Lifelong horse ownership

Pony Girl has raised the issue of providing lifelong homes for our horses. This isn't an issue that one hears being talked about too often. Over here, horses all too often seem to be bought to teach children to ride (before being swapped for bigger horses as the children grow), or to enable someone to do well in competition (again, in due course being traded in for a "better" horse). I have even seen a website called "Horses Wholesale", which makes me sad: for horses are neither chattels nor commodities, but living, breathing creatures.

Nevertheless, there are riders who keep a horse lifelong - there are some such at the barn where D and P live. A key factor seems to be accepting each horse as an individual, with his strong points and his weaknesses. (One might say the same thing about human relationships.) The important thing is the joy of the relationship, rather than achieving this or that objective. Is it more important to appreciate the quality of the relationship, or the achievements that the relationship facilitated?

An interesting point is that it can take a year for a horse to become acclimatised to a new home or a new owner. Back when I had the trail riding centre, a year was a luxury that we didn't have. I tried to keep my horses long term (some were there for the whole nine years), however new horses had to start work quickly. Fortunately most new additions found a companion to bond with - a herd of two dozen does give a certain amount of choice of friends. It did help that I was seeking easy-going horses in the first place. Some horses started quicker than others. P was bought on a Thursday, driven to the riding centre (he was a cart horse) on the Friday, left in the pasture over the weekend, then on Monday morning I started out riding him on a one week trail ride. Another horse had gone lame, and I was left without a lead horse. Fortunately P's former owner had ridden him on occasions (I knew this at the time), however his stamina and good behaviour were a great credit to him. He's a good little horse. I suppose that I must be his second owner, perhaps his third if he was sold as a foal too. P has developed a lovely personality, lively and amusing, in our care. I suspect that, when he was a cart horse, he was just expected to pull and certainly not to exhibit any personality. Now he is aged around eleven, and will - we hope - be with us for the rest of his days.

I don't know much about D's past, beyond that he is seven and that he came from a village a few miles east of where we lived. I know that he worked as a cart horse, and (knowing his former owner) I suspect that he worked in the logging industry. Probably he started work as a two year-old, that being the custom out there. Also, knowing his former owner, I doubt whether too much personality was tolerated. He was a work horse, pure and simple. In the riding centre, he was a work horse too, and was ridden or driven most days. Hard work does tend to suppress personality, in horses and people. In his new home, D is developing more of a personality. He is friendly, canters down the paddock to meet me, has special spots where he likes to be scratched, and has a particular way of entering his box and turning round inside. (Best to keep out of the way of that huge bottom swinging around.) He is excited by food (to the degree of throwing his feed bowl in the air), dunks his hay in his drinking water, and sleeps lying flat out and snoring loudly. He has a certain way of looking out from his stable, enabling visitors to admire his head and colouring, and unsurprisingly is becoming quite a memorable horse. We hope that he is with us for the rest of his days too - which might mean another couple of decades. Perhaps by then we shall own some land?

In some ways the two horses differ. P lived most of his life in a remote mountain village (actually about a mile from Castle Dracula), where wolves and bears were a fact of life, and is always well aware of the wildlife in his vicinity. Even a bird or squirrel interests him. He worked alone (unusually in a land where pairs were the norm - however his former owner was relatively poor), and is more wary and independent-minded as a result. He stops and stares at horses that are pastured a mile away. Ridden alone, he is a lively horse, and great fun to be with.

D grew up in a village in the valley, worked in a team with another stallion, and had a powerful, assertive owner. He worked on the main road, and in the forest around logging machinery. Nothing seems to alarm him, and indeed he just doesn't seem to care about horses, tractors or any otherything else. Being a stallion notwithstanding, he is an extremely safe horse to ride on the road and around the farm. Alone, he is not the liveliest of horses, but grows more energetic travelling with a companion. Having been a working horse, food and sleep seem to interest him most of all.

It's curious how each horse has demonstrated that he is settling into his new home. P decided to round up the other geldings to form his own band, to the annoyance of some other owners whose horses exist presumably to provide "riding on demand". Nevertheles, he still has his "groupies" who pay attention to him, whinney and come to the fence.

D has grown more lively in the field, and gallops across to see other horses being taken to and from adjoining fields, even throwing in the odd buck out of exhuberance. (He does this when I visit him too, which is encouraging: clearly my arrival is not bad news.) He feels secure enough to sleep lying down, legs sticking out, sleeping like a pig in straw in broad daylight.

I'm conscious of what a change these two horses have experienced. Literally, they have come from lives of hard work in a harsh mountain environment where temperatures varied from -30C in mid-winter to +30C in mid-summer. They have left pastures of rough grazing for a country where the diet is almost too rich. After rudimentary hoof care, they are now in the care of a leading barefoot practitioner. From a place where horses were just draught power on the farm, they have arrived at a home where they are much loved family members enjoying relatively easy lives. Instead of being ordinary, they are viewed as curiosities. Actually they are rather fortunate.

Comments

[PonyGirl]

What a lovely post. I enjoyed reading about D's personality starting to shine through and all the amusing things he does. I really think that as a work horse, he knew his job and was content to work hard and sleep and eat well for it. Things are different for him now. Equally, I have seen show horses with an almost glazed look in their eyes....it's like they've forgotten how to be a horse. They never see the outside of a stall or arena. I wonder how'd they feel to gallop through a field, or take a leisurely hack down a trail? I imagine they'd be more of sound mind and less sour in the show ring. Luckily, from time to time I have read top trainers recommending this in magazine articles. Even horses, show career or work, need a break from the mundane!

[jme]

your horses are very lucky to have you. they sound as if they are thriving in their new environment. i love to hear how their personalities have really come out!

i have always had difficulty in the horse industry for exactly the reason you describe - i couldn't bear to sell horses (and especially show horses) knowing they'd be passed around to various owners who would use them as if they were sports equipment and throw them away when they had no further use. all of my horses have a home for life with us, regardless of their behavioral or health issues, and we are fortunate to be able to give them permanent homes. indeed, many of our horses were rescued from just those kinds of situations even though we knew they had issues. it has been a wonderful journey to watch them develop these unique and endearing habits and personalities which had previously been stifled. i couldn't imagine disrupting their lives now by changing their world again...

[smellshorsey]

Your horses have it made. Wouldn't it be interesting to know what they're thinking of all this? Most likely, they're wondering how much longer before dinner.

Growing up, we kept horses, with few exceptions, for their whole lives. We had the space and horses weren't cheap to keep but they weren't like now.

I think all of us would like to keep our horses (unless they're stinkers) for life, but sometimes it's all we can do to afford one horse. We knew when we bought our daughter her pony that as much as we loved the pony, she was not for forever. Right now she's teaching another child to ride and is in a wonderful place where there are several other parents who are dying to buy her for their daughters.

The best some of us can do is make sure that the horse is sold for a high enough price so that it has value for the next owner, so that it will be well cared for and hopefully, sold to another person who values it.

It's a very painful and emotional subject. The woman we got my daughter's present horse from had given the horse to someone as a pasture companion so he could live out his days in a big pasture (he was very young for that but had had an injury.) It was a scam. He was sent to an auction and we bought him two dealers later. I can't promise him a home for forever, but I hope that I can. He's absolutely delightful, if bi-polar at times.

[Karen]

Great post! I hope I can provide good homes for all of my homes for the rest of their lives. They are like children to many of us.

[White Horse Pilgrim]

PG: you're right, I think that hard work does tend to dull the personality. The horses were happy enough when in hard work, certainly they weren't sour, however now they have grown more into individuals. Looking around, sadly there are too many bored horses confined to barns.

jme: yes, it is hard to buy and sell horses. Indeed, one has to be ruthless to make muc money from working with horses - or perhaps have a very special talent in training. I didn't have the ruthlessness to work my horses to their limit to make money (that is what many "successful" trail riding centres do) nor keep buying and selling horses which accompanies over-hard work. I guess that we're just too humane to make a lot of money with horses, but we're good and caring owners.

Anne: I take your point about how much horses cost. Danielle and I don't have children, and there are things that we forego - such as a larger house, second car, foreign trips, etc - in order to have horses (and cats and dogs). That's the way things have turned out for us, so we are able to look after our horses (so long as jobs hold out anyway).