IN reply to the letter headed 'Horses for courses,' I would like to suggest that the lady who wrote it check her facts, before trying to ostracise a group who started riding as young girls in 1967.

Miss Cynthia Cresswell started a riding school that year and ran it through to 1979. in 1980 she published a book called 'Ponies In The Forest.' Lots of these girls went on to become mothers and grandmothers and still ride in the Forest today – where they are allowed that is.

As for the remark about the damage to the soft, natural paths, I think they can only benefit from the odd gift of free manure. This will leach in to the adjacent ground enriching the edge of the woodland, unlike the damage that the boar cause.?This is far worse and they give nothing back.

The Forest is and always has been a working forest. For hundreds of years horses were used to extract timber from the deepest recesses.

I see you suggest riders should stick to gravel paths. I wonder how you and your friends would react, if it were suggested that you should stay out of woods and stick to these calping laid roads? Not well, I think.

I believe that when a group of people set out to victimise another group it is a sad day for freedom. How many of the people who nagged and cajoled the Forestry into taking this action were actually born in the Forest of Dean? Not many I think.

I am not a horsey person and I am an ex townie who moved here 33 years ago. By doing so I accepted the customs and practises of the area.

I also think that a great deal is owed to the horse sector who put so much money into the local economy – vets, farriers, equine dentists and animal supply shops benefiting from this expensive hobby.

I cannot understand how after the driest year on record there's a problem with the ground.

On a lighter note may I be so bold as to suggest that if you and your unhappy group of horse-hating friends dislike them so much, you move to France where they still eat horsemeat.

– A numble poet.