Letters may be shortened and edited due to limited space.

Breaking the bond

Kelly Burke from Cape Town writes:

I would like to commend you on an excellent magazine – I wait very eagerly for it every month. I find that the articles are very informative and deal with all aspects of being privileged enough to be part of a horse’s life.

I have to say I burst into tears reading your latest issue with the story about "When the bond is broken". We lost two horses last year in extremely freak tragic accidents less than three weeks apart and I am still at the depression phase about these two boys. Thank you for addressing this very real issue.

Losing Mona
Dena Fellows from Noordhoek writes:

I just received my next edition of SA Horseman and am very interested in the articles on the stolen horses in Lesotho. No one knows how bad livestock theft is, as it is almost never advertised.

I recently learnt that livestock theft can happen ANYWHERE!!! I am from a well-known area in the Western Cape called Noordhoek and on 5 March 2008, I lost my horse, riding with a friend on Long Beach. My mare got spooked and dropped a shoulder, resulting in me tumbling head first onto the ground and my mare bolting into our nearby reserve.

We searched with the community for weeks after she went missing. Animal communicators phoned, the SAPS were involved, NSRI choppers went out, Table Mountain reserve rangers were out, some privately owned microlites went out over a month, but no one saw anything. Posters were sent out and one radio station helped out with broadcasting.

It is now almost three months since she went missing and the police think she was stolen, as she was fully tacked up.

I wish that there was a way we could track our animals or even if there was something developed like the little chip that is injected into the horse’s neck with their info, if that could have a tracking device ... maybe Mona would still be with me.

Eer aan die perd
Hellmut Gettasch van Yzerfontein skryf:

In die "goeie ou dae" is groot perdeskoue afgesluit met 'n seremonie om die perd dankie te sê vir sy bydrae. Perde en hulle ruiters het in die arena opgelyn en die toeskouers gestaan terwyl die "Tribute to the Horse" gelees is.

Met die woorde van Ronald Duncan is die skou stil en waardig beëindig, en daar was menige vallende traan. Vir my was dit dus 'n groot anti-klimaks om dié wonderlike woorde so vermink in die SA Horseman van Mei/Junie 2008 in die "Terugvoer"-afdeling te lees. Hier is die weergawe soos ek dit ken:

This Cavalcade of Grace now stands,
It speaks in silence,
Its story is the land.

Where in this wide world can man find
Nobility without pride,
Friendship without envy or
Beauty without vanity?
Here, where grace is laced with power
And strength by gentleness confined.

He serves without servility;
He has fought without enmity.
There is nothing so powerful, nothing less violent;
There is nothing so quick, nothing more patient.

Our Pioneers were borne on his back.
Our history is his industry:
We are his heirs, he our inheritance.

Ladies and Gentlemen, The Horse.