Re: slant load stress

[Truman Prevatt <truman.prevatt@netsrq.com>]

The cowboys usually throw their horses in a stock trailer free.  Most of
the time - I am told by several - the horses will stand at an angle much
the same as they would in a slant load.

We haul quite a bit.  We routinely haul 10 hours to get to a ride.  We
hauled four very long days from Southwest FL to Torrey Utah for the ROC
in 96 and back and from Soutwest FL to CO for the summer and back in
'97.  This was all in a slant load and we had no problems.  I might add
that my wife is a LMT and has done quite a bit of work on horses and
knows how to detect sorness.  No soreness was detected that could be
attributed to the slant load trailer.  Yes they were a little stiff for
a day or two but this was a general stiffness and they recovered much
faster than the drivers :-).

The one thing we do is we do not tie our horses heads during travel.  So
they are free to move and brace better than if their heads were tied.  I
don't know if that helps or not.

Truman