Ok... here I go...
First off, I was not planning to post, as I never post on critiques although I love to learn about conformation and what makes a horse high quality (conformation/show ring wise) and I am going to word this as carefully as I can as I do not want to step on ANYONE'S toes if at all possible.
Strictly IMO, how can we learn and better improve the breed if people don't teach us? *FOR EXAMPLE* Lyn, how did you learn? You are one of
many VERY knowledgeable people here and I highly respect your opinion (along with many other people's.) So please, how did you learn? Did someone show you and point out
why a horses conformation is good? If so, shouldn't the more experienced people here be *helping* the less experienced? (Not that they aren't.) Show us why a horse is good.Tell us why a horse will do well and IMO everyone will benifit...
especially the Miniature Horse as a breed. And that's what we want, right?
The miniature horse to evolve in a positive direction as a breed?
I
really do not want to offend anyone else's opinion here, but they way I see it, you do not have to be a judge to be knowedgeable. To have a breeding program that will produce horses that will be sucessfull in the ring, you need to be knowledgeable about conformation ect. so you can pick your mares and stallions. Yes, judges may more experenced, but they have to start somewhere, right?
And a judges opinion is just that, correct? An opinion. Just as mine or yours. One judge could place a horse 1st and another 3rd. And the more knowledgeable we become as breeders ect, the more often we will be able to go to a sale and say, "There. That is a mare I want in my breeding program. Her conformation is amazing." And if everyone could do that, then the breed could improve (not that it's horrid or anything.) I know that all this may sound very sketchy, and I'm not quite sure how to word all this, but I hope that this is coming out right.
I also think (which appears that I may be doing to much of,
) is that to become more knowledgeable, we need to have people doing honest critiques. Now IMO *honest* does NOT equal *vicious*. They aren't the same thing, but many people (
not anyone in particular) appear to be confusing the two. I could say (again, not to any post/topic/critique in particular) "No, I would not consider him/her breeding material. Here's why..." Rather than "I don't like your horse. Geld him. Sell him as a pet, or whatever...just don't you dare show him."(Harsh, I know, and no one is that mean, but I hope you see my point.)
Show them why. That way the next time that samle person or anyone else goes out to purcase a stallion or mare for breeding, they will avoid making the same mistake. It can only help right? Don't sugar coat it, but try to help the person learn. There has to be a happy medium, right?
I think Marty does a great job with that!
Vern had said "
I'm not very good at deciding what is a good stallion." So the people who are "good at deciding what is a good stallion" could help him out? (Again, not that you don't.) What good is being knowledgeable if you're the only one who knows the knowledge? Sure, maybe you get more profit from the horses that you sell from your sucessfull breeding program, and that's wonderful. I applaud you for being so sucessfull. But after your gone, that sucessfull breeding won't benifit the breed as much as sharing your knowledge will. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think that you are in it for the money. My guess is that you're in it for the horses. So lets improve the horse breed that we love so much however we can.
One last thing. I think it's sad to hear that people can't post their show results. Especially when Mary Lou can't post about Ghost. He's an amazing horse with an amazing owner and she has the right to be very proud. The people who show work so hard and I think that they have the right to share with their fourm familly. That's what this is right? A familly. One HUGE familly! I love it! But I
hate it when y'all fight! We can't always agree, but can't we make an effort?
Maybe there should be rules for critiques...no, not rules. Perhaps guidelines though? It could make it more constructive than 3 pages of arguments and 1 page of useable information, right?
Ok, I think I wrote way too much. I was just going to make a little comment, but my fingers just kept going, and going, and going! lol. I feel like the Energiser Bunny! So I'm for sure going to stop now! Honestly though, I'm a little nervous about posting this. I
really don't want to offend anyone, but I had to get this off my chest. I tried very hard to be really careful about my words, so I hope it payed off, because I don't want to start any arguments. I just want the mood to he a little lighter here!
Erin
(p.s. Remember to Smile!
)
