(no subject)

[patgund]

Maybe it's just my cynical streak...

But I'm wondering if part of keeping Barbaro alive as long as they did was to try and get as many semen collections from him as possible before they would be forced to put him to sleep.

Yeah, if he survived he would have been at stud anyway. But most race horse breeding anymore is done via AI anyway. So I really suspect they were doing collecting on him for as long as possible.

On edit. My mistake, turns out that race horse breeding still needs to be done the old fashioned way.

http://www.examiner.com/a-115985~Breeding_Barbaro_could_earn_millions_for_owners.html

Comments

[aeddie.livejournal.com]

My question is why did cnn and msnbc think it was important enough news to make the headline banners on their websites.

[selenesue.livejournal.com]

Sadly, I suppose you are right. I hope the samples weren't messed up by the massive pain medications that =I hope= they were giving him.

Is this Big International News? Naaah. Sad little distraction from real news. "If it bleeds, it leads" as the old newspaper saying goes.

[cahwyguy.livejournal.com]

Then he surely went happy.

[jeran.livejournal.com]

If you're merely wondering, your cynical streak in insufficiently wide. Knowing professional horse breeders from personal experience I'd bet that not only were they collecting, they were not giving him any pain meds just because they might contaminate the samples.

[patgund.livejournal.com]

I don't know race horse breeders, but yeah, I can so see this with some breeders.

[jeran.livejournal.com]

I know show-horse breeders. These are the kind of people who'll cross a stud and mare knowing that 9 times out of ten the offspring will have foreleg problems so bad they'll have to be put down before they're 6 months old, just because of the sale price they can get for that tenth foal. I don't imagine race-horse breeders are any better.

Not all breeders are that way, but way too many of the top-rank ones are. Because you simply can't compete with sheer ruthlessness in pursuit of results.

Another view

[morgan-gw.livejournal.com]

One of the lists I'm on includes a woman who's very much a horse person (was a horse-riding stunt double as a child for TV shows, and started a group that rescues horses from wildfires). Today she posted an "In Memory" post, that included the following:

However, this valiant horse and his blessed owners (who were willing to spend so much time and money on his survival) have made a great contribution to the survival of all horses who suffer broken bones. Much of what was done to him was innovative and uncertain, enabling his veterinarians to learn a lot and will be share their research with others around the world.

Maybe they also collected more "donations" while they were at it -- dunno. And as to why the press has been so hot on this -- who knows? Probably part of the "sports stars are more important that just about anyone else" thing they have going.

Can you tell I've never quite forgiven the media for glossing over the passing of Gene Roddenberry because Magic Johnson happened to announce that he was *gasp* HIV positive that day? IMO, a jock who got a disease sleeping around is far less important to our culture than the man who created the phenomena that is Trek.

Oops, where'd that soap box come from? :-)

Re: Another view

[patgund.livejournal.com]

Oh, it's a soapbox I can certainly agree with :-)

I don't deny that they gained a lot of experience with this type of injury. But at the same time, I have to wonder if they had another motive in keeping him alive this long - many horses, even winning ones, would have been put down at the track for this type of injury.

[loli-cat.livejournal.com]

A local radio station threw the phone lines open to callers yesterday questioning why/if this should be the lead story, and why. Got a lot of interesting phone calls, especially one pointing out the fact that the horse was insured for millions of dollars and perhaps this decision was motivated in part 'cause the insurance money was running out and the owners would have to dip into their own pockets to pay for treatment...

Barbaro never bred, never will

[jj-maccrimmon.livejournal.com]

Died a virgin, never had his jewels played with either...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16890406/