DARTMOOR PONY HERITAGE TRUST

ANNUAL REPORT

2008/2009

From fledgling charity to an organisation on a mission!

Last year was a very successful year for the DPHT. This report concentrates on our four key areas of work; culminating in a clear direction for the next three years.

1. Dartmoor Pony Preservation Scheme
2. Education Programme
3. Our facilities
4. New Projects

Dartmoor Pony Preservation Scheme - The DPHT embarked on a major marketing campaign to raise the financial value and awareness of the Dartmoor Pony using a variety of value added initiatives.

• Publicity - a year where we received our fair share of local, regional and national media interest. We hit the year running with three national television features during the month of April 2008. We had a ½ hr feature on BBC2’s Johnny Kingdom series and two features on The One Show. According to a BBC journalist, viewing figures increased by a million viewers for the second show. We continued our presence on local television with a BBC Spotlight Inside Out programme, promoting a feature on taming Dartmoor ponies for our Sale in July which was broadcast in September 2008. We started 2009 with a news feature on BBC Spotlight following the sale of 20 Dartmoor Ponies to the Norfolk Wildlife Trust who were on their 6^th return visit to Dartmoor buying more ponies for conservation grazing. We finished our television interviews for the year with our launch at Occombe Farm and our new ‘Ponies Inspiring People’ project, but more about that later in this report.
• We handled over 180 foals, yearlings and older ponies, using our team of committed volunteers and expert handlers. Handled ponies have been much easier to sell and have increased the value of the ponies substantially.
• 79 colts not suitable for breeding were castrated, again adding instant value and saleability.
• The DPHT concentrated heavily on promoting Dartmoor Ponies for conservation grazing. We sold 101 ponies for land management to the following organisations: Norfolk and Suffolk Wildlife Trusts, National Trust, RSPB Suffolk, National Nature Reserves and Litcham Commoners Association. We have worked very closely with the National Trust to produce risk assessments and a protocol for handling and working with semi-feral ponies. We have also run a number of ‘Using Dartmoor Ponies in Conservation Grazing’ courses for wardens and rangers in the last year.
• We sold 145 Dartmoor ponies (Heritage, SR1, SR2 and full pedigree ponies all born and bred on Dartmoor) amounting to £43’195 for Dartmoor Pony Keepers. Our website has proved immensely valuable in creating sales leads and our thanks must go to our web master and silent hero Roger Claxton.

Education Programme – We have delivered a wide range of educational visits, sessions and courses. The success of previous sessions led us to consider how we could improve our educational provision by creating exciting and innovative approaches to learning based around a Dartmoor Pony experience.

• Our 23 Pony Power sessions based at Brimpts Farm were well received by local primary and secondary schools that all enjoyed the one to one sessions with our ponies. Many of the schools are now on their second or third repeat visit. One of the downfalls we currently face is the lack of winter accommodation for the sessions. Weather can cause problems as the sessions are all outdoor based. Learners benefit hugely from one to one time with a pony and grooming the ponies is an important element of the session which has to be left out when we have wet ponies. Pony Power would be impossible to run without our committed team of volunteers and a big thank you must go to Joy & Andy Taylor, Clare Stanton, Imogen McKinley-Clark, Jenny Whitehouse, Donna Saunders, Michelle Wright, Sue Aylesbury-Rogers, Patricia Pooley, Beverley Langley and Sue Parrott.
• Bellever created an opportunity to deliver 26 educational walks led by our highly experienced and motivated guide Liz Miall.
• Educational pilot projects – we have worked with approximately 40 young people from inner cities with drug and alcohol dependencies. These young people had no prior experience of ponies or Dartmoor. We found these groups to be highly rewarding. Their desire to work with ponies was profoundly touching and clearly showed us a new way to use our ponies to help young people develop all important life skills such as empathy, compassion, respect, trust and inner confidence. We have worked with Hamoaze House, Coombeshead College Inclusion Unit and The Prince’s Trust.
• We also ran a number of pony handling/taming and ‘Conservation grazing with equines’ courses for Duchy College, Norfolk Wildlife Trust, Sufolk Wildlife Trust, RSPB and the National Trust.
• We were delighted to work with both Mayfield and Millford School for young people with special needs. We worked with both groups in the lead up and during the annual Ten Tors Jubilee Challenge and yes, this year I crossed the finishing line with Rolo, Charlotte (pupil) William my son and volunteer Mitch, in floods of tears, it was all just a bit too much!!! Our super ponies behaved impeccably, we owe a huge thank you to the schools for the immense privilege it is to be involved in such a wonderful event of such courage and emotion. Donna Saunders, Kerry Smith and Michelle Wright, also deserve much thanks and a big thank you to John French for being the pony taxi over the weekend!!
• In March 2009 we were awarded 2^nd prize in the Edward Morshead Awards for work with young people with physical and mental disabilities and also for contributing to the public image of Dartmoor.

Our facilities – The DPHT has two full time facilities, one based at Brimpts Farm, Dartmeet where we have a small visitor centre and keep our adoption ponies which are also used in our Education programme. Our other facility is 82ha of moorland at Bellever.

·         Brimpts Farm continues to support our work by providing a home to our many activities. We have investigated a number of ways to expand at Brimpts. Unfortunately, we have come up against planning permission and accept a different site may be more suitable; so we continue to look at alternative venues to expand our business. A very big thank you must be given to Andy Bradford and his family for their ongoing support and friendship. Our facility and ponies at Brimpts are looked after by Joy and Andy Taylor. They carry out a wide range of tasks from dead heading our flowers to worming the ponies and ensuring they are always in tip top condition – they are a pair of troopers who we could not do without – a huge thank you from us and the ponies!

·         Bellever has proved to be a huge asset for the DPHT. We are able to run a herd of Heritage and Pedigree Dartmoor ponies to show visitors what a Dartmoor pony looks like in its native habitat. All the ponies are owned by local Dartmoor pony keepers, the ponies are held on the site to mature until they reach a more profitable age around four years old. Our herd is looked after by Lorna Smerdon who has done a wonderful job of managing our herd and keeping a check on them, no easy task when they have over 1,000 acres to roam. We have formed a very good relationship with Gary Hayman, Manager of Bellever Youth Hostel. He has booked our guides and provided us with a number of school bookings for which we are most grateful.

New Projects – Finally, as we draw to an end of our achievements for 2008 / 2009, we should draw much strength from some of the decisions we made to drive our charity forward. In February 2009 we hired Mary Edwards to run a strategy day to help us focus on where we were and more importantly where we wanted to go.

We had a full day’s meeting. This resulted in the team making two major decisions. The first was to create a new project called Ponies Inspiring People, to be based at Occombe Farm in Torbay, an opportunity to promote the Dartmoor pony’s temperament to a much wider audience. Occombe Farm receives over 70,000 people per year. We secured funding to run an 8 month pilot project funded primarily by the Clare Milne Trust and the remainder by National Lottery Awards For All programme. Our aim is to create a fully sustainable project using Dartmoor ponies as a platform for learning aimed at children and adults with profound to mild disabilities.

The second decision taken was to look at how we could create a new facility to provide an educational centre for learners from all walks of life to learn more about the iconic Dartmoor Pony and the role it has to play in our modern world.

The DPHT trustees and management team have shown great commitment, hard work and dedication. Thank you all for creating a charity to be proud of.