Posts Tagged ‘cruelty’
The good, the bad, and the angry
We were torn on the title of this post. The runner up was “These are a few of our favorite things”. Fingers crossed we made the right call!
I (Snugly) am currently sitting in front of my computer, electric fireplace on, hot chocolate laden with Bailey’s in hand, and the likes of Frank and Bing crooning Christmas tunes like no one’s business (they really could sing!). I was going through the writing applications from Fugly hopefuls and, as I’m sure you could guess, there are quite a few. A few comments have been made noting people’s interest in reading some of the better and worse submissions. Your wish is our command! Some of these have been edited for length, none have been edited for content or grammar. Enjoy!
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Alright, here we go. I am mouthy and an avid animal rights advocate. I hate backyard breeders, they are a bunch of dumb asses. I despise backyard trainers!!! (but that is another story).
the book to not ride their horse or even when they do start riding the
slight shiver of their horse makes them get off and go back to the
barn. On the other side we have the obnoxious stage mom pushing her
kid to ride horses because it was always her dream to watching her kid
grow up to be an “Olympic Champion.”
I hate riding with and I hate teaching these kind of people. They
really make me want to smack them with a horse whip and tell them to
get over themselves.
who has the balls to tell that person that horses might not be for
them?
Submission 3:
It’s always amazed me how people think that just because the way THEY
do something, it’s the ONLY way to do something. Horse people are no
different, in fact we can be the worst offenders. I’ve read the Fugly
blog for a long time, and I loved how it started off picking apart the
asshats who bred awful looking horses, never gave them any training
and left them to an uncertain fate all while happily breeding more sad
little future-less foals.
Then it changed, it became less about the rescue work and the pointing
out of the bad-seeds, and became all about how the only worthwhile
horses to breed at all are TB’s and WB’s and anyone who breeds
anything else, or decides to compete in anything other than the show
ring, or, GOD FORBID, not compete at all, just ride the trails with
their beloved pet horse, was the WORST PERSON IN THE WHOLE WIDE
WORLD!!!!
And it’s time we brought back the NAME AND SHAME aspect!
Enough with the “oh god why would you buy a cob when you could have a
THOROUGHBRED” rubbish, enough with the “you bred a Paint, clearly you
have no idea what a REAL horse is meant to be coloured like”. Bring on
the “you’ve starved these horses”, “you bred these 15 TB colts for
racing and now you’re sending them to slaughter just because they are
slow”, “you abused this animal and the SPCA are unable to get the
voices to get the power to stop you, guess what here are those voices,
you are going DOWN”
BRING IT ON!
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Huh. I guess those were mostly just angry! Oh well… there’s definitely a lot to be angry about in the horse world. Which brings us to a story that most of you have already heard about, but that hasn’t been properly discussed here.
You guessed it, I’m talking about Credit Card and the little psycho who arranged his death. There’s a decent story here with a link to the legal affidavit; the basic gist is that a female college student was having some romantic problems and thought a good solution would be to steal five horses and kill one of them. Not sure what the thought process was there, but she clearly did think about it; she made sure to scout ahead and even took notes in her little pink notebook!
So what do you think of the current laws for horse theft? Because these horses had a high monetary value, the potential punishment is more severe. Should that really make a difference? My horse isn’t worth much, but I think I’d be equally devastated if something similar were to happen to him! And how do you go about protecting your horse from theft? Or protecting yourself from the crazies out there? Not too long ago we had to deal with a rather explosive situation that was caused by a barn manager’s ex losing it. Thankfully, no harm came to any of the horses, but to say there were a few tense days would be a gross understatement!
Hmmm… in hindsight, “These are a few of our favorite things” would have been a really inappropriate title for this post!
What I Learned
I learned several things from this post.
Many of the people who read this blog think I hate them.
There are cavessons designed purely for looks, much like the tassels (shoo-fly) hung on every available nook or cranny western gear has to offer.
Wickipedia must be wrong.
(Wickipedia) Uses of the noseband
Today, the noseband has several uses:
First, to give a balanced and traditionally correct appearance to the horse’s turnout at shows. When raised high, it can make a long-nosed horse’s face look shorter and more proportional. Various positions up and down the nose may help the face look more handsome, and a wide noseband can make a heavy head appear more delicate.
Second, to keep the horse’s mouth closed or at least prevent a horse from evading the bit by opening the mouth too far. It can sometimes prevent the horse from putting its tongue over the bit and avoiding pressure in that manner
Third, the noseband is also used to help stop a horse from pulling. A stronger noseband can many times be used instead of a stronger bit, which makes it a valuable option for riders that want more control, but do not want to back their horse off, that is, to make the horse afraid to go forward, especially when jumping, which is often an undesirable consequence when the horse is placed in a strong or harsh bit.
Fourth, it can be an attachment for other equipment, such as a standing martingale or shadow roll.
It is also valuable for young horses just learning to go “on the bit”, as it supports the jaw and helps the horse to relax his masseter, and flex softly at the poll.
In some riding styles, a noseband is added simply for decoration and is not attached to the bridle or adjusted to serve any useful purpose.
Nosebands may add some pressure to the nose when the reins are applied, depending on adjustment, style and the degree to which the horse resists the bit. With a soft leather noseband on a well-trained horse, the effect is minimal.
A bridle does not necessarily need a noseband, and many bridles, such as those used in Western riding, flat racing, or endurance riding, do not have one. Some horses shown in-hand do not use a noseband in order to better show off the animal’s head.
Many old paintings also depict a hunting horse without a noseband, since it was not always deemed useful by certain riders.
However, even in disciplines such as western riding, where it is considered a sign of a polished horse to not require a noseband or cavesson, one is often used on horses in training as a precaution to help prevent the horse from learning bad habits such as opening the mouth and evading the bit (which is where I developed my opinion that nosebands are a cheat).
I also appreciate that there is a lot to be learned from the readers of this blog, the arguments gave up some incredible information and the indignant raging made for some great reading.
On the flip side of things I hate, if this horse had decent food, care and an owner with a 100th of the passion I’ve seen on this blog, I wouldn’t care if he was ridden with a noseband on each foot, just as long as someone filled his feeder every day and kissed his nose at night.
This is one of three horses rescued in Alabama earlier this month. The sore on his hip is the result of the hip bone coming through his hide.
3 horses neglected
Enterprise, AL (US)
Incident Date: Wednesday, Oct 12, 2011
County: Coffee
Alleged: Donnie Lavon Adkison
An Enterprise-area man was placed behind bars Wednesday after Coffee County Sheriff Office deputies arrested him on charges he allegedly neglected three horses.
Donnie Lavon Adkison, 45, of County Road 731, was charged with second-degree cruelty to animals. Photos of the animals show they were not fed well, and one horse was so malnourished that its hip bone had rubbed a hole in its side, CCSO chief deputy Ronnie Whitworth said.
The horses were adopted, and a state veterinarian gave the horses a checkup while he was in the area Thursday, Whitworth added.
Animal cruelty reports, especially those involving large farm animals, are increasing in the county, Whitworth said.
“There’s getting to be a lot more of this stuff,” he said. ‘When you take in a large animal, it takes a lot of feed and upkeep. You can’t neglect these animals.”
Read more: Animal Abuse: 3 horses neglected – Enterprise, AL | Pet-Abuse.Com Animal Cruelty Database http://www.pet-abuse.com/cases/18719/AL/US/#ixzz1cBKhLxsk
What do you think the percentage is of ignorant, cruel, horse- starving, 45- years- old yahoos still go by childhood names like “Donnie,” or “Petey,” or better yet, nicknames like “Bubba,” or “Duke?”
Pleasure or Pain?
There is an awful lot of discussion about the cruelty of western pleasure.
Pinned ears, wringing tails, sour expressions, crippled, unnatural, any of these snippets ring a bell? These are many of the terms I’ve heard defining western pleasure and I’ve certainly seen horses riding around the ring which looked exactly like this.
I’ve seen this in dressage competition, reined cow horse events, on many hunter jumpers, reiners and gaited horses. Oh yeah, I’ve seen pleasure horses looking the same way.
When “horse trainer” first became my job description on my taxes I was working for a small boarding, breeding and show facility. I gave lessons, trained some, started a few colts and learned to ride all around western events from an extemely accomplished young trainer so I could take over showing Lake, my boss’ stud.
This young man had trained the horse and shown him for awhile and was more than willing to teach me the ins and outs of the pleausure side of the tracks so he could quit riding the flipping horse. Lake just wasn’t very talanted. He was rude, hot and Fugly at its finest. The young trainer couldn’t wait to get out from dealing with him.
I learned a lot about the slow events, mainly that they bored me to absolute tears. The training was boring, the shows were boring and so were the horses. I’m a go fast kind of rider and I prefer to get in and be done at the arena, so this all day of showing… at …the…same…snails…pace was just about killing me.
Lucky for me, the work was intricate and the horse was a ball of neurotic fire, so I was able to maintain. This born-to-be-a-gelding was not particularly bred to do anything except scream a bunch and try to breed anything that looked good to him at the moment, but the young trainer had molded him into something that could win at open and breed one day, one judge shows, so the owners felt they had a gem.
I will always be grateful to the them, the young trainer and Lake. I learned a lot from about the sport of western pleasure and western riding, gained some much needed patience, developed a sixth sense that told me to duck a split second before Lake struck or lunged to bite and gained a bunch of training tools I still use today, even though, short of chariot racing, my discipline is about as far from WP as it can get.
Here’s the deal, as far as I’m concerned, WP is no worse or better than any other discipline. When a good born WP horse is born, it hits the ground with a low headed, flat kneed way of going. They are slow moving, quiet minded, pretty darn sweet horses. Of course not all of them are, but I’m betting over 80% of the top bred pleasure horses as good minded as a golden retriever.
WP takes each gait and intensifies it. The natural slow movement is made slower, the level top line is kept level at all times, the “sweepy” leg action is exagerated, and the horse looks like it is riding against the current of a fast, deep river.
Isn’t intensifying the movement that makes a horse beautiful the basis of all horse shows?
Morgans and saddlebreds have their heads and tails cranked so high it appears the rider is the only thing topping them from meeting in the middle. Their natural snappy legged motion is exagerated as much as possible.I’ve spent some time with a Morgan trainer, he won consistantly enough to have a barn full of clients and I have never been around more unnatural training practices in my life, including WP.
A QH’s inate cow sense is used to turn a cutter into a crouching, leaping torpedo. I’ve known cutters so reactive they can’t go out of the arena because their hyper awareness has made them so ADD they can’t take the stimulation outside a pen. They sure could cut though.
Like it or hate it, people entertain themselves by dinking with the natural order and this becomes incredibly obvious at horse shows.
The problem I see with WP is the horses go so slow it’s an easy class for a beginner to start in. It’s pretty hard to fall off of one of those guys, so I understand the attraction.
It is also very easy to fall into the trap of training through the mouth instead of the feet, so an awful lot of crappy WP trainers and green riders can get some semblance of a pleasure horse gait by cranking and yanking on the horses faces.
This is a Youtube video of the warmup at QH Congrss. If you watch you can pick up on who’s training their horses by the crank n’ yank method and who is driving their horse forward from the hind to the front as it should be.
I swear, a few of these horses look like they’re dealing with Rollkur, but that can’t be, Rollkur is a dressage thingy and the world of dressage wouldn’t exagerate a horse’s natural way of going.
WP training can be ruthless. Tying the horse’s head high in his stall the night before an event is common practice. A tired horse with a stiff neck seems to have the look so sought after by the judges. Scarred sides and mouths are not uncommon and I hate the dead look that eventually creeps into their eyes.
What I’m getting at is it’s not the separate disciplines that are the problem, it’s the people behind the discipline.
Do I personally want to ride WP anymore? No. Do I find just as many examples of cruelty in mine? Yes. I personally do everything I can not to sink to the lows I have seen, but I still want to be able to show.
I have been working for years to develop a sytem which will allow my horses to have a good life and still be able to go out in the pen and win a check. Am I there yet? Kind of.
The problem I see is too many people ready to accept the absurd heights the horse show industry is willing to push its horses to. We’re the ones who need to be accountable, not the judges, the trainers or the industry standards, because none of this would be going on if we, the horse owners weren’t buying into it. As long as there is an owner who doesn’t care what happens to her horse as long as the horse wins there will be a Cleve or an Anke to step up and provide.
I’m going to close with a video of Red Hot Krymsum, one of the best WP horses today. While I still say to each his own, I can’t help but admire such a beautiful horse. Now if he could be allowed to turn back into a real one.
