Brenda Corey, of North Carolina, wrote to me: “I live in the rural South. The problem of unwanted horses here is endemic, and it is not from high-bred sport horses, race horses, etc. but from the garden-variety backyard breeder. This backyard-breeding thing has been a problem for as long as I can remember and I am at a total loss to understand it. These people are not breeding these horses for any purpose, not even to sell, and the majority of them are never trained in any way. Many live out there lives in a back pasture, never having been handled. Others are sadly neglected and starved. I cannot understand why these people bring these babies into the world, knowing they have no plans for them. These are people of the most irresponsible kind, and the only thing that would put an end to it is to regulate breeding stallions. If they had to pay a hefty fee for a license to keep a breeding stallion, then you would see things change. These are people, for the most part, who keep studs right alongside their other horses. They are not paying a big stud fee to someone. It is a form of cruel insanity to me. But I firmly believe that the backyard breeder is the major contributor to unwanted horses.”

The prevalence of backyard-bred horses varies by region, but certainly no region is free of completely untrained, poorly cared-for horses sitting unhappily in a tiny paddock or in a stall behind someone’s house. And there are certainly horses who are stallions just because someone didn’t like the idea of gelding their colt or couldn’t afford it when the time came (probably their dogs and cats aren’t neutered either). The former probably think they’re contributing to the gene pool by offering friends and neighbors low-cost stud service (wrong!) and the latter have probably just sentenced horse they can’t handle to a life behind a barbed-wire fence, where he’ll rot away until he mercifully dies.

Brenda’s suggestion of regulating breeding stallions is a philosophically good idea that, unfortunately, has no practical application. What organization would do it? No breed association—from The Jockey Club to the smallest breed association—has any interest in or influence over horses who aren’t that breed. The U.S. Equestrian Federation has, shortsightedly, only the tiniest interest in breeding and no influence upon or interaction with anyone who isn’t a member. None of these groups have the funding or the wherewithal, and I can assure you that neither our state government nor federal governments have the means either. And we wouldn’t want them to. So I’m at a loss to see who would oversee stallion licensing.

It would be great if we American horsemen could come up with a long-term solution to discouraging people from breeding horses that shouldn’t be bred. But we—and specifically the hundreds of large and small rescue and re-homing groups all around the country—are facing a huge problem, right now. They simply do not have the facilities or the funds to handle the tens of thousands of unwanted horses that crop up each year.

The woman who is the head of CANTER Mid-Atlantic, one of the most active rescue groups in the country, posted this on the Chronicle online forum in August:

“CANTER (and I bet most re-homing groups) have been getting inundated with horse-donation inquiries recently—more so than usual. Most of these horses are severely injured, or useful for pasture ornaments only. I know that my group (CANTER Mid-Atlantic) has stopped taking horses from racetracks other than Delaware Park completely due to a lack of funding, and I would imagine many are in the same boat, and even from Delaware we can take only two injured horses at any given time due to finances, manpower and room.

“The question is, what do we do with these broken horses? There are no homes for them. We have sound horses we cannot give away because they aren't 16.2, male, and showing at 3'. Very, very frustrating, but also a really big problem.

“I've thought long about the issue as there are many facets. Euthanasia is expensive—really, really expensive—by the time you factor in renderer pickup.”

She then made the very good suggestion of a low-cost euthanasia program, at both racetracks and at barns. I’d suggest this is something the leaders of the American Association of Equine Practitioners should seriously investigate. It’s obviously fraught with controversy in our death-averse society, but it’s far, far more humane to end the life of a young horse with a crippling injury than to make him hobble about or be stuck in a stall for 15 or 20 years. As readers of this blog know, we’ve had to put down two horses (one because of colic and one because of age and illness) and an old dog this year, so I know that they go peacefully to sleep. It’s extremely hard on us, but it is not hard on them.

To conclude this blog, I’m going to reproduce the words of a veterinarian who also writes a blog, words that my wife, Heather, came across a few weeks ago. Christy Corp-Minamiji is a livestock veterinarian in Northern California:

“I recognize the necessity of euthanasia, and in an intellectual way, I’m glad to belong to a profession that possesses a legal means of ending suffering. But those are abstractions.

“Shopped euthanasias are the worst. When a client’s first words are, ‘What will it cost to put my horse to sleep?’ it doesn’t really matter what rationale is given. That first sentence is an all-too-revealing code for, ‘I can’t afford to keep my horse.’ We’ve had too many of those this summer. Too many slightly decrepit, but not-quite-suffering horses. Too many hard-pressed owners burning in guilt.

“People are sometimes horrified that I am willing to kill an animal that is not in extremis. Sometimes I am horrified, too. ‘I went to school to help animals, to fix them,’ the idealistic voice in my head cries. Her voice is fading, worn hoarse by years of reality. Reality is not always a shiny place with gleaming horses recuperating nicely in tidy stables and fat, retired ponies grazing emerald pastures.

“Today’s reality holds too many unwanted and unusable horses: the old, the intractable, the chronically or expensively lame or ill. Reality is several years of high hay prices, high fuel costs, lost jobs, foreclosed homes, and low prices for marketable horses. In modern society, the horse is a luxury, a reflection of discretionary income that for many is dwindling rapidly. The wanted horse is a luxury; the unwanted horse is a burden.

“Under pressure from groups both well-meaning and manipulative, equine slaughter has been outlawed in many states and faces a national ban. Most Americans react with revulsion to the notion of equine slaughter. The idea doesn’t thrill me either. However, banning the slaughter of horses hasn’t changed the ultimate outcome; the scene has simply shifted to one of prolonged neglect or meaningless death.

“Yet, I don’t question clients too closely when they opt for euthanasia. When appropriate, I try to offer other options for a horse that is not clearly suffering. These days, however, options are limited. Rescue organizations are overwhelmed, and I can’t pressure someone to choose between feeding a horse and feeding a child. In the final analysis, I know that this horse will die. Faced with this inevitability, I would prefer his death to come at my hands. This is my job, my responsibility. The owners always offer explanations and excuses. I hate the excuses. Not because I don’t sympathize, but because I do. I join them in this hideous hemorrhage of guilt, grief, and lost dreams. I hate the excuses because part of my job is to take the client’s guilt and make it mine.

“So many people ask the same question, regardless of the circumstances of the euthanasia: ‘Do you think this is the right thing to do?’

“I know the answer. There is only one answer to this question. I don’t care what the circumstances are; by the time this question is asked, I have done everything within my power for my patient. At this point, my duty is to my client. ‘Yes, you are making a good choice for him.’ The choice is always right. By this point, the alternatives are worse.

“’How can you stand to do this?’ More tears have accompanied this question than I care to remember. My answer never changes. ‘This is both the worst and the best thing that I do. Every one gets to me. Every one hurts. The day that it doesn’t hurt anymore will be the day that I have to find a different job.’ Privately, I wonder when that day will come. Every time that plunger depresses, I feel a bit of my soul slide into the vein with that blue syrup. How many times until there is nothing left?”

In his 1988 book The de Nemethy Method, the legend writes: “When I think of the rider’s aids, I am reminded of an anecdote that is told about one of the world’s great pianists, who was asked how difficult it was to learn to play the piano as he did. ‘It is really not difficult at all,’ he replied. ‘You only have to figure out which fingers go on what keys, and for how long. Then you practice for the rest of your life so that you can do it up to tempo.’

“Communicating with the horse is about the same. It is not really all that difficult to execute the correct instrumental acts once or twice, but it is a lifetime’s work to master them. Few horses are really willfully disobedient or stubborn, but any horse will be confused by a rider’s clumsy attempts to communicate through an imperfect vocabulary, and this confusion is often mistaken for stupidity or resistance. Luckily, the horse’s memory is excellent, and this provides an excellent basis on which to build our communication.

“Of course, the rider’s physical communication and contact with the horse are still paramount. He gives the orders, and the horse must learn to understand the equestrian language that he employs. This language is often referred to as ‘aids,’ though perhaps ‘signals’ would be a more appropriate term for the actions we want to describe.”

I have taped these words on to the wall of our tack room for everyone to read, because I think that Mr. de Nemethy has perfectly described the challenge we and our horses face in working together. And his words confirm that our legs are an essential means to talk to our horses with “an imperfect vocabulary.”

These mediocre results followed last April’s Rolex Kentucky CCI4*, where Buck finished third on My Boy Bobby, Phillip finished seventh on Connaught, and Stephen Bradley finished 10th on Brandenburg’s Joshua—the only three U.S. riders to make the top 10 at our own biggest event. The hand wringing has become more anxious following Burghley because we’re now exactly a year away from the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games at the Kentucky Horse Park. We’ll be blown out of the medals, some fear. Something needs to be done—now—they insist!

I think that the disappointing results our event riders have recorded in two of the three biggest annual events are symptomatic of a peculiarly American issue in all three Olympic disciplines. To an extent, it’s even true in the other international disciplines that will make up next year’s FEI World Games. But a lot can happen in a year. I know that scores of riders in all these disciplines have plans to get horses ready for the selection trials that could bring them to Kentucky, and at this point no one can predict how they’ll do.

But, in the longer term, we have some national issues regarding the development of international-caliber riders and horses—and putting the two together—that are not being addressed as well as they are in England, Germany, the Netherlands, France and elsewhere. And, honestly, I’m not sure the leaders and staff of the U.S. Equestrian Federation have (or even want to have) the capacity to do it.

These challenges fall into four categories, which space and your attention span are going to force me to simplify here. (Remember, I believe these absolutely apply to dressage and show jumping too, and even to driving and endurance.)

The first and most important is funding, which our deep recession has only exacerbated. Every single non-profit organization is struggling to make ends meet because everyone has cut way back on their giving. Almost all our rivals have a big advantage over us here: Great Britain’s teams are funded by profits from the nation’s lottery (funneled through their Olympic committee), and many others get substantial support from their Olympic committees too. The USEF gets less than $1 million over the four-year cycle from the USOC, enough to partly pay coaches and for teams to go to some competitions. 

But remember that that national funding is almost solely dependent on performance, on winning medals and trophies: A nation’s team wins the Olympics or the World Championships, they get more money. They go a year or two without winning anything, they get far less. Some have criticized U.S. coaches, especially eventing coach Mark Phillips, for being too ruthless and not caring enough about the horses or about developing riders. Well, Phillips’ job is to prepare his teams to win, and significant performance-dependent funding wouldn’t make him any less “win at all costs.”

Still, this low level of funds colors the other three issues. It has a direct effect upon the horses available to elite riders right now. The number of people willing and able to buy and pay for the care, training and competition of an elite horse has never been a big pool, and now that the housing and credit markets have crashed, it’s far, far shallower. International competition takes serious money—easily $30,000 to $50,000 per year per horse, depending on the discipline, or more.

Plus, in our giant-sized country, with so many horses starting their lives and their sporting careers from so many diffuse points, riders must have a system to find candidate horses, or they have to be lucky. I firmly believe we breed horses that are as good as or better than any bred in Europe, but 90 percent or more are never “discovered” or trained by anyone who can bring out their abilities.

The trouble with finding horses brings us to a cultural issue—the business model of all but a tiny handful of our elite and want-to-be-elite riders. It revolves—of necessity—around training junior and amateur riders, training horses for those riders, and buying and selling horses for those riders. That can leave them precious little time for training themselves or their horses, or for finding more horses. Show jumper Beezie Madden is the only elite rider I know of whose business doesn’t revolve around her training others. Thanks to her husband, John Madden, who’s one of the world’s most successful dealers of top show jumpers, her business revolves around her training her competition horses and horses for them to sell. In eventing, Phillip Dutton has come the closest to a business revolving around his riding (although he also trains a limited number of riders). And Beezie’s and Phillip’s results show how well this works.

The Europeans we compete against do not train these hordes of people. They train themselves and compete at the highest levels, and they can do that partially because their competitions do not have every level, from beginner to grand prix or advanced, as ours do. And they have better corporate and individual sponsorship. How or why? I’m not sure. But I do know that, in the three Olympic disciplines, a month doesn’t go by where an elite European rider hasn’t competed at least once against top international competition, and they could do it two or three times a month. For U.S. riders, facing competition like that two or three times a year would be a lot.

Finally, I really think we have a cultural issue that neither increased funding nor USEF policies is going to fix. I hate to say it, but precious few American kids or 20-somethings really want to put in the hours necessary to become an elite rider or true horseman. For a couple of generations, our society has encouraged busy-ness but not dedication. Our society has encouraged kids to do a lot of things—play soccer, play tennis, join school clubs or the band and do your homework for hours each day—but told them that focusing on doing one thing really well is too narrow. At the same time, money became relatively easy to make and could shortcut work. Plus we’re now fully comfortable in a nanny-state society, a society terrified of nearly any kind of danger. Well, horses and riding are inherently dangerous.

People have suggested a variety of schemes to encourage and promote training and sponsorship of eager riders who couldn’t afford it otherwise. I’m not suggesting such schemes should be completely ignored, but I fear that our current younger generation won’t take advantage of them like some hope. Why? Because they see their richer peers avoid the work with money and because no one ever really taught them how to work.

So, those are what I see as the problems. Are there solutions? Perhaps, and we’ll come back to this subject.

I’ve been a racing fan since I was about 11 years old. Growing up in north-central New Jersey, I would start almost every morning by pouring over the New York Times sports section, which in those days carried complete results and entries from Belmont Park, Aqueduct and Saratoga. After careful consideration, I’d “bet” between two and six races each day, keeping my own winning statistics and basic past-performance charts. About 15 years later I became an amateur steeplechase jockey (riding over timber, over hurdles and on the flat), and for the last nine years I’ve been an almost daily follower of the racing on TVG.

So, based on all that, here’s what I like and what I don’t like about the first TV show I can remember on the guys and the girls who ride races.

To start with, I’m really glad someone came up with the idea, because I’ve always thought that jockeys are the most under-rated and unappreciated athletes in the world. Just look at some of the shots of them parading around the jockeys’ room half-dressed or working out, and you’ll see how incredibly fit jockeys are. I’ve seen them come back from devastating injuries unbelievably fast, largely because they’re so fit.

The “Jockeys” producers have gone to great lengths to emphasize the dangers they face in every race. But they’ve gone overboard—I’m tired of hearing the refrain, “Every year, two jockeys die at North American tracks.” OK, but the danger is what jockeys have to force out of their minds every time they hear “riders up” in the paddock, or else they don’t make it.

Similarly, the show over-emphasizes the importance of singular races, from the Breeders’ Cup to Iggy Puglisi’s victory in a claiming race. In the world of racing—whether you’re a jockey, a trainer or a stallion—it’s not, can you win a race? It’s, can you win races, can you consistently come home first? Neither Laffit Pincay nor Russell Baze (the two winningest riders in history) ever won a Triple Crown race, but every trainer wanted them on their horses because they knew it improved the horse’s chances dramatically.

The opportunity to win races is a Southern California reality that’s not been mentioned. Time and again, the announcer tells us how tough it is to break into the Santa Anita/Hollywood Park jockey colony because the riders are so good. Yes they are, but another factor is that jockeys at these tracks have much more limited opportunities than at most other tracks, because the fields in each race are 30 to 40 percent smaller. I don’t know why (probably because of the cost to keep horses in training at California tracks), but it’s unusual to see races with more than six or seven horses. In New York, Kentucky and elsewhere, 10- to 12-horse fields are the average. That means that at a Kentucky track, a jockey trying to break in has 120 to 150 more chances to ride each week than in California. Those opportunities make a huge difference to a budding career.

Here’s a production decision I don’t like—the super-fast cutting from shot to shot, especially during the races. What, the races aren’t exciting enough that you have to zoom from angle to angle every two seconds, often throwing in shots from other random races? Are our attention spans really that short? Do the producers think we’re that stupid?

This is an Animal Planet production trend that’s long annoyed me. It goes along with how their show selection has changed over the last decade. We used to love to watch “Emergency Vets,” about a clinic in Colorado with a fabulous and enjoyable staff, and “Vets In Practice,” about veterinary students in England and their adventures. We also loved “Big Cat Diary,” about an English naturalist who studied two prides of lions, along with cheetahs and leopards, in Africa’s Masai Mara. But I suspect these thoughtful, poignant and elegant shows were too slow for the viewers network execs are trying to lure, so now everything is “Untamed And Uncut” or “the 10 Most Dangerous Animals.”

OK, enough criticism. What I do really like is that the producers are treating the jockeys as humans, not weird little midgets. The show featuring Aaron Gryder winning the World Cup in Dubai was excellent, following him throughout the trip, seeing his relationship with Well Armed, his pride and happiness afterward. What was also great was seeing Alex Solis and Joe Talamo watching the race on TV and getting a glimpse into the camaraderie these guys share. They were genuinely thrilled that Aaron, whom they work with daily and respect, had just claimed the world’s richest race half a world away.

Following Talamo—a definite rising star—has been great fun. Iggy Puglisi is emerging as a TV star, even if he’s never going to be a top jockey. (He was great as a TVG analyst while he was injured.) And Mike Smith is being correctly portrayed as a class act, a gentleman, and the rock of Gibraltar.

Here’s what I’d like to see the producers do more of, though: Delve into the difference between a really good rider and a really good jockey, a difference that’s subtle but absolutely critical. Kayla Stra, Chantal Sutherland (who’s returned to Canada to ride) and Iggy Puglisi are really good riders. They make connections with the horses they ride and do their best to bring them home safe and sound. But—even though Kayla and Chantal were top riders in Australia and Canada—they rarely win races in California. Garret Gomez, Alex Solis and Mike Smith win lots of races, because they can make those split-second, brave decisions in every race, decisions that put them in front. Because of that, they get the “hot” horses and ride for the top trainers. And if they don’t succeed in one race—well, they put it behind them and go on to the next one.

The one time I’ve seen that alluded to was in last week’s episode, when Mike told Chantal not to wait for the other riders to let her through, to make her own holes, to ride her race.

OK, even if the producers don’t take my suggestions, I’m going to keep watching “Jockeys.” It’s one of the best “reality” shows on today.

It’s now been more than two years since I last competed Merlin, as the infirmities of age made competing him at intermediate level impossible, and since then he’s been the schoolmaster of Phoenix Farm, teaching other horses and other riders his work ethic and about courage and desire. We’d hoped he’d be able to do that for years and years, but sarcoidosis, and the lymphangitis and laminitis it caused, have claimed him. We decided to lay him to rest before the pain became worse, because the last thing we wanted was for Merlin to suffer. We owed him everything; he owed us absolutely nothing.

I have so many memories of Merlin that I don’t know where to begin. Perhaps it’s best to start with how he was at first and how he was late in his wonderful life.

Merlin was given to us by our friends Lilith and Richard Boucher, steeplechase riders and trainers in Unionville, Pa. Let’s just say that he wasn’t working out as a racehorse, and Heather went to pick him up at the race meet in Middleburg, Va., in October 1977, since I was away on an assignment. She remembers him as big and awkward and terribly insecure, but he had her favorite facial marking—a giant-sized star and broad stripe. She tried to ride him the next day and fell off in the barnyard, the first of many times she’d fall off when he spooked at a movement or a noise.

But Heather persevered, doing a lot of longeing and flatwork to develop him physically and to develop his understanding and trust in her aids. And I started foxhunting him, to give him cross-country experience and confidence. Merlin loved to hunt, because he loved to go across the countryside and he loved to be with other horses, figuring whatever demons there were would get the others before they got him.

We worked hard in those early years to develop his trust in us, and whenever Heather would teach me on Merlin, or whenever we’d come out of a dressage ring or off a jumping course, Merlin would look for her and go to her. She would forever be his comfort zone, his protector on the ground, just as I was on his back.

Merlin never completely got over his anxiety about the world around him. He just became less explosive in his reactions. And the two funny things about his wary personality were that he wasn’t afraid of anything as long as he was galloping or if he was with another horse. The other horse didn’t even have to be in front of him. I ponied dozens of horses from his back, and he’d rarely spook if another horse was by his side.

And his ability to pony horses across the countryside was Merlin’s biggest contribution here at Phoenix Farm. He, quite literally, taught the babies and the “crazy” horses who’ve been sent to us as their last stop. I know it sounds airy-fairy, but I’m convinced Merlin imparted wisdom, a confidence, a work ethic to them. He told them, “This is how we play the game, and if you do it right, it’s a lot of fun.” That’s just one more reason we’ll miss him so.

I’ll always cherish our cross-country rounds, especially the ones at intermediate. I always felt that, with his long stride and his huge jump, it was the closest a human could come to flying. But it was also an existential experience, a feeling of the extraordinary trust we had with each other. All I ever needed to do was look at the next fence and put my leg on, to say to him, “We can do it, buddy.” And he’d say, “Hang on, Dad, here we go!”

That didn’t happen right away. It was the result of doing a lot of things together—years of foxhunting, years of competing through the levels, and three years of invaluable training with Sharon White—that built his confidence in himself and me, along with his complete understanding of the challenges he would meet on the cross-country course.

When we first moved up to the preliminary level (a level at which I hadn’t competed for 20 years at the time), I would have to ride him very positively, even aggressively, to the first three or four fences, until his confidence sort of switched on. But I’ll always remember the first classic-format preliminary three-day event we did, at Morven Park (Va.) in October 2004. Heather and I watched about a dozen videotapes of Merlin’s career last evening, after he’d left us, and we happily discovered we have two tapes of the Morven Park CCI*. We watched them both, cherishing that weekend.

Merlin and I cruised through the two roads and tracks phases and easily galloped the steeplechase phase 10 seconds fast, despite his incredible over-jumping of the steeplechase fences. He came into the vet box in great shape, and from the moment he left the cross-country start box, I could tell we were going to jump clean.

We flew over the first fence, and I reached down and patted him on the neck and said, “We’re gonna do it, buddy! Let’s go!”

As our veterinarian began administering the drugs that would take Merlin away, I kept repeating to him, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of death, I shall fear no evil,” thinking of all those cross-country rounds we shared, of us galloping and leaping, together.

Thank you, Merlin, for everything.