how much can he really change???

Shropshirerosie wanders in, reads the thread , and walks out again shaking her head at more crazy breeding.




Actually, no, I'll come back in to say this.

I'd read the phrase 'halter classes' but didn't actually know what it was until I read this thread. I just did not know that there is another discipline out there that encourages looks at the detriment of welfare. It's reminds me of the scandal within the British Kennel club a couple of years ago when a television exposé of unhealthy 'award winning' dogs led to radical overhaul of some breeds standards.

Yes, there have been many many examples of breeding to produce one characteristic at the expense of overall health - heavy draught horses are a good example of this where the ability to pull a plough well came at the expense of ground-covering limbs and lean athleticism - but to discover that there's a whole other world out there that promotes horses not bred to perform astonishes me.

But clearly this debate is one that has gone around HF and back again and I'm just joining very late in the day, so I'll back out now and leave it with those more informed than me.

OVO, I know this is one of the biggest things that we disagree on.

Just because I don't show in halter or raise halter horses doesn't negate my opinion on their more than questionable breeding practices. When people are breeding horses who are prone to unsoundness for the sake of "pretty", then that is something important to everyone who cares about horses and is worth speaking out against.

IMHO, it's no different than speaking out against every backyard krazy kolor breeder in the country who are breeding horses that are completely useless for anything practical.

Ok I'll bite. I don't like the way that many pure bred dogs are bred, as in, deeply inbred with traits that are extreme enough to cause genetic disorder and shortened life.

I'm not going to buy one of those dogs, backyard breeder or otherwise.

But to turn my head and pretend it doesn't make me sick? To not try to educate people to make better choices? THAT I can't do. I do believe that we, by taking responsibility for the evolution of the animal and it's general morphology, are also responsible for the PAIN AND SUFFERING WE INFLICT.

And I know I'm in the minority of the general population. How many people does it even matter to that certain dogs almost consistently need a C-section to give birth, or any other number of ills that has befallen them? They just want a qyooot widdle bulldog puppy!!!! And look, Joe Schmoe is selling them on craigslist for half of what you can get at the (reputable) breeder!

*sigh*

I honestly think that some people don't really link our breeding choices to the eventual suffering of the animal. They just don't think about it. And if I can say something and decrease the DEMAND for those types of animal (no specifics intended), then I helped.

I completely agree. Although, if you ask Arabs (the horses themselves, not their owners), they aren't horses, they're gods.
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Or princesses, Emmy is a princess

Well, of course!
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True...Arabs are very cat-like in that respect...

mine is more down to earth, she's the Queen.

I agree with all those who are opposed to breeding at the detriment of the animal. When the animals are in crazy amounts of pain, incapable of even leading a comfortable life as a pasture puff, never mind being useful, all because people have made them that way, something is very wrong.

And I'm sorry, but choosing a horse with a draft sized body, but the legs and head size of a small arabian over a money winning reining stud, who can actually WORK??? They have bred these halter horses to the point they look like Frankensteins monster for goodness sake.

"If we just chop the head and legs off this pony and attach them to the body of this Percheron, we have the ideal stock horse!!"

For me personally, I can't say "so, what" because many people who look at these conformational catastrophes of a horse think that this is what a real working horse looks like. These breeders create this way over-romanticized illusion of what an AQHA/APHA/whatever is supposed to be. I have met people like this and let me tell you, it takes one to know one!

In addition, many of the people who produce these horse's (in my opinion) are fortunate enough to be able to have the opportunity to live my (and probably many others on here) dream of breeding dream horses but they take it for granted by producing horse's with built-in obsolescence -- AND THEY KNOW IT.

This is why it is NOT okay -- It's UNETHICAL.

Might as well start selling these piece o' crap horses at walmart . . .