A forward-thinking programme of the Bathurst Agricultural Show, a positive attitude and a real love for horses have put Bathurst’s Austin Mhlonyane on course for a promising career in equine care. Already in demand for his skill and care as a professional groom-in-training, Mhlonyane won the title of Eastern Cape Reserve Champion Groom at the EC Showing Championships in Makhanda in September. Talk of the Town asked Mhlonyane, 20, about his career.
It started in 2016, when he was among a group of children from Bathurst Primary School who took part in a youth showing programme at the Bathurst Agricultural Showgrounds. The Bathurst Agricultural Society (BAS) is a member of the Eastern Cape Agricultural Showing Association (Ecasa) which since the early 2000s has focused on youth showing. Their programmes teach young people how to care for animals – including grooming and feeding as well as showing.
“We were learning about livestock. We started with sheep and they asked us if we wanted to do any other animals. Obviously everyone was, like, ‘We wanna do horses!’… You know – because… they’re cool”
That day, they didn’t have horses, but they did have sheep. So sheep it was.
Their chance with horses came a month later – and little Austin was hooked; travelling to represent the Eastern Cape in national showing events, with 2019 in Bathurst a highlight.
School got “a bit hectic” in 2020, Grade 10,and until he’d completed matric, in 2022, Mhlonyane focused on his studies.
“In 2023, I was a bit bored in the location because I wasn’t going to university or college. My friend told me someone in Bathurst might be looking for someone to look after horses. But unfortunately when we got there, the lady said they already had grooms.
But he stayed positive.
“I was, ‘Who else do I know that actually works with horses?’ Because I’d had experience with horses, so that’s an advantage for me.”
A friend’s introduction led to a year-long stint with a stalwart in the Bathurst equestrian community. That in turn led him to where he is now, based at the Bathurst Showgrounds Equestrian Centre. Along with the work of a groom, he’s also tasked with the responsibility of teaching three new grooms the ropes.
“I’m teaching them how to look after horses: grooming, feeding, and then eventually I’ll be teaching them what to do for shows, like plaiting,” he said.
The horses belong to the centre’s riding school and in the warm-up paddock next to the main arena, instructor Donna Deniss is putting Nooitgedacht-Arab cross Lady Dandelion and her young rider through their paces.
“By the end of next year, I want to be a riding groom: that’s my goal for the year,” Mhlonyane said. “That means if you go to a competition with your horse and rider, you’re still the groom for that combination, but you can also enter showing and jumping classes. So it’s not just work: it’s also a bit of fun – and of course competition.”
And in five years?
Maybe I’ll have my own horse. Meantime I’m going to be working hard so that I can eventually become a qualified instructor.
Blind Love
Austin shares his working week with equine welfare organisation Blind Love, also thanks to a chance encounter with founder Philippa du Toit. Du Toit is training Mhlonyane in equine animal welfare – “horses, donkeys and zebras – I’m still busy with that course at the moment.
“We go to [Makhanda] regularly to do clinics with the donkeys. We make sure they have proper harnesses, we treat wounds, give them Ivermectin [for worms] and educate the owners on how to treat their animals.
“At Blind Love, we rescue neglected or abused animals. And that’s my job.”
Equine care as a career
A profession with a longer history in Britain, horse grooms are responsible for the care, exercise and welfare of horses and ponies, and maintain the animals’ stables and riding equipment, that country’s National Careers Service explains. “With experience and further training, you could take charge of a stable yard or become head groom… If you work in a riding stable you could train to become a riding instructor,” their website says.
*Donna Dennis explains what it means to start and produce a horse for sale: “I team up an experienced groom like Austin with a young horse, and teach him how to train them from first steps to being ready to having a rider on their back when they are old enough. Austin was our pilot project and the results speak for themselves. He was commended by all the judges at EC Showing Champs for his handling and rapport with the horses he worked with.”
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This article was first published in Talk of the Town, October 16, 2025. The newspaper serving the communities of Ndlambe and the Sunshine Coast, with a weekly wrap of Makhanda news, is available at stores from early on Thursdays
