Hi Melanie

 

my name is ...... and I have information about Mooloolah Valley Riding Centre. I volunteered at the centre in 2018-2019. I also grew up riding there. 

 

So Atalanta buys the majority of her horses from sales and because of this a lot of them are not properly trained and it was up to the volunteers to make them "safe". Some of the horses never were and were then dubbed as staff only. 

 

The rspca and police has been called in the centre many times while I worked there and I can only imagine how many more times after, yet nothing continues to happen.

 

The horses are not fed ANY hard feed. In all the time I worked there I only witnessed one hardfeed occur and that was after a complaint to the rscpa. What she does feed them is very very cheap round bales that the horses don't eat, so to get them to eat it she covers it in molasses from the big barrel on the property. 

 

On top of the lack of feed the horses are never worked or vaccinated ever. A lot of the horses have obvious worm bellies. A lot of them have teeth problems and they rarely see a farrier. So it is very obvious they are in terrible condition 

 

The horses are often used for rides multiple times a day, meaning they will be ridden up to 4-5 hours. During this the horses will have both their saddle and bridle left on and released back into the property. Any horse person knows this is extremely dangerous. The tack is all ill fitting which leads to more damage on the horses already sore backs. 

 

On top of the horses tack being terrible the helmets provided for the riders are not up to date with ANY safety requirements which is incredibly dangerous for adults and children. When I was there some of the helmets were even bike helmets. 

 

So there was a horse named Marco Polo and he was easily in the worst condition at the time. During this she kept a rug on him and hid him up the back where customers could not go. So it doesn't surprise me that she is hiding them again. 

 

During the rides, people fell off all the time due to negligence. It is unsafe to have so many beginners out on a ride at once and still letting them trot and canter.

 

Atalantas husband/ex-husband Tony is an extreme horse abuser. There was a horse called Bluedog and he was VERY scared of water. Tony grabbed him and tied him up in the corral and used the hose to squirt him in the face and ears for so long that he reared up and flipped, causing him to almost hang himself on the railing. He also used to beat the horses with sticks right infront of us. There were alleged rumours that he was producing drugs up in the barn out the back, but I cannot confirm. He was a violent man that threatened us girls working to the extent that he tried to hit me with his car and I had to climb into a hay feeder. 

 

So I'm going to go into some detail about certain horses, whether they are still alive or not I do not know.

 

Texas

Texas was very very old. He was retired when I was there and one day he disappeared. Instead of searching for him Atalanta said he probably went off and died somewhere and didn't even look for him to see if maybe he got stuck somewhere.

 

Rebel

Rebel was used all the time for rides. However his Pasterns (back ankles) had a condition which caused them to drop almost to the floor, any vet would consider him permanently unrideable, yet he climbed rocks every day.

 

Captain Hogwash

He is easily the most used horse. He is the big Clydesdale with a white blaze. I don't have much to say on him other than the fact that he was taken out almost every ride.

 

At the time I was there, there was 42 horses and ponies, none of them were in good condition. Last year a friend and I (who used to be a manger there) took our own horses onto the national park for a ride. We ran into a group of Mooloolah valley riders and a lady asked us what breed our horses were as they look so much more filled out then there's. Interestingly enough me and the lady were on stock horses. It just goes to show that the horses are so bad and yet customers don't realise due to lack of experience.

 

I have many many more stories and would like to be apart of the process to close them down. There is a pony who is still there that I will still do whatever I can to save him. I'd save them all if I could.