08/18/2026
Set them up for success!
If you really want to save horses from slaughter, get your horse broke.
I know that is going to make some people mad.
I’ve been in the horse industry for almost 20 years.
In that time, I have never personally seen a horse that was sane, sound, and safe end up on a slaughter truck.
I’ve seen horses neglected. I’ve seen horses get in terrible shape. And I’ve seen what happens when unwanted horses have nowhere productive to go.
When the slaughter market was shut down, we saw horses being dumped and neglected on a much broader scale because there was suddenly a huge population of unwanted horses with very few places to go.
That was horses suffering because of a broken market—not because slaughter existed.
And it’s an important distinction.
The horse business is an economic business.
If a horse is sane, sound, safe, broke, and useful, that horse has value.
If a horse trader can sell that horse as a useful riding horse, they’re going to make more money doing that than they are shipping it to Canada or Mexico.
So when I hear someone say, “I rescued this horse from the kill pen,” I think there is an important distinction to make.
That horse may absolutely have been in a bad situation.
It may have needed someone to step in.
But if that horse was a safe, useful riding horse, it had value before somebody rescued it.
That’s why I think one of the best things we can do for our horses is make them useful.
Teach them to ride.
Teach them to load.
Teach them to stand for the farrier.
Teach them to behave in new places.
Give them a job.
Make them productive citizens.
I think about classic cars.
One of the worst things you can do to a classic car is never drive it.
I think horses are similar.
One of the worst things we can do to a horse is turn it out in the back pasture, never handle it, never teach it anything, and then wonder why nobody wants to take responsibility for it later.
Walk through our barn and look at every horse Bent E owns.
Bent E could disappear tomorrow and every one of those horses would still have value to somebody besides us.
Some have valuable papers.
Some have breeding value.
But most importantly, they know how to be productive citizens.
They know how to do a job.
They know how to interact with people.
They know how to be handled.
They have skills that make somebody else willing to spend money, time, and resources taking care of them.
And that matters.
If your horse isn’t a productive citizen today, that’s okay.
That’s why horse trainers like us are still in business.
You don’t have to do it yourself. You don’t have to make your horse a show horse. And you don’t have to use me.
Find the trainer you trust and love, and give them a solid foundation.
Because training isn’t just about making your horse better for you.
It’s giving that horse skills that can help protect its future.
And God forbid something happens to you someday.
I’d much rather your horse be the one somebody looks at and says:
“I can do something with this horse.”
That’s one of the best forms of horse insurance I know.
