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RE: [RC] Arkansas Sale Barn - Mary Krauss

I wish people wouldn't immediately point fingers at so-called "backyard breeders" as the source of unwanted horses. Has anyone done the research to show that backyard breeders flood the market? Seems to me that we just heard about loads of unwanted well-bred, well-trained horses that may very well have come from "professional breeders" who make their living creating horse after horse after horse. The "backyard breeders" I know, including myself, produce a foal once in a while to keep or to give to a friend or sell to a carefully considered buyer. Also, the people I know who've bred their mares have been really uptight about matching their horse with an appropriate stallion. They've been even more uptight about making sure their foals find good homes, complete with buy-back options.

While there's obviously a need for focused full-time breeders, I'd challenge any of them out there to review their production/placement/ sales policies to be certain they aren't part of the problem. The guy who wound up with over 100 "extra" horses sounds a poor businessman at best and cruelly irresponsible at worst. Just as bad are those individuals who choose to have horses without the capacity to care for them for a lifetime. Seems to me we have to accept that owning horses includes having the resources to handle retiring (or humanely killing) them once they're past using. By the way, I'm terribly sad that all the local slaughterhouses quit accepting horses as personally bringing one's friend to the LOCAL kill spot was a kind and practical way to handle the whole issue.

Mary K. -- whose sanest, soundest horse is a mixed-breed pony bought from a good-hearted drunk (sorry, the term fits in this particular case) who let his mare run with a friend's stallion because "they were in love"; and whose second-best horse is a beautifully bred Polish Arabian produced by a "backyard breeder".

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