Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

I'd like to comment on some of the various issues which have been brought up under this heading in the last day or two and bring up a few of my own.  Howard's initial post was a good one and I'm glad to see this topic continue to get attention on this forum.  By way of introduction, I am a regional director for the AERC from the PSW region.  I am chairman of the AERC's Protest and Grievance Committee which has investigated several horse fatalities and near fatalities.  I am also chairman of  it's Legal Committee and the new ad hoc Committee for the Welfare of the Horse.  I organized and conducted the workshop on horse fatalities at the 2002 midyear meeting of the AERC Board in Salt Lake City which none of you except for Steph and the other board members paid any attention to.  I organized and conducted the two workshops on horse fatalities at the convention in Chattanooga which some of you did attend. (I very much appreciated the participation of Howard, Jim, Laura and Mike among others.)  I was the only person on or off the Board who prepared a motion (and it was a comprehensive one with detailed procedures) for the Board to consider regarding the investigation of horse deaths during AND after rides.  I formulated the proposed purposes and functions of the Horse Welfare Committee and got the Board to approve it after Laura suggested it at one of the workshops at Chattanooga.

All of that and 25 cents may earn me a cup of coffee somewhere.  I don't know the answer for ending horse fatalities in endurance any more than anyone else does.  On the other hand, I am probably more familiar than anyone else about the complex dynamics of how the AERC and the North American endurance community is reacting to the problem.  I would like to share a few insights and opinions.  I will use the scattergun approach because I am responding to several different posts which raise several different points.  If this seems overlong, it's because it's a serious topic and I'm not writing for entertainment's sake.  This post will be in more than one part.  My thoughts are:

1.  To state the obvious, the reports Howard referenced are from the Vet Committee and not the AERC Board or any other Committee.  I made sure they were included in the minutes of the Board meeting for public consumption just like I think VC reports should have been in the past.  To be accurate, the reports were prepared by the VC as it was constituted before the Chattanooga Board meeting.  The VC has a new chairman, Jim Baldwin.  Jim has brought in a variety of specialists to serve on the VC.  I have been appointed a special advisor to the VC to help with reports and other issues.  I have seen several detailed emails from Jim discussing the medical issues involved in a horse death reported since the convention and have spoken at length with him.  Believe me, Jim takes this very seriously and will be preparing very complete reports.  Don't judge the new chair and membership of the VC until it gets a chance.  This is not intended as a criticism of the prior VC chair and membership because I think they did a good job under confusing circumstances.

2.  We expect too much of the VC and vets in general when we look to them for all the answers.  Jim will do a great job describing medical problems but has nothing unique to say about horses tripping over tree roots or escaping from portable pens.  Just because somebody is a vet does not mean he or she is comfortable in writing reports on non-medical subjects and digging up and examining witnesses.  After interviewing probably a dozen prominent ride vets over the last six months on these topics, I have come to recognize a subtext which no one here seems to see, except for maybe Heidi.  All of the rhetoric about investigations and publishing reports makes a lot of vets extremely nervous.  They don't like the idea of having their treatment of sick horses being the subject of investigation.  Some have expressed to me their concern that their licenses could be endangered.  As much as I tell them that the focus is on what made the horse sick in the first place and not on treatment, they are afraid people will want to investigate and criticize the vets who had to treat these horses.  I don't share this perception but I have to respect the fact that so many vets have it.  We have to be careful about creating a witch hunt atmosphere which may cause some vets to avoid co-ooperating with investigations or leave the sport altogether.

3.  Let's get real about horse deaths in the way we talk, anyway.  I am tired about hearing the socalled statistic that there were seven horse deaths in 2002.  That was how many died at rides maybe, but what about the ones which died after rides?  We have NO idea how many horses died after rides.  Of the horse fatalities the P&G Committee has investigated, more occurred after rides than at rides.  My motion for comprehensive investigations called for reporting of all horse deaths within 30 days after an endurance ride.  This scared off everyone as being too radical.  30 days isn't long enough, though, if you want information on every horse death resulting from endurance riding.  What about a horse which was lamed up so bad from endurance riding it had to be put down a couple of months after its last ride because it couldn't even support itself on four legs in pasture?

4.  It was very clear from the workshops I conducted and the written comments I received about my comprehensive investigation proposal that AERC members did NOT like it's coercive approach and detailed procedures.  They certainly don't want any more rules.  No matter what two or three regular ridecamp posters may think is needed, the vast majority of the hundreds of people who spoke up at Chattanooga or have otherwise communicated with me all favor a more non-coercive, educational approach to dealing with horse fatalities.  Everyone agrees this starts with the most complete and useable information possible about the fatalities which do occur even though people don't want the mandatory investigative procedures which may be necessary to obtain this information in some instances.

5.  The new Horse Welfare Committee was created specifically to implement this non-coercive approach.  Although no one committee can provide a panacea for the horse fatality problem, the new HW Committee can at least help focus our efforts.  I will submit its members and an outline of its purposes and functions for Board approval at the conference call Board meeting on July 29.  People who have agreed to serve other than me are Beverly Gray, Mike Jaffe, Laura Hayes and Jim Mitchell.  All of us are experienced endurance riders who know how to keep a horse going.  Beverly has around 13,000 AERC career miles, I have 8,500 or so, Jim has over 6,000, Mike around 5,000, and Laura brings up the rear with around 4,500 miles after doing endurance all of her adult life.  Beverly's exploits with AA Omner are both breathtaking and legendary.  How many other horses will we see in the future who both win on a regular basis and accrue 9,000 miles lifetime?  I ride the highest mileage gaited horse in the AERC, Remington still going strong at almost 6,000 miles, and rode his backup, Skjoldur, 1,600 miles in 52 calendar days on the XP2001.  Laura has been pulled less then once each decade of her career.  Jim and Mike have done equally wonderful things.  Although I may be an inveterate last place finisher, Beverly competes internationally and is a threat to win any ride she enters.  This is a well rounded group of people in their activities both in and out of endurance.  Everyone on the committee is level-headed, independent, reflective, well-spoken, realistic and thoroughly dedicated to this sport.  They all realize the complexity of the problem and none of them think there is some simple, magic bullet solution which will avoid the hard work all of us in the endurance communtiy need to do.  Obviously, the committee can be expanded in the future although I have chosen a small group to work with for now as we get things rolling.  If anyone doesn't like the make-up of the Committee, blame me and me alone.

Part Two is in the next post.

John Parke
Solvang CA