Hello this is L.A Vaught you probably know me from my much more famous work, “L.A Vaught’s Practical Character Reader.” A delightful work on how to judge how trustworthy your indo irish bondsman is by the shape of their silenial brow. Seeing as both the Indo irishman of the approbative type and fluffies are quasi animals I figured that I might as well branch out into fluffy Husbandry as well. This guide will show you how to raise, healthy, happy and most importantly well mannered furb alls for joy, profit or food. First things first preparation.
Prepping a safe room
It’s a common misconception that fluffies are all born with glass bones and paper skin which accounts for their high mortality rate. This is in fact not true at all, fluffies are about as durable as any other mammal their size and may be a little hardier actually. No the reason fluffies tend to have a short shelf life is due to the fact that fluffies are very curious and have no survival instincts besides fleeing things they see as "scary."until or they learned to fear through teaching or experience. Most of a fluffies instinctive responses are made so that they play nice with other fluffies, learn new words and act sweet and endearing towards humans. If they were naturally skittish or careful they’d be less inclined to play with and hug their owners which is basically the thing seperates them from a guinea pig genetically engineered for a blue coat.
While the saferoom is optimal simply making a decent sized pen for them to hang out in will usually suffice. Similarly it may actually be preferable as it allows you to keep an on eye on them while working assuming you don’t find their babble too distracting. Similarly if they are potty trained a litterbox and semi frequent walks will suffice it is best to avoid hard to clean rugs in case of any unhappy accidents. Similarly hardwood tends to not feel comfortable on their paw pads which for some strange reason people refer to as hooves. A good way to deal with both issues is getting a modular foam tile floor which will both be soft and warm and very easy to clean up.
In terms of bedding while many people will either get them a dog or catbed most fluffies actually prefer a blanket and pillow pile called a “nestie” which they will adorably burrow into. This is especially advantageous as this nest can be a safe place for them to go in case they get scared or nervous when you aren’t around, or on a rare occasion want to be alone. This is not to say a dog bed isn’t a good base for a nest simply that it is insufficient. What should not be used is a cardboard box assuming you want to use the sorry box punishment.
Toys should be simple and easy to use allowing for the fluffy to play with them when you aren’t there. These can be blocks, balls, cat toys, baby toys, stuffed animals, or really anything too big for the fluffy to choke on and not very sharp. Unlimited access to electronic or musical toys can be good but really shouldn’t be with them all the time, I’ll go into that later. Finally due to all fluffies innate fear of the dark getting a nightlight is a really, really really good idea. It’s best to get simple monochromatic ones as bright multicolored ones may distract them. Finally assuming that you do get a pen instead of a room make sure the gate is locked securely unless you want to fluffy proof your whole house.
Feeding
Most kibble will suffice, though sadly the more expensive it is the healthier it tends to be. Feeding should be done at very specific times and preferably be prefixed by a constant stimulus. This part is very important so your fluffies do not constantly pester you about what time they get to eat. Similarly you should feed your fluffies in a very specific place just so you really can drill in that feeding time isn’t whenever they want it to be. For bowl materials most dog or cat bowls will suffice and make sure to refill water constantly until bedtime. On the off chance your fluffy pony drowns in it’s water dish it probably wasn’t going to last very long anyways.
In terms of food anything with lots of complex carbs is good. Fluffies actually have quite a bit of computing capability and energy and need near constant power giving them quite a sweet tooth. While the need for constant neural spikes required for cognition requires a decent salt and potassium intake. The reason you shouldn’t give them candy is that simple carbs burn very very quickly and won’t keep them energized and running for the day. This is in fact why quite a few of them love spaghetti as it’s soft, salty, filled with complex carbs and easy to digest. As for potassium intake in case your fluffy seems particularly sluggish a good suppliment this is some bananas with their meal or as a snack.
Foals
Now let’s start with foals, everyone loves foals whether it’s a fluffy mother begging to have them or a Japanese investor looking for that perfect fried appetizer to order for their next big meeting!
The problem is like any mammalian young fluffy foals are actually quite a bit of hassle. Despite the name fluffy “pony” fluffies have almost zero horse DNA with the few small bits mostly being dedicated to mane and tail hair growth. Most of the actual genetic material comes from various new world Rodents including the Chinchilla and lesser Capybara as well as a decent spattering of human. All of which unlike horses, are species that produce relatively helpless and vulnerable young which need at least a decent amount of supervision and care until they reach the weanling stage. I will be going over two scenarios, foals with parents or foals without parents. Assuming the parents are ferals and or strongly falling into poopie/dummeh/bestes dichotomy and you don’t want that please skip the first section and check out the foals without parents section.
Foals With Parents
The average first time fluffy Mummah, while usually loving is by no means very competent with many seeing it as a sort of game or way to acquire new friends or even toys. While there are a few instincts fluffies have like hugging their young, singing to them, nursing them and licking them clean many of the other behaviors aren’t instinctual at all and must be taught. This is because pregnant Dams were intended to be sold as specialty items with kits as most fluffies were intended to be sold fixed. The intention would have been that the owners would have gotten to be just as involved in raising the adorable babies as the mother itself, if not more so. While taking away any risk that the mother would become overprotective and snap at the humans. If you have any experience around pregnant or fluffies this has upsides and downsides.
The pregnancy itself isn’t going to be that problematic assuming that the mare has easy access to food, water and a litterbox in their relatively immobile state. A few might be upset that they are less mobile and can’t play as much but many will be too overjoyed at the fact they will be giving birth to really care. If they have a special friend or attendant mare, they will most likely try to keep themselves occupied tending to the mother as while babbehs are supposedly “mostest impowtant ting!” they still want to feel involved in the process. A good way to deal with this is to have the other fluffy either construct a blanket nest for the dam, or push her around in case she turns completely immobile. If this doesn’t prove enough work and the fluffy is particularly stir crazy come up with useless dig a hole fill a hole tasks to for them to do. Chances are as long as the dam is tangentially related they will believe they are helping.
If you want to condition against the poopie babbeh response the good news is that it actually isn’t programmed in. The reason fluffies have such a wide range of colors is due to Hasbio wanting to have modular design in case new ponies were ever added to the show, while some of the combos are more unfortunate than others color rejection is not actually programmed on an instinctual level. The reason why this phenomena occurred is due to accidental pavlovian conditioning and association. Fluffies unlike most animals have very little survival instinct with most of it being geared towards speech and play, however to increase interactivity and allow vocabulary growth fluffies are quite good at associative learning. The particular conditioning that lead to this was actually completely unintentional. Due to their childlike demeanor, and family friendly intent fluffies tended to be kept in rooms suited to the aesthetic tastes of human children which of course meant lots of sickeningly bright colors and toys in various unnatural shades. Of course the one color that was usually missing from this was brown, meaning the only association many fluffies had with it was their own feces. Studies have actually shown that if raised in environments absent of red besides blood fluffies will instinctively fear their red foals and try to kill them, something that is quite rare in unconditioned fluffies. This can be alleviated by giving them positive experiences with either brown fluffies or brown objects from a young age and giving a lonely foal a brown teddy bear can work wonders. Most fluffies from non mill breeders will do this so if you aren’t picking up a feral or a mill fluffy this shouldn’t be a problem. If you are and she follows the poopie babbeh stereotype, try conditioning her first while pregnant and if not then give up, terrifying her into loving her children won’t work no matter how much you try. Similarly if you want to make sure she doesn’t get attached to a color just bombard her with negative stimuluses associated with that color. 9 times out of ten this will work assuming she isn’t that color herself.
Fluffy pregnancies tend to last around 3 to four months not a few weeks as people on the internet will have you believe. The reason it seems why they seem to be endlessly multiplying in safe areas is due to large litter size and the fact they don’t have a heat cycle. As for when she’s ready she’ll let you know by the trademark try of “BIGGES POOPIES!” now while it appears to be a fluffies way of saying they’re feeling a huge solid non fecal emission it’s also a curse of pain analogous to the english, “HOLY SHIT!”. As it’s shown that saying this phrase actually reduces a mares pain as well as the fact “poopie” is a common fluffy swear.
Assuming there are no complications in the birth this should be relatively easy, try to make sure that all babies get milk and not to hurt any of her babies. For the most part a first time mom while usually gentle thanks to instinct and conditioning will treat her foals like toys and that this is the best game ever. This is because fluffies while possessing a theory of mind will only apply when there is cause, and right now with foals that blindly wiggle and chirp it sort of makes sense she won’t see it as a fellow fluffy with likes and dislikes. This is because while fluffies are great at pavlovian learning they are terrible at extrapolation. It is very hard for a fluffy who hasn’t given birth or lived around birthing fluffies to fully comprehend that her foals are actually going to turn into adult fluffies until she actually sees it happen. In fact it is quite possible that she may be surprised that her babies go beyond the weanling or “big babbeh” stage at all. This means that as the owner of a first timer you have to be extra involved especially in regards to discipline and health. Mothers might choose a bestes babbeh as at this point they’re basically just pets to them and so a favorite foal can be assigned on any arbitrary characteristic. This categorization will later be rationalized once they begin to talk as she will look for excuses to prove this right. A good way to deal with this is either to tell her that all babbehs are bestes or to tell her that some babbehs can start or stop being bestes. Both work fine, and you can even tell her that the bestes babbeh is can vary day to day with it being the one that listens to you the most. A few of the more selfish and unempathetic mares may disagree as they see the foals as their toys but most fluffies tend to be kindhearted enough to value others happiness to a great degree including the foals once they begin to talk.
In terms of discipline you will have to force her to do it at first, more empathetic mothers will treat having kids like pet ownership and will struggle to punish their foals for bad poopies. A good way to deal with this is by punishing the mother for the sins of a child once it becomes clear she should be teaching them. Teaching them not being something that comes naturally as most likely every milestone in development will be seen as an opportunity for a new form of play with her foals. On the upside assuming the mother isn’t a smarty she will at least likely teach them to play nice with other fluffies which is good for socialization and language learning. Still you should be present in a capacity besides a distant authoritarian figure and actually spend time playing with and loving them, assuming you want them to grow attached to you. This can range from giving out hugs to pushing a ball around to play with, to even just telling them that you love them.
As they grow and change you might want to make it clear to the mom that babies don’t stay babies and that they in fact will “grow big and strong.”. It’s better to start this early so she doesn’t try and stop you from weaning them and throw an adorable tantrum which might actually endanger the foals she’s trying to help. It is at the weaning stage that you should probably name the foals as this is when they begin to develop distinct personalities. Next tell her that she won’t get to keep the babies forever, to soften the blow I suggest introducing the potential owners to the foals and mother to prove they’re going to find a nice new mommy or daddy. This way no one has to deal with a traumatized foal or mother crying constantly.
Experienced mothers by contrast will be much better at caring for their children as they now know they are their own sapient individuals rather than toys. So if you are a first time breeder it’s suggested that you get a mare that is not a first timer as most experienced moms will be able to do most of the work themselves.
Orphan Foals
If you are planning to take care of one or more foals without a mummah than it is not going to be an easy process and I actually recommend you keep at least two. While their few needs as chirpies may be simple they will seemingly need them constantly or at random. This is why any smart owner should try and automate some of the processes a mother would provide including warmth, and nursing. If you try to raise them completely manually you will most likely be unable to get anything done or end up with a bunch of dead foals due to other issues. The best bit is to buy a fluffy incubator which is comfortably heated, and equipped with milk dispensers as well as mummah songs. If not a small container with frequently changed sheets and regularly filled milk dispensers will suffice, though singing to the foals is rather crucial. In general this should either be done with a mare’s voice or your own unless you want the foals to seek comfort in the music stylings of depeche mode or Beyonce. The foals should be taken out of their incubator/box once a day and it should be cleaned while the foals are deposited in another soft, safe place. A good way for early bonding is to soak your fingers in milk and let the foals suckle on them. They may even try to hug and knead your fingers which makes for quite the heartwarming experience. The point is you should you make your presence known and positive to them in some way if you want them to have any attachment to you initially. This is also when you should get them fixed as they won’t be traumatized at all.
Eye opening happens a few weeks in and is a big part of their development and it’s pretty crucial you’re there within a few hours of it. Otherwise the foals will become distressed and begin furiously looking for something larger to imprint on. Once they reach this stage I’d recommend moving them into a larger container with a designated litter area which you can carry around the house with you. Luckily they just need your presence and the bare minimum of attention so sticking your free hand into their environment for them to hug and play with will usually suffice. Talking to them is also crucial though if you aren’t one for completely one sided conversations I suggest you put on some flufftv. Though this is no substitute for actual contact and you should probably teach them things not preprogrammed like ball, blocks, baby or fluffy.
Once they begin to walk and talk is when stuff goes right back to being difficult, they need several hours of socialization a day and while their natural empathy will get them far they still need to be taught how to safely and nicely play with other fluffies. If you can’t be in the safe area often then I suggest getting a nannycam which is really a good idea to have if you ever get fluffies. At this stage you should be giving them kibble drenched in milk, foal treats and occasionally foal sketti. Eventually a few months after they begin to talk they should be able to be left to their own devices to an extent, or at least as much as any other fluffy.