He’s the biggest horse in Britain

The horse’s head on Lincoln might not be quite as big as those in The Helix Park, but it is Britain’s biggest.

The massive mount is believed to be the tallest horse in Europe trotted into the five-star Tannoch Stables in Palacerigg last week and has set up home.

The enormous Shire horse stands at least eight feet tall and is expected to become the tallest known horse in the world within a couple of
years.

“He bumped his head off the roof when he arrived,” said stables manager Dawn Harrison. “He is enormous and has still some way to grow.”

But Lincoln almost didn’t make it to his new home.

Being a beast as big as to rival the famous Irn-Bru delivery horse Carnera who did his delivery rounds across Central Scotland and was believed to be the world’s largest, Lincoln takes a lot of feeding.

He’s currently still being nourished up to full weight and strength after he was bought by farmer Ruth Blair and fruit and veg wholesaler James Mackie and saved from slaughter.

That takes almost a stone of spinach, plus lettuce, cabbages and two stone of carrots every day to fill his 6’10” frame or 20 hands in horse measurements. Sitting on his back is the equivalent of being perched upon a Transit van.

Ruth said: “He now has a home for life and the spark is back in his eyes.”

And Dawn added: “We’re used to working with large animals - and smaller ponies, but it has been different, getting used to working with a horse quite as big as Lincoln is.

“We have 80 horses here but he dwarfs them all - even Alice who was previously our biggest horse at 18.2 hands looks small in comparison.

“We’ve had to repair a couple of fences too because he’s so big he can just knock them over without a second glance, but we’re very pleased to have him and look forward to him returning to full strength.”

As it stands, Lincoln is half a tonne underweight, and not yet fully-grown.

When he is, he’s expected to outgrow the current record-holder horse - an American called Jack - who stands 3/4 of an inch taller.