Month: April 2014

Life Lessons from the Herd
by Joe Camp

A book I picked up browsing at the library, because it looked interesting. And was. The author is the man who created the Benji films. I didn\’t know this at first so it confused me when he kept interjecting things about training Benji, without much explanation. Actually, the narrative in general tended to jump around a lot. I did not get a real clear picture of who this guy\’s horses were, or how he acquired them all. It is not a story in that sense. It is a book about how horses ought to live. Or at least that is what I gathered. And the facts in here pretty much amazed me, because it was contrary to how most people seem to keep their horses. I don\’t have horses, nor expect that I ever will, but I\’ve read a lot about them.

And Joe Camp says we do it all wrong. He wrote this book after keeping horses for only two years, and tells of his efforts to make the best life for his horses, what he learned and discovered about that. In particular things that people have been doing for ages, without questioning why or neccessarily applying logic to it. The main thing how to create an emotional bond of trust with the horse using Monty Roberts\’ methods. That horses should not wear shoes- it affects the health of their feet in a tremendous way. That they ought to live outside 24/7, eat off the ground, wander over distance to acquire their food, live in a group of other horses, etc. In short, they are healthier and happier (not displaying any \”vices\”) when living out in the open among their own kind, not shut in a stall most of the day. That we should not attribute what we would find comfortable or even important, to horses. They think and feel differently. He says that horses in the wild are by far healthier and have much longer lifespans than horses kept by people. I was surprised. I had no idea. I found the writing a bit simplistic, and the alternating chapters containing a storyline about a wild horse living through some american history distracting at best, but I could not put the book down because its implications about how we have been treating horses for centuries just astounded me.

There\’s a lot more in here about horses: behavior, how they live in the wild, daily interactions, learning to work with them and so on, but I\’ve just noted the things that really stood out to me.

I just discovered that he wrote a sequel called Born Wild, and I want to read that now too. Bummer my library doesn\’t have a copy yet.

Rating: 3/5      238 pages, 2008

more opinions:
Scratching and Sniffings
Coffee Clutch with Dutch Henry
Curled Up

by Marguerite de Beaumont

Most of the horse books I read are about behavior or people/animal relationships. This one was different, yet I still found it interesting. It\’s written by an Englishwoman who established and ran a stud farm. It\’s all about management. Starts off with the importance of having proper staff, caring for tools, organization, thrift and many other things. Discusses choosing stock, evaluating the points on a horse, breeding and caring for the mares, raising the foals. Health issues, feeding, housing and so on. Some of the views were interesting. She strongly believed in allowing horses to be kept out on pasture as much as possible. Talks about different kinds of training in brief, and about showing horses. There are not many anecdotes here, it is mostly just information. Lots of practical advice. For the right reader, I can see how this book would be very useful, for its good sense more than anything else. In the first chapter the author spectacularly (and quite casually) dated the book for me by quoting Ernest Shackleton, with whom she had held a conversation!

I found this book at a discard sale somewhere.

Rating: 3/5        192 pages, 1953

A Complete Pet Owner\’s Manual
by Dr. Peter Fritzsche

Thought to inform myself more on hamster care, since we have one now. So brought home a few pet books from the library. Learned from the fish experience not to bother with the ones in juvenile non-ficion section. A lot of the info in here was already familiar to me, but I was reminded of some important things- like how stressful it is for the hamster when you rearrange stuff in its home cage. Also learned more about the history of these little pets. They are not really domesticated animals, only having become part of the pet trade since the 1980\’s. In Syria where they come from, people consider them pests. There are twenty different kinds of hamsters, only a few which are suitable to keep as pets. I also didn\’t know that in the wild some hamsters hibernate through the winter, they can make ultrasonic sounds (similar in frequency to bat calls) and that they can become diabetic. I was also unaware that the use of exercise wheel in hamster cages is a controversial topic among pet owners. The book included some material based on research, from observing the behavior of wild hamster in their natural habitat. Some of the more useful information in the book (for me) was a list of natural foods the hamster can eat (including hay, cat grass and kitchen herbs), instructions on how to find/trap a hamster that has escaped its cage, and tips on how to help your child deal with the death of their pet when it reaches old age (at two or three years).

Rating: 3/5    65 pages, 2007