Mounted search and rescue

[Karen Nesbitt <spanishequines@yahoo.com>]

[Deleted HTML duplicate.  -Una]


Responding to and all:
  Message: 18
Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 07:11:54 -0400
From: "T'mi Fi" <tfinkle@erols.com>
Subject: Re: [MSAR] Red Ribbons

Karen,  (TOMI - I beleive this part below was wrote by Allen!)

You are right on the mark and getting out there in any riding sporting 
type of event will test you and your horse's mettle!  
  (Deleted for spase>>>>)

Karen, if you or anyone else would like a copy of the HRE slideshow, 
simply  email <officers@trotsar.org> attn: Dr. McGuinness, to request 
an 
electronic copy.   
  (Deleted for space>>>>>)
  
Tomi`
Commander
TrotSAR Mounted Team
Maryland

Karen Nesbitt wrote:         (ACTUALLY THIS WAS ALLEN too!)

>  One of the advantages of hunting is it is potentially rigorous 
riding 
>and good for fitness of horse and rider.  
>   
>  Do MSAR groups have any proposed standard to identify greener or 
more 
>anxious horses to riders that may be following?   
>
=====================================
   
  FIRST OFF>>My apologizes for being long winded  in this reply, but I chose 
to write one letter answering several vs several letters to all hoping it 
would float to the group...
   
  TOMI - those portions of the letter above were written by Allen, but thank 
you.  FYI, I am a horseman of many years..have raised, trained  and been 
breed well over 40 horses and some decent ponies, mostly Paso Finos for 24 
years and riding much longer.  I have had QH's, buckskins, apps and tried my 
hand at arabians and other breeds
  ....I am a diehard spanishgaited rider.  Mainly because I have progressive 
degenrative arthritis and I can no longer ride the trotter due to the 
degeration in my bones. (Technically, I have a permanant disability, however 
that does not restrict me in doing many things.)
   
  I find I can do anything on a paso that any other breed can do including 
drive, cut, jump, dressage and even lawnpolo ).... I am a diehard trail 
rider, however my Pasos have done very well at qualifying at regional levels 
to go to their  National shows in their early years in many classes and when 
I was showing them.  I chose not to show at the national level and now  I no 
longer show as I personally do not see the thrill of showring riding. I get 
bored easy as do most ringrode animals...To me, a good horse is a good horse 
regardless of ribbons.  And the amount of trophies someone may have never 
makes some backyard horse or horsman worthless however competition can and 
often does breed comtempt.
   
  One other reason we do not show is because the showring puts too much 
stress on young horses doing jobs too early for their bodies.... and they 
break down either mentally or physically before their time.   Most Pasos do 
not mature until they are 5-maybe 6 years old.  Now, the last thing I want to 
do is to put my fat rear up on a horse that has no knees or brains to handle 
what is coming.  We do a lot of ground work.  Which is also why we have sound 
old horses in the herd this day.  I opt for raising a more fit older horse in 
the end over a ribbon any day and an unsound horse later.
   
  We have also done well at trail class and barrels and gymkhana events and 
also competitive trail and endurance taking best of breed and other honors.  
We also have done numerous parades, demonstrations and exhibitions whereby 
visiting the college with our horse.  Having a farm where we had some cattle 
and other animals my horses have had their wonderful experiences and working 
around humming grain bins and other farm machinery, all this has given our 
horses quite their lives experiences.
   
  =======
  ABOUT DOGS - 
  IRV you are very lucky in that you have had only 2 dog experiences!  Having 
lived on a farm that was nextdoor to a garbage dump, I cannot tell you the 
number of mongrels that were attracted to that stench and how many times the 
Animal Control officers were out to our area picking up also dogs we had 
captured.  Since the local dog population also crossbred with the local 
coyote and wolf population we had some rather vicious pooches in the area.  I 
recall one bitch that ambled on to our property with her pups and the pups 
were the most vicious dogs I have ever encountered.  They were coy-dogs.  The 
trouble with a coy-dog is it is part domestic and part wild.  The wild part 
does not know what to hunt and will be a detriment to livestock in that it 
will often kill and waste what it kills.  The domestic part of the dog makes 
it overly curious and it wil go anywhere being rather fearless.  Coyotes on 
the other had will kill and clean up their prey, be it lamb, chicken, goose,
 fox, coon or whatever.  They are also shy so it is rare still that you will 
be close to one.  I would sooner give up a lamb to a coyote than a coy-dog as 
I know the lamb will be eaten.  As for the Coy-dog, the only solution to 
those mongrels in my opinion  is a bullet.  They are worthless wasteful 
wanton hounds that propose a danger of biting anyone coming near one.   I 
feel for the policemen  nowadays who are encountering the more malicious 
variety of dog used by criminals these days.  These dogs have been dubbed 
"guns with four legs"  and are often your garden variety pit bulls further 
trained to fight, attack and kill.
   
  I have worked obedience training and also used to show dogs...currently I 
am dogless insearch of a new pup
   
  ========
  A FEW WORDS ON MSAR ASSEMBLY - 
  As for when a search ride comes together for the real thing, a quick 
assessment of each riders abilities is required and it must be done quiclkly 
and efficiently at startup.
  It is not uncommon for the riders to break off in groups and each group 
then also needs someone acting as leader.  It has been my experience, the 
leaders are the strongest riders and those with more horse experience and/ or 
search ride experience  along with whatever rescue abilities that each can 
offer. And no two real calls are alike.  On my first real time search ride, I 
was delegated leader of one of the two groups that we split into. Not a 
position I was envious as I am green too in the feild and not full time.  
Also as a team, we need to be aware of the weak links.  We all can do a part, 
but we have to be cooperative with others.  (Not always easy!)
   
  I also don't know how any mock drill can  bring forth the adrenaline that 
comes with any given real search as it is very hard to mimick  the rise in 
adrenaline when urgence and a real emergency or when a dead vic is sought..  
emotions can run the gamette and we are all human no less frail.
   
  Given the breed of horse you will be using as your mount, will depend on 
how well you and it will do.  I for one cannot see standardizing a certain 
breed for MSAR activities as each of us ride what we ride best at our own 
chosing.  I feel inorder to ride our best we need to beable to chose mounts 
best suited individually.
   
  There is a distinct difference in dealing with hot bloods, warm bloods and 
cold bloods.  Each also has their own parameters of what looks good  and is 
good in stress, weight, P & Rs and endurance.  It is a proven fact that the 
hotblooded horses carry more endurance over the cold bloods and can recover 
faster in a hard and long ride and also the hot bloods are bred to take the 
heat.  They do not pack a lot of weight to start with and are LEAN (often 
showing rib) when fit and in condition for longer rides as are most 
thoroubreds that are racing...However, thoroughbreds, QH's and most cold 
bloods are sprinters and therefore are not bred to do distance.  And then 
there is IRV and his magnificent BLACK!
   
  And people can drive you nuts when they are not used to seeing a fit lean 
horse especially if they are used to fat obese breeds and typically show 
horses.  Show horses are not always fit trail horses...the conditioning is 
entirely different.  And contrary to what some QH people beleive, there are 
some Paso Finos and Peruvians that cut...(THAT AFTER ALL IS WHAT MANY WERE 
USED FOR IN THEIR OLD COUNTRIES on working cattle ranches....)  Clint 
Eastwood in fact rode paso gaited horses in many of his western movies and I 
beleive it was  Peruvian.
   
  It truly behooves me when some nieve person enters a barn and sees horses 
of all tyoes of fat and leaness and never do they take  in accountability the 
fitness of the horse or the activity, yet alone breed.  Unfortuneately I have 
met a lot of this type in places of authority only having them getting a 
lesson in true fitness.
  ---------------------
   
  A WORD ON VOLUNTEERING
  I remain an unafiliated volunteer as I beleive too much regulation can 
strangle an organization.   Mind you not that I do not beleive in rules or 
regulations, but I feel society is so strangled with letting rules do their 
thinking that common sense has a tendency to go out the window. Case in point 
in how Katrina was handled with people and ther pets etc.  (and we do have to 
look at the faults in the system...)
   
  To make a simple complaint you have to jump through a hoop, make a call and 
hope the person on the other end is the right department and will take your 
info down properly...If they don't and they spell something wrong, it may 
lose your complaint and without your being aware of it.  And that is how also 
nothing gets done., no first investigation nor followup.
   
  There are so many laws on the books that no one can learn them all yet 
alone remember more than a few.  And I fully am aware that some things need 
standardization, however when it gets down to it, we all are our own first 
responders and we all have a responsibility in a sense toward others.  Sorry 
to say many a conflict can arise though especially when both sides do not 
agree what is right for the other.  But whether your bandaid for someone is 
coming out of a sock in your saddlebag or an EMT kit, you are needed and the 
vic is not going to care whether you know regulation 50/0017 or what the heck 
if he or she is lost and you find them. 
   
  When you consider in the time it takes for a fireman to locate and put on 
his boots a child, pet or person left in a vehicle in this horrid heat could 
die in less than  three minutes and if you are not right there on the scene 
someone else is still doing cleanup.  And like someone said, NO ONE IS 
BEATING THE DOWN THE DOOR TO DO THIS...I for one do not realish the thought 
of riding and looking for someones corpse and certainly none of us want to 
become one doing it.  But the need for help is there as well as to help.
  ==================
   
  BACKTRACKING A LITTLE ON EQUIPMENT - 
  I have serious opinions on the equipment I would use and why I use it.  
While maybe a regulation may state a helmet is mandatory, in the 30 years or 
so of training horses, the only hat I have ever worn is a cowboy hat. I find 
that a lot of riders are injured more because they lack the skill in taking a 
tumble or going with a fall or how they ride .  Most have an overtendency to 
overcorrect their mounts when they run into trouble often causing them more 
trouble and of course there are always the freak accidents.  
  We can argue all day on hat vs helmet, but that  to me is a personal 
preference due to 
  how I ride and how I can now take a fall.  It is also that I take 
responsibility for my own so therefore whether someone would pay me to do 
this job which I do not want someone to do, I am a capable volunteer working 
within my own capabilities always leaving room to knowlegde.  I stand on the 
old adage, it is not the horses fault, it is the rider.
   
  Personally and for my own benefit that why I wear one AND is that the 
helmet does not provide ME the added cushion I need and  get with a cowboy 
hat brim in protecting my neck.  In all the falls I have had, the brim saved 
my head from actually hitting the ground and I have never ever suffered a 
concussion.  I was also taught to jump off af a running horse in my younger 
days and how to take a fall which helps.  Most self taught riders lack that 
experience and take their falls in the school of hard knocks..  thus also 
getting more hurt. 
   
  I have had horses fall on me twisting an ankle and go over backwards while 
training  for a flag carrying and in one instance when I was mounting up on 
one stallion, my knee hyperextended and blew out.  I had the sudden painful 
choice of completing mounting him or hitting the ground on a shoulder roll.. 
I chose the ground.(Notice, I said CHOSE!)  In protecting my own person in 
how I ride, I feel that I am the better judge of the use of equipment of my 
own physical challenges and we all have challenges.  I see no where in these 
instances of well over 30 years of horse experience where a helmet would have 
prevented me from hurting my kester or lower extremities since learning how 
to take a tumble is what more so saved my head. And with the brim, my head 
has never hit the ground.
  -----------------------------------
   
  A WORD ON GREEN - 
  I am going to miss my seasoned riding horse.  My filly has a long row to 
hoe to get to where I will consider her seasoned for riding in the back yard 
yet alone MSAR..  Hopefully her intelligence will fool me and she will not be 
a problem horse like the old mare was when I was first starting her.  As 
said, green is a state of interpretation.  And like IRV says, his horse is 
still green after all those years...Hopefully my young filly will get there 
quickly.  She shows me the eagerness to respond..but maybe too eager.  Smart 
horses if not trained right the first time can be problem horses. IN 
correcting.  I have seen more than on bad trainer train a bad habit as well 
as a good one.
   
  ------>
  AND LASTLY, WHAT ABOUT THIS HEAT -THE RIBBONS ARE NOT THE ONLY THING THAT 
ARE RED!  WOW!!
  Ok, so now what are we all doing to help our horses in the heat?.  Most of 
mine are in decent flesh, but I have two stallions fretting weight off as it 
is breeding season
  again....I go through this every year with them....my boys have high 
energy, but very little fat and though they  would probably whomp the pants 
of the cold bloods on a competitive trail ride we have the go rounds with the 
ignorance of people thinking FAT horses are always fit...and thin horses are 
sick.  Im eager to hear some input.
   
  Karen Nesbitt
  Illinois - unaffiliated
  Iroquois county
  spanishequines@yahoo.com
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