Fox Hunting News

Small video cameras are enlivening TV coverage of sporting events from NASCAR to football, bringing viewers into the driver’s seat and onto the playing field. Some horse racing professionals are hoping that cameras mounted on the helmet of every jockey in the race will help stimulate viewer interest in their sport. Cameras on riding helmets  may be nothing new, but Kenleigh Hobby, a student in the Horse Racing Industry Program at the University of Arizona is taking the idea one step further. He is mounting cameras on every jockey in the race as well as the trainers and the starting gate personnel. His new company, EquiSight, is said to be meeting with success in marketing a system that records races for playback. But his dream is to allow viewers to “Ride the Race.” Viewers would even have the option of selecting which camera to watch, in effect riding their particular favorite in the race. “We’ve seen what [the technology] can do for other sports,” said Hobby. “Horse Racing is still stuck in the binoculars age.” There are obstacle, however, as Hobby has discovered. Not only is horse racing bound by old traditions, making it difficult to introduce new ideas, but there is no commissioner with jurisdiction nationally and no uniform set of rules. Each state is different. What continues to propel Hobby, however, is the knowledge that horse racing is in trouble, and if the industry is to be turned around, changes are inevitable. Read more in Bud Foster’s article in KOLD News 13. Posted July 23, 2011

John Tabachka, huntsman for the Sewickley Hunt (PA) and Jennifer Buckley, honorary whipper-in for the Reedy Creek Hounds (VA) are engaged to be married. The wedding date has not yet been set, but plans are in the works. For those who don’t know Tabachka, click here to see and hear his brilliant work on the hunting horn. Posted July 23, 2011

In a blunt report to the U.S. Congress, the General Accounting Office (GAO) says that horse welfare has been harmed by Congressional action. Prompted by animal rights groups, Congress, in 2006, passed a law which eliminated funding to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) for the inspection of horses in transit to slaughter and at slaughter facilities. Since the law still required inspection, it was a back-door attempt at ending the slaughter of horses in the U.S. It worked. Within a few years the last domestic slaughter house closed. At the time about 100,000 horses a year were being shipped to slaughter facilities. It was the dream that these horses would somehow be taken by equine retirement facilities to spend the remainder of their natural lives in green fields tended by loving caretakers. The dream became a nightmare for horses. With retirement facilities unable to absorb even a small fraction of unwanted horses, the GAO reported that in 2010, 138,000 horses were exported to Mexico and Canada for slaughter. “The horses are traveling farther to meet the same end…in foreign slaughtering facilities where U.S. humane slaughtering protections do not apply,” said the GAO. The agency goes on to say that horses are sometimes shipped in too small containers—conditions that were not allowed when USDA inspections applied. Read more in Stephen Dinan’s article in The Washington Times. Posted June 24, 2011

A long courtroom battle to stop hunting on sixty wildlife refuges was decided by a federal judge in favor of sportsmen. The case started with a lawsuit brought in 2003 by the Fund for Animals, which later merged with the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). The judge’s decision was rendered in April, and the appeal period ended on June 20, 2011 with HSUS failing to file an appeal. The suit attempted to use the National Environmental Policy Act to close hunting on the refuges. In his decision, Federal Judge James S. Gwin said, “Plaintiffs…are not entitled to an inviolate sanctuary for their preferred uses….Congress has determined that, to the extent possible, hunters, fishers, observers, photographers, and educators must share the refuge.” Congress, with its 1997 Refuge Improvement Act, made hunting, fishing, and other wildlife-oriented activities priority uses on refuge lands. Groups representing hunters—the U.S. Sportsmen’s Association (USSA), Safari Club International, Ducks Unlimited, National Rifle Association, Izaac Walton League, and local organizations—defended the case through numerous and costly briefings. See the Outdoor News article of June 20, 2011 for more details. Posted June 21, 2011

The Thoroughbred racing industry is tanking in the U.S., and racing industry leaders from around the world blame the decline on our permissive medication practices. From 2007 to 2010, on an annual basis, the registered foal crop in the U.S. declined nineteen percent, races run declined almost ten percent, purses fell more than twelve percent, and betting dropped twenty-two percent. World racing leaders spoke up at a recent International Summit on Race Day Medication at Belmont Park on June 13 and 14. Denis Egan, the chief executive of the Irish Turf Club, said, “European buyers are drifting away because we view the performance of U.S. horses with skepticism because of the medication policies, and the stallions are not comparable to clean European stallions.” The Hong Kong Jockey Club has perhaps the most stringent medication rules in the racing world. Yet Hong Kong, with a population of seven million, and with racing only eighty-three days per year, saw nearly $10.3 billion in bets pass through the windows last year—almost as much as the entire U.S. The strict policies are good for business, insists Bill Nader, executive director of the Hong Kong Jockey Club. Over the past five years only one racehorse in 5,692 experienced sudden death while racing. In the U.S. the fatality rate is one in five hundred starters—worse by a factor of more than ten.   Much of the conference’s focus was on Lasix, a drug used to reduce exercise-induced bleeding in the lungs. Lasix also improves performance, so nearly all horses in the U.S. go to the gate with a dose of the drug, whether they need it or not. Dr. Anthony Stirk, senior veterinary advisor to the British Horse Racing Authority urged American horsemen to get in step with the rest of the world, not only in medication policies but also in racing less frequently. Joe Drape’s article of June 13 in the New York Times is the source for this material. Posted June 15, 2011

A British play about a boy and his horse during World War I that leaves adults weeping in their seats has won the Tony Award for Best Play. The horse—a life size puppet created by the Handspring Puppet Company—was winner of a special Tony. War Horse originated at the National Theater in London and was a runaway hit. It is currently at the Lincoln Center in New York and will tour the U.S. starting next summer. The sensitive melding of humans and puppets is said to create visually stunning theatrical magic. The play is based on a children’s novel by Michel Morpurgo. Steven Spielberg is working on a film version. Read Ben Brantley’s review in The New York Times for more details. Posted June 13, 2011