Possibly the most disturbing thing i have ever seen.....

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lukeylou

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I have always checked the H&H forum if i have any questions etc but never signed up. Finally got round to do doing it (yay)! and thought my first post should be a cheerful one.....

that is until i stumbled across the Tennessee Walking Horse. Now i've heard of the breed, as i'm sure all of you have but i have never ever seen anything quite so horrific before in my life.

http://www.hsus.org/horses_equines/issues/walking_horses/the_cruelest_horse_show_on.html

quickly checked H&H archive and couldn't find anything else on it, is this because none of you out there have seen this? i hadn't until this evening and it literally tore my heart out.

take a look at the link, if it works or just type tennessee walking horse into youtube and you'll see what i mean!

i want to know if you all think this is as crazy as i do!


thanks!
 
Hi, Welcome,

Oh yes, taking a guess and talking for most people on here, we've seen clips like this, and are horrified and outraged that this sort of blatent torture and cruelty goes on - in North America. I sincerely hope it doesn't happen in the UK, I can't see it somehow.

Just because it does happen in NA doesn't mean that all people who have TWH's agree with the practices, many, many don't and believe me, there are campaigns galore to stop it.

There are rules, but policing them is not easy and, like everything else where there is big money to be made, money talks and nothing much changes behind closed doors. You should see what happens in trotting circles too.

I just wish that for once, PETA and SHARK would get off their well padded rumps, stop persecuting silly causes, and actually throw their weight behind something that does need to be made illegal.
 
I couldn't bear to watch the video, turned it off after about 35 seconds.
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I always knew it was a horrible part of the horse world, but didn't know just how horrible until that video of them putting chemicals on the poor creatures legs. Very sad. Something wrong with those peoples heads too, to be able to knowingly inflict that sort of pain repeatedly.
 
Welcome Lukaaa
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Yes I have heard/seen this type of footage about the plight of the walking horses before
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It is one of those tragic situations where the people involved in that industry have got used to it so now fail to see how shocking and unnecessary it really is... sadly there are examples of similar unnecessary suffering inflicted on animals in practically every competitive sphere
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My old farrier told me that there are a lot of things that we don't see over here because they cannot take any of the horses with "odd" shoeing to a display or show. He said that some years ago someone wanted to bring a display of American Gaited horses to one of the big London shows. But they were told they could only enter the UK with conventional English shoeing. So they never came.
If you go to the Horse Park at Lexington you can see a Saddlebred with shocking shoeing.
Then there is the practice of "nicking" where the muscles of the dock are cut, and the tail is then "set" so that it is stays raised. The horse has to wear strapping to keep it erect, as eventually it would go back to its natural position.
All of this is highly controversial over there. But those making money out of these practices just continue, and some see the Gaited Horses as their heritage.
 
i don't want to watch the video, but i read ages ago that the TWH has been selectively bred for generations to have THE most docile temperament (enough that a total beginner could get on and safely use them for transport from A to B), that they will put up with literally anything...
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maybe we should ask Fugly to blog about them...
 
I am so glad the vidoe wouldn't load for me!

I feel physically sick just reading the bit about the concrete and wood on the sensitive surface of the hoof! I used to think this breed was magnificent and beautiful and I'm horrified to find how they get them to walk like that. Are there any that walk like that naturally or can I safely say that any TWH that I see walking like that has been tortured? Don't want to annoy anyone, just wondered if it could be taught another way?
 
what I don't get about it as they were bred to be comfortable rides which they def don't look like anymore. You can do youtube searches for normal twh and they look so much better, I believe they also have their own separate show circuit.
 
Wow, that palomino TWH is quite possible one of the most beautiful horses I've ever seen! I don't usually like pallys, but that looks like a fairytale horse!
 
I think a great number of unpleasant practices go on in the US that would not be tolerated here. There was a case just recently in the showing world there concerning the practice of numbing the muscles of the tail so that the horses in the ring wouldn't be regarded as misbehaving for swishing their tails. The horse was left with a permanently useless tail, terrible muscle wasting of the all muscles in the quarters and what amounted to a chemical burn so appalling scarring to boot. Its value is now zero so I'm willing to bet it has been destroyed as a result.
 
The american horse world does seem very odd, like a lot of american things it all seems to be about being Flashy.... some kind of laitent rebellion from puritans or something. and don't get me started on QH's slopping about at, well i wouldn't even call it a jog, with their noses on the floor. I know there is cruelty in circles in the uk (rapping and rolkur anyone?) but there seems to be higher proportion (allowing for the massive difference in population)
 
It's horrid. We have spoken about this before on HHO, some time ago now though I think.

I'm certainly not anti-American (we own a holiday house there and have plenty of American friends!), but I did find when I was there that some (more than is normal!) of the next door neighbours frequently "went through" pets... one family I knew would get bored of a dog after a few months and either let it run off or take it to a rehoming centre then get another! It was mental. A lot of them never bothered to take their dogs for walks either. They didn't seem to get attached to pets like we do here at all.
 
Rapping is when jumping a horse assistants raise the pole so it hits the horse mid air, producing and exagerated "cleaner" jump next time. The pole can also be studded just for that extra bit of niceness.

Rollkur is an extreme "training" method of dressage horses (mainly) it's also called hyper-flexion, involving the horse going with his nose wrentched into his chest.... it's horrendus.

Google both. Rollkur esp
good video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TahYWzsCdQM
This site explains it perfectly (and is a fab site in general)
http://www.sustainabledressage.com/rollkur/index.php
 
[ QUOTE ]
The american horse world does seem very odd, like a lot of american things it all seems to be about being Flashy.... some kind of laitent rebellion from puritans or something. and don't get me started on QH's slopping about at, well i wouldn't even call it a jog, with their noses on the floor. I know there is cruelty in circles in the uk (rapping and rolkur anyone?) but there seems to be higher proportion (allowing for the massive difference in population)

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I think America must be a really primitive country to do that to horses. Its repulsive and people should know better. They cannot use the excuse of being poor and using horses to eke out a living. Theres so many examples of awful horse care in the name of showing from the States - not just Tennesee Walking Horses but Quarter Horses, some Arabs, minature horses - genetic freaks - horses are not designed to have ridiculously short legs. Aren't they also big in the field of producing hairless cats and dogs for the convenience of their owners not having their furniture covered in hair?

IMHO extreme rollkur and unnatural "expression" in dressage is going down the same line...

Yes, where is PETA in all of this?
 
I don't think that you can tar everyone because of a few dipshits. America isn't a primitive country, any more than any other developed country. There are just some people (as there are everywhere) who care more for appearance, status, and cold hard cash than they do about a living creature and either don't care or just plain do not think what they do is wrong.

How anyone can call anything about that scene attractive is beyond me. The horses are crippled and the riding, well, never done it so I don't know, but it just doesn't look right in any way, shape or form.

I don't know any TWH people who compete like this, but I do know a lot of trotting people and their practices aren't exactly horse friendly, it's all about the money. Horses are expendable, common sense and compassion seem to be in short supply.

Bit like training your rising star every day in minus 20C. Does their wind a lot of good - not. I hear that the poor horse is totally useless now. If he hasn't been already, he'll be sold and make maybe $200 as a Mennonite buggy horse, or if he's lucky, a Rescue place will get him and re-home him. I see broken down standardbreds advertised every single day. As I said, they are expendable, but with a place or win making 5 figures it makes financial sense to them.
 
I really don't know how I didn't know about this before, I literally had never seen it until last night!

Thank you all for replying to my post by the way! H&H is such a lovely friendly forum!

xxx
 
I cannot understand why anyone would want to see a horse move like this. It looks really uncomfortable to sit on and the riders look hunched up. How the hell did someone come up with the idea of putting stacks on horses' feet? I wonder how many horses have broken their legs because of these.
I also don't understand how making a horse's skin sore will make them lift their legs higher/throw them out in front, or am I missing something? I can understand how putting things under the shoes to create pressure would make them try & carry most of their weight on their back end. They even mutilate their tails! It's grotesque and very very sad for the poor horses.
 
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