EDUCATION NOT REGULATION........... In response to the latest horse riding death there is now a call for a national horse registry. I am not going to comment on that specific case as that is not really pertinent. Despite the fact that a lot of big name equestrian people have put their support behind this, I am not in favor. It seems pointless because at what point is a horse assessed and by whom. What records on a horse will be held. An owner won’t report behavioral problems in their own horse that will affect its resale value. A past owner won’t report behavioral problems as then they would become liable for future accidents and a trainer won’t report behavioral problems as that would breach client trainer confidentiality. If a horse bucks when being broken are they deemed dangerous for life? Is it after the horse is considered broken? But then they are only well behaved for knowledgeable riders? If the horse ever has a bad reaction to the pain of an ill-fitting saddle, the heavy hands of an in experienced rider using bits that are inappropriate or a reaction to being taken out to a show when they are ill prepared for are they considered dangerous? After a horse has undergone training are the records updated and the “bad behavior” label removed? Are other members of a club able to report to the registry because they have seen a horse with “bad behavior” and have this added to information available on a horse by a subsequent purchaser? Are there assessors that will be deemed knowledgeable enough to make that assessment? This is extremely dangerous as by what standard are they deemed safe or unsafe. It is massively open to interpretation. Trainers that train “natural” horsemanship style conflict with pony club trainers and a lot of English style trainers so one could not assess another. There are also problems when an owner sends their horse off to be started and only wants to pay for 6 weeks. We all want value for money but every horse is different and 6 weeks may not be enough for some horses. If trainers are under a time constraint are they able to ensure that all issues have been sorted. On the other hand I have worked with horses that have just returned from being started under saddle and they have NO respect on the ground. Their ground manners, yields or cues are non-existent so the trainer was purely working them under saddle. Their attention was everywhere else but on me. These horses were far from safe and the owners were already starting to make things worse by stepping back out of the way of these pushy ill-mannered horses. So what is the responsibility or a breaker? I do agree there are many dishonest horse sellers out there and so many cases where a purchaser has been duped when buying a horse. On the other hand there are many purchasers who think they are a lot more experienced, and portray themselves as such, than they really are. Take into consideration that we are training our horses every time we go near them and horses are assessing their handlers all the time. It doesn’t take a lot of the wrong type of handling to turn an extremely respectful horse into a pushy bargy “dangerous“ horse. I help horse owners every day because the horses have or have developed behavioral problems and these people are seeking help to correct them. Most of these horses aren’t dangerous the owners just need a little guidance to help them communicate with their horse. So really it is only Education that is the key to correct this issue not regulation.
Posted on: Sun, 24 Aug 2014 10:56:04 +0000
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