'Tis the Season--To Come Together

Anyone interested in learning the breed standard and registration requirements of the HOA should do so by contacting the HOA board members and begin by referring to the HOA website. Of course, the same is true for each of the various registries. Those with little knowledge of Colonial Spanish Horses or perhaps those who are entirely new to these horses are at risk of accepting information presented on the message boards as being accurate when the facts may not so warrant. Misunderstandings and incorrect information serve only to create unnecessary obstacles to the cooperation between the various registries that is absolutely essential to the success of efforts at breed preservation.

When four men are stranded in a lifeboat without food, but with oars at hand, it makes much more for sense for each to grab an oar and work together than for them to bicker about the relative value of corn bread as opposed to whole wheat bread.

A posting on any message board is proof only that the poster knows how to use a computer. It is not proof, or even evidence, that the information presented is accurate. The quest for accurate information on these endangered, and in some cases nearly extinct, strains of historic horses is a vitally important endeavor and it is of the greatest importance to all breed preservationist that that quest continue without distraction.

The picture above is from several summers ago. Those kids and I started eight horses and one donkey well enough so that each was ridden on trails in the woods before Labor Day. They are great kids--but they are kids. They worked hard and they worked together.

Perhaps some felt that appointing a committee composed of HOA and SMR representatives to discuss ways to work together to protect and promote our horses was too much, too soon. If that is the case I will propose that we take a step back and proceed a bit slower.

Each organization has a small and dedicated Board of Directors. They can do our horses no greater service than to have a simple conference call to discuss current opportunities to help stave off the extinction of these horses.

I hold office with neither organization and I have discussed this with no officers of either organization, but I will be contacting the members of the Board of Directors of each organization to encourage that this small step be taken. I will suggest a modest agenda for discussion. I will ask each member to respond to my request because we must get a discussion going, even if we begin by discussing why some of you might not want to have discussions.

There has to be a starting place. The alternative is more splintering, more factions, and more horses lost. The little girls pictured above put aside their differences and worked very hard to accomplish something important for that summer.

We can all learn from their example.