Quarter's Worth

Winter Strikes

February 4, 2010

As a testament to the dedication of AQHA employees, those that were able to get to the office dug in where they were most needed.

The first month of 2010 ended in a flurry of activity – literally. A severe winter storm hit Amarillo last week. On Thursday, January 28, the AQHA offices closed at noon due to deteriorating weather and road conditions. We were able to reopen the offices Friday with a skeleton crew. As a testament to the dedication of AQHA employees, those that were able to get to the office dug in where they were most needed. Customers that called in to the customer service department were greeted by yours truly and employees from other departments.

After a foot of snow fell on Amarillo, new customer service representatives were recruited to answer AQHA's phones.

After a foot of snow fell on Amarillo, new customer service representatives were recruited to answer AQHA's phones.

Amarillo received a foot of snow on top of a layer of sleet and ice. The remnants of which can still be seen around town. Area schools closed Thursday and Friday. The airport also cancelled flights, which meant that AQHA Executive Committee member Peter Cofrancesco, who was in Amarillo for the Executive Committee meeting and a halter task force, got to spend a little extra time in Texas.
Many businesses in the area were adversely affected, and mail delivery was also impacted. So while we were able to process work such as registrations and Convention registrations, there may be a slight delay in those items making there way through the postal system.

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Amarillo is not the only area that is experiencing weird weather patterns thanks to El Nino. Is your part of the country being affected? Has the weather had an impact on your horse activities?

Happy trails,

Don Treadway

Don Treadway
AQHA Executive Vice President

Comments

One Comment on “Winter Strikes”

  • Lil Peck
    February 12th, 2010 at 11:42 pm

    I want to draw attention to a very important article by Dr. Jim Heird that was the text of his speech to other AQHA judges, “Do Right By The Horse,” at http://www.aqha.com/magazines/aqhj/content/2010content/feb10/Do%20Right%20by%20the%20Horse.pdf

    Dr. Heird said, “Society loves horses; people see them as noble
    and majestic animals. I suspect most of us started out our love
    affairs with horses feeling exactly the same way. However, as
    we become more deeply entrenched in the showing/winning
    aspect of our industry, we often lose contact with why we
    entered the industry in the beginning and shift our emphasis
    to winning rather than on the well-being of the horse.
    The descriptive term for this is “habituation” which is “a reduction of
    a behavioral response to a specific stimulus that
    occurs repeatedly.” In other words, in the case of extreme training
    techniques, we learn to ignore those stimuli that at first we
    find offensive. We ignore them because we want to win and
    believe these techniques are necessary to win. We ignore them
    because we see successful people do them. Worse, we ignore
    what we see happening because we are afraid of being embarrassed
    and ostracized for speaking out. Habituation prevents us
    from seeing that some of our actions and techniques are counter
    to our responsibility of protecting the horse and its dignity,
    the animal that is the very reason we entered the industry. The
    horse brought us to the dance. Sometimes we forget who
    brought us and forsake our original intent for “winning at all
    costs.” Further, we learn to ignore our responsibility to the
    societal ethics in which we were reared.

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    I have seen cruel training advocated, denied, defended and even outright lied about, over the past year when practiced by celebrity trainers. I think this is an example of the “habituation” that Dr. Heird referred to.

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