My Story About Horse Abuse and Neglect

I feel compelled to write this story on behalf of my daughter's new horse Pilgrim. My daughter wanted a riding horse. I had to give it some thought as years ago I raised horses and decided I no longer wanted to raise them due to a car accident I had. I thought it out and agreed to find my daughter a horse, so now the search was on. Since we are animal lovers we have a habit of attending animal auctions. My daughter asked for horses each time we went to the auction, for one reason or another I would tell her no. Now don't get the wrong idea some of these horses were beautiful and sweet, it just didn't feel right. Now looking for her horse has taken months, more due to me than her. My daughter started to look on the Internet for a horse, now mind you she's twelve, so every horse is appealing. After, about a month looking on the Internet she came across a half Arabian, half Quarter Horse. I looked at the photo posted and read the posting, I then book marked this horse and we continued to look. A few days went by and something kept telling me to go back and look at this horse again. I decided to place a call about the horse. I then found out these very nice folks had rescued this horse from a bad situation, they however could not keep him due to the fact they already had two horses of their own. We continued communications for a couple of days and I decided this was the horse for my daughter. I will call the lady Nan to protect her identity. Nan, her husband and daughter then drove three and a half hours to bring us this horse, which by the way was yesterday July 5th.

As you can imagine the anticipation of a child waiting for her new horse, the day seem to drag on. Nan and her family arrived at 2:15 pm. My daughter ran to the pasture gate to watch them drive in which takes a while as our road is very long and bumpy with a few turns in it. This is where the surprise came in. The photos on the Internet were not the greatest, I could tell he had some scars. Well, when we unloaded him from the trailer I was shocked to see him so skinny with numerous scars and wounds that were not healed that may have been about 2 weeks old. I told Nan he's skinny, her response was should have seen him when we rescued him. All I could think was my God he had to have been skin and bones. Then Nan proceeded to tell me the story of this horse. Apparently, these other folks had bought this horse for their 13 yr old daughter who knew nothing about horses. They bought this horse from a horse trader who told them this horse is green broke. He is not ready for an inexperienced rider. Well, with that said they let their 13 yr old daughter get up on him to ride. This poor horse did not know what this girl wanted him to do, so he didn't move. They had also put a saddle on him that didn't fit. Now the horse is in pain the girl is kicking him, he's confused and refuses to move. What happens next the father of the girl decides this horse will do as we say or else. The or else factor came into play by means of an Axe handle, the man beats this horse with an Axe handle. After doing this he actually believes he's going to get up on this horse and ride him. Now, I don't know about the rest of you, but this man was nuts. This horse is in pain due to an improper saddle, being beaten and now this man gets on him to ride him. Can you guess what happens next? Horse bucks man off. Of course, horse gets it again. Later, so the story goes their neighbor was threatening to shoot the horse cause it got in his garden. Somehow, they get Nan's number, call her up and tell her about this crazy mean horse who need to be picked up now before neighbor shoots it, mind you it's the middle of the night. Nan and her family get up thinking this is going to be a bad deal loading a crazy horse. Nan arrives and this horse as she put it trailers like a lamb. They get the horse to their place he unloads no problem. They spend a week trying to put weight on him before trying to find a home for him. In the mean time Nan's daughter who is also 13 rides the horse with no problems.

We now have this horse who we now call Pilgrim. I have had a lot of horses and I must tell you, this horse should not trust a human by any means. Pilgrim has only been here for 32 hours. We have wormed him and doctored his wounds. He loves his alfalfa hay, his corn with oats. He loves being brushed. Their are no problems haltering, leading. We come out of the house and meets us at the gate. He loves to be hugged, he drops his head so my daughter can kiss him goodnight. This horse is a wonderful animal. He has one of the sweetest dispositions I have ever seen in a horse. I'm amazed with him, he has no reason to trust a human, but somehow he does. Again fate played it's hand, Pilgrim belongs with us, him and I have something in common I understand how he felt due to abuse I received as orphan. My question to everyone out there, why do some people continually have an urge to beat and abuse animals? I know there are people out there that believe it's just an animal, they can take it. Trust me they can't, they have feelings too. Horses are so beautiful and graceful, how is it anyone can beat and starve these wonderful animals? I'm begging everyone out there that cares don't get an animal if all your going to do is starve it and beat it. If you don't know how to handle a horse find someone who does and have them teach you. Please don't take out your anger on the horse because you don't know how to train it, they really do want to please you. You must have patience in working with a horse or any animal for that matter.

It seems to me their have been a lot of news stories about horse abuse and neglect. If you have a horse and can't afford to feed it, find someone who can. People will hold out to sell the animal for money even though it's starving, for Gods sake give the horse or whatever animal it is away to a good home. People need to care about the animal, not the money. I'm begging people quit starving and beating these beautiful animals that God himself created.