Shocking video, warning bit gory

I'm dying to know exactly how that bloke was involved myself.

I've read a couple of Buck B's books and liked much of his thinking. I've now watched the longer clip and the diifference in Buck B handling the horse to the other man (who was attacked) is striking. I did also notice the horse lunged at the same man over the fence. :(
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLca9R5-EVI
 
varkie said:
He gave a lot of warnings, the cowboy handling him didn't listen, and paid for his inattention.

Those who point to his running at people when he was just alone in the pen, and saying that proves he was just a wrong'un - not so. What that actually showed was a horse who had got used to controlling the people around him. And you even got to see a clip of him training (and being trained by) people around him. By which I mean the fact that every time he ran at the people outside the pen, they leapt & shrieked & jumped out of the way. That was working very successfully for the stallion - he wasn't do that because he was bad, he was doing it to control the world around him.

People are seeing this too much in human eyes - the horse wasn't a bad horse, he was a horse making decisions which made perfect sense to him - he has no human concept of good or bad. The human came & handled him, he didn't like it, he told the human so, the human didn't listen, so he got rid of him. Notice that once the human went away (was on the floor) the horse stopped, and signs of aggression were gone. Equally, when he was in his pen, he viewed that as his space - running at the people is his version of protecting his space.
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*This* is what I was trying to say earlier but badly compared to your post. :)

I look forward to watching the whole movie. I'm a great believer that we owners should take responsibility for training and teaching our horses.
 
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Watched it.
Googled it.
Got a better idea.
Now going to add my two penneths worth.

He may have had brain damage, but long story short in his most formative years, the make or break years he was failed.
He became a man made problem.
He probably is better off being PTS than being passed around and beaten.
Fault lies at the feet of idiot owner who, knowing she was dealing with an orphan should have had the sense to 'parent' him properly.
Its a topic on here that causes most issues, horse's do need to know their place. We aren't playing with 2kg puppies here!
 
Little Squirrel said:
This isn't offensive then? :rolleyes:
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To one specific person yes. To a wide range of people, no. I was simply pointing out that it depends on your perspective as to what is offensive, and as such mine was a response to something which i find to be a provocative statement.

I was riled by the ridiculous claims and I should have expressed myself better. I am not by nature a rude person, but i stand by my statement that the post is a load of nonsense and no horse is inherently 'evil'. And also that anyone who thinks otherwise can never have met a horse which behaves in such a threatening manner, or everyone would agree the horse is 'evil'.... rubbish. I should not have told them to shut up though. just thought it.
 
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varkie said:
Actually, assuming one believed in heaven or hell, I think that horse would end up in heaven, as it was pretty clear he was the way he was because of how humans had made him.

He gave a lot of warnings, the cowboy handling him didn't listen, and paid for his inattention.

Those who point to his running at people when he was just alone in the pen, and saying that proves he was just a wrong'un - not so. What that actually showed was a horse who had got used to controlling the people around him. And you even got to see a clip of him training (and being trained by) people around him. By which I mean the fact that every time he ran at the people outside the pen, they leapt & shrieked & jumped out of the way. That was working very successfully for the stallion - he wasn't do that because he was bad, he was doing it to control the world around him.

People are seeing this too much in human eyes - the horse wasn't a bad horse, he was a horse making decisions which made perfect sense to him - he has no human concept of good or bad. The human came & handled him, he didn't like it, he told the human so, the human didn't listen, so he got rid of him. Notice that once the human went away (was on the floor) the horse stopped, and signs of aggression were gone. Equally, when he was in his pen, he viewed that as his space - running at the people is his version of protecting his space.

I own/have colts (admittedly usually much smaller than him!), and I have hand reared a foal myself - who is now a rising four year old colt. And he is an absolute delight. But I worked hard to make sure he was - aware of the tendancy for handreareds to be difficult. I have also taken on a handreared who wasn't far off the behaviour of this colt in the video. I took him on because other people couldn't cope with him. And he was a little s**t when he arrived. He reared, boxed, bit, kicked, bucked - whatever he thought might get him his way. And when he arrived with us he actually got worse initially, as he got boundaries for the first time in his life, and he did NOT like them! He was also entire. A few months of firm, quiet handling, and being castrated did him the world of good. He went off to a lovely new home, and my small daughter loaded him when he went.

Some years ago, I also used to work with wild colts that came off the moors & forests, handling them from wild. Every so often, when being handled, you would get one that would threaten to kick you, or even may actually do so. Quite a common thing for them to try. And when it happens, you cannot back off - if when they go to kick, you squeal & jump out of the way - well done! You've just trained a colt that if it wishes you to go away, it just has to pretend, or actually, kick you and you will move away. I once had one double barrel me in the chest - totally not his fault, he was startled while I was working with him, and his survival instinct kicked in. Once I took a breather, I had to go back to working the same thing with him - otherwise that would hang over us both in the future. It is VERY easy to train a relatively unhandled, or an overhandled horse, particularly a colt, how to control us & move us around - without even realising what you're doing!

Whether this colt could have been trained out of it - who knows. Would I have been willing to get in the pen with him - possibly not. Should he have been PTS - hard one to answer.

But I do think people need to see this as a horse with a horses reasoning, and understand the workings of his mind behind that, not consider that this is the equine version of satan. There was a reason for everything this horse did - and it wasn't because he was born evil. It was because he was failed at every turn by those who handled him and owned him. He was created to be this way, and indeed trained to be this way.
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I really like this post.

As far as the horse in the clip was concerned, I understand it was PTS.

The woman who took it to the Buck clinic had a whole load of issues herself, let alone her horses. From the film you are left with the impression that it was very much the last chance saloon for the horse, and it didn't work out for him.

Whether or not all the reasons given for the horses wild behaviour, are justified or true is a matter of speculation. What BB has said is that the horse may have been helped with his sort of training when it was a lot younger. Who knows?

As previously said, he wasn't born bad, just failed by those around him.
 
I have known a mare that was almost as bad as this stallion. She was fabulous under tack and an excellent show jumper. But would attack you in the field or in her stable. She almost took my arm off once when I looked into her stable to check if she had haylage. She ruptured my trainer's spleen and finally broke her owner's sternum and several ribs when she struck out at her in the field with her front legs. The thing I found really bad though was when her owner told me she had sold her to a 15 year old girl! I was speechless at first. Then I asked her if she had warned the new owners. She said 'Oh yes, I said she could be a bit grumpy in her stable'! :eek::mad:
 
Wagtail, that's just shocking!

I feel for the trainers when faced with an extreme case like this on a clinic. I know from experience that people will turn up with horses that have all sorts of stuff going on, to a clinic that isn't supposed to be about "problem" horses at all. Then the trainer is faced with wondering how to make things safer for the person and the horse, all in a few days when they would really like a few months. In my Parelli days we had a lady turn up with a horse that had to be sedated to load it to get there. Hoping for a miracle during a 2 day clinic when other people were entitled to their share of the instructor's time... what do you do? Walk away and tell her it's her problem? At another complete beginners clinic someone brought a horse that they'd discussed with me in advance and I'd said was not suitable (they said they'd bring their easy horse). Again, the instructor was supposed to deal with all the other riders, and a horse that knocked the owner to the ground, ripping the sleeve out of her puffa jacket, and somehow wave a magic wand in two days. It makes trainers pretty sad.
 
Yes that is totally irresponsible Wagtail! :eek:

Tinypony said:
I feel for the trainers when faced with an extreme case like this on a clinic. I know from experience that people will turn up with horses that have all sorts of stuff going on, to a clinic that isn't supposed to be about "problem" horses at all. Then the trainer is faced with wondering how to make things safer for the person and the horse, all in a few days when they would really like a few months. In my Parelli days we had a lady turn up with a horse that had to be sedated to load it to get there. Hoping for a miracle during a 2 day clinic when other people were entitled to their share of the instructor's time... what do you do? Walk away and tell her it's her problem? At another complete beginners clinic someone brought a horse that they'd discussed with me in advance and I'd said was not suitable (they said they'd bring their easy horse). Again, the instructor was supposed to deal with all the other riders, and a horse that knocked the owner to the ground, ripping the sleeve out of her puffa jacket, and somehow wave a magic wand in two days. It makes trainers pretty sad.
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Yes, this goes back to what you were explaining earlier about the message for owners. Some really need a reality check and a long hard look at their expectations, thinking, approach and what they have created with their handling. It's so easy to blame the horse and remove ourselves from all responsibility.
 
As some know, I organise clinics. They are for people who can handle their horses, who can ride their horses, and who are interested in a particular approach (very similar to BB's). Sometimes if an owner is known to us and makes a request in advance, there will be a bit of young horse starting during the clinic. So what do you do when a person brings along a horse that they patently can't handle, that is obviously quite disturbed for whatever reason, and the trainer is presented with a situation that they feel isn't safe for horse or person? Do they just give the money back and send them home (load it themselves)? Or do they try to do something to help in the time, bearing in mind that they can't spend the time they'd ideally like to, and therefore might make some wrong judgements as a result. I'm coming to the "send them home" point of view, but of course that means that a place has been wasted on the clinic, and there is a drop in income, which not many people can afford to ignore. Plus, you'd feel worried about not having tried to help. On the other hand, sometimes when a trainer tries to help, because of time constraints and not having time to get to know the horse properly, they make a misjudgement, and then find themselves villified on the internet, with the incident being quoted for years afterwards as an example of how terrible they are.
I think in this clip the man who got hurt tried, in his own way, to help. He got it very wrong and paid the price. The horse also paid the price, but when you watch the film, you have a bad feeling about that right from his first appearance.
 
Tinypony said:
I'm coming to the "send them home" point of view,
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I am too.

A more general point on this subject. I can totally understand that trainers feel almost compelled (out of their knowledge and experience of many horses with problems and a desire to 'save' a horse) to try and help though especially when it's a 'fix in one day or it dies' ultimatum!
I am coming to the conclusion that trainers do need to try and resist this black mail. After all, the horse is going back from whence it came and unless the owner is prepared to work on themselves and work hard in the longer term to change things, nothing has really been achieved.
Plus, trainers get seen as acting purely out of ego, which may or may not be a factor but they like the rest of us are only human...

Back again to owner expectations and responsibility.
 
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When you watch the entire documentary the two sponsoring trainers of the BB clinic (one of which was the guy who got attacked) are both very aware that a big problem has just turned up and instruct the owner to keep the horse in the trailer as it is in no way suitable to join all the other horses and owners in the clinic.

Buck Brannaman gives the female owner a major talking to and basically accuses her of haveing major issues in her life and totally failing the horse.

A very telling part is after the horse has attacked the trainer and it is being loaded up again Buck is in the roundpen trying to load the horse and the owner keeps knocking on the side of the trailer and calling the horse, he asks her at least 3 times to just be quiet getting more and more forceful each time (you can tell he really wants to say far more to her but his priority is getting that horse loaded as calmly as possible).

Once the horse is loaded and drives away BB walks away from the camera and you can tell that he is beyond angry and not able to talk about the incident.

The following morning the other members of the clinic ask him to talk about what happend and he goes into a very controlled rant totally slating the owner and saying that the horse has been totally failed and could with the correct handling and training from a young age have made a useful horse.

In hindsight yes maybe they should have just packed the woman off home again and not even unloaded the horse off the trailer but Buck made the comment that it was obvious that either she would end up killed or maimed or worse some totally innocent person would end up injured or dead and until she had faced the fact that her mismanagement had produced a horse that even professionals were in danger handling then she would blindly carry on.

Very sad story of a beyond stupid owner and a horse who could have had a useful life not being given any kind of chance at all.
 
The problem for the trainer is that, odds on if they let the owner stay on the clinic with their horse, and they try to help, that will produce the one thing out of the whole clinic that people will run them down for in the years to come.

I am sure that the lady who sedated her horse to bring him to my clinic has nothing good to say about the trainer who worked with the horse over the next two days to be able to load him for her to take him home. Because the day after the horse got home the owner decided to load and travel him again - and he collapsed, completely flooded by the whole thing. Maybe the trainer should have walked away, maybe the lady should have given her horse a rest from loading after the intensive experience she'd put him through. The end result though is that there is one person who has a bad story to tell about that trainer. I've could quote other examples. Bottom line is that the trainers are human, sometimes when they try to help it doesn't turn out as they hoped, but they tend to have the best intentions. (I can't quote an example from my first-hand experience where I'd say the trainer did it out of ego, it's tended to be out of worry about what will happen if they don't).
 
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