The Forgotten Prince: How One Racehorse Escaped the Slaughterhouse.

I am so glad that Stan was saved. But the numbers of horses that aren't is staggering and horrific. And it isn't just the losers. The 1986 Derby winner Ferdinand was killed in an Japanese slaughterhouse in 2003. It is a shameful thing.

This is possibly worse than the fact they slaughtered him.

The slaughterhouse tracked his carcass all the way to the end customers, who were all restaurants. These restaurants all displayed the same sign: "Dine on a Champion."

How much of a raced thoroughbred could possibly be edible? Those horses get so much exercise, the muscles would be only slightly more tender than the hooves. Even the hamburger would be tough.

Horses are large. They require space, exercise, time and energy spent handling them, cleaning up after them, etc., money spent on equipment, medical care, feed, etc.; they aren't cheap to keep. They are bred and raised to work WITH people. Like dogs. But who can afford to keep a horse once his working days are over? There are always people unloading their older horses; at around 18 or so, they can legitimately claim a few more years' use. Easy years. Then there are the years with all the care, and no use. Those in the "industry" generally unload their horses before those years come along.

We generally don't get rid of our dogs when they grow white hairs on their muzzle and become a little stiff, even if they don't go on long hikes or catch frisbees like they used to. They are easier and cheaper to keep, relatively speaking.

I have 3 horses out in the barn; a 5 yo, a 17yo, a 19yo. I will be hauling hay, paying for vaccinations, worming, and trimming, cleaning stalls and pens, grooming, and caring for them all for their entire lifespan. Only two of them are ridden at this point; the other has earned retirement. She could ride out for many more years. She's healthy, sound, and, despite her age, way too "hot." If I can't ride her 4-5 times a week, put 50 - 75 miles on her a week, she is not exactly a "fun" ride. She is not for anyone else; I don't have any other riders experienced enough, with a light enough touch and enough horse sense to handle her safely. She's half thoroughbred, the daughter of a horse rescued by my family off the track as a 2yo after a horrific accident.

A few miles down the road, another friend has an old tb stud, reasonably well bred and successfully raced until injury left him homeless. She rescued him after he'd bounced around for many years. Along with another old tb mare on her way to slaughter. Thoroughbreds aren't the best candidates for rescue. They are really big. They eat a lot, and they are hard to keep weight on for the winter months. They are "hot" to handle, both energy and temperament. These days, if I wanted a competition jumper, I'd go with a warmblood rather than a thoroughbred. Better bone, better temperament. If I want a horse to work stock, a quarter horse is the obvious choice. Dressage? Warmblood or andalusian. Trail? Mustang or quarter. Endurance? Arab or mustang. There's a better, more suitable breed for everything people do with horses outside of racing.

The "industry," in my opinion, needs to focus on breeding good horses that are also fast, instead of fast horses that aren't good for much else. It would be a lot easier to find homes for the vast majority that don't make it to, or on, the track.

Arabs or mustangs? Yeah, I will ride a mustang when I want to use an oversized bridle on a 14 had horse that moves like a truck hit it. And we have an Arab. He is twice as flighty as any TB in the barn. We have 23 horses on the property right now (I personally only own 7 of them. Six of the seven are TB's, including the 16.2 hand TB my 11 year old daughter shows huntseat). Everything from QH's to WB's. And the three best things on the farm are TB's. Two of which came off the track. One is a stud that my eleven year old can ride and the other is a 17 hand gelding that eats a quart of grain twice a day and is as fat as a house. The other one is a six year old, 16.2 hand TB that I lease out to a 14 year old girl. She shows him in hunter eq. And you are just wrong. Fast = Athletic. Even in dressage they are starting to come back more towards TB's. At least in that you are seeing more TBxWB crosses over straight WB. At least with a TB you don't have to wear two inch long spurs to get them to notice you.

To me, it isn't so much the breeding that makes TB's flighty, its how they are handled on the track in a lot of cases. But they are not any more screwy than anything else we have worked with. Hell, the hand's down craziest horse I ever worked with was a blue papered Quarter Horse.

The problem with horses (at least around here) is that every nouveau rich banker's kid gets one for their 12th birthday. The family aren't REALLY horse people and they don't feel any loyalty to the animal once it has 'outlived' its usefulness. Or, since they aren't horse people, they don't get that a horse only has so many 'jumps' in the bank and they pound their legs off and then discard them.

I am afraid that slaughterhouses are not going anywhere. The thing to do is work towards more humane conditions. The truly sad thing is that once an animal goes for slaughter, they are no longer viewed as an animal...they are a 'thing'. And it is easy to mistreat 'things'.

Coming from generations of people who worked with horses as partners and family members, I just can't think of them that way.

What do I do? These days, I just trail ride. I ride over rocky ground, steep grades, swim rivers. Sure-footedness is important, as is stamina to go the miles. I sometimes help gather cows. On the "hot" mare mentioned above, I used to go on "conditioning" rides with endurance riders and their arabs; I was valued as a trail buddy because that mare's normal walk is so fast that the arabs had to trot out to keep up. My mare, even though she is half TB, is only 14.2. The other half is a quarter/mustang cross. My "trail buddies" kept urging me to do some endurance rides with her, but my work schedule doesn't allow for the number of hours needed to train for that. She is/was a superb trail horse and great at managing cows or coyotes. I haven't ridden her in nearly 2 years, since her daughter came of age.

I'm not a fan of arabs, to say the least, lol. I got to know plenty of them on those rides mentioned. I do have one out in the barn, though. Not mine, another family member's horse. He's ok. Larger and stouter than the average arab, more cooperative, relatively good-minded and willing, although he is still an escape artist. I'm told he is a "polish arab" from a line known for bigger bone and better temperament. :shrug:

My younger mare, the daughter of the half-tb, is as easy-going, smooth, sure, and willing as anyone could ask. A little tall at 15.2 (for old arthritic knees like mine, lol), but great in every other way. I bred her myself, back to a foundation qh to lessen the tb quotient.

The previous generation of horse people in my family were tb fans; that's why my mare is half. They had to do something with the stallion they rescued after he broke his leg on the track, and he was never sound for anything but breeding again. They bred a lot of hunter/jumpers; not my discipline of choice, but they apparently did pretty well. I rode a lot of them to keep them tuned up. All decent, and all HOT. Not a calm, steady one in the lot. That's what my friend is doing with her rescued tb stud; he breeds warmbloods and qhs. One for jumping and dressage, the other for barrels. As an older tb, he is a little stouter, less greyhound-like than some of the modern blood.

Luckily for me, my first horse was an ASB showhorse. My parents didn't know anything other than that he was purdy. I had been taking lessons for awhile at a local huntseat/dressage barn and one day my Dad told me he had up and bought me a horse. I didn't know much, but even I knew that an ex-five gaited ASB showhorse wasn't totally suitable for...well, just about anything. But that sucker taught me a whole lot. Mostly how not to panic, but that has come in handy.

I have worked with horses my whole life. We have had working boarding/lesson/training barns of various sizes. These days, we keep enough to make it affordable for me and my daughter to show. I think my prejudice against the Arab is that we bought him for my daughter a couple of years ago. He has never done anything precisely dangerous or evil, but along the same lines as my ASB, he has managed to teach her a lot. He is a snarky little bastard.

I understand needing a mustang for what you are doing. My TB's wouldn't last long barefoot on a rocky trail (I have a running battle with the guy that does our trims. He is a natural farrier who thinks that ALL horses can go barefoot. Needless to say, I have somebody else do our shoes.)

My conclusion about TB flightiness stems from having rehabbed many of them over the years. Also, the six year old I was talking about is out of an off-the-track mare we had in training. She was a total fruitcake. Scared of her own shadow and twice as scared of every person who came near her for the first year we had her. We got her to where she could do a job, but she was never quite 'right'. This colt has been an absolute doll to work with, but I can see how he would lose his mind if he were pushed the way they push young horses on the track. He took awhile to mature and they wouldn't have been able to allow that had he been sent to the track.

We have a thin layer of topsoil over a deep bed of volcanic rock. Even in pastures, no matter how much rock you remove, more keep "emerging" every year, lol. The mustang is physically tough, has incredible stamina, the best hooves of any horse I've ever worked with, and a much more cooperative frame of mind compared to the arab. The tb is just not bred to be at their best in this environment. I'm a little biased, though. My very first horse was a little mustang mare who spent more hours with me from age 9 to adult than my mom did. If it weren't for her good sense, I may not have survived all the stupid things I wanted to do with her back then. ;)

A few years back I rode with a young girl (high school) who rescued an injured race horse. He was gelded and "rehabilitated" before she picked him up. He had good manners, and was pretty cooperative. He was not as handy on the trail, especially on inclines, but he was doing well. His only drawback was that, every once in awhile, for no observable reason, he would go from calm and alert to leaping and bucking madly around. She fell off every time; she had a decent seat, but he was so big, his legs so long, that he could catch a lot of air before he twisted back around. We, of course, checked all his tack, inspected his legs, mouth, back, etc.; had a chiropractor in, had the vet in, watched him like a hawk. We never figured out what set him off. She moved, and I never got to hear the end of their story. :D

That is not super uncommon in off the track horses. There is an explanation as to why, but it eludes me at the moment. We had a similar kind of thing with a horse in the barn about 20 (?) years ago. I would get dumped every time. After I got knocked unconcious, we ended up having to pass him along as a pasture mate. It broke my heart because when he wasn't cutting flips, he had a trot a mile long and was GORGEOUS. But MAN, I have never (and I have seen me some crazy horses) seen a horse that could go from Zero to Psycho and back again faster or more impressively.

And I hear you about the rocks. Our arena gives birth to wheelbarrow loads of rocks on a continuous basis. Except here it's quartz rocks.
Hey, it was nice meeting another horse person here.

straight from the track and be put down than I care to remember. It is a sick fucking ordeal.

and came across the Breeder's Cup. I don't watch racing (or eventing, for that matter), but for some reason we started watching. We watched one race where a horse came from behind and won. It was exhilerating. We decided to watch the next race. I did not get the words "You know, maybe racing isn't so bad" out of my mouth good before one of the horses on the track cut a flip. He had telescoped one of his fore cannons. They put him down on the track. Once again, I resolved to never watch another race for the rest of my life.

provide for the retirement of these animals.

there's enough money for that.

it's the only right thing to do.

and if they can't ''afford'' that --then they can stay out of the business.

will it be to force the racing industry to provide for retired racehorses?

if people want to play in the racing game they should have to provide for the retirement of their animals.

the race tracks and legal booking houses can contribute significantly to the that end.

as to people -- and their senior years -- i agree with you.

So well written because it's so simply told and yet specific. Here's hoping the new Senate gets its act together on the anti-slaughter bill.

:kick: