Been doing a lot of research recently regarding horse welfare. It seems there are some startling goings on within the industry that concern me greatly, as I am an avid racing enthusiast, but not at the expense of the animal.

No, I'm not one of those rogue protesters, nor am I going to agree 100% with anyone either side of the fence, I'll just state the facts I've found that are a matter of public record.

These prestigious bloodstock sales are full of a dirty secret.
Many of the larger auction establishments are purchasing the supplementary animals that don't achieve a certain figure, and selling them to the knackery for profit.

I have investigated this issue thoroughly, and have evidence of names of those that do it, and the horses involved. (Not to be mentioned here)

I went through the catalogues at the sales and looked for the cheapies, I then researched each and every horse purchased in house that had a racing name.

Then I went a step further and investigated the lot numbers at one knackery which shall remain nameless.

This concerns me greatly, because there are horses that need to be put down, but the treatment prior and the manner in which they are killed is simply sickening.

The big auction houses which are a part of this should be ashamed of themselves.

Looking up horses, I have found that horses killed at the knackery are hidden from public view, RISA are not even informed that the horse "died", many of them are simply listed as spelling

The second issue is the stance of a so called animal welfare agency.
They are criticising horseracing, whip use, jumps racing etc etc.
But both the Victorian and NSW divisions have supported the culling (too ashamed to say killing) of Australia's wild brumbys.

At first thought one might imagine that perhaps for the welfare of the population, numbers need to be decreased. I don't agree with this, but can see the point.

However, the startling facts are these:

It is reported that many are starving to death in the wild, however, just about all video footage of these horses in the wild shows them almost obese!
There are of course some starving brumbies, but this is natural attrition due to their teeth being worn down and unable to feed properly. This happens with windsuckers if left untreated.

In the last brumby cull many were not killed instantly and carcasses were just left to rot, which created all sorts of health risks for the remaining horses.
More than one brumby was found alive but injured days later, one brumby was finally found two weeks later still alive but wounded badly as repoted on ABC TV.

This is the solution to badly managed National Parks, to make the problem go away.

If someone shoots their own pet, they are charged with animal cruelty (if the animal isn't injured).
So how can this be legal?

Surely trapping the males and setting up a fenced area to control numbers is a more humane and effective longterm control. A fenced area could be less than 1% of a National Park and still be massive in size so as to not restrict freedom of movement and still supply enough food.

It costs $40 a head to kill 1,000 brumbies.
I think there are better ways of killing them for $40,000 than aerial shooting.

I don't know, it's all just inhumane and completely illogical to me.

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On a more positive note, I have mentioned that long striding types have a superior edge, providing they have the speed.
Sometimes we aren't able to judge the stride for many reasons.
The horse may not be extended when parading, you may not be able to see the stride in a race because the horse is a bit obscured by other horses, or you may not be able to pick it up with the naked eye.

There is another way to pick stride without having to look at the gait.

If the vertebrae of the withers are long (front to back), the shoulder is more free to move backwards. This allows for an increase of stride length (and so it can increase the horse's speed). It is also important in jumping, as the shoulder must rotate back for the horse to make his forearm more parallel to the ground, which will then raise the animal's knees upward and get the lower legs out of the way. Therefore, the withers have a direct impact on one of the most important points of conformation: the shoulder.

It is not necessarily the height of the withers, it is the length of the withers.

These are the horse's withers:



When going to look at suitable horses for dressage, eventing, jumping and even potential breeding or those suitable to race, I always look at the combination of withers and stride if I can.

Short withers are really bad, but ssometimes you can pick up a bargain if the horse has short withers, poor stride but has grand sire and dam with very good withers. This would be a case where I would purchase the horse for breeding at a fraction of the cost. Of course they may breed several short withered horses depending on the dominance of the gene.
Mixing various sires and dams can sometimes get a long withered horse, with good bloodlines and this is the cheapest way to get a very good horse.

If you look at all the champion sires, and racehorses, they usually have a combination of high and long withers, very prominent.

My horse Chrome Prince, which I owned a very long time ago, was a sprinter but had very short withers. He was a gelding and was not fast enough to make the grade, but did win a lot of picnic races because he had one burst of speed. He was well muscled and had a very good chest, but didn't have the stride or the withers.

Here are some pictures of some very good horses, note the actual wither definition. This is a key part of conformation.







Note the actual wither definition, the rise from the neck and the length, they all have this in common, and one could make informed decisions without seeing the stride at all. However, of course it's most preferable to see the combination of withers, stride and gait.

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That would be too easy for another human outside the authorities to do, however imbercilic beauracrats get paid to complicate and come up with illogical decisions.

Best TJ

TJ,
Then there's the jumps racing total debarcle.
Idea: Lower the jumps and make them collapsible.
Consequence: Horses go over them faster, and trip over.

Surely the whole idea is to get the horse to slow down and navigate the jump properly, no speed up increasing the chance of a fall.
Anyone who has watch eventing or Olympic jumping, or English jmps racing knows that the slower a horse goes over a jump, the more likely it is to do it safely.
But the boffins have really brought jumps racing into disrepute now

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ROSEHILL
R5 #1 RAIN AFFAIR unplaced
R8 #6 HONORIUS 2nd ($25,000 prizemoney)

MOONEE VALLEY
R4 #1 ATLANTIC JEWEL WON $1.05 (BFSP Net) ($132,000 prizemoney).
R4 #5 BONNE NUIT unplaced
R8 #7 ELITE ELLE unplaced

So far the "stable" has had 27 starts for 7 winners, 5 seconds, 2 thirds and earned $607,300 in prizemoney.
Betting action is minus 6.84 units. 25.33% LOT

I can see that the prizemoney just keeps increasing steadily, and the betting loss does also, so on one hand, I'm stoked, on the other perplexed.

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May be time to bin this one Chrome.

Cheers

Not on your life Darky

The horse I have picked out for the virtual stable have won $607,300 for the virtual owner based on stride assessment.
There is obviously something there, and I'm looking at stride / class refinements for the punting angle.

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100%- But the buffoons, have money goggles on and are ******** bent on looking good for their employers, rather than looking out for the animal. The English jumps racing is classic example, and should be taken notice of by our shores!

I see surpass saluted midweek, although not as impressive as its previous win at sandown, However I put that down to the track, he looks like he relishes a nice long straight like sandown or possible Flemington!

Best TJ

I would like to see you keep it going CP

I follow this closely and personally see great potential in it as a factor to deciding on whether a horse is worth a wager.

I doubt it will ever be the over riding factor and by including every race in your betting turnover I think sells the practice short when so many other factors are in play.

Thanks NP, yes I'll be keeping it going at least for a while because I think it's way too early to make refinements.
A lot of these horses have had huge jumps in grade and only been narrowly beaten, hence the accumulation in prizemoney. My personal challenge has been to put my eye to the test rather than a punting perspective. Can I judge the stride and does that translate to career potential?
So far I think from that perspective, it's going fairly well.

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