did you go custom made or off the rack for Bella? "When your Custom Tail is not in use, it should be stored in a tail bag slightly longer than the tail extension to prevent the ends from curling."
The end of your fake horse tail curling?! How gauche. I assume that would mean immediate disqualification?
Blessedly, Bella is just a normal bay, so any black tail was FINE.
My mom used to have this qh mare who was technically palomino, but really sort of a light-sand color with only slightly lighter-sand-colored mane/tail, so she just looked like a palomino with a pee-stained tail.
(It didn't help that she often peed all over her tail. I've spent more hours than I care to remember washing pee out of that horse's tail and then dousing the whole thing with quicksilver — not mercury, for you non-horse folks, just this super-expensive purple shampoo to make horses white parts whiter. Also bleaching it. But that's all another story.)
So, naturally, we couldn't just buy her a regular palomino white tail, because that would look fake as hell next to her natural pee hue. (Granted, all horses with fake tails look fake, but there's a fine line between necessary-fake and absurd-fake. AQHA shit is super weird.) We had to get her a custom tail, which was the most ridiculously finicky thing in the world (there is — or was? — an AQHA rule that when using fake tails you can only have horse hair touching horse hair, so there were tons of little braids you had to work into braids in the real tail and work those into larger braids and so on). And then of course we (I) had to make sure the fake tail and the real tail stayed the same color, so I was doing the whole washing/quicksilvering/bleaching routine on both tails instead of one. And yes, fake tail curling is basically the most embarrassing thing in the world, so afterwards I'd have to put this conditioner in it and comb it even more obsessively gently than you comb the real tail because heaven forbid you pull out any hairs, and basically supervise it while it dried, sifting through the hairs with my fingers to prevent tangling/curling.
Anyway the point is that I did all this for years before ever stopping to think about how completely absurd it all was. And fake tails, yes.
OMG-I had no idea! That's what you get for simply riding in the woods. The only flash my horse has is a coloured saddle pad with butt fringe.
The first time I saw a catalog of Western show wear–for horses and for people–I laughed myself ill (and then I saw the prices and was just plain ill). So much fringe! So much stretch velveteen! SO MANY SWAROVSKI CRYSTAL ACCENTS!
Oh yeah, all that stuff ain't cheap! Hence, my paltry woodsy rides although I admit investing in really good wearing tack (I just splurged on a custom made tree and saddle with matching breast collar and croupier for a horse that honestly deserves it).Sent from my iPad
Details, I need details about your new saddle and tack! And pictures. And what breed of horse, ect…
FWIW, I just purchased a saddle (arriving tomorrow, squee!) that I saved up two years to buy for my saddle fitting nightmare of an Arabian (who will Let You Know if his saddle or tack does not fit perfectly).
Best,
Amber
Glad to give details! The tree is from Rod Nikkel (rodnikkel.com), the saddle, breast collar & croupier is being made by Vern Rempel (vrsaddlery.com). Fantastic craftsmen and Vern in particular has been an absolute joy regarding the saddle's design, asking every single question regarding riding style, likes and dislikes, weight, decoration, etc.As for the tree, if you check out Rod's site, we did all the chalk tracings of Red's back, ditto the cardboard cut outs for wither placement, etc. All in all, I have high hopes for this saddle not only as a heirloom piece but as a high functioning piece of equipment.My reasons for going this route isn't because I have a hard to fit horse, but rather deeply personal and entirely sentimental.Sent from my iPad
Whoops, forgot to add: my current ride is Red, a wee American Quarter Horse. Short and stout with a quick walk and terrible choppy trot. Comes from working cow lines, hence the build. I based my saddle on him. Batty, my first love, is my big old pasture pet due to a bad hind leg injury (plus the arthritis, bad back, chronic shoulder soreness, blah, blah, blah). He's a total character and I'll keep both these guys until my dying days. What can I say, I love da horseys.Sent from my iPad
PonyAlong,
By any chance, do you also post on the CoTH forums? You "sound" familiar. Rod Nikkel's website and blog is AMAZING. There are a few blog posts by his (DVM) wife where she not-so-subtly throws down the science to dispute Dr. Deb Bennet's (and her saddle-maker acolyte) pet theories. Your two horses sound awesome. The trot's an over-rated gait. The desert Bedouin considered the trot to be a trash gait, only to be used if your mount is too green to transition from a walk to a canter.
You can never have too many Swarovski crystal accents on western tack. Have you seen the tack the barrel racers use? It makes western pleasure show tack look understated and plain by comparison.
"…the other horses spook at it…"
Horses: so very wonderful, so very "aw, C'MON for fuck's sake". I do love this image of horses going "WTF? NO, UH-HUH, GOTTA GO" at a weave, though.
http://www.customtails.com/
http://www.customtails.com/the-care-and-feeding-o…
I… this is amazing.
We do not have nearly enough Bella stories on The Toast. More Bella stories, please?
New Forest ponies are specifically forbidden to have any false hair!
This delights my little horse-loving heart. Hopefully the witch-braids are magically appealing to the horse. Or at least, the witch could stretch a panty-hose leg over the horse's neck immediately after the braids are finished to keep him from rubbing his mane off. That would be truly helpful.
As someone who would have LOVED to have access to horse manes and tails to practice braiding on as a child when I was learning how to do it and would literally ask strangers in stores if I could braid their hair (I was a weird kid), my bet's not on witches. It's on preciocious 6-year-olds.
Did the strangers ever let you braid their hair?
I think my mother always gathered me up with mortified "I'm so sorry, she's just learning to do it" apologies before they had a chance to respond.
I'd have let you braid my hair, no questions asked. That's awesome.
All 6-year-olds are witches. True fact.
I would have totally let you. I beg my daughter to practice her braiding on me all the time. Sadly, the novelty has already worn off for her. It was amazing and sooo relaxing while it lasted.
As a last ditch child-entertainment option, let them play with your hair. It's hours of entertainment, at the cost of hours of careful brushing.
Last ditch means "after you hand them your phone". Last ditch is last ditch.
My boyfriend's niece, almost two when I recently saw her, loved brushing/combing my hair. She didn't really understand which direction to move the brush/comb in, though, which made for interesting results.
LOL @ "marked for stealing".
Horse thieves are so crafty these days.
they're all like, "well I don't want to steal this horse now, but maybe tomorrow I'll bring my horse-stealing trailer around but WAIT what if I forget what horse I wanted to steal???"
CHRIS PRATT HAS GONE MAD WITH POWER
I see him taking the Concorde out there two, maybe three times a week and sneaking around braiding at night.
"It is the source of my powerssssss." he says, turning general charm and pleasant doughiness into a career as an A lister.
Ugh, of COURSE it's white witches, all going around making us look like harmless weirdos who only care about making the world nice and beautiful.
How are we supposed to terrify the villagers in the countryside with the threat of black magic if witches keep going around putting BRAIDS on HORSES?
ugh, blehg, fuh, [similar expressions of disgust]
Turn those braids into snakes?
Well I'm going to have to now!
West Sussex is just going to be all about venomous snakes for a while.
At least they aren't in Ireland, where the anti-snake wards are still effective. You have options.
Oh, man, don't I know it. Ireland is hell for black magic. I haven't even been back there since the 1990s and the Rain of Toads and frankly, I'm not sure anyone even NOTICED.
It's a great place to learn if you want to be able to put a curse on someone using only mud and like fifty broken brooms, but when am I going to want to cast a curse without my cursekit handy?
As a Sussex reader, I'd like to point out that none of the horses objected to my mane braiding and it was two years ago let it go jeez. Plus, they liked it -NEIGH- THEY ASKED FOR IT.
NEIGH INDEED.
I am from Sussex, and sadly have heard nothing about this (not even in the local papers, which are normally a goldmine). How disappointing.
My favorite recent (as in, from the past year) Brighton Argus headline was " AGGRESSIVE COWS ON THE ATTACK" and it had a picture of a cow in a pasture. I love local news.
I would definitely subscribe to that paper!
Even though titles involving ferocious seagulls > everything else
My favourites (from either the Sussex Express or the Seaford Gazette) are "Mask Stuck In Tree" and "Girl Takes Rabbit Out For a Walk". What do you mean, it's not news?
If you take the angle that news is something which makes people say "Ooo, did you see/hear…" (rather than that news is important information that people should know about) to each other, then sure, I'd be fucking thrilled to hear about a rabbit going for a walk.
I share boarding space with a group of three, fabulous, horse crazy pre-teen girls. Not only are they fearless, eschewing saddles and helmets for barebacks, summer booty shorts and horse dunking in fast running creeks, they love to braid their mount's manes and tails, sometimes with added daisies for a more girly look.
I love those girls, even when I have to wade through a tack room strewn with the aforementioned short shorts.
Oh man, do they use that horse glitter in the tube?? You always knew it was spring or summer break when all of a sudden a perfectly respectable looking chestnut gelding had daisies braided into his tail and peace signs made of glitter on his flanks being led around by a 14 year old in a sports bra and short shorts.
THEN they discovered that hoof polish that has glitter in it and it was all. over.
HAH! YES! Not on the hooves, though, these girls are backcountry trail riding ball-busting broads. Ride their horses up to the local lake, through the campground, give zero fucks about causing a stir, go swimming (horses included) ride home.
Ah, youth!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlMwc1c0HRQ
Hey, I'll have you know that I am a grown-ass woman who almost bought some of that glitter hoof polish and hairgel last weekend BECAUSE IT'S AWESOME.
(I ended up just going for tame and practical Effol hoof oil instead, alas. And the horse in question has a roached mane, so it's not like I could braid daisies into it anyway. More's the pity.)
Listen, why are we asking who the Mysterious Braiding People are and not DO THEY KNOW HOW TO DO HUNTER BRAIDS???? If yes, is there any way to bribe them into mysteriously doing them the night before a show?? I hate hunter braids with a fiery passion, and I swear to not ask questions if this mysteriously happens.
This was my first thought, too. HOURS you could save. Hours and arm pain.
Okay who else is joining the Sussex Horse Watch listserve
Everything about this is amazing but I'd like to call attention to the running theory of the little girl gangs marking their targets by mane-braiding, rather than IDK showing up with a truck and stealing the horse in a quarter the time that'd take if you really wanted a goddamn horse so bad
Of course even better are illicit driveby witchmarks you are not permitted to speak of but which certainly can be assumed to have almost nothing to do with diabolic possession. If you find your newly braided and bedazzled horse hovering in the air always just behind you trust us that this is a normal healthy part of the horse lifecycle, and the unusually dense swarms of flies everywhere are surely just a passing nuisance.
It is totally normal for an animal that weighs as much as a small car to have the same muscle complexity on all of its skin that you have on your face. Don't worry. That shivering thing they do when flies land on them is super normal.