Northernhorse.com Blog

The RSPCA in Britain is welcoming China’s first ever draft animal protection laws, which will be unveiled today September 19, 2009

The legislation, drawn up in consultation with the RSPCA, will include provisions to both protect pets and cover how farm animals should be raised, transported and slaughtered. It will also deliver protection for captive wildlife and laboratory animals.

The laws address deliberate cruelty and several of the most serious issues that have concerned the international animal welfare community for many years – including inhumane culling methods used against dogs, the live skinning of animals for their fur and the feeding of live farm animals to big cats in zoos and wildlife parks.

Read More at horsetalk.co.nz

Beginning Monday, September 21, AQHA Members have two days to purchase a limited quantity of tickets to the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games, September 25-October 10, 2010, at the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington.

This opportunity comes as a direct result of AQHA’s sponsorship of the World Equestrian Games. Early ticket sales begin at noon EST September 21 and closes at midnight EST September 23. The tickets will be sold on a first-come, first-served basis, and sales will be limited to online purchasing only – no phone or mail orders.

The Web site for early purchasing is www.aqha.com/weg.

You’ll need your AQHA member ID and PIN to access this exclusive ticketing site. If you’re still having trouble accessing the special Ticketmaster site with your AQHA ID and PIN, please call AQHA’s friendly customer service at (806) 376-4811 and we’ll be glad to help you!

Each person will be limited to the purchase of six tickets per session; if a particular session is unavailable, you’ll have another opportunity to purchase tickets when they go on sale to the public at noon EST on September 25.

Want to stay up-to-date on all AQHA News?  Click here to subscribe to America’s Horse Weekly today!

On September 19th, 2009, a historic dispersal of the award winning remuda of Stan and Nancy Weaver will be offered to the public in Great Falls, Montana.  The event will be celebrated as sixty-five program building mares and their offspring will sell along with the proven stallions, Ima Bit Of Heaven and PC Joes Frost.  The event is a once in a lifetime opportunity.

Plan to join the Weaver’s for the preview at 11:30 am and the sale at 1:00 p.m. at the fairgrounds in Great Falls, Montana.

To view the sale online or to place absentee bids go to their website – www.WeaverHorses.com

Haythorn Ranch Co. of Maxwell, Nebraska, has been named the 2009 winner of the AQHA-Bayer Best Remuda Award, which honors working ranches that have top remudas of saddle horses. The honor puts them in the company of some of America’s most historic and heritage-rich ranches – including a ranch operated by another set of related Haythorns.

Howard Haythorn came to Maxwell on horseback at age 13, helping his father trail in a herd of cattle and horses to their new home. He stayed in the Nebraska Sandhills to raise his own family and continue the legacy started by his grandfather: raising cattle and well-conformed, cowy American Quarter Horses with which to work them. Today, Howard and his son, Harry Byron Haythorn, run a 1,500-head cow-calf operation on 20,000 acres. Continue Reading »

They have marched with us through history. Lumbered with us through the North’s uncharted territories. Danced in the stories of the Indians’ ancestors. Documented in the journals of our early explorers. Like the grizzly bear, moose, and wolf, they play a vital role in the wilderness around us. Canada’s wild horses are a monument of early Canadian living. They were a valued resource to our forces in the First World War. Their history has been intertwined with our own since the beginning … yet their future stands on uncertain ground.

In a journal dated in the 1850’s by Reverend John McDougal, he describes the wild horses, preyed upon by wolves, between the North Saskatchewan and Oldman Rivers. Northwest Mounted Police, bringing law and order to the far reaches of Canada, estimated that there were horses in the thousands, loose on the rolling foothills. Continue Reading »

Dave doesn’t know this yet but I am thinking of attending and covering The Mane Event in Chilliwack this fall for Northernhorse.com. I enjoy the one in Red Deer in the spring so much and they have some really interesting  clinicians coming to Chilliwack too. Anyone been to both? I am interested in seeing it in a different venue and seeing what will most likely be a whole different group of people. I don’t think I have ever been to Chilliwack in the fall. We always go to the west coast for awhile in the spring to watch the migration. What is it usually like there in late October? October 23 – 25th is the Expo. Continue Reading »

We received these photos in an email. They say they are from a really big wind storm in the Medicine Hat, Alberta area. Anybody know if this is true? Do you think the wind blew all these round bales around like this? Or are we being duped by some folks with some Photoshop skills?

Bucking the trends in the racing industry and the economy at large, American Quarter Horse racing indicators showed the industry is holding steady in the face of the biggest economic downturn in decades.

Numbers released by AQHA show that purses in July, compared to the same month last year, held virtually steady with only a fraction of a percent drop. The number of July races was up 1.4 percent to 1,035. Handle saw a slight 1.7 percent drop, from $32.5 million last year to $31.9 million this year.

In comparison, Thoroughbred racing handle in July fell 13.4 percent, according to Equibase figures, while Thoroughbred purses dropped 7.4 percent for the month. Continue Reading »

2009 Summer Photo Contest Winner

The photographer who took the winning photo in our Summer photo contest, Nola Shannon has told us that she is going to donate her $50.00 Tim Horton’s card that she won in the contest to Alberta Animal Rescue Crew Society for their volunteers.  She goes on to say:

The volunteers of the Rescue Crew will be able to use the card for the days they head out on animal rescue missions in central Alberta.  Their focus is to rescue dogs but they have been known to rescue horses and cats.  They are brave souls for doing the work they do and deserve a free meal and coffee.

We applaud her generosity and thank her for making us aware of what sounds like a very special group of people.