ANIMAL behaviourist, Emma Massingale, who lives near Holsworthy, has embarked on her latest 2017 equine adventure, as she spends a month with her two young Eriskay ponies horseboarding across the ten islands, which make up the Outer Hebrides.

The Eriskay pony breed, from the Old Norse for ‘Eric’s Isle’, is named after one of these islands.

As she did when living on a remote Irish island two years ago, Emma will be camping out with the ponies, foraging and fishing for her food.

She said: “I’ll be dusting off my spear gun and hoping to improve my fishing skills, when on June 3, I start out on the latest in my native pony adventures, filmed for the BBC’s One Show.

“Again, I wanted to do something no one had attempted before, so this time I will be horseboarding behind Noah and Migaloo in the Outer Hebrides. We are planning to be away for a month, as we travel 185 miles across ten of the islands in the archipelago, crossing six amazing causeways, all with one the rarest of all our native ponies.

“There are fewer Eriskay ponies than giant pandas, and the breed is classed as ‘critically endangered’ by the Rare Breed Survival Trust, with less than 300 in the world. Although small, in the Hebrides, they would have been expected to be a draught animal, ploughing the fields, but also pulling a cart and being ridden when required. The Eriskays would have been the equivalent of the quad bike we use on farms today.

“My mission is to highlight the physical and mental strength of these small, tough ponies and explore the beautiful, unspoilt islands that they call home.”

Emma added: “Horseboarding is an up and coming sport, but my challenge is to teach my young ponies to do this whilst also towing the small trailer behind us for hundreds of miles.

“Their welfare always comes first, so I have started my miles of long reining each day and have introduced the basics of horseboarding in the manege. However, I know that the real learning will come on the miles and miles of empty beaches in the Outer Hebrides.”

Follow the highs and inevitable lows of Emma’s adventures, when they are broadcast in three parts on the One Show later this summer.