POINT OF VIEW Breed Good Horses: It Might Save Them From Abuse!
own way), but through their riders’ ignorance of effective training methods. A popular answer to that problem is to improve the education of owners and riders, and compa- nies like Purina sponsor lots of good clinicians to enlighten horse owners on horsemanship (and, naturally, on nutri- tion). But improving horsemanship is a very deep subject open to never ending discussions on how to do it the right way. Many horses will end up going for meat at the sales barn before enough people learn how to ride at least as well as they can drive a car! Another approach (and a big
M
any horses suffer some form of abuse in their life, not so much through the malice of their owners (most folks really love their horses, each in their
‘Soft backs’ (or sway backs created by lordosis), which
part of the solution) is to breed horses with good minds, good conformation and a genetic abil- ity for the job they are destined to perform or, even better, capable of many different jobs. If educating easy horses is hard enough to do for most as- piring horse trainers, difficult ones can be a nightmare for both the rider and the horse. The simplest description of the horses’ job is to carry a rider and perform some activ- ity calmly and adequately. If they are built wrong (physi- cally or emotionally), their conformation or their mind can get in the way of their rider’s desires at any moment and result in unfortunate and repeated conflicts with dire consequences for the horse (and the rider). Poor physique will also compromise these horses’ long-term soundness.
COMMON PROBLEMS Here are a few examples of the most common, mostly con- formational, problems I see when I am helping riders fix their training problems. Downhill horses (particularly with no withers) who can-
not carry a saddle without becoming sore on the top of their shoulders. I remember visiting a reining barn years ago and all the horses had white pressure marks on each side of the withers. As they all had the mark, the trainer was convinced that these were totally normal, to be ex- pected and nothing to worry about.
“If educating easy horses is hard enough to do for most aspiring horse trainers, difficult ones can be a nightmare for both the rider and the horse. ”
are very difficult to fit saddle-wise. These horses cannot carry the weight of the rider without lumbar pain or with- out raising their heads, which makes them excited, which in turn brings the rider to use stronger bits, gadgets, etc., which induces more pain and so more frustration all around. I see some of those in the fields around my farm in Kentucky. There was a Saddlebred stallion years ago who had that conformation. He was tal- ented and became world cham- pion. Many mare owners used him and made lordosis a common ge- netic trait in that breed. Straight hocks and stifles that do not flex effectively and there- fore do not help the back round up to carry the rider in a mechanically correct way. Lusitanos often have slightly bent hocks, quite different from Warmbloods. I remember a German judge (from Hanover) who
commented to me at a show in São Paulo, Brazil about this trait he was not used to. He said that if we continued se- lecting it (or at least did not try to eliminate it), we would have hock problems in the future. I told him that Lusita- nos had been built that way and had survived high school movements, airs above the ground and bullfighting for centuries without hock problems, so maybe it was not such a bad “fault” after all. He did see my point. Feet too small to carry the weight of big animals (some
Quarter Horses) or too poor in quality to sustain shoeing (many Thoroughbreds). Pasterns too straight and knees bent the wrong way
that cannot absorb concussion. We see those in some An- dalusians and Warmbloods. Necks that are inverted at the base, which creates seri- ous ongoing balance problems. Dressage horses without enough energy to willingly
produce collection. They end up being endlessly pushed forward by overactive legs/spurs, and nobody has any fun. Pleasure horses with too much energy to ever be relaxed
on a trail ride or at the show grounds. And again, nobody has any fun… Unfortunately, all these innate conformational or behav- ioral problems result in either acute abuse (frustration and
Warmbloods Today 67
By JP Giacomini
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