One thought on “Another reason to ride a draft (or draft x)

  1. And yet…people still cut off draft horses tail bones. Can anyone tell me why other than “we’ve always done it that way’? The excuse of ‘it keeps the tail hair from entangling the harness’ can be solved very simply…braiding the tail up. IF that’s a reason at all.
    To me, it’s a barbaric practice that has no reason to still be continued. But then, I’m of the opinion that a dog’s ears should be allowed to be ears, and a dog’s tail should be docked only when it poses a problem. For instance, apparently pugs have to have their tails docked because the tail will actually grow into the pug’s anus…eeek.
    Today I was at the Ridgefield, WA Horse Expo, where numerous clinics were held. As a breed exhibition, a ‘spotted draft horse” was released in the arena with a Belgian gelding. The spotted was smaller of the two at 17.3 hands. The Belgian gelding stood 20 hands 1 3/4 inches, as his owner kept repeating after the question was asked a dozen times. He was ENORMOUS. His tailbone was undocked and his tail reached his hocks. It was great fun to see the two horses grabassing…playing, galloping and just generally having fun.

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