Some competition/race horses DO sulk when left behind
I had an OTTB who had transitioned into my adult hunter ride. Who would throw a FIT, whirling and screaming in his stall, if the horse trailer left without him. Didn’t matter which horse trailer, didn’t matter which other horse (and there were 40 in the barn including his best buddy, who never showed.
Took care of several retired studs who would sulk, be off their feed and run around their paddocks screaming bloody murder when they saw another horse jog off to the exercise track. Sometimes it is just easier to keep them training. They’ll tell you when they’re done racing. And I don’t care what ANYONE says about the racing industry. You can not beat a horse, or train a horse, to put his head in front and dig. He has to want it, all you can do is run him where he can be successful and keep him fit enough to do what he wants to do. No one has to teach a hound to hunt, he just does, or he sleeps on someone’s porch. You can teach him what to hunt, and how to let you in on his game, but that instinct, just like some bloodlines, is born, not made.
Til the last day of my Thoroughbred’s life, when he and much younger horses were running in the field, he would have run his own legs off rather than not be the first one to the top of the hill. At a decade their senior, he flat out smoked them, and anyone who hasn’t seen a nearly 30 year old Thoroughbred, with crummy feet, a big ankle, who looks like a old broken down hack horse, turn into the most beautiful creature on the earth when he’s running, will never, ever get it. It’s all heart at some point, regardless of legs, lungs, or anything else. You can’t train that, you can only hope that the person who is the steward of that particular animal, recognizes when heart is all that’s left, and tries to find them a softer place to land. Sometimes it’s possible, sometimes, it isn’t.
Every time someone one here gets their panties in a wad about the racing industry, I want to just say “hey, just jump on over to the giveaway forum and see what you find over there”. What you’ll find is not people who don’t have farms to turn out their old horses, but people who will give them away because, wait for it, they are NO LONGER USEFUL AND ARE COSTING TOO MUCH MONEY. Oh, wait. I thought that was just the racetrack jerks. Not Cindy Show jumper and Donna Dressage Queen. Who have tried everything they can try and now they have a “pasture sound” horse that isn’t useful. Now, they have a truck and trailer. Money to keep a horse and a job that does not depend on that horse’s income. So I guess it’s okay to just give it away to someone else, because they are to chicken sh*t to just put it down themselves. People that you expect to know better, who have more financial resources. But those same people are right over here going “shame on the racing industry”. That has way more regulations and oversight that most of the trainers in other disciplines.
Any sport or enterprise, that uses a “dumb” animal for profit, whether it’s breeding or racing, dogs, cats, horses, cows, pigs, chickens, has a potential for and contains abuse. Racing is no better or worse. There just aren’t any “pounds” for unwanted racehorses. No real giveaway forums either, no time or money for that.
I’ve seen a dear student’s show horse go from winning a state competition to laying dead in his field from an aneurism without any warning. Event horses die in competition in spite of our best practices.
Horses are fragile. Sometimes they break. Sometimes, there isn’t a good reason. Just because he was at the top of his game once upon a time, doesn’t mean he deserved any more or less than any other 5 clamier.
Are there crummy trainers and owners? Sure. Just like there are crummy pet owners, and crummy spouses and crappy parents. Only difference is no one is betting on them.
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