Life Height Certificates

Thistle:- At no time have I said that you have followed the practices of dehydrating & underfeeding a pony to shrink it prior to measuring. I have commented on opinions voiced by you & some others in this forum. I and other posters, as can be seen, are against this practice. I believe a pony is either 14h2" or he is not.

Contrary to what one poster believes I am not against this because my pony was beaten by a larger pony & therefore I am moaning. Some years ago I had a pony, he was about 14h1"+/- without a height certificate. He could have been measured whenever I didn't mind, I had got nothing to hide. He was very successful, he is now retired, the rider now gone onto horses.

Throughout this thread one question has still not been answered .. I would still like to know if anyone out there owns a 14h3" pony that competes at a reasonable level....somehow I doubt it.
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To the best of my knowledge, horses do not have the structure that is called a "collar bone" in humans. Therefore there can be more movement (if that is the right term) in the shoulder/sternum apparatus in the horse than in the human.
I would agree with santa and others that horses can have considerably different measurements in different situations.
NB - at Balmoral (RUAS) they used to measure the small hunters on the day - anyone confirm if this is still the case.
Fiona
 


So you get your pony measured when he is under weight & unfit with no muscle & dehydrated. Why bother when he is in no condition to compete & you don't know if he will be any good. Certs are only obtained if you have a quality animal & you know he will be a good competition pony. I would say to you that ponies are kept under fed & dehydrated to make them smaller for measuring. Then after measuring they are fed , watered & exercised to get them back to condition. This practice is never right. It amounts to neglect & the people who carry out this practice are a disgrace & should be prosectued.



so you didn't say this and direct it at me then?

If you have a problem with how I keep my ponies (difficult to believe as i have never met you) then please get in touch and come round and meet the very happy gang.
 
Understand why you would have thought this, but just wanted to put the record straight.

The problem with the HOYS policy of automatically objecting to winners is that it is a drop in the ocean (only 5 show jumping winners per year, and you will see from the JMB web-site they haven't applied it to all winners as their policy states). And, it is not the winners who should be under most suspicion. I understand several top ponies will not compete at HOYS this year, for fear of objection and from our own experience it is amazing how some top ponies suddenly become "uncompetitive" in jump offs when they get to HOYS. As you will see from the 1st and 2nd place in last years 148, William was not under any instructions to go slow! But it is a shame that HOYS should be affected like this.

Thanks about your comments on Colton and Indie's foal - we are keeping our fingers crossed all will be well. Who knows whether we will get a pony or a horse, but it will certainly have some jump!
 
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