Docking Tails (not dogs)

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Kate260881

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Just a quick question if anybody knows anything about docking horses tails. The only place I'd ever seen it before was on old hunting paintings and all the horses are docked but the yard I just moved to has a draught mare who is docked and it doesn't look nice. Having chatted to one of the girls it turns out it was done over here mainly to the draught horses till it was outlawed but then people used to get it done in Belgium instead. Apparently it can also create problems with mares with a higher case of uterus infections as they don't have as much protections.

So anyone had any experience or know anything about it?
 
the horse nextdoor to mine has a docked tail. he is an ardennes horse and so gorgeous. i think he would look weird with a tail, only because im used to seeing him without one.
 
I remember seeing Docked working horses in France as a kid and I still see them on DVD's of working horses in the USA
 
It used to be done on a regular basis for heavy working horses, simply to keep the tail out of machinery which could result in serious accidents. It is normally only done now if a horse has injured it's tail
 
Where I live there are loads and loads of farm-working horses still. We have huge Belgians, Percherons and Clydes - ALL working horses still have their tails docked here so I am used to seeing them. The reason they still dock them is so that their tails do not get caught up in the machinery they are pulling. I've never heard of the "uterus infection" comment though.
 
I *think* it is illegal to dock in the UK, hence you get all the show shores with shaved docks. Obviously the law isn't world wide, so imported horses and ones born before the ban are OK to be docked.

*I think*
 
I'd imagine it is still legal in most countries where horses are still used for working. The UK hasn't really used working farm horses for generations; even the milk horses were disbanded, on the whole, a good few years ago now.

Do you still see draught horses (brewery ones) in the UK? And do they still dock them or do they have long tails nowadays?
 
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