• Home
• Cruelty
• Animals on Farms
• Experimentation
• Wildlife
• Sport and Entertainment
• Nutrition
• Recipes
• Animal Law
• Eating Wildlife
• Meat and the Environment
• Cruelty Free Products
• Vegetarian Restaurants

• Things to do
• School activities
• About us
• Contacts us
• Membership
• Mail us
• Links
• Credits

Web

animalliberation.org.au

• Battery Hens
• Pigs
• Dairy
• Chickens
• Live Sheep Export
• Adelaide Free Range Egg Outlets
• Compassionate Recipes
• Companion Animals
• About Animal Liberation
• Product Testing on Animals
• Can greenies eat meat?
• Cattle methane
• Milking the Murray
• The real cost of chicken
• CSIRO's Cancer Diet
• Eating Water
• Eating Plants

• Greenhouse Gases
• Water Usage Quiz
• Bush Tucker
• Climate Change

• New South Wales
• Queensland
• Victoria
• Tasmania
• Animals Australia

Horse Racing

The racing industry

Racing is a big industry and a lot of money changes hands. Unfortunately the horses are little more than commodities in this game, pampered while they make money and discarded if they don't.

Death on the track

Horses racing on the flat are less likely to die on the track than horses in jump races. Nevertheless, deaths do occur. The following table shows figures from the SA Thoroughbred Racing Authority:

Year	Flat racing - approx. 16,000 starters annually
	Serious injuries	Deaths	Falls
1996-7	28	10	?
1997-8	38	6	2
1998-9	45	3	6
1999-2000*	41	9	6

* Figures are not for the complete season

According to these figures, an average of 1 in 421 starters is seriously injured in flat races, and 1 in 2285 starters is killed.

The public becomes aware of the problem when horses break down and are destroyed on the track. A recent example was a horse coming into the home straight in the Melbourne Cup. In another example on July 1 2000 in the Ipswich Cup in Queensland, the horse Mushtak smashed both his front legs. Seven other horses were brought down. Mushtak, Arctic Venture and Blue Dash were destroyed because of their injuries (Sunday Mail, 2/7/00).

A study in California found that 83 horses died while stabled at race tracks, and of these deaths 93% were due to musculoskeletal injury. In most cases the horses were euthanased following injury in training or racing. There were 1.7 fatal injuries per 1000 race entrants, similar to the 1.4 fatal injuries per 1000 entrants found in Kentucky (1).

Another Californian study examine the 432 thoroughbreds who had a fatal injury or illness at racetracks over a 2 year period. Of these horses, 83% were killed due to musculoskeletal injuries, most of which involved broken bones (85%) and to a much lesser extent ruptured ligaments (10%). Other reasons for death included sudden collapse with no prior sign of illness, internal bleeding, gastroenteritis, pneumonia and pulmonary haemorrhage (2).

An Australian study investigated musculoskeletal breakdown over a 7 year period at 4 Melbourne race courses. "Breakdown" was defined as an injury that resulted in euthanasia or failure to race again for at least 6 months. Among horses racing on the flat, 2.9 per 1000 starters had such a breakdown, with 0.6 per 1000 severe enough for the horse to be destroyed. Breakdown was more common on hard tracks and among older horses. As the researchers commented: (3)
" The accumulation of repetitive microtrauma from a long racing career would be expected to place older horses at greater risk of injury. "

There are also deaths not related to injury of the musculoskeletal system. One study examined 25 horses who had died suddenly on 3 Chicago racetracks. Of the dead horses, 8 had massive internal haemorrhaging with large amounts of blood in the body cavities. Nearly all the horses had pulmonary oedema (fluid in the lung), congestion and/or haemorrhage. The researchers concluded that the deaths were due to exercise-induced acute cardiovascular failure (4).

Wastage

Australian breeders produce the second highest number of Thoroughbred foals in the world, after North America (5). Of this large number of foals, most end up as rejects, either because of injury or lack of ability. When horses are prematurely withdrawn from racing, it is referred to as "wastage".

In the Victorian racing industry, of the foals produced by 1000 mares, only about 300 ever start in a race. There is further wastage at the end of the first or second racing season, as horses are discarded because of chronic injury or lack of winnings (5).

Racing as a 2 year-old puts the horse at particular risk of injury because at this age the skeletal system is still immature and not ready for hard training. A study of 74 two year-old Thoroughbreds in Melbourne found that 16 of these horses did not race at all during a racing season, and 12 of the 16 were still unsound at the end of the season. Of the 58 that raced, 16 were unsound at the end of the season, making a total of 40% unsound, that is, with injuries that prevented training. The researchers concluded (6):
" The problem of unsoundness in two year olds is clearly one of immaturity of the skeletal system. Basic to the problem, particularly in Australia, is the emphasis on early racing of two year olds. "

One English survey found that over one third of horses in 6 racing stables were at some stage lame enough to prevent training during a 2 year period - 5.8% of available training time was lost due to this cause. Of training time lost, over two-thirds was due to lameness, another 20% due to respiratory problems. Over the 2 year period, 24% of the horses failed to race (7).

A Queensland study followed the progress of 1804 horses. Around 40% of these horses earned NO money at all in their first season of racing. The earnings of 87% of the horses were insufficient to cover training costs. Of those horses that first raced as 2 or 3 year old, 71% continued to race for at least a year after their first start, but only 46% continued to race for at least 2 years. In Victoria it is estimated that one third of the racehorse population is replaced each year, mainly due to lack of ability and to some extent exercise-induced injury. In the Queensland study, lack of ability also appeared to be a major cause of "wastage" (8).

Whatever the reason for the "wastage", many horses end up being killed. Only champions have a quiet retirement or a life at stud. The documentary They Shoot Horses, Don't They? , broadcast on the Cutting Edge programme on SBS TV, showed how unwanted race horses end up neglected in paddocks, or in slaughterhouses to be processed into meat, including failed or injured horses owned by the Queen (9).

Exercise-Induced Pulmonary Haemorrhage

Between 1% and 2% of horses have blood flowing from the nostrils after a race. The first time this happens they are banned from racing for 3 months, the second time they are banned for life.

However, the situation is actually much more serious than people have realised. Researchers at the University of Melbourne have shown, through the use of an endoscope inserted into the horse's throat, that 50% of horses have blood in the windpipe, and 90% have blood deeper in the lungs. In post-mortems of racehorses, one fifth have bruising at the back of the lungs, with the bruise more prominent the more recently the horse has raced. Racing regularly causes blood vessels around the lung to rupture (10).

The speed at which horses run makes a difference. When horses were tested within 2 hours of racing, 75% had blood in the upper respiratory tract, and 9% had blood at the nostrils. However, when horses were examined after only cantering, 38% had blood in the respiratory tract and 2% had blood at the nostrils. Those that bled at the nostrils did not always have the most severe internal bleeding (11).

In another study, 44% of horses had blood in the windpipe within 2 hours of racing, but only 0.8% showed blood at the nostrils. Horses over 5 years old were more likely to have haemorrhaging, possibly because the lungs could not repair damage during continued training and so, over the years, the problem became chronic (12).

One theory is that it is the force transmitted through the legs which damages the blood vessels in the lungs. In humans, lung trauma is common after an impact to the front of the chest, as in a car accident. Such an impact can lead to pulmonary oedema and localised haemorrhaging. In horses, a very large impact force is transmitted through the front legs to the shoulder blades and chest wall, and then to the lungs. The faster the horse is running, the greater this impact force, the more damage is done to the small blood vessels, and the greater the bleeding into the lungs and airway (13).

Stomach ulcers

A study of race horses at Randwick in NSW found that 89% had stomach ulcers. Many had deep, bleeding ulcers within 8 weeks of starting race preparation (14).

In a US study of 67 thoroughbreds, 94% had one or more lesions in the stomach lining. However, of the 42 horses who had raced within the previous 2 months, 100% had ulcers. That the stress of racing increases ulceration was indicated in a previous study by these same researchers - untrained yearlings had very few and only mild lesions. When horses continue to race, their ulcers tend to get worse. When 35 of the original 67 horses were retested a few months after the first test, 100% had lesions, and the average severity was now greater (15).

Apart from the stress of racing, the major reason for the ulcers is intermittent feeding. On pasture, horses spend around 70% of their time grazing, and their stomachs secrete acid constantly. However, when they are permanently confined in stables and fed only at certain times, there is nothing to neutralise the acid and it can damage the stomach lining. The answer is to give horses continuous access to fibrous feed.

Abnormal behaviour

Race horses in training are kept permanently in stables - they can spend more than 20 hours a day in a small stall. This confinement can lead to abnormal behaviour such as wood chewing, box walking (round and round the stall), wind sucking (grasping an object with the teeth and sucking in air), or weaving (swaying the head, neck and forequarters from side to side).

In a Victorian survey, 13% of horses showed 1 or more forms of abnormal behaviour (16). Factors which reduced these abnormalities included more access to forage such as hay, straw bedding, and visual contact with other horses, in other words, opportunities to express more of their natural behaviour (17). Another Australian study acknowledged that abnormal behaviour is related to how horses are kept (18):
" Stereotypies are repetitive, invariant behaviours with no obvious goal or function. In horses, stereotypies are primarily based on feeding and locomotory behaviours, and are associated with management practices that limit foraging behaviour and social contact. Thwarted motivation to perform these behaviours causes frustration which is though to cause the development of stereotypies. "

However, these researchers did not find any differences in cortisol (stress hormone) and beta-endorphin (natural opioid) between horses that regularly carried out stereotypies and normal horses.

References