Forgive me while I self-indulge in using this blog as a way to write myself through a conundrum.
This morning, my husband was driving me to the barn. We were engrossed in listening to a sci fi story we had been following for a couple of weeks. Across the highway, some movement caught my eye, I turned and saw a young man brutally beating a dog on a leash. I begged my husband to turn around (asking him to make a U turn on hwy 1) he saw the look on my face and asked what was happening even as he had started the illegal turn.
“That guy is punching and kicking a dog.” I said.
“I saw him out of the corner of my eye and I thought he was digging a hole.” He answered as he accelerated toward the scene of the crime.
“That’s how hard he was hitting that poor dog.”
We pulled up as the guy, a fellow in his early 20’s, white, with a hip haircut, was shaking an older pit bull and demanding that the dog “look at him.” I rolled down my window, with my hand on the door and told him that he needed to stop beating the dog. I was upset and loud (imagine that).
“Lady, you need to mind your own business. This dog just tried to kill a cat.”
“Dude, you have no right to beat any dog like that.”
“Look lady, just go your own way and call who ever you need to call, allright?.”
“Oh, you can bet that I will. I’m going to call and you know it.”
“Whatever.”
We pulled away and I called the local police. It seemed like it took forever and I was shaking like a leaf. The dispatcher had me describe the situation, asked if there were any weapons, told me clearly not to approach the suspect and that he was sending an officer out.
We parked for a cup of coffee to calm our nerves. I was still shaking and we were collecting our thoughts. I thought with satisfaction that a police would stop the guy and….
and what?
If he scolded the guy and the guy really is an animal abuser, he would just take it out on the dog and not in view of the general public. If the cop took the dog into custody, who is going to adopt an older, cat killing pit bull? What if this guy was just trying to stop the dog from killing cats so that he could keep the dog? Maybe it had already killed cats that were pets to him or people that he cared about?
I’m struck with the knowledge that, had I “done nothing” like the other morning commuters, then presumably, I would be complicit with the animal abuse. But by yelling at this guy and then siccing the cops on him, did I perpetuate the abuse indirectly or did I rain down police activity on a guy having a bad day and trying to right a wrong with an aggressive dog?
I’m asking our readers to chime in. What would have really made a change for this dog? What would have made a change in this guy’s violent behavior? What can we, as citizens do to make real change when confronted with brutality?
How is it that someone can dance into your life wearing aluminum shoes?
The back story is pretty common for our place; he raced successfully for four years – a somewhat long career for today’s Thoroughbred. He broke both ankles and rested for a year after surgery. His first race back was dismal. The jockey jumped off his back after the race and explained to the owner that the horse had simply lost interest in racing; that he would never be the same racehorse again. The trainer agreed that the horse deserved a new home that would love and care for him. He’d been a fine runner and deserved a good retirement.
The next day, we got a phone message stating simply “I brought you something, it’s in the third stall in your barn.” Click. The last time I got a call like this, there were two pygmy goats tied to the tack room door. Naturally, we were suspicious.
What I found in that third stall that afternoon took my breath away.
We all gathered around him, myself, my husband and the gaggle of teen-aged girls that make up any lesson or training program. We were dumbfounded as we watched this graceful creature prance nervously about his new home. We started to giggle when he lifted is lovely face and hay dribbled clumsily from his mouth. He twitched his dainty ears when he noticed us laughing as if to say “howdy.”
I entered his stall and reached up to stroke his dark chocolate coat. He flexed his iron muscles, pinned his ears and nipped in my direction.
“Is he mean?” the girls wanted to know.
I told them: “Not at all. He’s just come from the track and his body is full of pain meds and steroids. He just needs some time to adjust. He’s going to be very friendly, just wait and see.”
His registration papers were tacked to the wall and my husband was studying them closely. “First thing” my husband announced “is that he needs a new name.”
“What’s his racing name?” we wanted to know.
My husband cleared his throat “Wegottohaveharte”
“Wow, he does need a barn name.” We agreed.
“Let’s let him loose in the round pen to play and maybe we’ll come up with something.” I suggested.
And play he did. Anyone who has watched a mighty thoroughbred in a race knows about the raw power and speed of the animal. But it’s not until you see them play, unfettered by rider or tack that you can appreciate the grace, the joy and the stupendous fragility of 1100 pounds of muscle and sinew.
This particular horse was so well balanced. An almost perfect flow of beauty started at his chiseled face, up to small alert ears then over the arched neck which flowed into rippled shoulders, trickled toward shapely legs and then the flow stopped at his ruined ankles. Behind all this was a tight short back, powerful haunches, an upright tail that swished and swirled with a life of its own.
But this horse wasn’t thinking about ugly ankles. He was focused on being free to roll and jump and play.
The teen-aged girls recognized the mischievous gleam in his eye and squealed every time he galloped past, kicking and bucking.
My husband, ever the engineer, was still looking at the papers. He nodded his head over and over, visibly impressed. It seemed that this horse, not only exuded class in his body and movements and attitude, this horse was also a grandson of the famous sire Seattle Slew and had himself won over $250,000.
The girls suggested names like Hot Rod and Indy due to his speed and ever running engine, but nothing seemed right.
Over dinner and wine that night, my husband pointed out that this horse was smooth rhythm and grace. Jazzy even. He was Just. Plain. Cool. We paused, looked over the rims of our wineglasses at each other and tuned into the music coming from the speakers. It was crystal clear to both of us, his name was Coltrane.
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In what seemed like no time at all, Coltrane became the darling of the program.
“I wanna ride Coltrane”
“Will I ever get to ride the beautiful brown horse?”
“Me wride Cultwain.”
became the things we heard everyday.
Coltrane was trusty on the trail, soft over jumps and a hoot to play polo on. The horse that pranced his way into our barn, snuggled his way into our hearts.
The kids taught him to bow for treats and to shake his beautiful brown head up and down to answer questions. Coltrane only knew how to say “yes.”
He carried little children, anxious teens and worried women his his brief career with us.
Then the call came.
“Um, Coltrane fell over in his pen early this morning. The guys were doctoring some cattle and I think one scared him. He’s up now, but I think you had better come out right away.”
I rushed to the barn and there was our lovely boy, dazed but eating next to his best pal, the gorgeous but always aloof white mare Gigi. I checked his vitals and aside from a slightly elevated heart rate, he seemed fine.
I started my work and checked on him throughout the day. He was quiet, he was eating. But Gigi never left his side.
At feeding time that evening, I put his halter on. It was the blue one that the kids had painted with his name and with musical symbols on it, and took him out for a walk. The horse who always bounced out of his stall like Liberace entering a stage was quiet and obedient. I found myself in tears.
Jenny, age 17 and tender as peaches in season found me crying and joined in immediately.
As luck would not have it, our regular vet was out . The vet on call arrived on the scene to find two crying females snuggling what looked like a tired horse. The vet was late for a BBQ and brusquely administered a mild tranquilizer and some pain meds.
“Go home girls” he said as he slammed the lid to his truck “let this poor horse get some rest without you blubbering around him and bothering him. He’s going to be fine.”
The cranky vet didn’t know Coltrane. In fact, nobody knew Coltrane as well as that snooty mare Gig and she was very concerned.
Jenny, Gigi, Coltrane and I settled in for a long night. Eventually, Jenny collapsed in sadness and exhaustion with her arms around Coltrane’s old injured leg. Coltrane hung his lovely head low, brushing his lips on Jenny’s hair. Normally, I’m a stickler for safe body position around horses, this time, I was too tired, too sad and too touched by their closeness.
Gigi hovered her massive grey body between Coltrane and the gate, preventing anyone from getting close to him without her knowing. Her long grey ears twitched at every sound. As for me; I paced.
Sometime in the middle of the night, my husband brought blankets, a flashlight and hot cocoa. He and I lit the flashlight and went to take Coltrane’s vital signs. Both Gigi and Jenny were asleep.
At the sound of the click of Coltrane’s halter going on, Gigi snapped suddenly awake and rushed at me violently. It was at that moment that I knew Coltrane was not going to be fine; Gigi made it clear, Coltrane was dying.
My husband and I gently nudged Jenny into the car to take her back to our house and tuck her in on the couch. I lied to get her into the car. I told her that Coltrane was going to be fine. And she believed me.
Once out of earshot of the girl asleep on the couch, I started paging our vet. He works at the local racetrack and so I could safely assume he was up and working by 5 am.
At 6 o’clock, he called back.
“Well” he drawled in is Oklahoman accent “I heard that Gary treated your brown horse for colic.”
“Problem is” I replied “it’s not colic.”
“What in the hell is the story then?”
“I wish I knew, but his heart rate is up to 55 beats per minute and he’s listless as hell.”
“Poor bastard. It’s probably a busted diaphragm. Didn’t you say he fell?”
“How can you diagnose something like that over the phone? If that’s true, he’s a goner.”
“I know, little missy, because I’ve known you for 10 years and you ain’t never up at 5am unless it’s real bad.”
It was true. “So what can we do.” I asked.
“Head back to the barn and check his heart rate again, if it’s over 50, call me. Okay, gotta go. Bye.” He rang off the line.
I sat at the kitchen table, head in my hands when my husband walked in. Rubbing my shoulders he asked “You okay?”
“Nope.” was the best I could do.
I snuck out of the house as quietly as I could leaving my husband to deal with the sleeping girl on the couch. When I got to the barn, Gigi was no longer protecting Coltrane. She looked resigned and tired. I took this as a very bad sign.
Coltrane’s head was even lower than before and his ears drooped from his skull. His dark chocolate coat had turned mangy brown literally overnight. How he managed the strength to give me the signature Coltrane “muzzle snuggle” I’ll never know. But when I went to move him for a little walk he defiantly refused and instead started manically pawing the ground and sweating.
Our gentle, beautiful, jazzy Coltrane was in mortal pain.
I took a deep breath, fished my phone out of my pocket and dialed.
“Dr. Ash’s exchange – can I help you?”
“A message to Dr. Ash from Square Peg ranch, need euthanasia services ASAP.”
“And how do you know that you need euthanasia m’am?”
I hung up the phone.
Within 10 minutes, my phone rang.
“No Bueno I guess?” said the good doctor.
“When can you be here?” My voice was flat.
“About noon by the time I finish up here at the track.”
For the second time in 10 minutes, I simply hung up the phone.
I staggered back to see the animal whom I had just condemned. Again, he nuzzled me just before he collapsed and started thrashing.
The thought of waiting hours for the vet to come became unbearable. Morbid thoughts ran through my mind. Could I come up with a knife to slash Coltrane’s throat and end the misery? What about closing off his nostrils with my hands in the hope that suffocation would work? Would a neighbor bring me a deer rifle or a revolver? In the meantime, Coltrane’s eyes rolled in his beautiful head as sweat streamed off his body.
I ran to my office, to the locked cabinet and found a half used bottle of tranquilizer. I readied a syringe and dropped to his side, placing my knee on his jaw and my free hand on his shoulder to keep him still enough to deliver the shot that I hoped could help. After finding the vein and pressing the medicine inside his body, I took my knee off his lively face. He soon quieted. I had been successful in delivering some kind of mercy. I sobbed and stroked his neck and shoulder and I felt like I could feel the chemicals coursing through his ropey veins that would take the fight out of both of us.
I was tired. Tired of playing God, tired of making the right and practical choices. Tired of keeping my head in a crisis, of calming the kids and their mothers. I was tired of making little girls’ horsey dreams come true and tired of allaying the fears of middle aged women. I lay back on Coltrane’s sweaty and doomed body and couldn’t believe that even at this hour, he was holding me up.
I realized that his entire life, he has submitted to bit and bridle, to the jockey’s whip and to the inadvertent kicks of little kids. He ate what we gave him and would go without if we forgot. He carried me over fences and over hill and dale and still every day, he was happy to see you if only you would bring a slice of apple or a scoop of oats. He asked for so little and gave everything he had.
At some point, the vet arrived and pushed in the drugs that stopped Coltrane’s valiant heart.
I keep his forelock braided with dry flowers in a secret place.
Coltrane in 2006Handsome ColtraneColtrane was always making us laughEven other horses loved Coltrane
Today is the first day without Willa in the barn. The rendering truck, buzzing with the rancid smell of corpse has left and in it is 1,000 pounds of what used to be our lovely old black mare.
I’ve got a lock of her tail in my pocket. I’ll probably wrap it in ribbon and gift it to a child who has fond memories of learning to ride on Willa.
She was probably 30 years old. I’d retired her several times, or tried to at least. Once to my friends’ rolling pastures not far from here. While there, she blithely pushed through electric fences to tour the neighborhood. I tried to retire her to a neighbor’s lovely green pasture only to find her impaled on an uncapped t-post. Both the vet and I felt that the hope of her recovering from that wound at her age were slim and we were both wrong. The vet would often ask to see her when visiting so that he could marvel at the tiny scar – all that was left of a deep, gaping wound.
When we moved to our new location, I thought for sure that I needed to find a retirement pasture for her. My staff rebelled and reminded me that pasture retirement hadn’t worked for her in the past. They wanted to keep her with us “until the end.” I gave in and once again, we put her back in the riding program lightly and she thrived on the attention and showed her particular spunk and spark to another generation of new riders.
“
Willa teaching 2008
“Willa was the horse who always knew which kids got under my skin – she bucked them off” I still laugh thinking that what my barn manager said was true. She was the horse who dealt out “attitude adjustments” with an uncanny skill.
A few months ago, we decided that Willa was fully retired and that her only job was to eat carrots and play in the turnout with the other school horses. Volunteers were always eager to brush her glossy black coat and take her for walks. We suspected that she was almost entirely blind. She developed a habit of ducking under her paddock fence in the middle of the night. We would show up in the morning to find her walking up and down the shed-row, helping herself to all of the food and treats to be found. She would greet you with a curious face as if to say “can you put me back in my stall? I’m very thirsty after all this eating.” All you could do was laugh as you cleaned up the mess she’d made during the night.
Willa sported a racing tattoo and we knew that she played competitive polo for many years. She had taken a tumble on the polo field and had injured her neck badly. She was easy to spot with her characteristic drooping head. Indeed, her original barn name was Willow and was shortened to Willa soon after. One could surmise from her build that she had had a few babies. I suspect that she served everyone who came across her with humility and grace. She was not one to demand attention and she had no bad habits. We loved her for her kindness, for her spunk, for her willingness to let us put just about anyone on her back. From what we know and what we can tell, she lived a long life of service to humans.
Today, I have to live with the fact that once again, I was required to play God and to make a decision to end suffering. The heaviness I feel right now is not doubt, nor is it regret. I did what I had to do and I had the excellent assistance and advice of our dear veterinarian, Dr. Ashton Cloninger who checked on her every day of the last 12 days of her long life. No, the heaviness I feel today is the knowledge that I must tell 100+ kids that Willa is no longer with us. Many of them had some of their earliest and best rides upon her strong back. All of them have fed her carrots and laughed at the curious faces she would make to entreat you to feed her another. I will console the kids and explain the beauty of the circle of life. I will wipe their tears away. I will gratefully accept the beautiful artwork and cards they will make, and when it is all said and done, I will be so lonely for my old friend.
Greetings!I’m not going to dress this up as anything else but what it is; this letter is an urgent request for financial support of Square Peg Programs.
Square Peg Ranch runs lean
Volunteers do everything from clean the stalls, to planning the fundraising events, from scheduling the lessons to feeding the animals.
But no matter how dedicated our volunteers are, all organizations need cash-flow to operate.
We spent two years searching for a place where the students and the animals would flourish in a healthy and nurturing environment. In February, we made our biggest and boldest move, to Canyon Creek Equestrian Center.
Our new facility affords us so many opportunities to teach and learn. We now have lights in the arena, a round pen for training young horses and for teaching lessons, we have private trails with an ocean view!
Our new location is safer, larger and owned and run by people who support our mission. Not only that, but we managed to decrease our monthly expenses by almost 10% because the new facility runs so much more efficiently.
And yet, a very rainy winter and spring had our lesson program at a standstill many times. The move itself cost us thousands of dollars to do repairs to the old facility and to get the new facility ready for our programs and animals. Our volunteer community spent hundreds, if not thousands of man-hours helping with the move.
Local businesspeople, such as farriers, veterinarians, feed providers, hardware stores have been extremely patient during a long winter and through the move, but they can’t wait forever.
Summer is at our doorstep and with it, our summer programs will bloom and cashflow will be easier. A volunteer team is working hard to create fundraising events that will carry us through the next winter and spring.
But between now and then, we have a serious cash crisis. We need to raise $25,000 to pay off a series of bills, to engage an accountant and to create a buffer whereby necessities like feed for the horses and liability insurance is on time, every time.
Not a cent of this cash campaign is for salaries or administrative expenses.
I’m asking you personally, please donate what you can to Square Peg programs today. We need your financial help to keep turning “I wish” into “I can.”
I was reading a blog of a popular horse rescue expert. She’s at the Homes for Horses Roundtable and she posed the question about how a rescue chooses horses to save and how to say no when you have more animals than you can feed. I expect that her questions will elicit a lot of chatter and I’m eager to hear what people have to say.
This week, we brought in a new horse to the program. He’s not staving, he wasn’t headed for slaughter. He’s young and healthy and he’s played a lot of polo. He’s sweet and he’s cute and he’s nice and small. He’s going to be great for our riding program. But each time we bring in a horse, we have to answer to the public, to our board of directors and most importantly, to the kids who participate in the program – “why this horse and not another?” It’s one of the hardest questions we have to answer. Here’s my attempt:
I think the question that ALL rescuers ask themselves late at night when they replay the phone conversation in their minds from the “take my horse or else” people is
“if you can’t save them all (and you can’t) whom and why do you save?”
The answer we came up with sounds trite, but it’s true – education. We pick the horses that we can use to educate the next generation that animal ownership is for LIFE and that taking on any animal into your family means that you have a responsibility to that being. So we have 14 horses, two goats, some cats and two retired foxhounds. Each day, those animals reach out to kids in the community to teach them about responsibility and second chances for animals, most of which were “thrown away.” Maybe, just maybe, we can change the thinking of the next generation and then the problem will be, if not solved, then at least much more manageable. So some of them are old and lame, some are young and adoptable, most are in-between. We don’t actively solicit for adoptions, we use the horses in our program to teach important lessons and we hope to find sponsors for them. Then we hope those families that sponsor will go on to be responsible horse owners, or owners of any pet. We get flack for not “leasing” or adopting out more horses. But each day, our rescues change lives and each day they are guaranteed the care that they need. It’s the only way I can answer the question of who and why do we save a particular horse.
**Update** I was contacted by the author of this piece, a Ms. Julia Edwards (Dake) of Camden, South Carolina. She’d also like us to know that she is not 87 years old. Her lovely blog can be found at:
I ride.
That seems like such a simple statement. However as many women who ride know it is really a complicated matter. It has to do with power and empowerment. Being able to do things you might have once considered out of reach or ability. I have considered this as I shovel manure, fill water barrels in the cold rain, wait for the vet/farrier/electrician/hay delivery, change a tire on a horse trailer by the side of the freeway, or cool a gelding out before getting down to the business of drinking a cold beer after a long ride.
The time, the money, the effort it takes to ride calls for dedication. At least I call it dedication. Both my ex-husbands call it ‘the sickness’. It’s a sickness I’ve had since I was a small girl bouncing my model horses and dreaming of the day I would ride a real horse. Most of the women I ride with understand the meaning of ‘the sickness’. It’s not a sport. It’s not a hobby. It’s what we do and, in some ways, who we are as women and human beings.
I ride. I hook up my trailer and load my gelding. I haul to some trailhead somewhere, unload, saddle, whistle up my dog and I ride. I breathe in the air, watch the sunlight filter through the trees and savor the movement of my horse. My shoulders relax. A smile rides my sunscreen smeared face. I pull my ball cap down and let the real world fade into the tracks my horse leaves in the dust.
Time slows. Flying insects buzz loudly, looking like fairies. My gelding flicks his ears and moves down the trail.
I can smell his sweat and it is perfume to my senses. Time slows. The rhythm of the walk and the movement of the leaves become my focus. My saddle creaks and the leather rein in my hand softens with the warmth.
I consider the simple statement; I ride. I think of all I do because I ride. Climb granite slabs, wade into a freezing lake, race a friend through the Manzanita all the while laughing and feeling my heart in my chest.
Other days just the act of mounting and dismounting can be a real accomplishment. Still I ride, no matter how tired or how much my seat bones or any of the numerous horse related injuries hurt. I ride. And I feel better for doing so.
The beauty I’ve seen because I ride amazes me. I’ve ridden out to find lakes that remain for the most part, unseen. Caves, dark and cold beside rivers full and rolling are the scenes I see in my dreams The Granite Stairway at Echo Summit; bald eagles on the wing and bobcats on the prowl add to the empowerment and joy In my heart.
I think of the people, mostly women, I’ve met. I consider how competent they all are. Not a weenie amongst the bunch.. We haul 40 ft rigs, we back into tight spaces without clipping a tree. We set up camp. Tend the horses.
We cook and keep safe. We understand and love our companions, the horse. We respect each other and those we encounter on the trail. We know that if you are out there riding, you also shovel, fill, wait and doctor.
Your hands are a little rough and you travel without makeup or hair gel. You do without to afford the ‘sickness’ and probably, when you were a small girl, you bounced a model horse while you dreamed of riding a real one.
“My treasures do not chink or glitter, they gleam in the sun and neigh in the night.”
Square Peg Ranch was started in 2004 by my husband and myself (Chris and Joell Dunlap) with the notion in mind to change the world “one horse, one child at a time.” We have been doing just that, every day since then.
The ranch, located along hwy 92 in Half Moon Bay within the gates of Canyon Creek Equestrian Center hosts 16 horses, two retired foxhounds, two pygmy goats, a few cats and a gaggle of kids of varying abilities, ages, learning and financial challenges.
The hardest part of my job is turning down horses for the program. I see way too many “please take my horse or else” emails and just want to cry because I know that we can’t save them all. I have to look at the fact that all of our students, volunteers and their families are learning that taking on the life of a pet means making a commitment for the rest of that pet’s life. They learn this when they help wrap the injured legs of a retired racehorse or take our elderly horses out for a quiet walk. Each horse at Square Peg Ranch has a story to tell and a lesson or two to teach us.
Take Hank, a gorgeous 16.1hh six-year-old thoroughbred gelding; he raced at the track as a three-year-old several times. Each time, he would race badly and then not be able to walk for a couple of days. His trainer x-rayed his legs, took blood samples to see if he had a metabolic problem or infection and each time, things would come back negative. He was given to Square Pegs in May of 2008 and was doing well adjusting to being a saddle horse when he began being dull and listless and laying down all day. We also had a blood panel run to see what was the matter and, just like at the track, we found nothing. So we put him in a large grassy paddock with another horse his age and watched his hair grow long and shaggy; he seemed to lose weight no matter what we fed him. Just as I was getting really worried, a volunteer mentioned what a tall horse he was. Hank (registered racing name; My Cheatin’ Heart) was not what I would call a tall horse by our standards. Suddenly, it all became clear – Hank’s lethargy and appetite were due to his crazy growth spurt! We measured him and compared the measurement to what we had taken when he arrived at the ranch. The young gelding had grown almost three inches in 90 days!
Hank
It was clear from the start that Hank and our ranch manager, Greg Crosta had a special bond. Greg, standing 6’2″ at age 22 knew that an adolescent growth spurt could be physically painful as well as daunting. Greg adopted Hank in September 2008 and they both enjoy a rousing chukkar of polo on the weekends and casual gallops on the coastal trails during the week.
Most of the Square Peg horses are Thoroughbreds with a Dutch Warmblood, a Paint horse and a pony thrown in for variety. Some have had splendid show or competition careers and some have come to the program over a bumpy path. Each year, we find a forever home for one or two of our horses and are able to take in horses to take their place.
Compare Legacy, a giant Hannovarian gelding who was long listed in dressage for the 1986 Olympics (had he gone, he would have competed against Reiner Klimke and Ahlerich) to Stella, an older Thoroughbred mare who came to us after being found with 32 other horses starving in an orchard. Stella and her friends were all suspected of being used in “horse tripping.” In this “sport” horses are run out of a chute and roped by their hind legs. Stella’s legs healed as she gained weight, but we decided never to ride her deciding that she had paid her debt to humankind several times over. Stella, after a year of TLC at the hands of the Square Peg volunteer community, now lives at Joe Shelton’s Thoroughbred Friends ranch in Winters, Ca. Legacy died peacefully at the age of 34. Both made huge impressions on the kids at the ranch. They taught lessons in generosity and forgiveness and kindness that can’t be learned in any classroom.
Square Peg Ranch is a place where kids come not only to learn how to ride at their own pace, but to learn to be a part of a community doing something important. Most of the students volunteer, to the extent that they are able, but often their family’s do too. From running the online auction, to the daily chores of stall mucking and cleaning, the work at the ranch is about as hands on as you can get. But don’t take it from me. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a quote from the heart might be worth a few pictures. Here it is, straight from the folks we serve.
“I feel like Square Peg has not only helped me grow as a rider, but grow as a person as well. At Square Peg, I have learned that everyone can fit, and how much it makes a difference.” Nicole, age 13
“There are lots of places where you can learn to ride a horse, but none that offer the love, support and just plain fun that this one offers. It is a magical place where kids can be kids and are celebrated for it.” Cathy, parent
“Square Pegs has helped me become me. A haven. A place i feel i can just be myself. It means the world to me. I’m not sure words can really describe what the ranch means to me.” Farris, age 13
“For me, Square Peg is a place where the world stops and a horse listens
.” Tomio, age 18
Of course, the ranch runs on program fees and donations. And while feed and other costs have hit an all time high, donations are harder and harder to come across. If you can help us make a difference “one horse, one child at a time” please consider supporting our work with a donation.
“When you call upon a Thoroughbred, he gives you all the speed, strength of heart and sinew in him. When you call on a jackass, he kicks.” Patricia Neal
Ten years ago, rescued dogs were all the rage with the tawny set. It seemed like everyone in Palo Alto and Pac Heights was toting around a mutt with a story.
“He’s most likely a pit bull/coc-a-poo cross and he was horribly abused when I got him from the local rescue. I’m working with a full time trainer to get him over his food guarding issues.”
It’s been great business for the trainers and for the dogs themselves and people were able to feel good about their dog ownership. For awhile there, being seen at a local dog park with a pure bred dog seemed selfish and terribly unfashionable.
Now that notion seems to be trickling into the horse industry. Having a rescued horse is trendy and cool and each horse has a story. With the economy still in a free fall, horses are needing homes in droves. However, in the words of my equine training mentor “All horses need owners, but not all owners need horses.”
I write this article knowing full well that those I wish would listen will most likely not and those who already know will read and understand. My very own mother in law decided to take on a two year old rescued mustang as a mount for herself and her grandchildren. When I explained to her that it was an inappropriate mount for the job she calmly dismissed my entreaty to let me know that she had paid for sixty days training with a very good trainer. Needless to say, she now has a broken hip to show for the experience.
By the same token, I was out walking our latest project, a three year old colt fresh from Santa Anita racetrack when my dear friend and our resident dressage trainer looked at his lovely, lithe body prancing at the end of the lead rope, crossed her arms across her chest, scowled at her students and proclaimed “Thoroughbred” in a tone that was clearly pejorative. Then there was an instance on an endurance ride when a woman would announce to her riding buddies every time my friend and I came near her with our ex race horses she would yell “oh no, here come the THOROUGHBREDS!” As an aside, I do believe that we crossed the finish line within two minutes of this woman and her highly bred endurance horse with our throughbreds who not only scored well in recovery rate and soundness, but each of the vets complimented on how relaxed and sweet our horses were.
It’s true that I have an ax to grind. It’s true that I love to be right. It’s also true that 100,000+ horses will go to slaughter this year in Canada and Mexico and many of those will be young race stock that either couldn’t compete or were injured or unfit for the breeding shed and couldn’t find a home. After 25 years in the horse business, I’m here to tell you that an ex race horse can be one of the most versatile and honest mounts in the equine world if you understand him and his needs.
A racing thoroughbred is bred not just for speed, but also for qualities that cannot be measured with a stopwatch; he’s bred for heart and for generosity. Without heart and generosity, he won’t strive to win, he won’t even try. For this reason, off track racehorses have proven themselves dominant in polo and three-day eventing and excellent in dressage and in the hunter jumper ranks. They have won titles in endurance, in barrel racing and in roping events.
Once you understand what a thoroughbred has been raised and trained to do, you can better understand them and make choices about their needs and care and training.
Thoroughbred horses can trace their history back 300 years to the importing of three stallions from the deserts of Arabia. These stallions were bred to the best English saddle mares to form the foundation of the modern Thoroughbred. American studbooks of the Thoroughbred breed trace back to 1730 when the stallion Bulle Rock was imported to the states. American horse racing continued to grow and the first American Stud book was produced in 1873 by Colonel Sanders Bruce of Kentucky. The selective breeding process of breeding the sires with heart and generosity to the swiftest mares has been going strong ever since.
Thoroughbreds can be identified by their tall stature, small heads, broad chests, fine bones and relatively short backs. Many people will tell you that due to their propensity to speed, they are flighty and nervous. I would argue this point to say that thorougbreds, by and large are sensitive and curious, two important traits that make them receptive to training.
At the track, a race horse is fed a diet of cooked oats and other high availabiliity energy food. His diet is geared to giving him a burst of speed to carry him for about two minutes of racing or less. If you don’t want him to act like a racehorse, don’t feed him like one. Like your rescued dog, he needs exercise and companionship – if you want him to act like a neurotic mess, then lock him in a stall at a boarding stable and visit him twice per week. If you want a dressage horse that can execute moves like Baryshnikovwith hooves, put him with the best, most consistent trainer you can afford. Otherwise, don’t expect it of him.
Meet Ocean Fury, aka: “Quincy” a 3 year old colt recently injured on the track in January. He has a sponsor who is committed to healing his injuries and paying for his retraining as a saddle horse. He’s beautiful and sweet and has a slightly naughty sense of humor. With any luck we will be riding him in the next three weeks or so and have him exploring the coastal trails by summer.
Ocean Fury aka: Quincy
Regretfully, for every Quincy, there are several that end up in less than ideal circumstances.
A four year old thoroughbred right off the track knows a few things. He has been ridden with a saddle and a snaffle bridle. He has been around cars, trucks, bicycles and heavy equipment. He’s had daily baths and he’s ridden in horsetrailers. He’s had his feet picked, his legs wrapped with bandages and his coat brushed to a shine daily. What he hasn’t experienced are things like cross-ties, mounting blocks and leg pressure for turning from a rider. Given the proper diet and turnout and exercise and training, an off track thoroughbred can be expected to carry a rider on trails and in the arena in a reasonable amount of time. But just like the rescued dog, any adopter needs to understand that time and patience, as well as proper diet and exercise are the keys to success with these athletes.
Here’s a quick video of Square Peg kids riding a whole pack of retired and rejected racehorses. Not bad if I say so myself (except for the video editing, which is clearly not my forte).
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