This is shameful and the not first time I have heard that OSU ships their “retired” horses to auction.
Is this what happens to all of the donated horses after they outlive their usefulness?
http://www.paulickreport.com/horse-care-category/hoof-care-category/six-horses-saved-slaughter-pen-found-oklahoma-state-riding-team-mounts/#.WEy9Uel3GEQ.facebook
Depends on the school. Some of the stories are truly tragic.
It does depend on the school but a vast majority end up in dealer hands/auctions via different routes. It is horrible and extremely sad.
Full disclosure: I can’t access the article at work.
I don’t know. What is horrible? Is it horrible that the colleges offload at auction, or is it horrible that owners offload to colleges knowing (or feigning ignorance by not inquiring) of their horses’ potential eventual fate, or is it horrible that auctions and kill buyers exist, or is it horrible that we so indiscriminately breed and use up horses, allowing for the glut of unsound/unsafe/unsuitable/infirm, or is it horrible that we often can’t bring ourselves to end our horses’ lives humanely when they’ve outlived their usefulness?
I would argue that the “horrible” begins long before a college auctions their unusable stock. In an ideal world, yes, colleges would euthanize rather than auction, but I feel that way about all horse owners. The reality is that if owners knew of the potential for this fate and elected to donate anyway, responsibility for their horses’ fate is shared. I don’t think the absence of US slaughterhouses form the scene has improved things for auction horses, either, but that’s a different thing.
It would be nice if more horse owners could more analytically, less emotionally consider the likely outcomes for their horse and make the difficult but more humane decision when they, as is true of most of us, aren’t equipped to provide lifetime homes. I know of very few colleges in a position to offer lifetime homes, either, so unless horse owners were misled, we really need to ask the hard questions before we make these hard choices. Not doing so doesn’t absolve us of guilt.
There’s a link to a Horse Nation article with more info at the bottom of the article OP posted. It includes comments from the OSU coach. He claims he gave the retiring horses to a friend of the program after offering first right of refusal to their old owners. According to the coach, it was after rehoming them that the 6 ended up at auction.
There’s no evidence backing up the coach’s claims, of course. Could be he’s just giving a line. But I would be surprised if the college just directly dumped the horses at the auction. A handoff to someone else and then a move down the line to the auction sounds much more likely. I’d love if some intrepid reporter did some more investigation but I doubt anyone over there has the budget or time to send someone to sniff around.
It depends on the school and it depends on the horse. It also depends quite a bit on the former owner/donator.
Colleges are just like any other program or individual owner.
Sorry OP but I think it’s a pretty big jump to assume that OSU retired the horse 6 years ago and then dumped it at an auction recently. I also didn’t see anywhere in the article that all 6 of the rescued TB’s were from OSU, just the one.
I’d be more inclined to believe that the coach is telling the truth. They also don’t say anything about the horse being in bad shape, just that they bought it from an auction (where they were able to ride it).
I agree with what everyone above has said.
As a current member of my college’s equestrian team, I can tell you that we currently have 3 or 4 horses that basically are retired but are still at the barn because our coach is meticulous in her research about the best options for retirement for each of those horses. I also know that in the past several horses ended up being retired with former team members when she couldn’t find a place up to her standards that had availability.
Obviously not all schools are like mine and the coaches may be under pressure from their administration to quickly move along horses that are past their prime. I suppose this was a long-winded way of saying that every place is different, but I find it hard to believe that horses would get shipped straight to auction in a collegiate scenario. There are too many watchful eyes, and it’s hard enough to keep equestrian programs at the varsity level (at many schools) that I can’t imagine they would want to run the risk of a scandal.
Depends on the school quite a bit. The school I went to, our program was tiny…horses that were no longer useful as team horses went to a variety of people. The coach still has at least 2 retired at her home farm, she pays all their expenses. Over the 4 years I was on the team, 3 horses just weren’t a fit for the team. One went to a former team member for $1, I took one, and the third we were actually able to sell for a decent profit. (I’m friendly with the owner, and the horse is happy as a clam, his owner is in college now, so he just loafs around.) Obviously with the horse we sold, anything could have happened to him, but that’s true of any sale.
I am sorry - although I read the article carefully, somehow I missed the part that you have referenced where the horses were retired 6 years ago. Where do you see that?
The horses were not allowed to be photographed or video’s posted of them on the Internet: “They made it very clear to us when we were looking at these six horses that photos or videos of them could not be posted on the internet.” “They were not advertising these horses for sale, but they made a deal with us that day. All we were told was that they came from a college equestrian program.” Note that six horses are mentioned not just one.
In addition, OSU Coach Larry Sanchez declined to share a name or contact information for the individual who took the six horses from OSU. Why not? Why not out the person who took your team horses to auction without your consent or knowledge?
I’m sure it’s just me but the way I read it the OSU coach seems complicit.
The only thing I find surprising here is singling out the one school. What do people think happens to unusable, sometimes damaged assets donated to any organization?
How many threads on here discussing the pros and cons of donating unsaleable, unsound often difficult at best to handle horses to school programs or handicap programs that partially fund by selling unusable donations? Or, they put them down which to me is far more responsible.
Im not willing to go down and haul them back to keep them so I’m not going to judge. There’s thousands of unuseable horses out there that thousands of naive owners assume will go on to happy forever homes when they are no longer suitable for the owners needs and, most of the time, not going to be suitable or useable anywhere else.
Easy to sit and criticize decisions by people actually caring for then personally/financially participate in keeping unuseable horses.
Off soapbox.
[QUOTE=findeight;8971323]
The only thing I find surprising here is singling out the one school. What do people think happens to unusable, sometimes damaged assets donated to any organization?
How many threads on here discussing the pros and cons of donating unsaleable, unsound often difficult at best to handle horses to school programs or handicap programs that partially fund by selling unusable donations? Or, they put them down which to me is far more responsible.
Im not willing to go down and haul them back to keep them so I’m not going to judge. There’s thousands of unuseable horses out there that thousands of naive owners assume will go on to happy forever homes when they are no longer suitable for the owners needs and, most of the time, not going to be suitable or useable anywhere else.
Easy to sit and criticize decisions by people actually caring for then personally/financially participate in keeping unuseable horses.
Off soapbox.[/QUOTE]
Colleges around here have refused to take back horses that were free leased out; have sold horses for $50; and have given away horses to anyone without references. I personally know about some of these situations. People should be told when they “donate” a sound horse that it won’t have a good retirement. Euth your horses to make sure they do not suffer. The therapeutic riding agencies are just as bad and callous.
I have come to like thinking of horse ownership as stewardship. We fail too often there.
Im no bleeding heart either and don’t think you need to keep them all for life. But keeping a horse healthy and useful is our best gift to them and gives them the best shot at a series of good home in their lives.
“I’m going to keep it forever so don’t need to worry about planning for potentially long retirement because nothing will change in my life and finances” is not responsible stewardship.
Think on that.
Edited to add " I’ll just donate it if I can’t continue to support it or use it" is equally poor stewardship dumping those decisions on somebody else assuming they will just be caring stewards instead of operating under regulations and financial constraints. They do care but have to be much more realistic.
In my zone we had schools that routinely bought and sold at low end auction… including donated horses. Sometimes less than a month post-donation. I can’t think of a single horse from my school’s program that was “retired.” Most good-natured ones were used right up until they died. Maybe used less, and for walk/trot lessons-- but used. I can recall at least one OLD horse dying who was still in the lesson string at the time and we had some ancient ones still toting people around, grumpily. Horses that stopped working out just “went away.” To my knowledge they weren’t sold to team members and I doubt they went to “retirement farms.” Since some of the horses came from auction, I presume the ones that didn’t work out sold there too. I don’t think it was a New Holland level auction but I also don’t know for sure that horses from the program didn’t end up with the meatman.
I don’t do uncertainty and I would never donate a horse to an IHSA program based on my experiences.
I am reminded that sometimes the people who donated the horse originally took the horse back in the end. I had forgotten that. That did happen sometimes.
But it was also the case that old horses were kept going long after they wanted to play ball, sometimes until they died. And that some horses came/went by auction.
It’s in the contract, clearly spelled out, although that contract can be with parents, not minors who don’t always get told the truth about where their junior horse might end up. People tend to assume things about donating horses based on second hand info that often are not what the contracts clearly spell out.
That usually says it’s their horse and there is no obligation to keep it or even keep it alive. In some cases there are tax ramifications if donor is expecting a tax deduction, they don’t even guarantee to use the horse for whatever time frame that deduction involves these days. Seen that get nasty at tax time or during an audit.
They might have a give back clause if it doesn’t work out but if it was donated because the donor no longer could use or even afford to keep it? What then?
Will say private school accepting donations from former students with a generous alumni contribution seem to meet the expectation of a happy home better then state supported institutions that can’t afford to keep failed donations forever. Or club sport level programs operating out of private facilities that don’t have room or money for non useable donations not to mention…sketchy…practices and ethics.
[QUOTE=fourhorsepoor;8971186]
I am sorry - although I read the article carefully, somehow I missed the part that you have referenced where the horses were retired 6 years ago. Where do you see that?
The horses were not allowed to be photographed or video’s posted of them on the Internet: “They made it very clear to us when we were looking at these six horses that photos or videos of them could not be posted on the internet.” “They were not advertising these horses for sale, but they made a deal with us that day. All we were told was that they came from a college equestrian program.” Note that six horses are mentioned not just one.
In addition, OSU Coach Larry Sanchez declined to share a name or contact information for the individual who took the six horses from OSU. Why not? Why not out the person who took your team horses to auction without your consent or knowledge?
I’m sure it’s just me but the way I read it the OSU coach seems complicit.[/QUOTE]
I reread both articles and there are some discrepencies.
“A young woman who rode on the Oklahoma State team told Specht that the horse in question had been retired from the program with a suspensory injury six years prior. Specht believes the injury must have fully healed in the six years since it occurred.”
This quote is in the Paulick article, but not in the horse nation article. From the horsenation article you’re right, it seems as though the horses were given to someone from OSU in May 2016, and auctioned in June. The Paulick article makes it sound like the authors horse was retired from OSU 6 years ago, with no mention of where the other 6 horses came from.
Its such a catch 22. I’m a bit bitter about the donation program, but I also don’t want to see the programs go away.
My old show horse (who I tried to buy) was donated to a college. To my knowledge, he’s still there. I sent an email to them letting them know that should be ever become unusable I will drive down and buy him/take him/whatever. I know this horse will eventually become unusable.
They simply replied - we’ll forward your email to the coach.
I don’t know if that coach will still be there when he is deemed unusable. I don’t know if she got the message. And I certainly don’t want to be a stalkery weirdo. But by god I do not want that horse to end up like these OSU horses. And I don’t know what the answer is - for my old horse or for any others in a college program.
I would never donate a horse to a college without specific prerequisites for how it was to be maintained and I would absolutely include that upon retirement the horse must come back to me. I have seen college horses that have been donated and I find it very hard to stomach the way they are cared for considering the top schools have tons of money to feed and maintain the horses. I also have concerns that the horses may be drugged for competitions. These are girls that are used to top horses in top condition and it breaks my heart to see how some of them are cared for. With their budget, you shouldn’t see a rib or any lameness considering most schools have vet schools also. The donators need to make sure their horses are cared for and in the end when they retire do the right thing by them. Period. They get the tax write off and these people have plenty of money and should follow how their horse is cared for. If one of my horses ended up at auction, I would be out of my mind crazy. These are beautiful animals who give so much and then to be thrown away disgusts me.
