Mounted search and rescue

["IRVIN LICHTENSTEIN" <ilichten1@verizon.net>]

The key reason we are there is search, and using a horse solely for
transportation is a waste of resources. It does not any difference as to
whether a track was trampled by a shod horse or an unshod horse. The track
is trampled.  A good tracker might be able to reconstruct the track but the
obvious question is why? If I am visually following a track down a trail the
important area is where I lose it and perhaps a stride before.  In most
areas going off trail is difficult to impossible due to brush and ground
clutter.  In a desert area where there are passable areas alongside the road
it is possible to avoid centering, but not in an old growth eastern forest.
Also realize that you are part of a 3 horse task running a wide phalanx (V)
on and alongside the trail to spot tracks and possible turns.  

We do not work on pristine ground.  We work searches in public parks with
thousands of visitors per day.  One park here has over 300 extra deer in it.
That is 300 head that park management wants shot over and above the ones
cars kill every day in the park and hunters get across the boundary.  Where
I board white tail are a nuisance animal, as are coyote, and fox. 

We use our mounts like search dogs and nobody yells about the mess the dogs
make bashing through the brush.  The only advantage to a tracker of having a
horse shod may be the distinctive tread of a custom shoe.  My experience
indicates that shod or unshod a hoof that needs a #4 RB keg shoe with studs,
Borium, and #8 nails will pretty much obliterate anything it steps on, and
he doesn't like mud.  

The shoe rule is a stupid rule.  It is stupid because it does not improve
the chances of a find.  Rules or SOG's should only get published and broadly
enforced if they improve the probability of a find or decrease searcher
injury without decreasing the probability of a find.

Irv Lichtenstein   

-----Original Message-----
From: msar-riders-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:msar-riders-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Jorene Downs
Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2009 7:15 PM
To: 'Mounted search and rescue'
Subject: Re: [MSAR] MSAR horse - barefoot vs. being shod