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ESSENTIAL DESTINATIONS

MONTH: October 2006

Walking horse industry quick-steps after failed USDA soring inspections

 

NASHVILLE--Between allegedly "sored" horses and sore losers, walking horse competition burst into national view as never before in late August 2006. But the attention was almost all embarrassing to breeders and exhibitors in a business whose excesses, a generation ago, prompted passage of the federal Horse Protection Act a year before the passage of the Animal Welfare Act.

 

The Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration championship competition in Shelbyville was cancelled on August 26 after USDA inspectors disqualified seven of the 10 finalists for alleged soring violations of the Horse Protection Act. For the first time in the 67-year history of the event, it named no grand champion.

 

The National Celebration reportedly brings as much as $38.5 million a year into Shelbyville.
U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tennessee) on September 7 asked USDA undersecretary Bruce Knight to "clarify" the USDA definition of soring to enable inspectors to enforce the Horse Protection Act "in a more consistent manner."

 

Soring, explained Pat Raia of The Horse, "is a practice whereby horses are subjected to deliberate skin lacerations around their hooves or the application of caustic chemicals such as diesel fuel, kerosene, or lighter fluid to irritate their forelegs, thereby achieving higher stepping animation," exaggerating the "big lick" gait for which walking horses are known.

 

"Horses can also be sored by having nails driven into the 'frog' on the bottoms of their hooves, " added Nashville Tennessean staff writer Brad Schrade, "or by being made to wear overly heavy horseshoes that can pull the hoof off the leg. In an effort to make the pain stop, the horses step high in a reaction to the soring agents, federal officials say."

 

In practical terms, the Frist recommendation would mean that the looser interpretations of the less experienced inspectors who supervise local and regional walking horse shows would prevail over the judgement of the experts who govern the top events.

 

Frist's office subsequently refused to release a copy of his specific regulatory proposals to news media, but Schrade and Tennessean colleague Sarah B. Gilliam obtained a copy anyway.

 

The Frist request, co-signed by Senator Saxby Chambliss (R-Georgia), "would decriminalize certain behavior that is currently illegal, thereby protecting owners and trainers and not horses," Friends of Sound Horses executive director Keith Danes told Schrade.

 

The Frist proposals were endorsed by attorney Tom Blankenship, who represented the National Horse Protection Society in a posting to the Walking Horse Report web site. Blankenship earlier argued for relaxing the soring rule as representative of the Walking Horse Trainers Association.

 

Summarized Schrade and Gilliam, "The [proposed] new language, in part, more narrowly defines soring as evidence of injury or irritation, with current 'pain, swelling, redness, heat or loss of function.'"

 

In effect, it limits the definiton of soring to current inflammation, without regard to past suffering inflicted on a horse. "It completely eliminates the existing regulation referred to as the scar rule," Horse Protection Commission administrative director Donna Benefield told Schrade and Gilliam.

 

Both Danes and Benefield are themselves veteran walking horse inspectors.

 

USDA stands firm

"Where compliance fails, the USDA will enforce the Horse Protection Act," responded USDA deputy administrator of animal care Chester Gipson, DVM, at a September 11 "listening session" in Chattanooga.

 

"We're truly at the crossroads," Gipson continued, "and the industry needs to make some determinations, some decisions about which way they are going. We are not going backward. So from our standpoint, we're going forward. You," Gipson told the assembled trainers and owners, "have to decide which direction you're going."

 

Listening session participants disputed whether the Horse Protection Act had truly succeeded in eliminating "90%" of the abuses seen 30 years ago, as trainer Mack Motes contended, displaying old photos of abused horses, or whether trainers had simply become better at concealing the evidence, as 35-year horse enthusiast Lucille Davis argued.

 

"There is an obvious problem when horses pass inspection on the scar rule one night, then fail inspections two nights later," Motes claimed. "There were three times more disagreements between the National Horse Show Commission inspectors and the USDA inspectors at the 2006 Celebration, compared to 2005."

 

But alleged abuses observed at the 2005 Celebration produced the 2006 crackdown. "At the 2005 Celebration," explained Schrade, "the USDA used a device that tests horses for prohibitive substances, such as numbing agents and irritants, that may suggest soring. More than half of 92 samples (54.3%) tested positive. The same device used at the 2005 Kentucky Celebration found 100% of the 25 horses sampled" had been treated with "one or more prohibited substances."

 

"Weeks before the 2006 Celebration," Schrade continued, USDA chief horse protection regulator Todd Behre "told an owner he was 'stunned at the condition of horses' that industry-hired regulators had allowed in Walking Horse competitions throughout Middle Tennessee the previous weekend, according to an e-mail exchange between the two.

 

"Exhibitors and trainers were at times bolting from shows when regulators showed up," Schrade continued. "The USDA inspection teams last year started attending more than one show event in a weekend, a practice that continued this year, Behre said. That means it is less predictable where federal regulators will be."

 

"Hearing trainers say 'we don't know what to do about the scar rule' has grown a little old," Behre said in an e-mail posted to The Walking Horse Report web page.

 

"Friction over interpretations of USDA scarring rules have plagued walking horse events all season," summarized Pat Raia of The Horse, "but came to a head at the Tennessee Walking Horse National Celebration, when USDA inspectors issued 225 notices of violation and disqualifications."

 

The Horse Protection Act banned soring in 1970, but since the walking horse industry itself trains and pays the "designated qualified professionals" who inspect for soring, humane observers have often doubted the vigor of enforcement.

 

That changed abruptly on August 25, 2006. Then, wrote Raia, "Event organizers temporarily halted competition and postponed preliminary classes, at the request of trainers who complained that 'inspections were getting out of hand,' according to Celebration public and media relations director Chip Walters."

 

Elaborated Schrade, "USDA inspectors disqualified six out of approximately 10 horses they inspected, spurring near bedlam that eventually led event organizers to cancel that night's performance, as well as the next morning's. The dispute turned so intense that the Tennessee Highway Patrol called in state and local reinforcements to create a wall of law officers to keep an angry crowd of walking horse enthusiasts separated from the regulators, before the federal staffers could leave. The flap erupted further when the Grand Championship contest was cancelled."

 

Celebration CEO Ron Thomas told reporters at the time that said they understood that the trainers and owners of the three championship round horses who passed inspections had refused to compete without the others.

 

Rebutted Allen McAbee, whose horse passed, "We were not contacted or asked by anybody if we wanted to show. We don't know who shut the show down. We weren't given an option; they didn't ask me."

 

Thomas told Schrade that the show officials could not talk directly to the owners and trainers of the three qualified horses because, "You can't get through an angry mob of 150 people."

 

A Celebration news release said that Tennessee Highway Patrol officers "were confident they could protect the safety of the people working in the inspection area, but did not have the manpower to assure the health and safety of the 26,000 spectators, exhibitors and horses," Schrade summarized.
About 3,400 horses took part in the National Celebration.

 

Officers with the Bedford County Sheriff's Department, the Shelbyville Police Department, and the Celebration's own security guards joined about 30 highway patrol officers in trying to secure the scene, Department of Safety spokesperson Julie Oakes told the Tennessean.

 

"The crowd was a consideration, but not the reason for the shutdown," Oakes said.

 

"How can the highway patrol stop a horse show? We didn't start it and we can't stop it," added Tennessee Highway Patrol Lieutenant Johnny Hunter, to Sarah B. Gilliam of the Tennessean. "Everybody's just passing the buck."

 

Money talks

Amid the heavily publicized furor, the Kentucky Walking Horse Association cancelled the Kentucky Walking Horse Celebration that was to have been held in Liberty, Kentucky, September 21-23.

 

"It's not a protest," Kentucky Walking Horse Association president Earl Rogers Jr. told Raia. "It's that we felt we couldn't make any money. Many of the competitors could not come because they were either suspended or banned from shows."

 

The Tennessee Walking Horse Breeders' and Exhibitors' Association told Associated Press writer Kristin M. Hall on September 21, 2006 that it will hold a new national championship in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, on November 24-25.

 

Offering $150,000 in prize money, divided among 50 different classes, with $15,000 for the grand champion, "The Mur-freesboro contest will be open to horse owner Mike Walden, who has been banned from the Celebration for two years after accusations that he offered $10,000 to trainers of competing horses if they dropped out of the championship earlier this month," reported Schrade.

 

"Walden's horse, Private Charter, was a favorite to win the grand championship at the National Celebration," continued Schrade, "but was among the horses in the title round that were disqualified by federal inspectors looking for signs of possible soring. Whether Walden and Private Charter will compete [in Murfreesboro] is unclear."

 

Walden's version of the incident was that he was "led to believe" that the owners of the horses who passed inspection "did not want to show as a sign of unity. The guys were riding for the money, and I said owners should get together and pay for the reimbursement for what the winnings would be, and unite and not show. It was not my intention that I was paying them not to show," he told Gilliam and Schrade.

 

The owners and trainers of the horses who passed all told the Tennessean that they had intended to compete, until the show was cancelled.

 

The Walden case was "not the first time that allegations of money and influence threatened the Celebration's image," Schrade and Gilliam recalled. "Allegations arose in connection with the 1997 Celebration that a horse trainer tried to bribe a judge. The trainer was later fined $25,000 and the judge $20,000 in a 1999 settlement that contained no admission or denial of the charges."

 

Rabies, too

Capping the Shelbyville fiasco, the Tennessee Department of Health on September 10 warned about 4,200 National Celebration attendees from 34 states that an exhibited horse from Missouri had turned out to be rabid. Apparently bitten by a rabid bat while still in Missouri, the three-year-old gelding fell ill on August 23, the first day of the National Celebration, and was euthanized after rabies was diagnosed on August 28.

 

"I keep preaching to rabies-vaccinate horses and cows," Texas A&M University College of Veterinary Medicine professor Tam Garland commented to ANIMAL PEOPLE. "Maybe some day people will not think I am crazy for doing it. I hand-feed my cows, the big pets, and I always vaccinate them.

 

"Many people hand feed their horses a treat or handful of feed. That alone," which exposes the person to potentially infected saliva, "should make us vaccinate every horse. Having our hands in an animal's mouth can expose us to the rabies virus earlier than the animal may demonstrate clinical signs. The cheapest insurance for protecting oneself and the animals they love is vaccination."

 

Drugging allegation

Soring horses to produce high-stepping is a practice unique to walking horse trainers, but abusive practices also afflict other branches of horse exhibition. Also in early September, for example, the British Show Jumping Association asked the Jersey Police to investigate an allegation that Kim Baudains, 36, fed a sedative to rivals' ponies in an attempt to help her 11-year-old son Josh win the under-16 Young Showjumper of the Year final against Timmy Clark, 13.

 

"The event was cancelled over safety concerns after a tablet suspected of being the veterinary sedative acetylpromazine was found on the ground. Some owners complained that their ponies were drowsy," reported Richard Savill of the Daily Telegraph. "The worst affected pony, Flying Sunbeam, which was not the subject of the complaint, was reportedly unsteady on its feet."

 

Flying Sunbeam is Clark's pony, Savill wrote.

 

According to Savill, "Josh Baudains has been riding since he was two and won his first championship at five. He has won two trophies on the junior novice British circuit in the past 12 months. Mrs. Baudains rode her first point-to-point winner at the age of 16."

 

Lucy Bannerman of the London Times reported that Kim Baudains was "confined to bed," according to her mother, "receiving medication as a result of stress from the allegations."

 

"As long as there is competition, there will be cruelty," equine care and transport expert Sharon Cregier commented to ANIMAL PEOPLE. Working from Prince Edward Island, Canada, Cregier consults about horse protection issues throughout the world. "Kudos," Cregier extended, "to the inspectors who saw those horses out of the championships."