Hm.
I'm not sure that I really believe that giveaway horses 'devalue' other horses in any way that is unique to today or to the last couple years - or even that they devalue sale horses in general. If 'free horses' devalue a given group of horses, the seller probably needs to get into a higher segment of the marketplace.
In slow economic times, it's always hard to sell horses, any horses. Sales have been slow since 9/11, according to a number of people I talk to in the business, but this is at all levels of the business. Sure, there are some 'recession proof buyers', trust fund babies, but even given that, the top segments of the market are slow now too.
There are ALWAYS a lot of freebies around, but there are more during tough times. I'm not sure it really changes the market, except at the lowest segment.
There are always free horses, cheap horses, and poor quality horses. Always.
But nor do I believe, that horses are always homeless or going to the cutters because they are 'inferior'. I don't really believe that, when some top sport horses are winding up at the killers. It's not all about quality.
There are MANY reasons horses wind up at the kill market.
No, most of these don't start by selling their horse to the killers - they sell the horse to 'a nice person', but it's a downhill trip, and if they thought about it, they'd realize they're sending this horse on a one way trip.
An average horse, no training, nothing special about him, he isn't going anywhere good. As a trainer told me, 'I buy him for five hundred dollars, I put two thousand into him, and I have a five hundred dollar horse'. That isn't 100%, of course, but much of the market is about very, very superficial things - desirable color, a cute little head, dumb stuff, that sells horses. And if he ain't that, he ain't appealing.
Neither is the lame one going anywhere good. He has no future either. Sure, you might think 'what a nice person' you're selling him to. Trust me - the only way to be sure what kind of home a horse has, is to keep it yourself.
A great many horses going to the killers are going there because they were injured or lame, and the owner did not want to support them for years. So they sell them 'down the hill' and they just keep going down the hill. The seller conceals the lameness and gets the horse sold, and walks away. The horse gets a one way trip to he**.
A great many other horses are going to the killers because they are ruined by someone who thought they could train a horse 'DIY'. The biggest part of most horse's value, is TRAINING. TRAINING. Many horses, if they are not trained, they have no usefulness to anyone. These folks always don't feel they need lessons, they don't listen to anyone, and when they fail, when the horse embarasses or scares them, it's the horse's fault and away goes the horse. Often simply to save face, and not just money, THAT horse also gets a one way trip to he**. People overestimate their abilities. Guess who pays? The horse.
I'm not really sure the race track is such a huge part of the problem, it is one part, sure but don't over-emphasize it to deflect responsibility from other people. There are far fewer race horses being bred these days. And race horses very often are rather useful for a good many other professions, as long as they don't land in a place where the people are incompetent to retrain them.
I'm not so very sure the 'backyard breeder' is really the whole problem. I'm really not sure I believe that. First of all, there are fewer and fewer backyard people every year. It's getting so a lot of people can't afford to keep a horse, even in a really primitive way. If they don't get vaccines, shoeing, feed them well, fence them well, the chances of them doing so without being noticed are smaller and smaller all the time. A lot of back yarders have gotten closed down. The country is just a little too crowded and a little too expensive.
I've looked back and traced some horses that were in a bad way, and they actually were not from backyard breeders at all - they were from mid-level breeders who had nice to average stock. They weren't poor quality at all. Some had been riding school horses at a girl's school for years - pampered pets. The minute they went lame they were out the door and down the hill. Some others were nice kid's horses, til they got sick or lame, then they had to go.
Those mid level breeders also had a lot of culls, culls they didn't actually CULL, but should have. Babies with crooked legs, babies with temperament so bad they would have been put down by a responsible person before anyone tried to break 'em, things like that. Stock with twisted backs, with severe leg deformities, that are already showing stress even as weanlings....they sell them to someone instead of doing the right thing.
They also sold their stock to people they shouldn't have sold to. People who clearly, obviously, had no business getting a baby, an unbroke horse, and trying to 'DIY'. They are not dumb, these people. They realize it, you can tell from how people talk about horses, how they walk around them, it's not rocket science.
This isn't really a 'someone else's problem'. It's no good pointing the finger at the other guy. Everyone is in this one. Everyone who ever buys or sells or breeds.
And still, yes, the answer to 'should I breed' is always - yes - always - a resounding, 'No you should not'. Really. it is. That's all there really is to that.
And no, to be honest, I don't feel the person who gives the home to the unwanted horse is the 'problem', actually. He's at the end of a very, very long chain, of a great many people who fail to act responsibly.
