Nope, Joey is a gelding, and the girls are his little herd. Lola especially is like his shadow and it's very useful to have him near when we are working with her o give her more confidence.
With Merlin, it's a long and gradual story of what happened...when I first met his owner she kept him in the same field as Coconuts and Joey and also her two arab mares. With her horses living out she was as keen on using natural horsemanship as my friend Cathy. So when I was relearning to ride she would teach me the groundwork and using the rope halters and just your weight to direct the horse. One of the mares became ill and was put down, one went off to our breeder friend and had a lovely part-bred foal. Then she met her new chap and ended up with her posh house and own stables, and over time she got to be more and more harsh with her horses, going to dressage and jumping lessons and having less enjoyment of just spendind time with the horses unless it was for a set purpose.
She got Curo as a 'competition' horse and Merlin got the job of earning a living by her giving lessons on him to children. But Merlin is not a 'nice' horse, I love him but he is not gentle and loving with strangers and has been biting and bolting. So to 'cure' this and make him behave he wasn't allowed any treats, not allowed any fuss, not allowed to play around and then I started hearing he was getting hit and he was being put in more severe bits. Of course it is hard if it's not your horse but it was getting to the point where he would be putting his head over my shoulder and pulling me in for our special cuddle and I'd be told off like a kid that I was making to much fuss of him. Because I would wait for him to lower his head for the bridle and be careful not to bang his mouth I was spoiling him. Because he always groomed my hair gently making it stand up on end I was making him bite people.
I will always be grateful that I was allowed to learn how to ride on Merlin well enough to be confident for my holiday in Spain, if I hadn't had all those hours in the saddle I wouldn't have been cantering along goat tracks or enjoying the technical rides on steep dry riverbeds, but I am saddened beyond words that I have to stay away from him to avoid all the negativity. I can't change how he is treated now, all my gentle suggestions were brushed aside and belittled. If I won the lottery I'd buy him in a heartbeat
Why don't these people inform themselves and get a good trainer or at least look at those thousands of clips on youtube to see what they should be doing and what it should look like... and learn basic rules; no tension on the reins, use your weight and slight hand movements to tell your horse what it needs to do, no forcing there (like actually should be the case in English riding too IMO lol). I wonder how those people would ride with English tack? Why would one pull and force riding western style if one is able to be gentle when riding English style?
