Difficult decision re retiring young horse - what would you do?

[cptrayes]

Don't we need to know what's wrong with him before we can give you any advice on what to do with him?

For example, if he broke a bone or cut a leg half off and will always be slightly mechanically (not in pain) lame then he is safe-ish to go to a properly vetted loan home.

If he has a degenerative disease which can be masked (like OCD, shivers, hind leg suspensory desmitis) then I think you should have him put down so that you know he can't be passed from pillar to post at any point in the future. (You may think you can look after him in a loan home, but you never know what your own future will be.)

If he is permanently lame with "navicular" then he can probably be rehabilitated barefoot at his age, and if you want to know more about that option PM me.

 

[little_flea]

Thanks everyone. I will not have him PTS. I also think loaning as companion would be the best option - no way will I risk him getting sold on. I would be very happy to contribute financially towards keep - I just don't know if being upfront about it would be wise - what if attracted the wrong person? The only reason I mentioned a sanctuary is because they might actually want a good load of cash (£5k or so) to take him... I know he is not a charity case and I really really want to do what is best for him. Maybe, with a little luck, he can go back to being a riding horse...

 

[little_flea]

The problem is that we still don't know exactly what us wrong with him - in short, he started bolting, he has had a large number of examinations and treatments and the jury is still out as to whether it is back pain or behavioural. To top it off he got a tendon injury and had now been in field rest for 6 months. He is due to be brought back in and reassessed end of Jan. If suitably sound, we will send him off to be ridden/re-backed and take it from there. As we don't know exactly what is wrong with him, I have to assume he would have to be fully retired and not ridden again.

 

[cptrayes]

How difficult for you. I hope you manage to get to the bottom of it, but please don't be afraid to have him put to sleep. There are far worse places for a horse to end up than peacefully dead. I sold a slightly unsound horse of mine, with a very tight contract, for £500 as a medium dressage schoolmaster. After 14 weeks I had to rescue him, weighing 200 kilos less than he had when he left me. It was completely heartbreaking, not to mention very expensive.

If it does come to it that you rehome him please PM me for the name of the fiend who starved him if anyone from Cambridge contacts you.

 

[monkeymad]

I have had to retire 2 young horses (a 7yr old and a 8 yr old) due to soundness issues. One I placed in a retirement home and paid £10 a week, he lived out all year and loved it! I used to visit him once a month and was happy that he was looked after and well. The other horse I had pts. He was a different character to the other horse who had happily retired, and after he jumped out of the field for the 2nd time (onto the road) I made the difficult decison to have him pts. It broke my heart, but horses do not think into the future, they live for the present. Please, if you do retire/loan your horse out, make sure that the home is legitimate and will not abuse him -unfortunately if you can't guarantee his future wellbeing, the only way you can be certain he will not suffer is to have him pts. Good luck.

 

[FrodoBeutlin]

[ QUOTE ]
My pony was injured when he was only 2. The injury aside it just wouldn't cross my mind to have him PTS and 6 years on he's a happy field ornament who spends his day doing exactly what nature intended him to do - eat grass and poop.

There is an expense to having him and it means I can't get another but thats just tough as far as i'm concerned. I bred him by accident (didn't know his mum was preggars) and whether I like it or not I considered myself responsible for him. In my house no animal is ever disposable and just because they become unrideable does not mean their lives are suddenly valueless.


[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, totally agree with this.

 

[SO1]

Sadly another difficulty you may have is that without a diagnosis you may not be able to get the insurers to pay out for loss of use as without knowing what the problem is the vets may not be able to say 100% that he will never recover or what the prognosis is.

A sanctuary may not be able to take him but they may be able to give you advice or assistance on re-homing. Even if you donated 5K this would not cover the whole of his life so you would still be relying on the sanctuary to cover the costs of your horse long term.

Has your horse been investigate for kissing spines - there was a horse at our yard that had developed behavioural issues and vets kept saying there was nothing wrong with her and eventually she got a 2nd opinion from another vet and it was kissing spines.

Like others have said a big horse with an undiagnosed problem is going to be harder to loan out as a companion than smaller ones and even if you do loan him out you have to be aware that the loaner could return him at any point if it did not work out so you might need a plan B.

If you can afford to keep your horse when he was suitable to be ridden then you could afford to keep him on grass livery and perhaps cut your costs down enough to be able to afford to either share a horse or perhaps get a ridden horse on loan that could also live out.

If you do decide to loan out to total strangers I would be looking at somewhere near enough that you or someone you trust could visit very regularly for at least the first few months to make sure he was ok.

 

[missieh]

Just be aware of the retirement homes that sound too good to be true. I read about them somewhere last year, I think it was an article on the "missingonloan" website. Have a look anyway. They advertise for horses as having permanent companion farm homes and it sounds perfect, but of course why would someone take on all these horses for nothing?! The truth is they are en route to markets or the meatman and, despite great assurances to the contrary, the horses are of course never seen again.

Hopefully the outcome of further assessments in the new year will be favourable, and this will all be academic.

Good luck