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Re: [RC] 'pound dog' mentality for horses? - heidiA surprisingly large number of horses at the Killer Feedlots go there accompanied by their papers showing they have been extremely well-bred. Bad things (divorce, owner illness, etc.) happen to good horses. That's a part of why it is still helpful to understand something about all this breeding stuff if one DOES "shop" the kill auctions. As I mentioned in a previous post, the couple of people I know who have had any consistency of success going to the auctions have really educated themselves about what families they are looking for--and they look until they find the sorts of horses you are talking about. The majority of the ones they get do indeed have papers--or even if they can't get the papers signed off, they at least know who the horses are, and what their ancestry is. They've come up with some gems that way--but as you say, they don't just randomly shop the auctions, and they come home with horses bred to be successful. I had the interesting paradoxical position for several years of both vetting local rides and being the sale yard vet at the local auction. Ours didn't deal with a very high number of horses, and most of them went to the kill buyers. I had the "opportunity" (if one can call it that) of seeing the same horses that came up with chronic "mystery lamenesses" etc. at rides come through the auction barn, sometimes with the ride numbers still on their hips. <sigh> And I likewise had the knowledge of who they were and how they were bred. Talk about getting to see the seamy underside of things... :-( Some horses also came through from the local back yards, and as Dyane says, many had their papers with them. But it was seeing those horses that weren't really suitable for the sport to begin with, who were made to do something they were never intended to do and who paid the ultimate price for doing so, that perhaps made me a bit more blunt and frank about this subject. I don't have a thing against the horses that are not meant to be endurance horses--I just think that they deserve a better fate than going back to the auction barn with a ride number on their hips when they don't work out. And the best way to prevent that is to be honest about what they are suited to do in the first place, and to put them to work in jobs to which they are suited. If that job isn't endurance, then out of fairness to the horse, that isn't where he ought to be. I think that is a lot of what Lif was talking about, too, with regard to the difference between rescuing a horse because you like him and want him to be your pet, vs rescuing a horse and asking him to do a specific and very strenuous job. You need to do your homework just as much if you are going to shop the auctions for an endurance prospect as you do if you are going to buy from a breeder--or in actuality, even moreso, because there is no one at the auction to mentor you and help you out. Kristi is right on the nail with her previous--it isn't necessarily the horse that tugs your heart strings that is suited to do the work. You really need a horse that does both--you need to like him, since he will be your partner, but for HIS sake, you need to ensure that he can do what it is you are asking him to do. Heidi =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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