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María Alejandra Ramelli

If you think that keeping a horse monthly is too expensive, there is always
the option to lease your horse, and thus only pay half a monthly fee. However,
paying half the price also means riding half the time, as another person will also
ride your horse. If you own a show horse I don’t recommend you lease him, un-
less you know the other person will treat your horse very well. I’ve always been
too possessive of my horses. I don’t let anyone but my trainers or someone I re-
ally trust ride them. Once I left an equestrian center because the trainer let other
people ride my horse when I wasn’t there. It made me really mad. Horses have
a good memory, and they remember bad experiences quite well. You don’t want
someone to pull your horse’s mouth hard if he has a very delicate mouth. Or, you
don’t want your horse to learn some bad tricks because of someone else. Always
think of all the work, dedication, and even money you’ve invested in your horse.
If at any point something bad happens to him, you want it to have been at least
while you were riding him and not while someone else was doing it.

A horse is a living being. Just like you, your horse can get sick, and even die
at any time. You have to be ready to pay an expensive bill to your vet if your
horse gets sick. Also, no matter if you or your horse are sick, you have to keep
paying your horse’s maintenance every month. Horses are very delicate. Just a
simple mistake like feeding them with the wrong grain can kill them. More-
over, accidents are also frequent, and they can happen not only while riding,
but also when your horse is in the truck, in a paddock, and even in his stall.

Three real accidents

1. On an ordinary morning, a groom was lunging a horse because the horse had
rest for two days, and his owner, who was a ten-year-old boy, was riding him
in the afternoon. This horse began to jump and kick so hard that in one jump
he didn’t put his hooves on the ground, and killed himself immediately by
landing on his head. Now you can imagine the little boy’s face when he went
to his horse’s stall after high school and there was no horse there.

2. A mare who used to be very grumpy went alone in the truck on her way to
the airport to go to the United States where her owner was. It turns out that
since the mare was the only horse in the truck, her groom decided to leave a
lot of room for her. However, in a curve the mare began to kick the truck so
hard that in one of those kicks, a board was stuck in one of her back legs. The
mare obviously couldn’t travel, and due to the severity of the leg injury she
could not jump or do any kind of hard work again in her life.

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