Why, of course, you need to thank 
Who doesn’t want a Self-Training Horse?
@McGurk for the WIN! 
!!!
Car Keys 
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One of the best things I’ve ever read on COTH! Thank you for sharing your brush with Stardom.
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In college (I went to a school with a riding program), one of our total beginner horses was named Stuart. He was a rotund, sway-backed, flea-bitten gray fellow. Average in every way. The pokiest kick ride ever. Supposedly he was pushing 30 years of age. Unless you were totally new to riding, you were insulted if you were put on Stuart for your lesson.
One day there were some alumna on campus. I was working in the barn that day and they asked me if Stuart was still around. Then they proceed to tell me he used to be a Grand Prix jumper with a famous rider (never said who) before he was donated to the school!
I still have my doubts.
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You can pm by going to your pm page, clicking “new message,” begin typing the username in the “to” field, and then selecting it from the list.
Making a profile private nixes the usercard, but doesn’t remove the ability to pm.
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I figured out how to tell her my sob story. But thanks.
Em
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@Xctrygirl Em, I’m sorry for your troubles and hope the tide turns soon. But thank you for starting this thread, because some of these stories are Pure Gold!
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I half leased a horse one summer in college. I’d graduated and moved back up here and was looking for a lease again, back when you did that through the local horse paper. Saw an add that sounded like the same horse, same first name for the owner (who’s number I had since lost), so I called.
Turned out it was the same owner, but she had a new horse. Back story I later learned about the horse was that he crashed through a fence at the Hampton Classic and given his previous teen owner a bad head injury and she stopped riding. Sounds great, right? I ended up half leasing him for ten years and he was totally reliable in every way (OK except about donkeys), and loved loved jumping. It took him a bit to get used to going out on hacks but once he did he loved it, would drag you to the trailer in anticipation of going cross country schooling or on paper chases. He’d jump shadows for fun, once gleefully jumped into a showdrift, and thought ditches were great. I found his USEF number and the one and only time I showed him it was very obvious he knew exactly what he was supposed to do. But any show results were before USEF online records so I never confirmed.
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Not mine, but two separate trainers. First one was generously gifted an “AA-rated” show horse for her child who was in need of a horse after outgrowing her large. Horse arrived from Florida. It was crystal clear he’d never driven past an AA-rated show, let alone been in one. She hopped on him, pointed him at a low line, and closed her eyes to simulate a beginner. Just like McGurk’s Star, he carried her like a perfect, safe gentleman. She kept him! lol
Second trainer came from a multi-generational Virginia horse family – racing, hunters, jumpers. Horse in question was a really, really nice young prospect. Potential buyers claimed that the PPE radiographs showed the beginnings of a severe degenerative issue brewing ( I can’t recall what it was, maybe a navicular cyst). The owner and the trainer immediately pulled the horse off the market. A few days later, trainer’s grandfather and great-uncle were visiting that barn and the owner and trainer asked if they would like to take the horse for a while while he was still sound. Just bring him back when they started to see an issue. Surely in the next year or two there would be a problem, they figured.
The horse remained bewilderingly sound. They took him down to FL for the winter circuit. He cleaned up. Someone tried to give them a blank check for the horse, which they met with “Oh, no, we can’t sell him.” Years passed and absolutely nothing happened. Until one day when the horse was around 20. He looked a bit off. “Well, we knew this day would come,” everyone said. The vet took radiographs to determine if the problem was progressing quickly enough to consider euthanasia in the near term. To everyone’s shock, the X-rays came back with no sign of the degenerative issue. The horse was off from straining a muscle messing around in the field.
They’re still not sure what happened. Because this was well before the days of digitalized radiographs their best guess was that there was some sort of mix up and the wrong horse’s radiographs were read. Or perhaps the potential buyers had lied about the issue hoping that they could negotiate a lower price not realizing the owner would instead give the horse away to someone else?
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Thanks.
I am loving these stories too.
It isn’t changing my situation, but it warms my heart tons.
Em
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