It is true that horses can get stolen and that very nice, well-trained horses do get slaughtered. By and large though, a horse that will let anybody get on and whoop and holler and will run when asked and stop when asked and can behave sanely in the unfamiliar environment of the auction ring will have a very good chance of being worth more than meat price as a riding horse.

        Most people don't want their horse to be subjected to such rude handling and work hard to keep their horses in safe and quiet environments and focus their attention on improving the horse's performance. The problem with this theory is that most horses are not the cream of the crop and can't be G-1 stakes winners or Grand Prix horses or Congress winners. They are not going to be the best at their field and will eventually be replaced due to age, or lack of ability or family finances, or they can get stolen from people that wanted to keep them permanently. These horses are the ones that end up being thrown out in a back pasture, fenced in barbed wire and without proper nutrition, shelter or veterinary care because the new owner can't handle them. These are the horses that cause an owner to get so frustrated they send the horse to a trainer that uses harsh methods that can make the horse violent or get the horse hurt. These are the horses that get sent to the stockyards because they are too dangerous and "they need to be dog food so they don't hurt anybody."

        When you have a horse that you want to have a good life and you can't guarantee that you can provide it for the horse's entire life, train it well! Give it an all-purpose base of knowledge, not just training in a certain field. Teach it to calmly accept screaming children and barking dogs and fluttering plastic and all other manner of scary things so that it will not hurt people by accident and get a bad reputation. Teach it to lead with respect, not pulling you around and eating what and when it wants because somebody else's solution might be to beat it or use a harsher leading technique that could get the horse hurt. Teach the horse to accept you throwing the saddle on and jumping on and going riding, killer buyers that are testing out whether or not horses are broke do not take the time to longe the horses first. Teach your horse to tolerate even the most beginner rider and that horse will be valuable to someone as a first horse for their 8 year old child, even when the horse is 25 or 30 years old.

        Any time you have a horse in your care, you can improve its' chances for the rest of its' life by teaching it more tolerance and better respect.

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