the galah

i agreed with the banning of the live exports.shame they are going to allow the cows to be exported again. Its just another example of the current government prioritising the $ over the environment and animal welfare issues. I've always thought the whole dairying and to a lesser extent the cow exports is quite a tangled web of influence by people with big money. its not just central government, its local. Just look at the backgrounds and the connections of some of those who got postions at ecan and those people,then allowed all the water to be taken to enable dairying on such a massive scale,knowing with it came very serious environmental issues. the press, some years ago, had a very well researched article which delved into the links between one of nz's richest men and the people making the decisions at the likes of ecan. I could name several examples of men who have either themselves or through their proxies,got into positions of authority and influence on water right decisions who have had hundreds of millions of dollars riding on the dairying expansions and the taking of water. but back to the sinking of that big ship . it was very interesting to follow that. the ship,with a history of mechanical, maintenace issues,sailed into a typhoon when all the other ships on the seas in that region had taken cover ,as they knew what had been forecast.Hell they had engine issues not long after they left napier.They didn't lay the total blame on the inexperienced captain ,but the guy must have been an idiot who chose to risk everything ,seemingly partly to create a good impression with the financially troubled company he was working for and to meet deadlines for the watering and feeding of the cows. Seems so crazy that someone could be that stupid. anyways,i say ban live cow exports.

perhaps i should have added,as i wandered off to care for my horse i watched our driver and the driver who knocked us over ,get into the same car and start their journey back to auckland with others . Harness racing operates within a bubble and things within that bubble are magnified.. You need outsiders who aren't part of the group think. The irony is,the more outsiders you have,the better those within the bubble perform. But its all heading the wrong way and cambridge racing is an example of that.

working out the reasons why racing at cambridge is such a bore and so unattractive from a betting perspective,doesn't seem too hard. 1)having.6 races with an average field size of just 6.6. 2) so many opportunites for every horse that exists in the north island to race every week of the year. 3)The small number of participants and the bubble they work in-i think this is the most important reason myself. Look at the backgrounds of those competing. they all know each other because many are related,they are all mates,so many of them work together.I'm guessing all the drivers from oustside the waikato area would travel in 2 or 3 cars to the track.No one,and i mean no one exists outside te bubble that exists in waikato/auckland, except for luk chin. outside the amateur race last night you had 9 professionals and 10 junior drivers. j stormont,p ferguson,w rich,z butcher,b butcher,m white,j dickie,a poutama ,n chilcott l hibell,e johnson,j dunn,b wilkins ,k coppins,m ranger,c hackett,f schumaker,h orange,k denisfotova now i'm not saying this bubble doesn't have good people with camradery and i'm sure they would rally around someone within the bubble if they needed support in some way.But i'm talking about the racing product that they want us to bet on. i've seen how it works.quite a few years ago, we travelled a long way to start a horse in the middle of the north island. Half way down the straight bang,when travelling and looking like the winner,a driver inside barges into our horse and knocks him over (which caused a career ending injury),you could hear the bang 200m away where i stood. So the horse and driver come back in,the driver says,we got completely flattened by ...,he just barged his way out ,it was quite reckless the way he did it. So what did he tell the stipes,well nothing apparently. Even though blind freddy could tell what happended from just 1 look at the video. That was 30 years ago and the stipe being escott,well he preferred to be the big bully that he liked to be what asked to show the video evidence that justified his inaction. Tosser..anyway. the lesson i learnt was drivers aren't going to moan about what their mate has done as they may need their mate to cover for them next time. Mates don't want to upset a good relationship by complaining . i get it,thats just the way it works. but heres the thing, you see the same thinking in the way they drive. They drive like they don't want to be annoying one another with aggressive tactics.Afer all,we're all mates aren't we,type of thing. The drivers up there i'm sure are very loyal,hard working and would do whatever they can to help someone they knew out. but the problem is theres no one outside the bubble to keep those within the bubble on their toes and its all ended up like the punter is being taken fro granted and that they know HRNZ is going to keep prioritising the uncompetitivercaing they dish up.. you know ,i used to read where gammalite would say,he hardly ever watchs redcliffe races at all and i used to not quite understand that, as he is a pasionate follower of harness racing. But having watched cambridge recently,i get why now. And the thing is redcliffe racing has full fields and is more competitive than cambridge.

i guess if you backed a winner or owned a winner you would be happy enough,but isn't the racing at cambridge so boring. I know,you csn say,don't bother watching.well,i've actually got to that point now. I just flick over ,often the races are half over. canterbury workouts are much more exciting . the races at cambridge are generally run at speeds where the leaders are testing how slow they can get away with running them. When i have caught what the "out the gate" trackside presenters have bet their money on,i just feel sorry for them. They seem to love betting on horses that just sit at the back on slow speeds,or break up at some stage. And they are nearly always paying next to nothing anyway were they to get somewhere. what about the racing at cambridge would attract anyone new to the sport? Wouldn't it do the opposite?

she or i make life unenjoyable for hard working participants. i'll give you points for consistency,for you, its always the fault of people like us. they won't bring her on board,because racing hierachy don't think like that. And its because the hierachy don't think like that,that shes not on bioard and now has an outside platform with so many followers. as to what does she know. Well i thought most of what she has talked about, is rehoming racehorses and all the factors relating to that.Well this woman has credibilty because shes walked the walk,so to speak. there is something about her which may be a bit too judgmental even for my liking,but hey i think her hearts in the right place.that counts.

well,whether you like it or not, its the best starting point. you bring people like that on board for several reasons. i do think shes genuine and is talking about issues that need constant regular tweeks as to what is best policy. you give her the opportunity to raise all grievances with you first. Knowing whats coming is better than not knowing. And you give her the opportunity for her to give her solutions,no harm done listening.. it would be a double edged sword for her ,if she was asked by the industry to work with them. so i think there is definite value in trying to get her on board,even if down the track you decided to use the knowledge of how she thinks and acts, to your advantage if matters get a public airing.As these type of things periodically do. theres a reason why the industry is so sensitive to the issues shes raised.

I get what your saying, no one can argue her findings about arcano lack specific professional forensic support. that would have proved costly had she gone ahead and paid for that herself.Instead we are left to take on face value what she says she was told by a couple of vets and that the pictures she shows are from the right horse. But i don't think its reasonable to infer, what she said was done with an intent to mislead. iAnyone who has worked in a freezing works knows lungs come in all degrees of health and who really knows when and what point stress or trauma happened in an animals life. All they can tell without knowing the animals history is it did happen at some stage. So i agree she made assumptions without possibly knowing the full life hisrotory of the horse. but to be fair,assuming she has accurately identified there was damage. But she is relying not only on that but other factors.e.g. 1) hrnz came out with statements cleary concerned at what their intelligence had told them was the use of xenon.Just reaad their press satements at the time 2)m kerr was one of the trainers widely rumoured to be involved in its use. i thought nearly everyone knew that. 3) the fact that m kerr was able to achieve a total form reversal with arcano ,from consistently running down the track at manawatu and nelson, to winning impressively at addington,after having him for just 5 weeks. Then the following week dropping out a well beaten last. 4)the fact arcano was now dead which she says was a result of the horse getting sick and not respending to treatments.-when did that happen.Hard to tell because he just shows up as being deregistered on the hrnz website. Obviously it happened some tiime in the last 5 years. 5)with your claim that aren't you just doing what you are criticisng her for doing. i.e. making assumptions. Interestly you seem to have tried to link her to being instrumental in arcano being put down. So whats the point of saying that. do you think people are going to think someone who dedicates there time to rehoming horses is somehow going to have a change that mindset. anyway,i think you overestimate what you say is her skill to be rhetorically savvy and underestimate her audience which you say is easily fooled. as i said on the other thread on this forum,i think this topic is a bit of a no brainer. Its not about her,its about what shs saying and like it or not,the reason she has 50,000 followers( i have no idea whether thats a lot or not for facebook) but it tends to suggest that the industry should be working to get her on board instread of fighting her message.think

7 less horses running in southland than the same meeting last year,despite 11 canterbury horses racing there this week. looks like it will pretty much play out as predicted numbers wise.. What the southern surge achieved was a shuffling of the numbers at their meetings. southland racing is quickly heading the same way as auckland and cambridge has. When people talk about auckland becoming a drain on the industry coffers due to meetings running at losses,to be fair they should always include southland in that same context. its the same phenomenon happening in southalnd as is in auckland and canterbury. They have lost all the small time players. How will HRNZ react to this. Will they base their response on population size. invercargill has a population around 56,000. If HRNZS do,well southland is toast, no,they won't do that. Will they start pouring money into stakes like they have auckland ,with golden gait racenights and regular $35,000 races programmed for mif grade horses. no they won't do that because that would take canterbury horses away from canterbury and canterbury numbers are already being stretched. My guess is they will run an extra southern surge type series. That way they can both,put wallpaper over the problem and placate the southern people who think they have been missing out,then they can get their talking heads to fudge and confuse by saying everything is rosey and positive,just look at the success of the southern surge.

sounds like you living the life or reilly, yes you a lucky man. actually typing that reminds me of that tv series that sam neil starred in,reilly,ace of spies That was a good one.The real life person from which the "life of reilly "saying came from that sort of gave them the idea of the james bond movies. why have they never shown that again on tv or sky. Sky tv has so much rubbish on these days. i would rather watch re runs of the fall and rise of reggie perrin,black adder,fawlty towers,dads army or miami vice. The shield another great show,was the best tv police series,completely different and so much better and real than all the police ones you get on tv these days. hard to find anything to watch on tv these days. i guess thats why the internet so interesting. I was just watching an interview on anti depressants. They say 1 in 5 of the entire population of the usa,including young and old,are currently on anti depressants.Compared to the 1990's, the prescribing of anti depressants in the USA is 5 times greater today,yet the number of people getting diagnosed as depressed these days is about 5 times more. They were saying how anti depressants are being prescribed on the basis that its fixing a chemical imbalance of things like serotonin levels in the body,but thats all a lie . Because all the research has shown,whether it be through blood tests,brain scans, autopsies or whateverthey have tried,they find nothing different biologically between depressed and not depressed people.So the idea of an anti depressant fixing a chemical imbalnce you may have,well its just a lie. But its been a great marketing strategy by the drug companies.. thte bloke i watching not a fan of cannabis as he says all the research shows its gateway drug.he saying the potency can be as much as 40x greater these days than it used to be.Saying It effects people in different ways but proven to cause psychosis(loss of reality) which can endure for up to 18 months after use. He saying the drug companies are doing nothing to lobby against the big de criminalise cannabis push who want to make selling it a big industry in all states of the usa. And the reason he says is obvious. Because its great for their business because cannabis use leads to people seeking help for depression issues and they end up getting prescribed the drugs they sell. its a bit like if you were born in the USA back in the 1960's,you only got 4 vaccines before becoming an adult,nowdays if you took all the vaccines they recommend ,you would be taking over 80 by the time you became an adult. Thats why RFK jnr is asking,is the rise in so many of the life effecting physical and mental issues related to that. seems a fair question.who knows. its all a bit like what they said about the covid vaccine. I still haven't got covid,still unvaccinated. my wife the same. anyway, i must be bored as rambling on a bit. time for a walk maybe.i can't pop out and buy a $30 burger in oslo like brodie.

i think if you had read the above replies, you would see 1 person didn't like the new format,1 person did and 2 didn't comment either way. so to say a few old grouches,well i think thats more an indication of how you view those who post on bit of a yarn. As to your newsflash about thursday harness racing turnover being garbage and no one is watching/punting. the point i made was the ones who still are viewers and punters on thursdays, are watching mainly because of the racing,not the presenting format and if the racing is boring or an unattractive bettting product or a leader biased track,then even if the new format attracted more viewers,why would it translate into increased turnover. Like i said north island harness racing has a boredom problem.It can't be fixed by any change to a trackside presenting format. there are very few moves in the races up there. HRNZ model in that area is to saturate the racing opportunities for the horses and connections and a consequence of that is if they get a bad draw or they settle back in the running,drivers have a pre conceived mindset of lets wait for next week.Thats a real turn off from a betting and spectator point of view.

did you see about an hour after you posted, they had on trackside aaron white and 2 bowlers,one gary lawson, in the commentary box. Looked a bit like a golden oldies front row. actually i don't mind a white giving his bowling mates a plug leading into races. The reason i say that is,mr white is linking in his own subtle way,the sport of outdoor bowls and the sport of harness racing.And there are definite links which the racing industry these days does nothing to foster. A white probably the only one that seems to be at least trying. you may say,so what. well i will explain why i thinks its relevant. firstly ,it takes me back to the days when one of the 3 clubs at addington(before they amalgamated into 1) recognised the link between harness racing and certain sports and to foster that relationship, they dedicated race nights to each sport.It may have been the canterbury park trotting club,although i stand to be corrected.In my mind i seem to associate those type of nights with names like brian hastings,who was a president of the club and who had been a well known nz cricketer. The club had a bowls night,where they would have selected members of each club take part in a roll up/sudden death /next to kitty in the birdcage.It used to have a grass bit back then. the golf night they would have the same concept with the promotion being chipping closest to the pin. the rugby night they would have the fastet men from all the rugby clubs have a 200m sprint down the hme straight. The same with the rugby league clubs. they had a cricket night. i can tell you from having been to many of those meetings,it really gave the race nights a boost in attendance and in sense of occasion and entertainment.You would remember them as well i think ranga. thats why people say,those were the days. It wasn't just the racing,it was the people you met on course,it was the administrators who fostered relationships with the whole community in a way that linked everyone. i've said it before and now say it again. for racing to prosper,you have to get racing into the psyche of new zealanders,to get them to subconciously view and accept racing as part of the fabric of their community. and you do that through subliminal messages via visual exposure of the sport. anyway,back to the link between bowls that started my post. i will quote the figures from a nz bowls study from 10 yearsago.I'm sure the figures i quote would still be relevant today. 85% of people who play outdoor bowls do so for enjoyment and they value the socail aspects of the sport.Fitness and sport performance were the next 2 main reason.but the social side was just under 4 times more important to most. playing in teams,groups of friends and for clubs is very significant part of bowls. lawn bowls is played outdoors at facilities based around man made club rooms. 52% of out door bowlers played 1-2 times a week and another 31% played 1-2 times a month. 64% walk eegularly,32% fish,31%play golf and 31%swim. 84% first started when over 35. 79% are european 67% are 55 and over. 67% are male. .........the similarities between bowls and harness racing is there for anyone to see. now i can give you my own anecdotal experience i've observed with bowlers. i also have observed the same with golfers. they like to gamble. so my point is,if the people at hrnz reallyn wanted to spend there money promoting ownership through syndication,they need to be directing some of their attention to bowling and golfing clubs as these are the sports which have participants who fit the profile of who is likely to become interested or involved in a small way in the sport. these bowling and golfing clubs are fertile ground for planting the seeds for future participation. hrnz should have some in each of the populated areas specifically designed to promote and liase with this clubs and even have a policy which they can formulate ,which is mutually benefical to both sorts national organisation. its not just harness racing that could benefit fom the relationship,it could work both ways as the sports could boost their numbers by fostering participation from harness people. anyway,its a sunday,so thats my sermon for the week.

if you were able to google the tab nz website,you would see it says under "location restrictions" " If you already have a tab account but are travelling or staying outside of nz,you will not be able to access your account while travelling abroad".

yes,i get what your saying. There were some positives .but describing it as they did in that article,was only painting half a picture. as i pointed out,its a bit simple to say,hey things are good ,because turnovers up 25.9%,when the number of meetings was up around 59%.. i really think they treat us like they think we are dumb. if they are going to comapre years,the first figure they should tell us is the profit/loss for july 2024 and 2025 ,then break it down to the profit loss for each individual meeting in july 2024 and 2025,then break it down futher and mention the things they did in that article. they are deliberately pulling the wool over peoples eyes when it comes to the sustainabilty of regularly incurring losses.

steele also says in that article the number of customers is up 20% and the bet size has increased. If thats the case,they why isn't it shown in the turnover figures. remember the % increase in harness race meetings held in july this year,was double the % increase in turnover. and in the article he also citng the geo blocking as contributing to the increase. On the contrary,it appears the geo blocking may have seen no betting turnover increase,if you look at the turnover figures Also previously harness racing would have been getting a % of the turnover of money invested by nz punters with the overseas bookies on nz harness. But that doesn't apply anymore does it.

the people at hrnz and in the media just think the average nz harness racing follower is dumb. for example. their is a story on harnesslink,written by bruce stewart and quotes mr steele. its headlined "betting numbers up significantly" it goes on to say betting turnover in july was up 25.9%,compared to the previous july. but then it goes on to say,what any thinking person would be asking themselves,that being their were 7 more meetings hald this year as compared to july last year. so 12 meetings held in july 2024,then a9 this year, well thats an increase of just under 60% of meetings. so the betting turnover went up 25.9% as a result of a 60% increase in the number of meetings. really they need to also give us a breakdown of the number of races rtrun in july of each year amnd the total stakes paid in july of each year if we are to get an accurate picture. Who do they think they are kidding. these people treat us like we're dumb. Why should we trust anything they say when we know they continually manipulate figures like they do. also,if you have bettimng turnover increasing at a rate this year,less than the number of meetings last year,then doesn't that mean,your overall losses are probably higher this year than last.

i posted about what i had read about xenon on a topic on this forum 5 years ago. Russian athletes were using it about 15 years ago. tests on rats had shown a 70% xenon 30% oxygen mix doubled epo levels a day later. A quote from HRNZ at the time " international racing laboratories(including nz)are acutely aware of the potential threat that this type of substance could pose to the integrity of racing" But i'm not going to get into an on going argument with you about its performance enhancing effects. besides reading the facebook page of the nairn lady, about what she found with arcano is consistent with uncaring or desperate treatment of a horse. yes i know you thought having 3 horses from the same stable suffer heart issues and drop dead at the racetrack. I didn't. You don't find something your not looking for. when i said earlier it was over 1 year,to be accurate the 3 horses from that stable died within 4 months. yes i know you keep saying you think all drugs are detectable.you always say that.I really don't know whether you actually believe that,as i think its obviously wrong. again everyone knows if your using a test thats not designed to pick up certain performance enhancers or all the derivatives of certain performance enhancers,well you won't get any positives. Thats what they said happened in the usa. i've tried to keep my reply brief as this topic is about animal welfare and i also don't want to go over things we've already discussed at length in the past.

there can be no denying what she says has occurred in the past. The only thing i would say is we need to be a little bit cautious in inferring these problems currently exist at the level they have in the past. when she talks about vodka. Well thats not something i'm up with the play as to whether its ever been much of an issue in racing. Having said that,a few years ago i did have a greyhound trainer tell me thats what he and others would give dogs occassionally if they wanted them to downgrade or if they were punting something else in the race.I assumed it wasn't that common,but i have no idea myself. the fridge gassing,formalin thing,well thats why woodend was viewed as a hive of illegal activity for a while there. Of course the problem there was it wasn't fair to lump all trainers at woodend as being cheats. But it was accurate to say they came from a training area where % per capita of cheats was very much higher than anywhere else. but when opertion inca came around,one flow on effect was about 5-6 years ago,the riu of course poured resources into uncovering other illegal activity and they were actually successful. The likes of j alford got 9 yeras for the formalin,c jones got a few years,even being caught injecting the very same horse alford had been training after it being transferred to him after alford was disquialifioed. The fridge gas horse that the nairn lady refers to was used on arcano,well they never caught m kerr for doing that to any of hiis horses but he of course was extremely well known for being very volatile while he still had his licence.I guess thats what happens when you lose over $1 million on the punt and you have defrauded so many people. Then you had m anderson who infamously was the driver behind the catalyst for the police decision to continue with operation inca.Of course he went on to be known more for assaulting and strangulation of his partner,although the damage he did to her would have been more phsycological than physical long term.And of course he was guilty of being he distributor of party drugs to others in the industry,which he got from someone within the indutsry who i believe got them from her hairdresser,although that bit i don't think ever really came out.Of course m anderson was m kerrs regular driver. anyways,you get the picture. Harness racing had some really dishonest people who in some cases were proven to have used and in other cases believed to have used the substances that this woman nairn talks about. All to gain an advantage with the motive money. of course the upshot of the RIU catching these people was 3/4 of the industry thought about time,yet a very vocal,often high powered group was not impressed and believed it was better for racing to swepp such things under the carpet and avoid the bad publicity. of course now you get stables with trees cut down,big gates,all to avoid the riu spying on them from a tree. Like there were people who most thought were doing nothing wrong,yet people wondered why di you need to cut all the trees down. the RIU was relentlessly actacked in some circles.. The chief someone who falls into the 1/4.The industry is its own worst enemy in that respect.. as a result,it seems these days the riu doesn't do much enforcement in a manner that is likely to catch anyone. actually i did think the riu investigators became emboldened by their success and maybe slightly overstepped the line occassionally. anyways,people who say thsi nairn woman doesn't know what she is talking about,well thwey don't know what they are talking about. its just the scale and current relevance that i'm not so sure of. And i've always said the cheats like the ones i mentioned above are the poor mans cheats. The clever ones are the ones who get their vet or say maybe an owner who makes regular trips to the usa,to bring the better,undetectable stuff in.i think when they took down the mass producer af performance enhancwers in the usa it has helped nz in some ways. Also,liike i have said so many times,if you follow the form you can teell. for example i started a thread one time about the way a certain trainers horses would perform and noted there was sometihibng peculiar abot hiow some of his horses ran. I inferred that it was something they were being given or fed that was impacted their hearts. Well of courtse i got criticised for it in this forum,but 12 months later that said trainer had several high cobalt charges. then of course,at6 one stage you had 3 telfer trained horses,within a year, all stop to a walk and either collapse and die on the track or back at the stables. Now,of course when i posted that boy did that set some people off. But its a fact it happend. An offical inquiry found nothing. it was never going to. But i think the telfers addressed the problem and took steps to make sure they weren't doing anything for it to happen again and it hasn't.the nairn woman has made the point that horses are underdeveloped when they are trained and raced as 2 year olds and i think you will find the stables that do put the pressure on early clearly have more bone issues than the ones that don't. The telfer stable is an exmaple of that,but thats not their fault. Their owners and the indutrsy pour so much financial incentitives to race 2 year olds these days.

i watched it at times. i quite like it as its entertaining enough. Once a week about right. the unfortunate thing is these blokes are backing at cambridge meetings and they are sometimes betting on favorites who settle at the back. its a shame cambridge is such a front running,advantageous track to be on the inside in the first 2.it lowers the appeal of the racing.But it is ,and combine that with north island drivers who don't show much positive initaitive even at the best of times,in the lower stakes races nad you get--- boring,do you think that driver was even trying,a lot of the time. Last night they had some $20,000 races and you got some movement but the week before,on the normal $8000 stake races, the only driver to move up all night was an imported south island driver,s ottley. so what i'm saying is the presenters may be entertaining enough,but the racing product is not very entertaining. actually i did like the wee fella with the glasses the first week as a couple of times he said,well that driver left it too late to make a move. It was very obvious what he was saying was correct,anybody could have seen that. But the fella poppewell beside him quickly tried to move him on from stating the blatantly obvious ,as if poppewell didn't want to come across as a sore loser. I thought that was a shame,because whats wrong with stating an opinion,which anyone could see was true. It reminds me of when jason teaz was commentator. He always used to make comments about drivers tactics and whether they were good or bad. Thats why i always thought he was one of the best. he would be far better than aaron white as the north island commentator. Aaron white is a good commentator but he doesn't say things about tacticss which accurately describe what punters can see on their tv screens.. Punters like it when a commentator makes comments about tactics as the race unfolds. anyways,i don't mind the thursday night crew,just the cambridge racingproduct needs better drivers with more intent and that aint going to happen.

to quote your first paragraph " old disenfranchised men,who are so bitter and cynical that they do nothing but continually attack the industry. Especially those that are succssful. In my opinion that is anti racing". Thats the label,in this thread, you've put on people who not only through their words,but their actions have shown to those who know them,that at least they are trying to do what they think is best for the present and future health and welfare of the racehorses and ex racehorses, in their care. Its interesting you also found this nairn womans comments about the damage that can be done from use of some performance enhancers,as anti racing. Me thinks your words that i quote,somehow seem a bit harsh chief.Your thinking, it sort of reminds me of that kinks song,its a mixed up,muddled up shook up world. but hey,at the end of the day,even though i disagree with what you say about this current topic,i'm not silly enough to label you anti racing. Because i know your not.

Isn't the biggest problem with rehoming being,there simply isn't much demand for rehoming ex racehorses. and farmers used to be people brought in eras of when the horse was valued and admired,whereas these days you have all the dairying,forestry..Put simply land use is more concentrated,profit focussed,so many more corporates involved in land ownership.so corporates have no use for horses and the new generation of farmers are not only smaller in numbers but have diminishing connections with horses,the upshot of all that is horses aren't finding homes on farms like they used to. then you have urban sprawl which has meant people looking for grazing for their ex racehorses are finding it very very difficult to find anywhere suitable and people who are looking to keep an ex reacehorse and ride it around are finding with urban sprawl they have to travel so much further. Time is important to so many. then you have ,at least in harness racing,little focus on the small time breeders. As much as you hear hrnz statements about the positivity in the industry,the small time breeders simply feel left out,undervalued.they have no positivity.Hrnz just kidding themselves whey they say that. Thats illustrated by the significant drop in numbers being bred by small time breeders in recent years,and it will happen again this year. So those type of people are making the hard decisions and simply find their mares aren't wanted so they are getting rid of them. I mean,if the people who have bred from families they have nutured and who have treated their horses with more care and love when they have retired for decades, ,well if they are getting rid of them,then things are bad.yet that is what is happening. i really do believe that if suitable affordable grazing was made available,you would have less horses being put down once their racing careers end. but that type of grazing hardly exists and the industry has never tried to address i also think ex racehorses are under used as far as being used in programmes assisting peoples mental health and rehabilitation.i've previously suggested funds should be used to set up these type of programmes and they could become self funding,if in populated areas. Like i have said before,racing sponsored rehoming places will flatly reject your horse as suitable for rehoming with them just on the basis of age. over 12,no not interested. now i guess thats because they have so many younger horses wanting to get into their rehoming programmes. I find it interesting to hear discussed earlier that they have been asked to rehome horses who may not have the right temperamant or be unsound,yet they reject a 13 year old that could be the perfgect horse,just based on age. the greyhounds simply have way to many to rehome as well.NSW sends 1000 a year to the USA to keep their numbers looking respectable. Nz send many to the usa. the industry could so much more than it does in my opinion,having said that,all the negative issues would still exist as thats reality.Its all about mitigating the problem. the lady on the video has better enforcemnet of the use of perfromance enhancers as sdometing she would like to see done. Well i've always agreed with that,but just look at how large parts of the industry deliberately tyry and undermine the riu when they actively do that.

not sure which bit you say is fiction. i thought what i said was all fact. just goggle the ladys facebook page with arcano and you can have a look at the pictures she provided of itsdisected insides. Seems she had a hand in its rehoming so took an interest in why it got so sick after being rehomed.Hence her cutting it up after it died. . i know we argued over the honesty of matt anderson many, many times times in the past,long before he got all those charges . And mitch kerr as well but not so many times. i just spent 10 minutes looking for the arcano thread on the harness site 5 years ago.i gave up as not sure what heading it came under. The only thread i found in the month it won at addington,to be fair,most were saying how wonderful m anderson and m kerr were.. Neither you or i contributed on that particular thread. Actually brodie was m andersons greatest chair leader at the time. we need more like himhe said. Not on the money that time was he. .Only the likes of newmarket,harewood and even hunterthepunter suggested they were given performance enhancers. neither you or me posted on that particular thread,in fact i seemed to have taken a break from posting around rthat time. That was around the times the articles in the papers about the fridge gas, were giving the industry bad headlinesi suppose you do remember that don't you. Remember HRNZ publically saying at the time how they were concerned about fridge gas being reportedly used and working out how to test for it.. i know i've certainly questioned the hionesty of both m kerr and manderson as far as the use of performance enhancers many times. Have you never noticed,just how accurate i have been over the years in predicting things uncovered later. anyway,off to watch a reality show with the wife now. hope its not the the fatties and i end up watching a tummy operation.How do those american fatties afford all that food.?

i don't follow this lady on facebook,i don't do facebook,but hesi seemed to be saying,hey have a look at what she says on there. so i did. and the first thing that came up was where she had done an autopsy on arcano after he died. People who follow harness racing of course know arcano well. he was a horse that a lengthy thread on the harness side of this forum was started. Arcano was an older horse,grey in colour. he had turned a run of poor performances around with a win at addington one night for his new trainer. That was what prompted the thread on the harness part.Arcarno then went and fibrillated next start and retired the following start.. anyway,90% of the poeple posting said it was obvious the horse was running on a performance enhancers. Anyone with any idea of analysing form could tell that. Of course we got the likes of the chief saying,what a load of bullocks,hes never returned a positive and people who linked his performance to the fridge gas thing were just fools and scaremongers. Arcano of course was trained by M kerr, and driven by m anderson. Both those trainers had several threads about their horses performances ,questioning their honesty and their use of perfromance enhancers. Of course chief always defended them each time saying they had no positives and it was just people who were jealous or shit stirrers,bla,blah. Actaully what ever happened to m kerr and m anderson,.trust worthy blokes that they were. Perhaps they are mentoring someone in between trips to their probation officers. of course the chief was their main defender,after all no positives and he hates people slinging mud at pillars of the indutsry.I see your saying that in this topic again chief. i always give you points for consistency chief. anyways,back to arcano. i see arcano shows as being a deregistered 15 year old on the hrnz website so one could get the impression heshappily grazing somewhere in a paddock. which is interesting,as on this nairn ladys website is pictures of his dissected body and a summary of what she found. To be honest,i stopped the goggling of her there,as its all very sad what i read she found. but hey,therein itself is the actual crux of this woman nairns point. and its something i have said so often,but i think never gets the traction it should. if your only going to treat the horses you care for the same as the cows,the bobby calves,the sheep ,the lambs. In other words see them as a commodity based on their abilty to win $,then why,when your training the horse, would you care much for the horses welfare after it finishes racing. anyways,its an interesting topic and you can tell by peoples words how they view their horses.

i think what they can say is the recent 3 meetings with southern surge races,were a success because they got much higher numbers than is normal for this time of year down there. but i don't think people should get too carried ,as it was one of the goals of the southern surge to have more horses kept in work over winter, so numbers at the spring meetings coming up,see an increase in starters as well. and this weeks meeting they have 10 less starters than the same meeting at the same time last year. so,as i've pointed out previously,the level of success of the southern surge needs to consider the big picture over a 12 month period,because as i've pointed out racing and training horses in the winter does take a greater toll on them. if you increase numbers in a couple of months,but lose similar or more numbers over the following 12 months,then you haven't achieved much. Like i've said before ,having races like the southern surge or the golden gait at auckland,i believe all your doing is taking horses who would start in one race somewhere and seeing them transferred to the race with the bigger stake. Like those golden gait auckland races. You had a dozen or so canterbury horses go up there. So by having the big stakes you had those canterbury horses increase numberts in auckland,but,and its a very obvious but,those horses would have started in races in canterbury had they not gone to auckland. So in effect,yuo got a 10 horse field instead of 11 horse at addington,and you got an 11 horse field instead of 10 at auckland. Again,thats not achieving much is it. if you look at southland this week,the high achieving stables who value their udrs,the likes of n williamson and p williamson,who had good numbers last week,they haven't got any starters this week. so,while the southern surge looked promising,people shouldn't be going the early crow,if they had anycommon sense.

i think your second post,clarifies your first. in other words, your latest post acknowledges duncan garner is the one that said she is saying that,whereas the lady never actually said that in the interview.

record keeping by racing authorities has supposedly been improved. i think thats true,but also think it could be classified as a bit of cosmetic changes as well. so nz racing authorities have tried,and now they give the impression of better traceablity. the harness horses they seem to classify as deregistered these days,dead or still registered.. what happens to the follow up record keeping after they have been notified as deregistered,i'm not sure. looking at ours ,we still have horses shown as deregistered grazing in paddocks. the mares are still shown as being current.the ones that have died are shown as dead.i suppose thats because we have notified them each year . so record keeping is reliant on the owners replying properly to hrnz request for information.. Micro chipping was introduced fo harness foals bred about 4 years ago and i think is also applicable from this year to any thorougbred foals bred. personally i'm not a fan of micro chipping. big racing stables may have micro chip readers,but people who are the ones who care for the horses after finsihing racing are unlikely to. So it makes it harder for them. is their a requirement that pet food places in the future notify racing authorities of the identication of the horses they process. Because if its only a optional,then that wouldn't create a proper picture. the micro chipping itself was sold to people as being a method for easier traceability,but you only have to look to the USA ,where you saw horse animal welfare groups lobbied hard against it, as they quite rightly said it made it more difficult for people to identify harness horses at horse sales where the pet food operators active.Some well known harness breeders over there actually do both freeze branding and micro chipping ,just so their ex racehorses could be identified more easily after finishing their racing. the whole topic is very complex.