The Soul of a Horse

by Joe Camp

  There’s a vet in a neighboring community who actually stocks horseshoes and farrier tools and sells them to farriers at a discount. I’m guessing that doing so wins him a basket load of recommendations from farriers. Is he likely to tell his clients to pull off the shoes he himself sold to the farrier who nailed them on?

  There is no disputing that a horseshoe prevents hoof flexing. Nor is there any dispute about why the hoof is supposed to flex. Nor about the good things that happen when it does. I can’t help but wonder how a vet sworn to do his medical best for horses can sell horseshoes and supplies to farriers and still live with himself.

  But I didn’t press, and changed the subject with Dr. Matt.

  “I’ve read that leg wraps are not good for horses,” I said. “The article stated that they’re usually tightly wrapped when the horse is at rest; then he goes out to work and the blood vessels in the leg attempt to dilate to get more blood down to the working leg, and the leg wrap prevents the vessels from dilating. True or false?”

  Dr. Matt smiled. “I don’t think they give any support or any true protection for the leg, but if they aren’t worn too tightly, they don’t really hurt anything.”

  “But isn’t it really best not to have them at all?” I persisted.

  “Look at it this way: If an owner wants to use them, and I tell him no, and the horse comes up lame from some activity, who’s going to be blamed?”

  “Blankets?” I questioned, again changing the subject.

  “No need for them unless it’s really cold and raining. A horse has a terrific system for keeping his body temperature where it needs to be, unless his coat gets really soaked while it’s really cold. Snow is no problem. It’s the combination of cold and wet. I recommend pulling them as soon as the rain stops to keep the blanket from weakening the horse’s own internal system.”

  “Is there any hard research on cold and wet?” I asked.

  “Better safe than sorry,” he said.

  “So, most of the time, the owner is blanketing his horse to make himself feel better. Like I almost did.”

  “I prefer to think you were more misinformed than selfish.” He smiled.

  On the subject of stalls and barns, he did say that horses are better off moving around, being out 24/7. I was jubilant. At last an unqualified recommendation.

  “Do you recommend that to your clients?” I asked.

  “I try to be sensitive. If a person can do nothing but provide a twelve-by-twelve stall, there’s little point in telling him to do something different.”

  I believe if a person loves his horse, he’ll figure out a way to do what’s best for him. Or at least put some thought into it. But, again, I didn’t press.

  “There’s an old saying,” Dr. Matt said. “‘You can have money. Or you can have horses. But you can’t have both.’ I usually get called as the last resort because people don’t want to spend money for a vet. Remember that call I got yesterday while I was at your place? When I got over there, I was told the horse had been lying on his side without eating, pooping, or peeing for three days!

  “Three days!” he added incredulously. “I deal with that kind of thing every day of my life.”

  “There are people who shouldn’t have horses,” I said.

  He nodded.

  I quietly thanked God for Dr. Matt, because I couldn’t do what he does. I couldn’t face what he faces every day. I’d have no clients at all by the end of the first week.

  He did share that he felt there was a new day on the horizon. “For several generations, the horse was nothing more than a beast of burden, like an ox. Or a tractor.”

  “Or a motorcycle,” I said.

  “Right. But today I’m seeing more and more people who actually care for their horses. Granted, it’s a small number, but it’s growing. With all the publicity that people like you are getting, and the natural horsemanship clinicians, and the barefoot trimmers, and the vets who have studied all this…well, I have to believe it’s getting better.”

  “I hope so,” I said.

  But, unfortunately, for the most part, word won’t be coming from the folks whom you would normally turn to for advice. The farriers, most of them, are not going to take up the banner of barefoot. If they did they would have to completely change their skill set or they’d be out of work. A few of them have done just that, but few is the operative word. We’ve already talked about how difficult it is to get most people to change, even when it’s change for the better.

  The veterinarians, most of them, have no choice but to hedge for the same reasons. Economics. Fear of being out of a job. Fear of risk. I’ve spoken to vets who have said, “I agree totally with what you’re saying, but please don’t tell anyone I said so.” Many of them feel they can serve best by keeping their jobs and making a few small inroads here and there. Considering what they face, it’s difficult to argue with that.

  Until I look into my horse’s eyes.

  Letting him be a horse certainly won’t be getting endorsements from the manufacturers of horseshoes, leg wraps, blankets, prefab barns, hay feeders, and so on. Those folks aren’t going to burn their paychecks.

  So think about it. Think seriously about it every time you hear someone say that what they do for a living is better for your horse than what the horse would do for itself in the wild. Ponder the presidents of those tobacco companies testifying before Congress, emphatic that tobacco was not harmful. Dig around on your own. Do some research. Compare what “the experts” say. Gather your own knowledge and don’t let someone else make decisions for you. Whether it’s about your horses or your life.

  And if you do own a horse, show him that he’s not an ox, or a tractor, or a motorcycle. He’s your partner.

  And let him know by your leadership that you love him and will give him the best care you possibly can.

  14

  Nature Lives

  For more than a year, the golden colt and the young Powhatan had been following the band of river travelers heading ever toward the setting sun. They had seen and experienced things that were beyond description. Great buffalo in herds of thousands. Eagles, hawks, trees taller than mountains, and mountains taller than the sky itself. Indian warriors who, like the boy, raced the wind on the backs of horses.

  And snow.

  This unusual white substance that came from the sky was of no consequence to the colt, other than it made him feel playful. But the cold that came with it seemed to take a severe toll on his young friend. The boy had traded a deer felled with his bow to a young Shoshone about his own age, receiving in return a cloak made of thick buffalo hide. This seemed to keep him warm most of the winter, except for those days and nights the colt had to lie across a hole in the ground to protect the boy from the snow and icy wind.

  The young stallion’s coat had grown thick and long, and the boy once joked that he looked more like a fluffy bear than a horse. On these cold days of winter, if the colt sensed rain in the air, instead of snow, he would lead the boy to a windbreak—a cliff, an outcropping, or a stand of trees—to avoid the combination of extreme cold and wet that might penetrate his coat. The winters in this new country were harsher than those in his native North Carolina, but he adapted readily, as his ancestors had done forever.

  The boy had watched the changes with amazement, often wishing that he could adjust like his four-legged friend. But now winter was behind them. They had left the plains and were crossing the tallest mountain the boy had ever seen. And below them was the most spectacular valley. The pair had fallen in with a band of Shoshones who had brought horses to help the river travelers cross the great mountains. This place was as beautiful as any the boy had ever seen. It might even be a good place to stay for a while. For reasons inexplicable, both the horse and the boy seemed to feel something special for this land. Little did the young stallion know that he was not at all far from where his most distant ancestors had begun their evolutionary journey on earth more than fifty-five million years before.

&nb
sp; Across the Alaskan bridge into Asia, on to the Middle East, then to Spain, North Carolina, and now back home, where it all began.

  15

  And Nature Dies

  “I’m sorry, I don’t care what you say, I’m not watching my horse stand around out there freezing when I can put a blanket on him and he’ll be warm.”

  “It’s only fifty degrees,” I mumbled.

  “I’m cold, so he must be cold.”

  “Are you a horse?” I asked.

  She rolled her eyes and walked away. I have always believed that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. I was about to learn that this isn’t always the case.

  “What possible harm can come from it?” she tossed over her shoulder.

  I followed.

  “The blanket disturbs his natural thermoregulatory system.” I was spewing research I had learned of only the day before. “He can’t grow his winter coat with a blanket on. And his system works on the whole horse, not parts. When he’s covered with a blanket, he’s half warm and half cold. His system has no idea what to do.”

  “Well, go talk to his system, not to me. Cold is cold and warm is warm.”

  “For millions of years the horse has done just fine without blankets,” I crowed. “When you disturb his natural systems, you’re messing with nature, with his genetics, and ultimately with his health and safety.”

  She turned on me.

  “Do what you want with your horses and leave me alone, okay?”

  Clearly my bedside manner needed work. I stood there frustrated, with no clue why this newly discovered information was of no interest to someone who I knew truly cared for her horses. I would never make it in politics.

  German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer said, “All truth passes through three phases. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as self-evident.” Knowing that didn’t make me feel any better. Or understand the mystery of this woman’s reaction. It was merely preparation for what was to come.

  I was standing by a small arena at a local horse club event. The woman next to me was the mother of a teenager trying out a beautiful gaited pinto horse in the pen. The horse was prancing, lifting his legs high, and looking very spiffy. At one point the owner said proudly, “And he’s totally barefoot.”

  “Wow,” said the mom. “Just think what he’d look like with shoes on!”

  The owner had the grace to ignore the comment. I didn’t.

  “Why ever would you put shoes on him? He’s happy and healthy and looks great.”

  “Oh, if you compete on him, he has to have shoes.”

  “Why?”

  “He just has to.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, it’s probably in the rules.”

  “Barefoot horses compete,” I said.

  “Well, trust me, he needs shoes. There are special shoes that make gaited horses prance higher.”

  “Oh, so that’s something you want, not something the horse wants.”

  There I go again, I thought. Like a reformed smoker. My presentation definitely needed work.

  “Doesn’t hurt him,” the woman said.

  I took a deep breath, swallowed the words that were threatening to escape, and handed her a card with our website on it, suggesting that she look at some of the new research documented there on how shoes affect the health of a horse’s hoof. Then I mustered a friendly smile and left.

  I told Kathleen the story.

  “We’re going to lose every friend we have if you don’t shut up,” she said.

  “I never saw this woman before,” I whimpered. “She’s not a friend.”

  “You know what I mean. People don’t want to hear this stuff.”

  “Do you disagree? Is it incorrect information?”

  “Of course not,” she said. “But…”

  “But what?”

  She just looked at me for a long moment.

  “Think about Skeeter,” I said. “And how much happier and healthier he is since you brought him here.”

  “I know,” she said. “I know. You’re right, but it’s so frustrating to have people’s claws come out like they do. When you slap people in the face with the notion that they’re doing something wrong, the natural reaction is always going to be to defend themselves. You do it yourself.”

  “I do?”

  Her mouth dropped.

  “All the time.”

  “When?”

  “Last night when I told you that paragraph in the book was not good. You bitched, and screamed, and got ugly…and then got up this morning and changed it.”

  I thought about Schopenhauer’s quote.

  “Phase Three,” I said.

  We both smiled.

  It kills me to find that so many horse owners make decisions based upon what they think is best for the horse without really doing the research. Or use human criteria to make the decision, not equine criteria. And the horses suffer as a result.

  It began, I suspect, back when man first decided to dominate one of these thousand-pound animals. Working strictly from fear, with no comprehension of the possibilities available when the horse is given choice and a relationship is built, he must have believed that force was the only consideration for domination. And if one doesn’t dominate a beast so large, surely the beast will do the dominating. And hurt you. And ignore your will. This was the lesson taught by the old cowboy from whom we had bought Mariah. And, in days of old, such an attitude was just fine with everyone because that’s what man did. Dominate.

  Genetics again.

  At the expense of the horse.

  A well-known clinician was asked to respond to a question from a woman who wanted to enter jumping competitions with her horse. It seemed that whenever she went to such a competition, her horse refused to jump. She wondered if it could be a negative reaction to being around so many horses or being inside a big, noisy facility. “Please tell me what to do,” she begged. I never saw the clinician’s response, but I hope he told her to begin by evaluating whether or not her horse liked to jump. Before being asked to do extreme competition, shouldn’t a horse have some inherent desire to do it?

  Like the new Benji. She enjoys performing, reaching, figuring things out. We have other dogs who could care less. And one who would be totally intimidated by the workload. To put that dog through a movie production would not only be a disaster, it would mean massive stress for the dog.

  When we were searching for the new Benji in shelters all over the country, I looked for a dog that not only resembled the original Benji, with those famous big brown eyes, but was smart and intuitive, and, most important, loved to work, loved to please his master, loved to take on the kind of long and difficult chores that are always present during the production of a movie.

  It’s true that a horse who doesn’t like to jump, or rope, or cut cattle, or run barrels, or race can be made to do it. If the horse is strong and athletic, he can probably be made to do it pretty well. But doesn’t it stand to reason that if the horse really enjoys doing something, he will do it better than if he doesn’t? And he’ll be a happier horse. And he and his human will have a better relationship. And he’ll be without the stress that comes from doing what he hates, or what he is mortally afraid of doing. Which means he’ll live longer.

  And if participating in the competition is of his choice because he likes doing it, and if he’s been taught well, there will be no need for force. Or cruelty.

  What kind of force or cruelty?

  When Dr. Matt was out to vet check Kathleen’s new horse, Skeeter, he ran his hand gently across the big palomino’s rib cage. There were thirty or forty small dimples in the coat and skin. On each side. Dimples like you might see in someone’s chin.

  “Know what those are?” he asked.

  “No idea,” we said.

  “Internal scars from spurs.”

  Our mouths dropped open. And we choked back tears. Skeeter is a beautiful eighteen-year-old quarter
horse, who has done some dressage but was mostly used as a roping horse in competitions.

  This is the sweetest horse you could ever want to meet. As willing and well mannered as Cash. Without a mean or ornery bone in his body. Yet somewhere back in his history, some human was so obsessed with ego that spurs were used violently enough to leave more than eighty scars in his sides. There is simply no acceptable excuse for that sort of treatment of another living being.

  Either Skeeter didn’t like what he was doing and had to be forced to do it with extreme spurring or he hadn’t been well trained and therefore didn’t understand what he was doing well enough to do it without injury.

  From the day he arrived at our place, watching his expressions has tickled me to laughter. He loves his new life, but his scrunched eyebrows and big questioning eyes seem to belie a fear that any minute he might be awakened from a spectacular dream.

  He won’t be. That’s our promise to Skeeter.

  He joined the herd in our natural pasture, and for a while he seemed to not know what to do with all the space. He would just stand around, bug-eyed, and watch the others. Eventually he assimilated, but he still seems to be amazed that life can be so good. And we’ll not take that away from any of them.

  “But ugh, being in a natural pasture 24/7, they stay so dirty.”

  “Horses do like to roll.”

  “I like my horses clean.”

  That conversation actually happened. What was best for the horse was of no concern. What the human liked was the issue.

  There’s a photo of a stalled horse in Horse & Rider magazine. Below the photo is this headline: I AM CONFINED…THEREFORE I AM AT RISK. The subhead: “Confinement-related stress can cause stomach ulcers in your horse—in just 5 days.” It’s an ad promoting medication for the ulcers. Not a word about eliminating the source of the stress or any discussion about other health problems that could be caused from a stress so tormenting that it produces stomach ulcers.