Buying Help Quick links down the page 1. Beware when buying 2. Buying from an auction 3. If small size is important 4. Always check passport and Micro-chip when buying 5. Buy for good conformation and good bloodlines 6. Tetanus 7. Pay for the best 8. Follow your instinct Copyright: Fairytail Stud 2010-2100 If you are the sort of person that would like your life to be fulfilled with something special maybe like owning a miniature pony or foal then try it. Some very useful information to help you, when buying a good miniature Shetland pony. 1. Beware when buying a pony if you or the owner cannot quietly walk up to it in the middle of a field and put a head collar on it. 2. Beware when buying a pony from an auction; ask the seller lots of questions to try to make sure that you know what you are buying. Ask for recommendations from someone else who knows the pony. There are many breeders that now "farm" these ponies and then round them up at sale time, fit a head collar and sell them cheap. The unsuspecting buyers of these terrified ponies or foals think that they have a bargain until they let them out in a field and then cannot catch them again. 3. If small size is important to you then never accept a ponies height, even when written on a passport or sales list. Always take your own measurements from the highest point of the withers at about the 9th - 11th vertebrae to the floor using a measuring tape or stick. You may sometimes find that most ponies are not as small as the owners say they are. 4. Always check the passport markings against the ponies to make sure that it is the right pony (All ponies should have a Shetland Pony Stud Book Society or (SPSBS) passport). This is now more important than ever with DNA testing now being so common. Please check out our links to the SPSBS for lots of other information about the breed and the showing of these wonderful ponies. New News 09: As from July 2009 all Shetland Ponies will need to be chipped with a security tag. This will help make them more secure from theft. If it is stolen it will be easily proven to be owned by someone other than the present keeper. The chip detectors are cheap at £35 and available to all of the police and anyone who wants to own one on Ebay. 5. A discerning breeding-buyer should buy for good conformation and good bloodlines firstly; colour is or should be of secondary consideration having acquired the correct quality bloodline. However if coloured ponies are your preferred interest because they sell for more money, then please be aware that it is very difficult to breed good quality well marked coloured ponies and so there are much less of them around which is why they cost more. We at the Fairytail Stud have one of the largest collection of coloured miniature Shetland ponies in the World. 6. We have found that most good owners and breeders will have their ponies inoculated for Tetanus every two years and this will show in their passports. If owners are prepared to pay the small cost for this it usually means that they have loved and cared for their pony properly. The best owners and breeders will sometimes go much further by regular worming, we do, and even regular flue and strangles jabs. 7. Be prepared to pay a little more for something special, at the end of the day you really do get what you pay for if you follow these rules. 8. Follow your instinct, if you like the people that you are dealing with and get there trust then go with it. Recommendations are worth ten times the research. Janette and Selwyn at the Fairytail Stud have many letters of recommendation that we will show to anyone interested in buying one of our ponies. We have sold many ponies that have helped all sorts of children's behaviour problems. You can trust us.