As we move further away from the origins of the Straight Egyptian Arabian horse and look forward, what do you see as the most important things which need to be done to maintain a viable and robust herd of Straight Egyptian Arabian horses for future generations? FORBIS - Times change. People change. We are in an age where instant gratification is the nor m. Society is visual. People don’t read; they want pictures, and they don’t want to take the time to study. Education must be made more interesting. Conferences need to think out side the box. There must b e greater interaction bet ween breeders whereby p eople have fun, exchange ideas, and are serious and dedicated in what they want to accomplish - and willing to have the patience and make the sacrifices it takes to b ecome a “breeder.” People have to make educated choices rather than based on emotions and hop eful marketability of putting “t wo champions together” and making a third. Leadership is requisite and new young leaders with the right motives need to emerge. LACY - Well, I answered part of this question in the previous t wo answers in ter ms of gene pool. I also think that finding more popular event s, other than halter shows, is a necessity to keep this horse viable and relevant. This is a difficult task—should we focus on endurance, jumping, dressage, reining, cutting, polo, trail riding or racing? And there are many other sport s to include in that athletic p er for mance list. I think that whatever athletic event s we as a community pursue, we should use horses as tr ue to the Straight Egyptian Arabian typ e as possible, with the p er for mance asp ect as a bonus. Another way to state this is that the athletic endeavors should not b e a place to put poor quality or culled horses to some use. Ideally, the athletic horse would also b e a horse that could succeed in halter comp etition, at least on some level. In 1969 that was often the case; today it is much less common. In fact, it is rare to see a prominent show horse that is also a successful p er for mance horse, or vice15
THE SOURCE Volume 1, Spring, 2014
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