Can there possibly be any excuse or explanation for this?
Jun 14 2007
Thanks to Snotegon of the Manure Pile Message Board for contributing this perfect example of what this blog is all about…namely, asking breeders “What the fuck were you thinking?” And yes, I do mean this gelding’s legs when I say that, although it’s also true that Clinton and Stacy would have a field day with his handler’s unflattering wardrobe choices.
This is quite possibly the most upright set of legs I have ever seen on something that is not a member of the Okapi family. Could those pasterns be any straighter? And of course they lead down into teeny tiny double-ott feet that couldn’t successfully support a Breyer horse, much less this one.
Moving up, witness the unbelievably weird way the gaskin attaches to the rump. I’m guessing this is a yearling, so perhaps the front end will actually reach the altitude of the back end one day, but every growth spurt this unfortunately boy goes through is only going to put more weight on legs that scream “I’m going to be dead lame from navicular by age three, tops!”
Think I’m kidding? Years ago, someone brought me their 2 year old AQHA filly for training. She was two. She was already sixteen hands. She was a pretty gold color. And as soon as I began teaching her to longe, I realized she was lame. So we called the vet. She had navicular. I was horrified. Nothing had ever been done with her, but she had straight pasterns and little feet. Of course, her moron owners took her home – to use as a broodmare. Because, you know, the world needs more horses who are so badly conformed that they are crippled before you ever do ANYTHING with them!
I am not anti-halter-horse. I have friends who breed halter horses, but they are also horses with good feet and normal pastern angles, who halter as a prelude to their riding careers, which they do have. (I have had to edit this post after learning that what is shown above is actually what is winning now. My friend who breeds normal looking halter horses says this is why she doesn’t show a lot anymore – she sees no point in going out and wasting money getting beat by things that are this structurally incorrect because it is the current ‘style.’ I suggested to her that we start a new trend, of halter horses who can jump courses, since hers could without going lame or falling over.) I actually broke out, many years ago, a horse who’d been top ten twice at AQHA world in halter. He was sound. He was a butthead but he was sound, and he got over being a butthead and went on to a successful 4-H western pleasure/horsemanship career. Sure, he was musclebound but the basic structure was correct, which in this horse, it just ain’t. Not even close.
Just for comparison, I’m going to add a picture of an okapi. See the resemblance?
10 comments to “Can there possibly be any excuse or explanation for this?”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment. Not a member? Registering is free, and you do it here!
Thank you for this blog…someone needed to do it!
The okapi has better conformation.
That horse’s legs are just…damn disturbing. I may not agree with everything you say but many times you just hit the nail right on the head.
You do realize that when you say “Okapi family” that the closest relative of the Okapi is a giraffe, right? And also that “Okapi” is not a family…
Horrifying. I’d rather ride the Okapi.
Oh wow! WOW! This is the most deformed, yet weirdly ripped, horse I have ever seen.
Do we assume people paid lots of money to have the poor thing conditioned? Someone should have stood back and given their heads a shake (Or a slap!)
Actually,
Out at my boarding farm we have a halter champion QH that looks much like this! Much to the dismay to everyone he is 4 years old and is the lamest horse I have ever seen. He has navicular so bad he will have to be put down! Come on people…obviously…somethings wrong here! It’s not just halter horses with QH either. Some Arabs are starting to be bred with weak pasterns as well!
How can a yearling have that much muscle?? He reminds me of body builders that are so muscle bound they can’t move. Ick.
Jennifer, thats exactly what he is! I stated somewhere else on this blog that we had a horse boarded at our place for a while who was a halter-style horse and she couldn’t even bend her legs enough to get her feet up for trimming! SHe wasn’t HORRIBLY gimpy, but she didn’t get around well. Also a friend of mine bought a halter conditioned APHA gelding a few years ago..he came to us scarily ripped, and we called him “Tank” for a while, but after a couple years of getting to be a w/t/c pleasure horse and just run around and loosen up he looks and moves MUCH better!
This horse is actually not the worst example I’ve seen. I much prefer to see them standing up straight with maybe one or two MINOR faults than standing strung out behind/too far out behind or with scant muscling through the gaskin.
While halter horses are not exactly my cup of tea, I’m sort of on the fence about them. I’ve seen a few go one and make decent riding horses, when crossed on the right mares. But to be perfectly honest, I can’t see WHY ON EARTH a person would breed an enormous chest onto a legs and frame that can’t support it. While that may be FINE AND DANDY for a horse that is expected only to halter, you can’t take a horse built like that and do ANYTHING with it without a MAJOR STRUCTURAL MALFUNCTION. Navicular being the most common, but certainly the list is long of the problems associated with this all-too common conformation fault.
I like to see balance in a horse more than anything else. A correct trapezoid with a balanced frame, and legs underneath to support the horse.
I have a hard time understanding why halter judges pin the horse with the biggest muscles. It’s generally not a halter class at all, it’s a ‘whose got the bigger muscles’.
And the things they do to the horses feet to get them to look like that! NO JOKE, they shave them off and make them stand on their tiptoes to make their forearm muscles and gaskin and hindquarter muscles ‘pop’. Just RUINS a horse, IMO.