The Celebration has been shut down...!?!?!?

[TWHLuvR]

I just got an e-mail from one of the walking horse groups I belong to on Yahoo, and then confirmed this at thewalkinghorsereport.com. Most of the horses going into the ring for the starting classes of The Celebration were (allegedly) passing inspection with the DQP's, but were NOT being passed by the veterinarians for the Dept. of Ag. It seems there is some disagreement over the scar rule. All of the remaining classes for this evening were cancelled, and there is no word yet as to when those classes will be held. So far, classes are still scheduled to begin tomorrow morning at 9:00 AM. The Dept. of Ag. is meeting with breed officials to try and come to some kind of agreement, and supposedly they'll be meeting throughout the night. It's also being reported (though this is hearsay) that the National Guard has been called in, as there is concern that a riot will start in Shelbyville.

Exhibitors were told something along the lines of "bring your horses to inspection with feet that are as clean as the day they were born, or you'll be turned away."

[JumpJoeyJump]

good! that sounds like a step forward in the well being of these animals

[tmsStauffer]

oh wow!


Good for them though!

[stormy_warning]

The trainers shut down the show when the USDA inspectors made the statement that they were going to write up every horse that was led through that night. It didn't matter if they were sored or a had a scar or not, they were going to get a ticket for either soreness or scar rule. They meant everyone.

I guess it didn't matter to them. Shows you how well things are run doesn't. They don't care about anything except the money they get from the tickets.

You have to remember, they were writing up in hand horses and pleasure horses.

[Lindsay Kern]

I don't really understand what happened????

[TWHLuvR]

What happened is that the USDA has been telling the Walking Horse industry that it needed to clean up it's act since the Horse Protection Act was passed in the '70's. They didn't do it. They were warned time and again that if they didn't do their own house keeping the government would do it for them. The government has offered numerous clinics for those who own Walking Horses to discuss what would or would not be acceptable for horses to pass required inspections (this is intended to rule out horses who are chemically sored, put on blocks, pressure shod, intentionally scarred, etc.) and prevent them from showing. There are allowances for horses who may have been injured in the pasture - uni-lateral scarring (scarring that occurs on one leg) is allowed, but bi-lateral scarring (scarring that is present on both legs) is not. Enough time has passed (20 years or so) that anyone with a horse that is scarred knows they cannot show it. This has been known for years, and yet, at this years Celebration *young* horses who could not pass inspection were presented to show.

The USDA showed up and started inspecting horses at the opening Friday night show. Two classes into the show there were trainers who had horses that were NOT passing inspection. They started a screaming match which escalated into the show being shut down until Saturday night. The USDA veterinarians were told that their safety could not be guaranteed (things were apparently very hostile). They did show up throughout the event to inspect horses, and there were something in the neighborhood of 200-300 tickets written for horses that were presented and found to be not sound.

To top it off, the World Grand Champion class, which is the one class most people pay attention to, was not held. Nine horses qualified to show in the class, but out of them only THREE passed inspection to be allowed in the ring. Some trainers didn't even present their horse for inspection (what does THAT tell you?), and the remaining were turned away as unfit to be shown. One of the trainers went around and offered the trainers of the three horses who passed inspection $10,000 each to stay out of the ring. Other people offered additional cash incentives to the trainers to keep those horses out of the ring. Consequently, NONE of them showed their horses. As a result, there is no WGC Tennessee Walker for 2006. (Though ironically, the owner of Private Charter, a horse who was deemed unfit for showing when presented for the WGC class, had purchased a cover ad on The Voice magazine proclaiming his horse at the 2006 World Grand Champion. Seems like he thought he'd paid enough people that his win was in the bag. Oops.)

It's a shame that people still feel a need to resort to soring horses to get un-natural movement. I hate that people who are in my breed do this. Of course, it's just my opinion, but we ought to be breeding for NATURALLY gaited horses rather than pacey horses who need to be stacked just to go square. My problem is not with the people who are showing sound, stacked horses (though this is a BIG exception rather than the rule - and I personally think it's ridiculous). My problem is with the people who are intentionally inflicting pain on innocent animals. It needs to be stopped. All of the whining because the government has *finally* stepped in and done what they've been saying they would do all along is commical. If they'd stop soring horses the problem would go away.

Doesn't it sound simple?

[Lindsay Kern]

Thanks for taking the time to explain what happened. That is awful, I could never imagine hurting my horse to make him perform better. Also, IMO, if nobody sored their horses and everyone's movement was natural, the entire competition and standard of ideal movement would change. I don't understand the mentality of some people!!

[TWHLuvR]

I think so, too. I'd love to see the breed focus on naturally gaited horses. The problem is that there is a LOT of money in big lick horses. People who have made their living on stacks will fight tooth and nail to keep things as they are. After all, that is how they support their families. I feel for the situation they're in, however, this has been coming down the pipe for many, many years. I feel even more for the horses who are intentionally gimmicked. It hasn't ever been right, and it is a shame that these practices were ever started to begin with. The moment that this started is the same second that true competition went out the window.

People who are big lick advocates have a whole laundry list of justifications for why they like it, why it isn't wrong, and how it doesn't hurt their horses. They're entitled to their beliefs. While I don't agree with it as a practice, those people who show BL horses SOUND (and I mean without any gimmicks aside from the stacks and legal weight chains or bell boots) are not the enemy. Misguided, in my opinion, but not the enemy. They ought to be just as outraged over what happened at The Celebration as the rest of us. The behavior there gave our breed a black eye, and in particular, was a very bad representation of BL horses. They already have to justify those stacks to FOSH people and flat shod enthusiasts ALL the time. Now they have to do it to the rest of the horse world, too.

[whiteys-wild]

Wow that sounds like really serious s**t...what do they do?...I have no idea about gaited horses, I worked w/saddlebreds for 1 week and standardbreds off the track.....but TWers I have never been involved in....I always made the assumption that a gaited horse was naturally gaited and that enhancements were minimal?

But I guess since I spent so many years at the track I should know better...

Lorna

[TWHLuvR]

If it were only that simple, Lorna.

There are some very nicely, naturally gaited horses in the TWH breed. I'm only going to talk about those that perform the running walk and the pace here (otherwise it just gets confusing). Those people who prefer nice pleasure horses or would like to show flat shod horses (keg shoes to something that carries a little more weight but still considered flat shod) look for horses that are naturally gaited. These horses will perform a nice, head shaking running walk while barefoot. When people first started selectively breeding for gait in the TWH breed, this is what they were breeding for - to cover lots of ground smoothly. However, while trying to breed for that ideal people also wound up with horses that would pace. The only way to get a pacey horse to 'square up' (and I'm being a bit sarcastic when I explain this because there are other ways to get a pacey horse to square up) is to add weight and action to the front hooves. This breaks up the timing of the pace, and boom!, you get a pacey horse that now performs a running walk. Somewhere along the line someone had a pacey horse and decided to put it up on pads. That person started winning at shows. Someone else decided they'd out do that guy, and put on bigger pads, more weight, etc. - and guess what? THAT horse started winning out over the first guy. It snowballed into the "performance" horse that you see today. Take away the stacks, weight, chains, and soring, and you have a horse that HARD paces.

As for what is done to sore horses, well, it's only as limited as a person's imagination. They've pressure shod horses, putting something that will put pressure on the sole of the foot between the sole and the pad and then put the stack on top of that. Nuts, bolts, golf balls - whatever they could get in there. Every time the horse takes a step they snatch their foot back up. Thanks to technology this is easier to detect so I think it's not as common now. However, this is being replaced by putting a horse on 'blocks'. The horse is forced to stand on something that puts pressure on the sole. This bruises the sole, and you get the same effect of the pressure shoeing but nothing that would show up on an X-ray. Then there are the chemical irritants that are used to sore the pastern and fetlock area. You name it, it's been done. Forced founder - anything that will force the horse to pick it's feet up high in front, and crawl in back. If those hocks are scraping the ground (I'm not kidding) it's considered desireable. Lots of people refer to "performance" horses as freaks because of the way they move, and in those circles that's taken as a compliment.

Most of the people who own Walkers own flat shod horses (it's somewhere in the 90th percentile), and there is a lot of buzz in the breed to have the TWH World Grand Championship class showcase the flat shod horse rather than the minority-owned "performance" horse.

*fingers crossed*