I had one that got away too. And at least one, maybe two, that I bought and wished I hadn’t. It is so hard to know, but I think buying the known horse that you have been riding for a while and get along with is less risky (even with a known drawback) than calling an ad and flying across the country to ride the horse once or twice before deciding.
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Poor boy. While some kissing spines can be managed or treated with injections. Buying a horse with this level of kissing spine would involve expensive treatments (most likely surgery) and a significant downgrade in his potential to stay sound.
For me, this would be a hard pass. If the trainer wanted to GIVE him to you and you felt up to the challenge AND wanted to re-evaluate (or give up) on your goals, you could consider it.
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Less risky only because you already know the horse has a serious potentially performance limiting, painful condition that typically requires $urgery with no guarantee of success. No insurance help on the pre existing condition.
Can see no other advantage in buying this horse. Even free, surgery and aftercare are expensive,
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As a relatively novice horse family, we’ve had the experience of dealing with a horse that needed treatment, a long period of rest, and a very gradual return to work (suspensory injury).
I can say from personal experience, this is not a situation an inexperienced person should take on unless they have to. Rehabbing a horse–especially a big warmblood-- is not a walk in the park. Suffice to say, horses are not always cooperative patients, and they don’t necessarily like being cooped up or taking things slow. The resulting behavior changes (even in a previously placid, sweet horse) can be difficult, frightening, and require lots of trainer help.
All of which is to say… OP, I don’t think you should take this horse on.
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Preach. It feels like once a month we have a thread on horse care of very experienced horse people saying “I love my horse and I’ve got 20+ years of experience but my rehabbing horse is explosive and I don’t know what to do”. Stall rest or slow rehab can be really challenging even for trainers or very confident horse people.
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@carrotgirl: I’m sorry for this outcome. Heartbreaking for you.
I predict that the trainer (seller) will offer you this horse at a big discount. Be prepared for this. This horse will never meet the goals that you have described.
Are you prepared to change those? Like, just do flat work? 1st level dressage? If not, move on. It’s going to be rocky - the trainer will try to get you to take this horse. DO NOT buy this horse.
If you are open to different goals: go away for 6 months and see what you come back to. Maybe you decide you want a fun horse to W/T/C and this one is it. Maybe this horse is still sitting at the trainers barn.
DO NOT buy this horse now.
Best wishes with this. I went through several PPEs with both purchases in the last 20 years. I cried driving away from one round. Things work out and other horses appear.
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Well. I’m sure I’m not the only one here who is thinking less and less of this “trainer”, who blamed the previous rider as the reason for this Grand Prix potential horse to suddenly start stopping, rather than doing diagnostics and treatment for pain. OP you need to walk away from this horse AND this trainer.
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@carrotgirl – If this is acceptable for you, I recommend that you contact Dr. Cliff Honnas at Texas Equine Hospital (private facility). He is one of the foremost experts on KS in the U.S. Horses are sent to him from all over the U.S. for surgery.
Find out if he will at least look at your xrays and give you some feedback. You can send those by email and consult by phone, if he will do it without examining the horse himself. Hopefully you can get the most realistic prognosis for whatever options he would recommend.
https://www.texasequinehospital.com/veterinarians
[Only talk to Dr. Cliff Honnas among the vets at the practice. He’s the guy with the KS brain.]
Also please, please do not feel that you have a mission to ‘save’ this horse. Unless you have a) the financial resources for a 20 year pasture pet, along with your other riding still continuing, or b) well there is no ‘b’, really, that I can think of. Perhaps sometimes you can ride him, sometimes you can’t. You find out when you try to get on and he pitches you over the moon because of a pain spasm. Even after a surgery or two. With rehab.
The horse’s current owner (the trainer) has already stepped him down to simple lessons that aren’t triggering any reactive behavior. He can stay with that, forever, for riders as they come into the program. He’ll be ok. It’s not a bad life for a horse.
Trainer may even be accepting of that future for him. There is a fair chance that she hasn’t sunk that much money into him. Some European imports get here without a huge investment, relatively speaking. He may be meeting his expenses with the lessons, maybe even better than that.
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FWIW … interesting that the horse didn’t have problems in Europe, where he jumped so splendidly in 30+ shows.
I know that KS can develop over time. Suppose that we can only speculate that this is what happened.
But it did seem to hit hard on landing in the U.S., if we believe the European accounts of an unblemished show record (regardless of placings or no placings).
Not doubting the diagnosis at all. Just interesting how this horse’s story has played out.
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Either way, the trainer did wrong.
Either she didn’t do appropriate diagnostics when the horse started acting not like himself and do her due diligence and instead blamed the rider.
Or she knew and didn’t tell the OP.
I agree it’s interesting he did okay in Europe but not here, unless the rider was just one of those legs-of-steel types who could pilot him around…until the horse said “no” very clearly, when given the option.
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^^^ THIS ^^^
Count me among those disgusted that this trainer did not do some fairly simple and inexpensive diagnostics on behalf of this horse.
OP, please take this experience to seriously reevaluate this trainer and her program.
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Lets look at the actions of the “trainer”
- Imports a horse that is jumping well in Europe (at least at one time)
- Puts a student of hers on the horse. This results in multiple stops and “difficult” training sessions. Trainer is unable to resolve issue.
- Trainer apparently pursues no diagnostics on the horse.
- States horse is worth 50K but care leases to a novice rider.
- Encourages novice to buy horse and spend $$$ on PPE to do the diagnostics she never did.
It will be interesting to see how this person spins the KS diagnosis.
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Some of them don’t travel well, and he could have lost significant topline. And there are a lot of riders who don’t know how to ride a horse in correct posture. Sales horses don’t often get custom saddles. We know nothing about the day to day management. Lots of reasons for the KS to become symptomatic here after being manageable there. And the horse’s natural response to the pain is to invert further, which could make this disease worse.
But of course the real upper level potential horses who have significant show records over there are not sold for what I imagine this trainer paid for this horse unless the Europeans can tell the horse won’t make it up the levels or hold up. Sometimes, they just don’t have enough blood or scope to keep moving up. These make wonderful American horses a lot of the time. However, there are a host of ones that are still hot blooded and scopey and catty go for cheap after they get to the 1.20-1.30m level (very successfully with a very good rider, often a man) in Europe because of some problem in the axial skeleton. I’ve seen it enough times myself that I am not surprised one bit by these turn of events. It is a heartbreaking scenario but not one you need to finance any more than you’ve paid for that extensive PPE.
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Again if OP is still around, can you answer a few questions???
-
When was this horse imported? At least the year,
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When were the European videos taken? What year?
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Did trainer import him or buy him from a dealer over here?
A) if she imported him, does she have the PPE xrays?
B) If she bought him already here, does she have those PPE x rays?
C) Does trainer physically have his passport and other documents? -
What year(s)are the US show records from?
These answers can help answer many questions and provide a comparison on the progression of the KS.
ETA, this horse is 10 some if the European record and video could be 4/5 years old,
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I was going to chime in to say just this…. I also think poorly of this trainer, but as we know, there are many uneducated trainers. I hope @carrotgirl follows up w @OverandOnward’s idea to help make a clear decision.
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I would not spend another dime in diagnostics on this horse if I were OP. There’s no way to know if the KS is actually the cause of the problems or just one factor, so a second opinion doesn’t help her at all. It still comes down to taking a huge and very expensive gamble on a horse that doesnt sound like a good match anyway. She’s already out the money for the PPE. I personally wouldn’t be comfortable continuing to ride this horse either, he’s clearly uncomfortable even if he isn’t acting out with OP in the saddle. Continuing to push is both unfair to the horse and a safety risk for the rider if he finally hits his breaking point while she’s on board.
50k can buy plenty of lovely horses that are way more suitable for OP’s current experience level and don’t require extensive diagnostics up front. I also agree with others that I wouldn’t recommend buying anything until she’s spent time in a better program and is at least jumping small courses consistently. I think trainer has been pushing ideas that are not in OP’s best interest at all, but it’s hard to see that clearly without getting some distance and another opinion.
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Absolutely, it is reasonable and customary here in the US for SELLER to continue to diagnose any negative PPE findings and treat them before returning the horse to the market or whatever they want to do with it.
I am sure the DVM KS expert is wonderful but he does not work for free. Did OP pay for the X-rays or did trainer and does OP physically have the disc? Still unclear on that.
ETA sometimes remote vets do not want to consult on a horse for anybody but the owner,
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if it were me I would not spend another dime either.
But. This seems to be someone who has already lost her heart to this horse. It is crushing, devastating, to get a diagnosis like this. With the best future being a pasture home for the next 20 years.
It would almost be easier if she already owned him. Then there is not the feeling that one is abandoning the horse to the whims of this erratic trainer and an unknown fate. Although hopefully my low level lesson Horse scenario is in the cards.
Obviously this is not a horse she should be buying for her future riding purposes.
But it is very very hard to leave a loved horse to an uncertain fate.
If she just had some reassurance as to what his future will be if she moves on without him, and that he will be safe and cared for regardless, that would help immensely.
I have no sympathy for the trainer. She played some unpleasant trainer games and won unpleasant prizes. But unfortunately that is probably a life pattern and who knows where it goes from here.
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In this saga …
- Whatever her motivations, trainer imported a going show jumper with a successful record at 1m+, ridden by an able amateur.
What didn’t happen in this saga …
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Trainer gives the horse a proper transition after shipping to the US.
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Trainer gets another good amateur rider, or a pro, to take this horse to some shows and reestablish the record it had in Europe.
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Trainer works through her network to find a buyer who will carry on with this nice warmblood imported show jumper. For a price possibly above 100k, but given his age probably in the mid to high fives.
Sometimes looking at what would be normal to happen, that did not happen, can also throw some Potential insight into a situation.
Why this trainer put the horse on a road to a ruin of a fine record is a mystery. Knocking 10’s of thousands off the horse’s value.
Re-tracking the horse to an inexperienced amateur does make a kind of sense, but in a sinister way. Frankly.
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As others have said, do not spend another dime trying to diagnosis the issues of a horse that doesn’t belong to you. I can only imagine how much $$ you spent on an extensive PPE.
ETA: I had a similar issue come up years ago where the horse was very slightly off. Owner said it was thrush. I went ahead with the PPE with the understanding that there was something wrong with that hoof/leg, she was on the hook. We did that leg first. Horse had a fractured sesamoid. In retrospect (and talking to other people who had bought horses from her), I’ve always thought she knew there was an issue beyond thrush but probably hoped I wouldn’t do an extensive PPE on the horse.
This is where the trainer/owner should step up.
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