Small Pony, Same Number of Days
Store seven days of supplies for your Shetland pony as a minimum and aim for fourteen, exactly as you would for a much bigger animal. The emergency does not shrink because the pony does: closed roads and broken water supplies last as long as they last. What changes is the size of the pile, not the length of the cover. A Shetland's modest appetite makes a fortnight's store genuinely achievable in a small space, which is an advantage worth using rather than an excuse to store three days and hope. Work the amounts out, write them down, and stack the store where it stays dry.
Measure Her Actual Ration First
Calculate the Shetland pony's food store from her real meals. Weigh a day's hay nets as you normally fill them, because Shetlands are usually fed carefully restricted forage, and a guessed bale count will overshoot or undershoot badly. Bundle the emergency hay into daily portions if you have time, so that anyone feeding her during a chaotic week gives the right amount without thinking. Avoid stocking special rich emergency feed: a thrifty native pony does best on the plain forage she already knows, and an unfamiliar sugary ration offered in a stressful week is a recipe for a sore, footy pony.
Water Storage for a Determined Small Drinker
A Shetland pony drinks less than a horse but still needs clean water every single day, and ponies are champions at tipping, standing in, and fouling containers. Store her emergency water in sealed containers with lids she cannot shift, kept in shade so they do not warm and green. Plan how the water reaches her if the usual supply fails, including which tap, tank, or neighbour's supply you would use and what you would carry it in. In freezing weather, think about ice as well: a stored supply that is frozen solid in an unheated shed is storage on paper only.
Keep the Store Out of the Pony's Reach
The unique risk in a Shetland pony's emergency store is the pony herself. Shetlands pick locks, lean through rails, and treat a feed room door as a puzzle, and a pony that breaks into a fortnight of feed in one night has both eaten the reserve and made herself ill. Store everything behind a fastening she has demonstrably failed to open, in bins with lids that stay on when knocked, and check the door catch as part of the routine. If she has ever reached stored feed before, assume she remembers the route and change the arrangement rather than trusting a sterner warning.
One List the Whole Household Uses
Pony stores go wrong in families through double counting: one person buys hay believing the shed is empty while another has already stacked it behind the tack. Keep a single inventory with the daily ration, the number of days stored, and the date the water was filled, and update it whenever anything is used. Let everyone who feeds her read the same list before ordering or borrowing from the store. Putting your Shetland's ration and store details on her KinsLe profile through Family Sharing means the whole household checks the same figures instead of keeping private estimates.