Pony Penning Week 2019 - Updated Activities Schedule

Pony Penning Week is fast approaching, and a lot of people are getting excited.  The week (actually 9 nights and 7 days) of activities, can actually start being counted on Friday night, July 19th, with the evening opening of the Chincoteague Volunteer Fire Company's Carnival, and ends with the closing of the Carnival on Saturday night/Sunday morning of July 27th.
   On Saturday, the 20th of July, there is a slight change this year:  the round-up of the herds in the Southern compartment used to begin in the afternoon; this year it is scheduled to begin at 7 a.m. (This has already brought some complaints from people who will be in transit that morning - but there is plenty to see and do the entire week.)  There are currently three groups in the south - Riptide's herd, the Don Leonard Stud II's herd, and the group of yearlings that are the 2018 Buy Back ponies.  Once the ponies are rounded up, they can be viewed at the main corrals on Beach Road on Assateague Island in the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge.  The Carnival is open Saturday night.

(2013)

   Sunday morning, the herds in the Northern compartment will be rounded up and gathered together.  I believe that the bus seats have all been sold out, so if you wish to see the herds in the northern holding corral, you will need to hike 2.5 miles north up the Service Road off  of the Wildlife Loop.  This is not a road open to personal vehicles.  You will have to walk there, and walk back.  Take lots of water for hydration and lots of insect repellent, if you choose to walk.
   Monday morning, 22 July, at dawn, the Saltwater Cowboys will move the northern herds east across Assateague to the Atlantic surf.  There, the ponies will be herded south along the beach to the CNWR/Assateague National Seashore parking lot, and then west along Beach Road to the main corrals, where the southern herds are gathered.

(2011)

   Monday afternoon and Tuesday, the herds will be in the main corrals.  The veterinarians on call, with their vet technicians, will check each and every pony for fitness.  The foals' blood will be drawn for Coggins' testing (so new owners can transport the babies across state lines later in the week).  The vets will decided which ponies are too young, too old, or in such condition as to warrant a trailer ride to the Chincoteague  Carnival Grounds instead of swimming.  (Unci, an older mare with a swayback due to a genetic condition, is usually trailered over, along with very pregnant mares, or those with cuts, scrapes, or other things indicating transport versus swimming.)  This is a great time and place to take photos - however, the board fencing can make photography difficult.  If you have a step-stool or a short ladder, you might wish to take it along for good photos with fencing in the view.

(Riptide & Ajax)

   Wednesday morning, 24 July, is the actual Pony Swim Day.  I have heard that it will occur between 8:30 and 10:30 that morning - but the time is always subject to change.  The ponies swim when the US Coast Guard declares the tide running between the islands is "slack" - when it is not moving north or south, when it can carry the ponies away.  The time of slack tide can be influenced by local storms. Some people are at the swim area by 5 a.m., others arrive later.  It is very hot and humid beside the Assateague Channel, and there are quite a few cases of heat exhaustion each year in the crowds along the Channel.  Please take plenty of water to hydrate everyone in your party... 
   The Swim itself takes about 3 minutes from the time a pony enters the water from Assateague until it stands on solid ground on Chincoteague.  The first foal to reach Chincoteague is declared King or Queen Neptune (depending on gender) and is raffled off in a drawing.  Tickets are being sold now, and will be sold up until an hour before the actual drawing.
   Once all ponies are ashore on Chincoteague, and King or Queen Neptune has been marked, the ponies are given a 45 to 60 minute rest period.  Then the Saltwater Cowboys herd them along Beebe Road and the north on Main Street to the Carnival Grounds - the Pony Penning Parade on Main Street.  The Pony Committee of the CVFC will decide the choices of sexes for replacement breeding stock needed on the island due to deaths and illnesses. The Pony Committee members, along with the vets, will have been looking at the foals and evaluating bloodlines, conformation and coloring, and they will choose the foals to be designated as Buy Backs on those criteria.  The Carnival will open about 90 minutes after the ponies are in the pens on Main Street, and will stay open until 11.

   The Pony Auction begins at 8 o'clock on Thursday, 25 July, with foals being sold to the highest bidder.  Payment to the CVFC in the amount of the winning bid, must be paid in cash, with Travelers' Checks, or through a Visa or Mastercard payment.  No other types of payment are accepted.  Most foals will travel to new (hopefully, "forever") homes, but the designated Buy Backs stay on the islands.  If you purchase a designated Buy Back pony, you receive a tax write-off for the amount of purchase, as you are essentially giving your money to the CVFC for the naming of the foal.  The CVFC will maintain the foal throughout it's life and will be able to sell any foals that pony produces as it grows older.
   If you purchase a pony to take home with you, you will receive a sales receipt,  a veterinary report, and a care booklet, plus other donated "goodies" (these change from year to year).  You are expected to provide approved transportation from the Carnival Grounds by noon on Saturday, 27 July.  If the foal you purchase is too young to separate from it's mother, you must return in October for the Fall Round-Up and have transportation for your foal at that time.   The Carnival will be open Thursday afternoon and evening.

   On Friday, 26 July, the ponies living in the southern compartment will make the return swim from Chincoteague back to Assateague on the morning's slack tide.  The expected swim time for Friday is announced Thursday night at the Carnival.   Ponies from the north end will be trailered back to Assateague during the day.  The Carnival is open Friday night.

   The Carnival will be open the evening of Saturday the 27th of July, and drawings for all of the raffles will occur just before closing.   
   And Chincoteague can settle back into it's usual summertime routine once again.
 

Fifty-four Chincoteague Pony Foals So Far.... And Pony Penning Week Information

The annual Pony Penning on Assateague and Chincoteague Islands in Virginia will happen during the week of July 20th through the 27th this year.  The Chincoteague Firemen's Carnival will be open  every night except Sunday; and will be open on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons.  On Saturday, the 20th of July, the Saltwater Cowboys of the Chincoteague Volunteer Fire Company (who is the owner of the ponies on Assateague Island in Virginia) will round up the herds located in the southern compartment of the island and take them to the main holding corrals along Beach Road.
  On Sunday, the Cowboys will round up the herds in the northern compartment, and deliver them to the north holding corral, about 2 miles north of the Wildlife Drive Loop, on the service road. Monday morning, at dawn, the ponies will be herded across the island to the Atlantic ocean beach, and walked down the beach, next to the surf, to the main parking lot and on down the Beach Road to the southern holding corrals.  On Tuesday, all of the ponies will be checked by the veterinarians.  Foals will have blood drawn for their Coggins tests so they can be transported out of state.  Any pony deemed too old, too pregnant, too young, too ill, or with any other mitigating problem, will be taken by trailer to the Carnival Grounds on Chincoteague.  (Unci, an older mare with congenital lordosis - causing a swayback - is routinely trailered over.)
   Wednesday morning, at slack tide, the ponies deemed fit by the veterinarians will swim the Assateague Channel between the two islands.  The crossing is about 1/8 of a mile, and the tide will not be running in either direction.  The swim usually takes less than 3 minutes, and the ponies are closely monitored by the US Coast Guard, the veterinarians, and members of the CVFC.  After resting from the swim, the ponies are herded along Beebe Road and then north on Main Street to the Carnival Grounds, where pasture, hay and water troughs await them.
   On Thursday morning, at 8 o'clock, the auction of the foals born up until that moment, are sold to the highest bidder.  Most will be leaving the island for the rest of their lives.  A few will be designated as "Buy Back" foals; these foals will not leave the two islands.  A person or group may bid on and purchase a Buy Back baby; they will have the right to name the foal and have their photo taken with it - but the foal will live out it's life on Assateague (with 3 days on Chincoteague each year) and all of that pony's progeny will belong to the CVFC for selling in future years.  (I purchased a pony in 2015; she had her first foal this year and the filly will be sold on Thursday, 25 July.)  If the foal is too young to be taken from it's mother, the new owner must return for the Fall Round-Up and pick up that foal.  Any foals born after Pony Penning are usually sold at the Fall Round-Up; this past year the foals were sold by a silent auction mail-in bidding system.
   On Friday morning, or early afternoon, again at slack tide, the southern herds are taken back to the Channel to swim back to Assateague.  Originally all the ponies of both the north and south compartments would make the return swim.  Since the CVFC, the National Park Service and the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge do not want any pony fatalities caused by crossing Beach Road, the northern herds are now trailered back to the northern end of Assateague (in Virginia) and released.
   *****   We have had fifty-four foals born so far, with only one fatality.  Kimball's Rainbow Delight was seen with a foal at her side on 19 May.  They were seen from a distance, and a photo was taken.  To me, the foal looked to be chestnut, but a few other people think it was palomino.  The foal hasn't been seen since that day, and Rainbow Delight was at the third equine pythiosis (aka "Swamp Cancer") vaccination without a baby.  So we seem to have lost it to unknown causes.
   Of the 53 foals living, there are 23 fillies and 30 colts.  There are 10 bay babies, 3 buckskin babies, 5 chestnut babies, 3 palomino babies, and there are 5 babies that other folks believe will be black.  I think there are definitely 2 black babies - but I'm not sure how the other 3 will shed out, once they lose their baby fur.  They might be black, a dark bay or brown, or possibly a dark, smoky buckskin... only time will prove the real coloration.  There are also multiple pinto babies - 1 buckskin pinto, 1 black pinto, 5 palomino pintos (one of them a perlino/cream with blue eyes), 9 chestnut pintos and 12 bay pintos.  DSC Photography has classified one of the bay pintos as a chestnut pinto, but the end of the foals' tail is black, not chestnut, so it is technically a bay.)
  How many more babies will be born before Pony Penning?  How many during and after?  Again, we can only wait and see...