How racing and conflict are shaping horses today: a thought provoking conversation
This blog entry features a conversation that recently took place on Facebook between two friends of mine, both bold and provovative thinkers (and doers). Yassine Jamali is a farmer and occasional horse and dog breeder who lives in Morocco. He recently authored an important book on the past, present and future of Barb horses. Severine Vesco is part of the Beni Sakr breeding program in France, which breeds solid, authentic Arabian horses of North African lines for utilitarian purposes. Her stud is one of the very few to have incorporated the bloodlines of the Syrian imports to France. They are both active on Facebook, where they often engage in substantive debates, sparring occasionally and agreeing some times. I translated and lightly edited an excerpt of this conversation, which was triggered by Severine (S) sharing a video which some “online content creator” had posted of a short 1km (0.6 miles) race somewhere in the Middle East, and Yassine (Y) reacting to that.
Y: From 20,000 meter races to 1,000 meter races. I mean ,it’s a nice race, but it’s against the nature of these horses. And it speaks volumes about the lack of understanding of tradition, and the influence of Western models. A selection process based on this kind of racing would result in … the Quarter Horse, in a century’s time.
S: Long-distance races still exist. And the horses in these longer races reach the starting point on their feet, not in trucks..
Y: So much the better if there are still long-distance races, but how many? Racing more or less shape the breed, and it would be a shame to go against the grain of the old selection methods.
S: It can go up to 40 km, so 80 km round trip. Last year, I posted a video of a 6,000 m (3.7 miles) race at full throttle. People [: i.e., Western people on social media – Edouard] cried abuse…. but we clearly don’t have the same horses. Here in the West and over time, people have compensated for all their horses’ weaknesses by modifying their lifestyle, including access to a richer diet, shoeing, vet assistance and pauses during endurance races, reduced distances, lighter riders, to make their horses’ performance look as good as it was before.
Y: In Mali [a desert country in Western Africa which Yassine visited – Edouard], around the year 2000, there were still 15-20 km races. Of course, the horses would also walk to and from the starting point. At the end of the day, horses like the ones I saw there are last asil [i.e., authentic – Edouard] horses. I mean asil in terms of the lifestyle, not the breed or the genetics.
S: There are still horses like that in the Middle East, the majority of them not registered with WAHO. Maintaining these qualities is how they have survived or are surviving in Palestine, Syria, Iraq or Yemen. We [i.e., at Beni Sakr Arabians – Edouard] are trying to maintain the frugality, the quality of the feet, and the athletic and mental qualities of our horses. We’re not doing too bad, but we can only slow down the inevitable pace of westernization of our horses.
Y: Well, they will survive until tracks or asphalted roads allow cars, motorcycles and vans to replace them as a means of transport. When the utilitarian function disappears, the symbolic function [i.e., displays of wealth, power – Edouard] is all that’s left, but the symbolic functions don’t sustain individuals horses or the breed at large in the same way. Add to that changes in the environment, demographic growth and population density, the spread of crops at the expense of grazing land, and the entire system goes bust.
S: Horses today are taking part in conflicts. This has started to be documented, about the conflict in Afghanistan. Both sides there used horses for their ability to carry weight, access hard-to-reach areas, and also to move unobtrusively into hostile zones. This will certainly come out about other conflicts too. I doubt that horses in zones of conflict, and therefore, zones of great deprivation, are kept the same way they are here in the West, for no other uses than symbolic ones. There won’t be cavalry wars anymore, but in wars of attrition, guerrilla-style, horses still have their uses.
Y: Deprivation in itself is neither necessary nor sufficient. There’s the option of a diet based on wild plants grown in a difficult but organic environment. For example, the oil from rain-fed mountain trees growing in rocky terrain is said to be 30 times richer in polyphenols than that from intensive olive trees. I know that horses were used in Afghanistan, but I don’t know exactly how. There was Sudan and the JanJawid, the “horse-riding demons”. Certainly in certain areas of Central Asia, such as Rajasthan [a dry region of India – Edouard] horses are still used to herd cattle, hunt and move people around. But here again, excessive financial resources and the search for the exotic are taking their toll. In Uzbekistan, for example, an oligarch is now seeking to import big fat horses of the modern fantasia Barb type, to introduce them into the buzkashi [a popular traditional horse-riding sport in Central Asia, and the national sport of Afghanistan – Edouard].
S: I’m not claiming that nothing is changing, but in a conflict zone — and a good part of the Middle East is now a conflict zone, whether open or latent — the vision of the Arabian horse is starting to revert to that of a war horse, rather than a short-distance racing or show horse […]. At the end of the day, it makes sense to use horses in this way. As far as deprivation is concerned, it’s mainly because in difficult times, when you’re fighting for survival, you don’t want to bother with extra mouths to feed. And in war zones, in general, food deprivation for both humans and animals takes no prisoners [i.e., survival of the fittest – Edouard]. So, sad as it is to say, I think that the conflicts in the Middle East today are the breeding ground that will eventually enable the breed to maintain its original characteristics far better than we think.
Oh gosh, I missed this conversation on the post, but it really does make me think of Abba’s background and how it has made her a very tough, resilient little horse, with her experiences of deprivation and bush racing, in an area which has run horses to death. She went through a crucible similar in some ways to that which produced the Arab horse, and emerged sound on the other side.
I do think that testing the performance of the horses is important inasmuch as it should, theoretically, keep selecting for the attributes of the Arab horse. Endurance does this up to a point; it doesn’t test the rideability of the horse, though, how quickly it can stop and turn and take off again, which was clearly important, vide Lady Anne Blunt’s description in “Bedouin Tribes of the Euphrates” (pp. 229f.), which gives a good idea of the agility desired:
“I never saw a prettier sight than Tellál on his chestnut mare, the day after our arrival, armed with a lance three times his own length, doing the fantasia with his uncle and a score of devoted retainers, who, while they admired the boy’s courage, seemed terribly afraid he should get hurt; and all the time the boy himself thought nothing, I am sure, of danger, either to himself or to any one else, in the sport of pursuing and of being pursued, with the steel point of a lance within six inches of his back. He would gallop up to his uncle, as he was riding beside us (for we were all marching in line, moving camp), and challenge him, according to Bedouin practice, by pretending to attack us, and then shoot away like an arrow, with Faris, who is a magnificent horseman, thundering close behind, and making his lance quiver over his head, and then twist and turn and double till he managed, thanks to his feather weight, to escape.”
Endurance also fails to test the sweetness of temperament of the horses, which is another feature that the breed historically possessed. I know that here, uncertain tempers are tolerated in some lines which have proved to hand on stamina and performance ability, because the hard-headedness also turns into mental grit on the endurance track.
As for climate, I imagine that the longer lines are bred away from semi-desert and desert climates, the greater the likelihood that certain physical adaptations to an arid environment will be lost. I will say that from what I have seen, in photos and videos, of horses in the Karoo and Kalahari, they tend to have a certain wiry quality that I don’t see in horses in the better-watered parts of southern Africa – but I have also seen Abba and Sahara transform in a matter of weeks when temporarily moved to limestone soil, so it is possible that a horse from a lusher environment would also land up looking quite different in a xeric shrubland.