Hunting cob

“SHE’LL NEVER SAY NO”

FOR Berry the cob (below), humans are just an inconvenience.

“When the hounds are there she knows exactly what she’s doing,” explains her owner Kate Kear. “I can fall off her, and she’ll just carry on going with the hounds.”

Kate hunts the Kent and Surrey Bloodhounds for her father-in-law, Bill, and she and Berry are an incomparable duo. “She was bought for peanuts with no expectation at all,” says Kate. But when Kate’s other hunting horse became lame, Berry had to step up to the plate. “Berry just fell into the role straight away. She has always been good with hounds right from the first day, but when I got her she couldn’t even jump a stick”.

Something clicked because now she jumps hedges, timber and even a five-bar gate.

“I have never known her to say no,” explains Kate. “She’ll hold her own around big country even though she’s 14hh, and a cob!”

While Berry knows her job, she’s not one who always needs to be up front. She is happy to be in the field when they go visiting, and she and Kate have also paraded the hounds at shows including Ardingly.

Although she lights up around hounds, she is happy to pootle around at home.

“My 14-year-old who doesn’t really ride can hack her out, and even my five-year-old daughter has ridden her.”

Do people ever express surprise that a cob can do what she does?

“I think most good hunting people know that cobs make good hunters,” says Kate. “Cobs can and do hold their own out hunting, and Berry definitely fell into her job.”

“Cobs have something about them that you don’t find in anything else”

KATHLEEN BOTTING