Tennessee Walking Horse Torture Continues: More Soring Injuries Than Ever Come to Light
To all who've visited my blog before to read my coverage of Tennessee walking horse mistreatment, unfortunately the abuse (by some, not all trainers) continues. This year's so-called Celebration produced a higher number of incidents of abuse by soring than last year's event. That does not mean there is more abuse taking place. It could just mean the more light shining on this formerly secretive industry (secretive for obvious reasons—because some trainers and owners are torturing animals), the less abusers are able to hide in the shadows.
The Chattanooga Times Free Press's Pam Sohn has this heart-rending account of a woman who was forced to put down her Tennessee Walker because of injuries inflicted by a cruel prior owner, coupled with an account of violations by trainers and riders at this year's event:
Charlotte Stolz has spent the week mourning one of her best friends.
Her horse, Soldier, a Tennessee walking horse she tried to rehabilitate from old soring injuries sustained before she bought him, finally succumbed to too many years of abuse. He had to be put down last weekend, she said.
"My heart is broken. I lost a best friend, and I hate that he had to go through that. I want people to know this is wrong," the Hixson resident said.
Soldier's death came just about a week after the 70th Tennessee Walking Horse Celebration ended with more violations of Horse Protection Act this year than last.
Reports posted online by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which enforces the 38-year-old Horse Protection Act, show 187 horses and their trainers were cited with violations related to soring in this year's Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration in Shelbyville, Tenn. Soring is a banned training practice using pain-causing chemicals, cuts, or foreign objects deliberately lodged in hoof pads and shoes to achieve the "big lick" exaggerated show ring movement of some horses in the multimillion-dollar walking horse industry headquartered in Tennessee.
USDA records show there were 2,744 entries in the most recent 11-day Shelbyville event that ended on Aug. 30. The USDA inspected 693 horses while industry officials certified by USDA inspected the remainder.
Last year, Celebration entrants tallied 104 violations, and in 2006, 10 horses were disqualified in the final championship competition. With only three horses left in the ring, the 68th Celebration ended with no champion crowned."
Is it good news or bad that more violators are being charged? It could just mean more violators are coming into public view. The more publicity the practice of soring receives, the closer we are to wiping it off the face of the Earth. That will be a great day.
Tags: Georgia | Tennessee | animals | USDA | horses
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soring
Having only recently become interested in gaited horses, I was appalled to watch video's of the Tennessee Walking horse "Celebration", and hear all of the hooting and whistling as the obviously profoundly sore, pathetic animals enter the dramatically dark arena one by one, valiantly trying to move with those absurd pads on their front hooves, having endured the diabolical chemicals placed upon their pasterns and coronet bands back in the shed row behind closed doors for who knows how many hours and days and weeks and years, and the buffoons hunched over backs like monkeys in an overcoat, (can anyone in their right mind consider this equitation!) and the egregious owners and judges and sponsors of this despicable display of human ignorance, I cannot help but wonder with deep dismay, "Who ARE these people?" And more so, "Who ARE we, once knowing of it, to allow this behavior to continue for one more show season?" Thank you Bonnie for initiating this blog, and may the groundswell of opposition finally put a stop to this horrifying abuse.
support the tennessee walker
i own and show tennessee walking horses. i know and understand many of the USDA laws, and my horses are also NOT sored. it is ridiculous to sore a horse just to win.
there are several sides to this so called abuse. one immediatley hears about the general public's opinion. a person from the city who knows nothing about horses sees one scarred TWH and immediatly assumes all are like that, or they may see a padded performance horse and call it abuse. they also do not understand that not all TWH are "abused" to be able to walk that way. there is a science behind it, as well as many laws regarding height of pads and amount of weights used. so there is the general population vs the horse society. but inside the horse industry, there is a divison. there are the big time trainers who do sore horses to gain the bigger points and money. more wins equals not only more money for the trainer, but more publicity and therefore more horses sent to his barn to be trained. therefore, these people are totally against all the new laws because they are getting hurt by it. but what about the other people in the industry? ones like myself. we are against soring completely, and win with natural training. we follow all rules, and do not sore. but we are against some laws. such as the strictness on the scar rule. the scar rule is where a USDA DQP inspects the horse for scars from chemical soring. but they dont just count simple scars as you would think, they count callouses to. now here is where the problem comes in, a 16 yr old TWH may have calluses from working hard for so many years, same as a 50 yr old man, so according to the scar rule, a 50 yr old man must retire because of calluses. this is absurd. calluses are not scars. and there is a way to tell. they do look similar, but not the same. and still there are more problems with the USDAs laws. one is hoof testing. if a DQP is not properly trained, they could easily break a horses hoof bar with hoof testing, crippling the horse for the rest of the season. One last controversial thing is this new chemical "sniffer". it was introduced not to long ago. its purpose is to "sniff" out chemicals used for soring. though this sounds like a great idea, it has its flaws. what if a trainer leads the horse across the parking lot, on the way to inspection. there is a chance that the hoofs will pick up diesel. then the sniffer is used and the trainer gets a ticket for using diesel for soring, even though he didnt. these things need to be fixed. Therefore, i stand in the middle. the general public does not have the knowledge to judge, but the trainers have no right to abuse the horse. the government needs to fix the flaws in the system before continuing on. the industry is slowly going down because of the USDA. help is needed. during the winter, before the season starts again in the spring, many things need to change, or else this situation will become worse.
tennessee walkers
my sister has raised walkers for years and would never abuse her animals in such a way-I agree that those people and Mike Vick have much in common. but,once again, it is the people who buy these animals and judge these animals that are to blame the most-for without high scores from judges it would cease to be-what wins is what gets done-so go to the root of this problem-the judges! when scoring changes so will the abuse- what do you judges have to say?
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