Aberdeen Riding Club Public Page

Aberdeen Riding Club Public Page Quality approved riding school and livery yard providing training and livery for Aberdeen and the su

Aberdeens largest riding school and livery yard which opened in a purpose built brand new facility in May 2017. ARC is a non-profit making club, created and run to ensure that riding remains accessible and affordable in the North East of Scotland. We offer tuition on over 30 well trained horses and ponies to all standards of rider from beginner to advanced. We are also the facility provider for AR

C Hippotherapy (a branch of RDA) and the riding tuition provider for Robert Gordons University. We offer all types of livery from grass to full on a fully flexible service. With 2 indoor arenas, one outdoor arena and a future off road hacking route planned, ARC is a groundbreaking new facility within the city boundaries.

07/06/2026

Thomas got his first look at the stables and arena today - he certainly fills a stable!
First day in the building with any new horse, we put a lunge line on their headcollar and let them just have a wander round the arena and a good look and then do a couple of short trots with them. Nice and easy for them and lets them know the arena is a nice place and they can relax there. Our arena has loads to look at for a horse as there are stables all round it, folks walking round and leading horses etc so it’s good for them to take it all in and be as nosey as they like.
Thomas seemed to approve of everything and enjoyed his wee leg stretch. If we were actually lunging him for more than a 1 min trot, we’d put a lunge cavesson on him, but he’s in an enclosed arena and the point is just to let him have a look in his own time and then a wee trot rather than working him on the lunge. Thomas won’t do much work on the lunge for a start - he’s ginormous and still growing and we don’t work young ones on the lunge much - he’ll do some long reining in walk and lots of hacking initially to build up his muscle behind before he’s ready for any circles/work in arena.

Monday saw Thomas come in to meet Bennachie Equine Vets to have his guttural pouch flush done. We’ve posted before about...
05/06/2026

Monday saw Thomas come in to meet Bennachie Equine Vets to have his guttural pouch flush done. We’ve posted before about our biosecurity processes, but each horse coming into ARC (to stay) does 3 weeks of isolation with temp checks each day and they have a guttural pouch wash early in that isolation period. We have always done tests for strangles - for about 20 years now - initially we did blood tests then we moved to flushing 5 or 6 years ago on vets advice. The point for us is to catch any carriers - as a reasonably sized yard, we’ve always wanted to try to ensure we don’t have any carriers on site and flushing is one part of a bigger biosecurity policy, along with isolation and temperature checking, as well as ensuring liveries and members who visit the centre are well educated on good practice when out and about at different yards or comps. Thomas is up to date with his flu and tetanus vaccines which is great - if he hadn’t been, we’d have started his vaccines at the same time as again it’s policy at ARC that every horse is vaccinated for flu and tetanus.
So Thomas came up to the yard on Monday and went into the wash bay area for his flush as it’s easy to clean and disinfect after. The great team from Bennachie then came, gave Thomas a touch of sedation so it was a nice relaxing process for him and then did the flush. Thomas was a star for it - although we did realise that we maybe need to put our solarium even higher as his ears touch it when he lifts his head up higher 😩😩😩 Thomas results were back by Tues and all negative, so whilst he remains in isolation, if his temperature remains normal, he can come into the arena to start doing some training if there are no other horses in there.
A big thank you to Bennachie Equine vets for making it such a nice process for Thomas. We are always very grateful in the North East of Scotland that we have such great vets and specialists to keep our horses in such good health.
We would expect to pay £300-£400 for a guttural pouch flush - for that we get an experienced, qualified vet that travels to our centre, with all the fancy equipment needed to do the flush, the horse given sedation for it and often the vet also has another member of their team with them to assist, then there is also the “lab” part where the results are tested. So like the vetting and the transport, it’s very good value as far as we’re concerned and most importantly it helps to reduce the risk of our lovely horses getting strangles and all the cost and stress that goes with it.
Thomas will have another appointment with Bennachie Equine Vets in the near future now we know he is negative on the strangles flush - the next appointment is part of our management process for new school horses - feel free to guess below what Thomas might be having done! For those who are interested in the costings, the running total for Thomas so far is:
Purchase: £6500
2 stage vetting: £300-£400
Transport:£300-£400
Guttural flush:£300-£400
But like L’Oréal - he’s definitely worth it 😀

So having had a successful vet check for Thomas, the next step was to pay for him - so we did this the evening of his ve...
04/06/2026

So having had a successful vet check for Thomas, the next step was to pay for him - so we did this the evening of his vet check - 2 days before he was due to travel up to us. We would always make sure funds had been transferred to the seller at least 24 hours before the horse is due to be collected as the seller needs to be assured all funds are received correctly. We’d been down in person to see Thomas, met his owner and were completely comfortable to transfer funds. At this point, Thomas becomes ours and we accept the risk with that - which was easy in this case as Thomas was very well looked after and loved where he was. We got a receipt from the owner for the funds once they were received and we retain this both for our accounts, but also to help with change of ownership in passport if needed.
For transport, we used the brilliant Eric Gillie transport - we normally use Gillies as they are so good at what they do and have regular routes up and down the road. Lots of people assume we’d go and collect a new horse ourselves but we never do for a few reasons. Firstly, ARC doesn’t own transport of any type, secondly we don’t have all the required licenses and certificates to be transporting horses as part of our work and thirdly, Gillies are professionals at this and we want the horses travelling in style and comfort 😀
We’d normally pay £300 -£400 to have a horse transported the distance Thomas travelled and like the vetting, we think it’s an incredibly fair price and money well spent. For that cost, we get a driver who is experienced and qualified to do the job, a lorry for an enormous horse which is designed with horse comfort and safety in mind and all the costs that are associated with running a team of people and lorries to do the job so well - including the ever increasing cost of fuel. So we can sit back and relax knowing that Thomas is in the best hands and will have a great experience being transported up to us, so for us it’s money very well spent.
Thank you Gillies for always providing such a fab service for our horses!
From viewing Thomas on the Thursday, it took 5 days to get vet check and transfer funds (it was a holiday Monday too) and 7 days from first viewing to his arrival at ARC - the process can be a relatively smooth, fast one if you plan ahead and keep everyone involved in the loop. Plus it meant we got to see the fabulous Thomas ears in our fields as soon as possible! Although we may need to add “bigger feed bucket” to his shopping list 😀

So Thomas is having a quiet couple of days in his isolation field having had his strangles guttural pouch flush done on ...
03/06/2026

So Thomas is having a quiet couple of days in his isolation field having had his strangles guttural pouch flush done on Monday which was negative - more on that in another post. So while he’s having a couple of quiet days we can update on the next stages of the process we went through to have Thomas join the ARC team - vettings.
There are lots of opinions, views, experiences and stories about vettings out there - so the caveat to this post is - this is how we do it when buying a horse for ARC - but every buyer and seller is different and has to decide what works best for them. Our view has always been that vettings are money very well spent, but that the key is in understanding what a vetting covers, being honest with the vet about your expectations and future management of the horse and remembering that vettings are to check the horses health that day. Our view has always been that a vetting is one part of the process and that the far bigger factor in future soundness and health is how we manage and ride the horse once the horse arrives.
So we normally have a two stage vetting done on potential school horse purchases, but we advice private buyers that we are supporting to have a five stage vetting done. Most folks assume we do a two stage to save money, but that’s not the case - we do a two stage because by the time we’re having a horse vetted we’re already happy that ridden work and temperament wise the horse is a good match for us. We’re also not vetting a horse for a specific purpose (eg dressage or light hacking etc) as we are in the position that with a wide variety of riders and session types, we can tailor work and management to what the horse needs best for its way of going and physical strengths and weaknesses. So if for example we purchase a horse and it develops arthritis and is advised not to jump, that’s fine with us and we will adapt what the horse does - most private buyers are buying a horse for a specific purpose and a five stage vetting gives a more detailed insight into how the horse performs during and after exercise.
So for us, we want their heart and eyes checked as regardless of how experienced we are, we have no idea of the health of their eyes or heart, plus we want a vet’s opinion on how the horse moves, how it responds to flexión tests and the vet is best placed and qualified to give the horse a really good once over looking at skin, feet and everything else in between.
We are very realistic about vettings - vets don’t have a crystal ball - they can only assess what is in front of them that day, so once a horse is vetted and the report is good, we don’t make any assumptions that the horse will remain healthy because the horse was vetted. The minute that we transfer funds to buy the horse, it’s soundness, healthcare management and all other management becomes our responsibility - so if a horse goes lame a week after they arrive, we would look at management/what had changed and start to investigate - we’d not assume there was something missed on the vetting - it is on that day only and horses have an amazing ability to develop weird and wonderful conditions!
As Thomas was out of our area, we asked a good friend from that area which vet they used and they gave us Rowley Mile Equine contact details. So we called and booked the vetting whilst we were at the viewing with Thomas owner - we always try to book a vetting while we’re at the viewing as it lets the owner know we are keen to proceed with purchasing the horse and it also means the owner can give the vet the address/directions to where the horse is kept and going to be vetted.
We had great service from Rowley Mile - from booking the vetting which was really smooth, through to the vet calling prior to the vetting to check through what we wanted and then great service calling back after the vetting to let us know all the detail in the vet report.
We normally pay between £300 and £400 for a two stage vetting which we think is fairly exceptional value. For that price we get a professional with years of training and qualification, to drive to wherever the horse is kept with all the expensive equipment they need, to spend an hour plus looking over the horse in great detail and giving us their professional opinion, plus them carrying out thorough trot ups/flexión tests etc and let’s not forget there is risk associated with handling horse’s legs that you don’t know - then there is the fact they are fully insured as a professional for the task and also carry out continued CPD. So no one will ever hear us moaning about the cost of a vetting - it’s a very small amount compared to the cost of purchasing a horse and managing that horse going forwards and it is money well spent - we have had health conditions picked up in vettings that we’d never have been aware of - it doesnt always mean we don’t buy the horse - it often means we buy the horse, but have a plan in place for management/ongoing healthcare.
So a big thank you to Rowley Mile Equine for their excellent service and assistance in the process of buying Thomas and a big thank you to all the equine vets who are out there working hard doing vettings to help us make the right choices by our horses.

So Thomas is in the “holding” pen for an hour or so as he’s waiting for his 12pm appointment with the vet when he’ll hav...
01/06/2026

So Thomas is in the “holding” pen for an hour or so as he’s waiting for his 12pm appointment with the vet when he’ll have a biosecurity check done before heading back to his isolation field, but as promised, some info and costs relating to a new horse!
Thomas cost £6500 to buy - his price was on his advert, so it’s not confidential - we tend to be very transparent about costs at ARC, but we don’t normally disclose purchase price of horses as that is information that involves the seller too, but as lots of folks saw Thomas ad with the price on it, it’s not confidential.
There is lots of discussion about horse prices out there - from the view (normally from buyers) that horses are overpriced, to the view (normally from producers/sellers) that folks want horses for unrealistically cheap prices. Our view has always been that horses were underpriced for too long - a well produced, nice to ride, well mannered horse who is over the age of 5 has had a lot of money and time invested - current prices are likely a better reflection of the value of horses and at the end of the day, a horse is worth what someone is willing to pay for it. When we are considering viewing a horse, we consider the asking price and whether we think the horse is fairly priced for its individual situation - this includes age, health, temperament and everything else that’s to be considered with a horse. If we think the horse is over priced, we will either ask if the seller is open to negotiations or we simply won’t go and view the horse - what we would never do is go and view a horse that was out of budget or we felt was over priced without having a conversation first about whether the price was negotiable and by how much.
Surprisingly to many, we then very rarely barter or negotiate once we’ve viewed the horse - because by the time we view the horse, we should be happy with the price if the horse is as described. If the horse isn’t suitable or as described, then we wouldn’t be buying the horse so we don’t tend to negotiate once we’ve decided we want the horse - we tend to agree to purchase at that price subject to a vet check. The vet check occasionally brings a situation where we will ask the owner if they’d be willing to accept a reduced price - this would be if the horse was found to have a condition which we would need to treat asap - in which case we’d ask the owner to consider reducing the price by roughly the cost of the treatment - this happens very rarely, but there are some things that may come up in a vet check which mean we still think the horse would be suitable, but that we need to consider the cost of treatment etc. We don’t insure our horses for vets fees (too many to make it financially sensible) so we can be a bit more flexible around vet reports and consider whether we can manage any conditions.
So Thomas was a fair price and relatively cheap for a big horse - for a few reasons - his owner wanted the right type of home for him and a smooth process of selling, he’s quite green - has done mainly slower hacking and he will need a fair bit of training once he’s fully grown and strengthened up with more hacking. He’s also enormous so whilst he’s great for taller riders, he would have a limited market of purchasers who wanted a horse that size. So we thought Thomas price was very fair, found his owner very genuine and were happy to pay that for him.
Thomas came with a bridle, couple of rugs, a headcollar and his saddle, but we told his owner to keep his saddle as whilst it was a lovely saddle which was fitted to Thomas, it’s not a type we use in the riding school and Thomas will change shape quite a bit over the next few months and then have a saddle fitted at ours. So it was far better that his owner keep his saddle in case they get another horse or so they can sell it on to reflect the fair price they sold Thomas for - there would be no point in us taking the saddle just because it was part of the purchase price and we wanted to recognise how grateful we were that Thomas owner was easy to deal with.
Before everyone gets excited and thinks they can go out and buy a Thomas for a private home at that kind of price, Thomas is a long way from the finished article. He’s a lovely big guy, but he’s about to cost us a lot more in food, field space, equipment, preventative healthcare and most importantly - training time. One of our senior staff will be working with Thomas most days and building his knowledge and physical strength and there is a fairly high cost associated with that. In posting about Thomas and his progress and costs, we would hope to help prospective horse buyers understand the time and cost that goes into producing a nice well mannered horse, but also the work that goes into producing and training a horse who will one day hopefully be ready to help lots of riders learn in the riding school. In our next post we’ll cover vettings and transport and how we do it with new horses - including rough costs.

Thursday was an exciting day at ARC with the arrival of a new equine team member - Thomas 😍😍Sally saw an advert for Thom...
31/05/2026

Thursday was an exciting day at ARC with the arrival of a new equine team member - Thomas 😍😍
Sally saw an advert for Thomas pop up on social media last week and the pic of his head was enough for her to get up early on her day off the next day and drive 3 hours down to the Borders to see him 😀 Why a pic of his head? Well Sally thinks you can tell a lot about a horse from their eye and Thomas had a particularly kind eye and looked a happy chap. Plus he had ginormous ears and every horse that Sally has met with ginormous ears has been a great horse - so whilst she still needed to see Thomas in the flesh to assess whether he’d be suitable to join our team, she was pretty confident those ears and eyes would fit in!
Thomas is an 18hh (ish and still growing) 6 year old Irish draft and when Sally went down and met his lovely owner, it was obvious that Thomas was very loved and that his owner wanted to get the best home for Thomas to continue to thrive in in the future. His owner was unable to ride Thomas as much as they’d hoped and wanted Thomas to go somewhere he could continue learning and be with people who were experienced in working with horses of Thomas size. So it seemed a good match for Thomas to come to ARC and Sally agreed to buy him subject to a vet check.
Thomas arrived on Thursday last week and went down to his isolation field for a few days to chill out and be admired by everyone from a distance (he’s so tall we can see him from any point on the farm 😀). Sally has been checking his temperature each day (part of our biosecurity process) and he’s very much enjoyed getting factor 50 on his big nose and getting lots of fly spray on. He’s been getting small mash feeds to ensure he’s drinking plenty and some haylage each day alongside his grass as grass sickness is always a big concern for owners at this time of year, particularly when a horse has moved areas, so we do everything that’s advised whilst he’s settling in to reduce the risk, but as we know, it’s always a risk that’s present regardless of how well you try to manage horses.
We are going to be documenting Thomas progress as he goes through isolation and initial training and we’re also going to take the unusual step of providing rough costs for everything from purchase to transport and vet checks - the reason we’ve decided to do this is to help potential horse owners know what steps we take with a new, young horse and what’s involved, but also so people understand the costs involved in buying, producing and managing horses for a riding centre, or any business that has horses.
A huge thank you to Thomas owner for deciding ARC was a good home for Thomas and for giving him a good start to his ridden work - he is a credit to you.
More posts about Thomas to follow!

It was a big day for Madge yesterday when she did her first lesson - Madge has been working with Sally for the last 6 mo...
26/05/2026

It was a big day for Madge yesterday when she did her first lesson - Madge has been working with Sally for the last 6 months to build up her experience prior to starting to be ridden by some of our members. So yesterday she did her first session with a member - an individual lesson with a more advanced member working on how to work with a younger/greener horse. Madge was super and enjoyed herself very much!
Whilst her initial training with Sally is now pretty much done, she will continue to work with our staff team to keep building her knowledge and experience whilst also doing some individual sessions with our more advanced members as it takes a long time to ensure a horse has enough solid training and experience to enjoy and flourish in the riding centre.
We’d always planned to hog Madge as she has really grown into herself in last few months and has lovely neck conformation, plus she gets hot as she has such a thick mane - so yesterday was her first proper haircut too - she likes the clippers though as Sally did a bit of clipping with her over winter. For the purists who like their forelock hogged too - we keep them on most of ours as it helps keep the flies out of their eyes in spring and summer.
Well done Madge 😍😍😍

Great to see some of the young riders from Deeside Pony Club on Fri when they came along for some lessons on “Murphy” to...
24/05/2026

Great to see some of the young riders from Deeside Pony Club on Fri when they came along for some lessons on “Murphy” to help them prepare for upcoming P Club tests

We are on the lookout for new members of our equine team if anyone knows of any or can share this post to get the word o...
16/05/2026

We are on the lookout for new members of our equine team if anyone knows of any or can share this post to get the word out.
Our equine team are a hugely mixed bunch with every type from small first ridden type ponies through to bigger weight carriers and ex competition horses and we are looking for pretty much any type, but need 15.2 -16.2hh most (although we’re not averse to bigger giant horses 😀)
Our current equine team come from a variety of backgrounds - we have older ex livery ponies who we took on to ensure they got to stay at ARC, some from performance sales in Ireland, some from local private homes and some from commercial UK sellers - we’re always happy to consider horses from any walk of life.
To join our team, horses and ponies must be:
Sound and fit for their level of work - we have a huge range of participants so are happy to consider horses that no longer jump or have manageable medical conditions - we have horses that only walk and trot with novice participants or RDA through to horses that need and enjoy faster or more advanced work.
Over 6 years old - whilst we fully understand you get great, sensible 5 year olds, we think they need a bit of life experience first before being able to help our participants.
Backed with a history of being ridden.

What we offer:
A great home for life with really experienced staff to care for them - we don’t sell or pass on horses - we never have. Our view is once they come to us, we have a responsibility to them for the rest of their days and we keep them in retirement.
Great healthcare and management with really good vets, farrier’s and a whole team to support their individual requirements.
Management tailored for the horse - 24/7 turnout, stabled overnight with day turnout, laminitic management - we can accommodate most things but we want all our horses to have a minimum of full day turnout as them having downtime in field is very important to us.
Easy to deal with - we will ask for some videos of the horse, come and view the horse and have a vet check their heart/eyes etc and then we will purchase or take ownership of the horse or pony.
Always happy for ex owners to come and visit - we have an open doors policy for previous owners to come and see them.
We are happy to buy horses or take on older horses or horses with management conditions where the owner is looking for a secure home for life for them. However we are a not for profit club and try to utilise as much of our funds as possible making horses accessible to everyone, so we only consider horses that are realistically priced - but we are realistic with value.
Our current equine team would all fully recommend as they love their home and routine as we’re sure would previous owners.
If you have or know of anything do please let us know by email - [email protected]

15/05/2026

A big day for Gemima (piebald) this week when she was able to get back out into the field with her pal Holly. Gemima is an older girl - around 20 years old and she went lame behind before Xmas. So Bennachie Equine Vets came out to scan and xray Gemima and she was found to have a soft tissue injury and some additional age related x ray findings.
The ideal treatment for Gemima was box rest and whilst we try to avoid box rest for a lot of our horses as they love their field time, Gemima is very happy either in her stable or in the field so we knew she would be a good patient for box rest. She has pals next door to her and they can interact through the stable bars, plus Gemima is very well behaved so was trusted to be walked a few metres to her friend Holly so they could groom each other most days.
Following some in hand walking, this week marked time for Gemima to be turned out again. Turning out after 3 months box rest can bring its own challenges but we find the best way is often to have the vet sedate them slightly and turn them out with a trusted quiet friend - that way they don’t tend to gallop or over exert themselves. Gemima was again the ideal patient - she went out, spent most of her time grooming Holly and has been as quiet as a lamb for the following days turnout so she is now happily back in her routine and will do a few weeks building up in the field before starting some light walk work with smaller riders.
Gemima has been a brilliant school pony so our view has always been that if she doesn’t come fully sound or able to do ridden work again that’s fine - long as she is happy and comfy and can enjoy some turnout, she can enjoy her retirement and do groundwork/grooming sessions and if she comes sound, great - she can do some walkies and RDA again. Whatever our wee Gemoomoo wants she gets 😀

Address

Nether Anguston Farm
Peterculter
AB140PN

Opening Hours

Monday 8am - 8:30pm
Tuesday 8am - 8pm
Wednesday 8am - 8:30pm
Thursday 8am - 8pm
Saturday 8am - 5pm
Sunday 8am - 4:30pm

Telephone

+441224733111

Website

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