The Heroes of the Horse World

Everyone in the horse world is important. Everyone has their place, and their place is valuable, and appreciated.

But I’d argue, respectfully, that the people in the horse world who make the most difference in the horse world (good, bad, or indifferent), are the people who start colts.

See, how a colt is started, is likely how he’ll go for the rest of his life. If he’s not started well, it could be that for the rest of his life, people will spend that horse’s life trying to fix what happened back then. This is actually what a lot of what horse trainers do, is try to “fix” or even “complete” a long-ago botched start job. It’s kind of a vicious circle. A horse gets a bad start job, then goes into the horse community, where trainer after trainer works to fix the fallout from the botched start job. A horse only gets ONE first ride, ever. There are no retakes or redos. The humans get to do it again and get better at it. The horses don’t.

The benefits, or the scars, from starting can last a lifetime for a horse. We don’t get to pick, necessarily, what sticks forever. But many of the “issues” that grown-up horses exhibit can be traced back to their early learning and their starting.

Furthermore, I’ve got a bit of a theory that horses tend to reflect the values and beliefs of the people who develop them. So if a person believes horses are lazy and will “test you” to “get out of work”, well, then, that’s the kind of horses they tend to make. If, however, a person believes that horses are kind, and generous, and hard working, well, then, that’s how their horses tend to turn out. I don’t have any evidence for that aside from my observations and experience, but I’ve decided that it’s just safer to mindfully dictate my beliefs based on what kind of horses I want to produce. Horses are just too smart and adaptable to risk it. Horses are horses, but they’re also “plastic” to some extent.

So it matters a lot, who starts these horses. I’d argue that maybe those start jobs are the most important thing that goes on in the horse world. But, shame on us, we don’t really value colt starters.

If every horse got a good start, would there be less horses in kill pens? If every horse got a good start, would there be less horses at rescues? If every horse got a good start, would it be easier for them to find homes and would they be worth more money? If every horse got a good start, would they stay sounder and saner, longer?

We should value the people who start colts well, and we should be picky about it. We should be willing to pay them, with both money and respect. Because they, in large part, are responsible for the kind of life a horse will have. We, as horse owners, should understand, at least in brief, how a horse is started, so we can understand what a “hole” in a horse’s foundation looks like. Things get skipped, things get abandoned, and things get simply haywire, for a lot of reasons.

And we need to realize that the consumer (the horse owner), not the trainer (the service provider) for the mostpart dictates how trainers start horses. If the consumer is not willing to pay, or not willing to give the service provider time, then the service provider will have to figure out how to do the job in the time allowed, with the budget constraints given. It’s either that or not work. The consumer won’t necessarily know how the service provider managed that. In other words, the horse owner won’t know how the colt got started in a mere 30 days. What was skipped? How much pressure was used to get it done that fast? How much experience can a horse actually get in 30 days? How many things were started and not finished? Did the horse get sore from working “30 10s” instead of “90 3s”? I mean, these are questions the consumer answers, not so much the service provider.

When we buy a horse, we should ask how it was started. If we have a horse started, we should be particular, and we should be willing to pay for that expertise and experience. Even if we’re never going to start a horse ourselves, we should understand the process so we can see our grown-up horse’s behavior through that lens. And we need to embrace the truth that “how he’s started is how he’ll go.” We need to recognize and value those folks who dedicate their lives, bodies and livelihoods to setting horses up for success in life.

I would love if, in the comments, we took the opportunity to sing the praises of extraordinary colt starters we know. They make the world a better place for horses.