Tour Scotland Photograph Skewbald Shetland Pony

Tour Scotland photograph of a Skewbald Shetland Pony on the Shetland Islands, Scotland. Shetlands can be almost every colour, including skewbald and piebald, called pinto in the United States, but are mainly black, chestnut, bay, grey, palomino, dun, roan, cremello, and silver dapple. Shetland ponies were first used for pulling carts, carrying peat, coal and other items, and plowing farm land. Then, as the Industrial Revolution increased the need for coal in the mid 19th century, thousands of Shetland ponies traveled to mainland Britain to be pit ponies, working underground hauling coal, often for their entire, often very short, lives. Coal mines in the eastern United States also imported some of these animals. The last pony mine in the United States closed in 1971.



All photographs are copyright of Sandy Stevenson, Tour Scotland, and may not be used without permission.

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