After bouncing on non-gaited horses for 20 years, my aging body longs for a smoother ride. Little did I know that my search for a smooth gait would lead me to a jolting discovery.

Natural meets UNnatural

By Jennifer Klitzke

Surfing online ads in the warm comfort of my Midwest home on a wintery February day in 2007, my eyes latch onto a black beautiful, registered Tennessee Walking Horse filly. Her name: Gift of Freedom (a.k.a., Makana, a Hawaiian word for “gift”). Just turning three years old, she has 20 rides on her. Raised on the family farm, she had been imprinted from birth and handled daily. Intrigued with her name, partial to her color, valuing her upbringing, and she is barefoot like my other horses.

My husband and I take the two-and-a-half-hour road trip through the snowscape for a visit. The black beauty meets me at the fence. I instantly know she is the one for me when she wedges her nose between my arm and body. She literally makes me hug her. “What horse does that?!” I exclaim, “She is the friendliest horse I have ever met!”

I love everything I learn about Makana and the family who raised her that day. Driving away, my husband senses my excitement and says, “You already have three horses.”

A few days pass. On Valentine’s Day, my husband surprises me with better than a box of chocolates and says, “Yes, you can get the horse.” Wow, my first naturally gaited horse!

I send in my registration papers and become a member of the Tennessee Walking Horse Breeders’ & Exhibitors’ Association (TWHBEA). A month later the Voice magazine arrives. I page through this thick, glossy, well-produced magazine and am perplexed. Page after page, I notice unnatural hoof angles, thick pads, chains, big shoes, thin shank bits, exaggerated poses and distressed expressions.

Is this how Tennessee Walking Horse are trained?!

I decided then and there, dressage is all I knew, and dressage is all Makana will know.

Meeting naturally gaited Tennessee Walking Horse Trainers

A couple months pass, and I attend a Midwest Horse Expo. That’s when I meet the Brenda Imus and watch her naturally gaited horse presentation. None of the gaited horses moved in the manner I saw pictured in the Voice magazine. One of the riders was even dressed in dressage attire and rode her horse at a flat walk, not trot. Inspired, I follow Brenda back to her booth for a chat and buy her DVD set.

Looking through information about TWH associations, a television catches my eye. It brings the Voice magazine photos to life. A TWH wearing the big shoes is moving next to a TWH with regular shoes. What a staggering contrast: mechanical and exaggerated movement vs. natural and flowing movement. 

I later learn I had been watching Jennie Jackson riding her flat shod stallion Champagne Watchout at the Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration World Grand Championship class. She was the only flat shod entry riding among performance horses wearing the big shoes. And Jennie had been an advocate against TWH abuse for 30 years. 

Soring? What is THAT?

In 2009 I took Makana to her first recognized TWH show, the Minnesota Celebration. Each horse was officially inspected for soundness and palpitated for evidence of soring before entering the show ring. Soring? What is THAT?

I was mortified to learn it was more than big shoes that made the horses move with exaggerated motion. Some people put corrosive agents on the horse’s front feet and add chains around the horse’s fetlocks. When the chains hit the raw skin the horse flicks its sore foot up with each step to produce the extreme motion. That’s what soring is. Horse abuse for a blue ribbon.

How jolting! However, I was thankful learn that soring has been made illegal according to the Horse Protection Act.

Then in 2012 my husband urgently called me into the living room to watch Nightline. I was shocked to hear reporter Brian Ross uncover an investigation about the ongoing soring abusive and inhumane training practices predominant in the TWH performance division.

“This is ILLEGAL! How can this be!?” I exclaimed.

Soring is hard to enforce. The infrastructure needed to police soring is expensive. Those who sore their horses have devised ways around the system, and those who get caught receive light sentences.

In November 2013, House Bill 1518 called the Prevent All Soring Tactics Act (PAST Act) was presented to Congress. It proposes to ban all use of pads and chains from the show world.

According to veterinarian Dr. Haffner, “The fact is the big lick can only be accomplished by soring,” he wrote in a letter to Congress urging them to put an end to this abuse. “When one soring technique becomes detectable, another one is developed. The big lick is a learned response to pain and if horses have not been sored, they do not learn it.

“It takes skill to be able to teach a horse the big lick and then determine the proper amount of soring and the proper timing to have a horse ready on a Friday or Saturday night. The horses must have the memory of the pain, but they must also be able to pass inspection.

“It takes a combination of the built up pads for the weight and the chain to strike against the pastern that has been sored to produce the big lick. Other methods have been developed, but the traditional method is oil of mustard placed on the pastern and a chain put around the pastern to strike against it.

“The hair must be protected and this is generally done by applying grease on the pastern with a stocking over it. Calluses develop as a result of the chain rubbing against the skin. Later, the calluses are removed with a paste made by mixing salicylic acid with alcohol and applying it over the calluses and putting a leg bandage over it for a few days,” he wrote, adding, “This practice is also very painful to the horse. I have seen many horses lying in pain in their stalls on Monday morning from an acid treatment on Saturday.”

To think that all I wanted was a comfortable, smooth horse to ride would lead me to such a jolting discovery about the exaggerated movements seen on the cover of the Voice. My naturally gaited and barefoot Tennessee walking horse might be boring to watch, but at least she’s happy and sound.

For more information about soring, the PAST Act, and ways you can help put an end to abusive and inhumane training methods, visit the links below.

Links

How You Can Help

PAST Act Opinion Poll

Letter from a Former Performance Horse Veterinarian

Letter from a Performance Horse Owner

Letter from a Former Performance Horse Trainer

Caught in the Act of Soring

Chronical Forum

Voters Who Approve the PAST Act