Roughly 30 years ago the Karratha & King Bay Horse & Pony Club (K&KBH&PC) was established.
The club was in charge of the following:
- Manage agistment centre - at the time behind the golf course, roughly 15 years ago moved to current location on Robins Road.
- Run events
Current Situation
In 2006 the K&KBH&PC voted at an AGM to split the club into the following:
Karratha & King Bay Horse & Pony Club - Runs all events, pony club, adult riding and any other event type activity.
Karratha Agistment Center (KAC) - To manage the agistment centre
Karratha & King Bay Horse & Pony Club - Aimee Troy 0417804578
Karratha Agistment Centre - Aimee-Lee Hollemans 0438 896 374
The main reason behind the change was that the club was in a situation where not everyone in the agistment centre was interested in events and with the huge task of organising these events the committee never got around to doing improvements in the club. This freed up the agistment centre committee to solely look at the agistment center issues and facilities and not have to worry about horse riding related activities.
The Karratha Agistment Centre manages and has ownership of the following:
- Main Lease - Shire Contacts
- Dampier Stables
- Main Arena - with some jumps, dressage arena and shed
- Shed and Donda - conjunction with K&KBH&PC whom store theif stuff there
- Crush and Measuring Bay
- Club block - still to be developed
- Roads
- Main Gate
The Karratha & King Bay Horse and Pony Club manages and has ownership of the following:
- 1 full set of show jumps
- Portable Dressage arena
- Trailer with large toolbox
- Donga in which they hold pony club activities
Karratha
Karratha has 21 lots of land. These lots are managed by the Karratha Agistment Centre and leased through the shire.
The club has a block of land yet to be developed for short term agistment.
The Karratha Lease is a Shire of Roebourne lease. The Club leases that land for ~$5.00 a year and manages that lease in accordance with the land management plan, constitution and SOR lease.
Block horse have exclusive use of the land allocated and own the buildings, fences etc on top of their specified lot.
Block can be on sold for the improvements made to the facilities.
All facilities are to be club and shire approved priod to commencement of building.
Dampier
The Karratha Agistment Centre also manages the stables in Dampier.
The Lease at Dampier is between Karratha Agistment Centre and Riotinto Iron Ore (Pilbara Iron)
Dampier has 5 lots as per plan
Rules associated are the same as Karratha.
The Club does have stables with no runs available for people that need them for short term (less than a week) for emergencies etc.
All contact on these stables should be made to the Karratha Agistment Centre.
Currently Dampier has no vacancies.
- Contact a club member
- Be put onto an executive member
- Receive a new member pack
- Information on any yards for sale etc
- If there are no yards for available purchase, formally write to the club to be put on the club wait list for land or yards for sale.
- Once the letter is received, the letter will be tabled at the next club meeting and you will be put on the waitlist.
- If a yard comes on the market it will be offered to the waitlist in the relevant order.
- If you are offered a yard, you have the right to nedotiate with the person selling.
All persons that are looking to hold a yard at Dampier or Karratha must be financial members of the Karratha Agistment Centre.
- Obtain a New membership pack from the club (contains Constitution, Rules and REgs of the club, Membership form and Land Management Plan)
- Complete new membership form and deliver/post back to Treasurer
- Your membership is not accepted until it is pasted at a meeting.
- Membership application taken to the next meeting and tabled for acceptance
- Once membership is past, full membership rights are granted
Signing a membership form constitutes that you agree to the
- Rules and Regs of the club
-Constitution
- Land Management Plan - for those block holders
Failure to comply with those result in club penalties that apply.
The Karratha Agistment Centre offers riding facilities at both Karratha and Dampoer. Karratha has a large work area which includes:
- 60 x 20 dressage arena
- Show jump area with jump poles with soft beach sand
- There is plenty of country around the area for trail riding etc
- 2km trip to a beach. Not great for swimming but good for trail rides or fitness work
Dampier is in close proximity to the beach and also has a 40 x 20 work arena.
Beach Riding
There are a number of beaches that horses can use in the region. Depending on the tides decides which location we go to. Karratha is close to a beach that is good for fitness work, however if you stable in Karratha you would need to float to a swimming beach. Dampier is on the foreshore of Dampier's main swimming beach.
Pony Club
The club is the only active pony club north of Exmouth. With a number of instructors the club also includes visiting instructors from Perth to make sure the riders have access to top level instruction.
Pony Club meets once a month between the months of April and October.
In 2009 The Karratha & King Bay Horse & Pony Club is hoping to hold Adult Riding under its EFA affiliation. This will include similar set to Pony Club with lessons and horsemastership and access to visiting instructors.
Events
The Karratha & King Bay Horse & Pony Club is in charge of organising events around the Karratha area.
In 2009 Karratha & King Bay Horse & Pony Club will be affiliated with the EFA. Numbers are low in the region for shows however the club will have a calendar available soon. With the events that the club hopes to hold
FeNaCLING - Karratha's local Ad Show is held on the first weekend of August. This normally comprises of Hacking, Dressage, Showjumping, Games or Stockhorse events.
North West Horse of the Year - Is held in partnership with Port Hedland, it will be held next in Karratha in 2010.
Karratha has a small and large animal clinic in town. They also treat ponies and horses with various injuries or illness. You can take your horse to them or they will travel to you.
If for some reason they can not treat your horse they will recomment the next best option.
Contact number for the Karratha Vet Hospital is 08 9185 1600
Karratha does not have a local Farrier or Dentist
However the Karratha Agistment Centre is a way that someone within the club can arrance travelling professionals to visit the area.
There are farriers and a dentist available in Port Hedland 200kms away.
If this position is to change at all with the transit population we have in Karratha contact details will be updated on the website.
There is a number of options available:
- Local
A&P Transport in the light industrial sell some horse feed - 91442044
Poinciana Nursery is owned by local horse enthuses and are now selling some stock feed, you can contact them on 91444029
- Purchase in Perth and Freight Up
The other option some people follow is to purchase their own feed most of the time in or around Perth and have it freighted up. Star Freight will bring it to the Karratha depot for $10 an item. In which case people generally do a bulk buy of feed to keep cost down on freight.