Racehorse Monzante has been euthanized by the horse's trainer. Jackie Thacker, the trainer who opted to euthanize grade I winner Monzante, said he made the call when it was apparent the gelding was in a state of suffering following a breakdown in a July 20 claiming race at Evangeline Downs Racetrack & Casino.
Even though the state veterinarians initially stated the horse’s injuries might be ‘salvageable’, they let the horse’s vet and trainer examine him further and make the call.
After speaking to the state vets, Thacker said, “So we loaded the horse into the trailer, took him back to the barn, cut the bandage off his ankle, and you could see the sesamoids were shattered. I don’t think there was any possible way they could have put that back together. My vet said, ‘I just don’t see it happening, Jackie.’ So we had to make the decision.”
“My vet and I talked about it and he said, ‘If we try to save him, there are still a lot of things that could go wrong with infection, and the fact some surgeries don’t hold,’ ” commented Thacker after having spent between $10,000-$20,000 on previous cases similar to this one, where the horses ended up euthanised.
“The money (involved in attempting to save the horse) wasn’t as much the concern as having to see Monzante suffer,” Thacker continued. “He had become like one of our family members. He was really my wife Geraldine’s horse. Every time she went by the barn she brought him a carrot or apple, so she was really upset about it. We didn’t want to see him suffer anymore. We thought we were helping him more than hurting him by going ahead and putting him down.”
Although this even has brought up once again backlash through social media about horse retirement and safety in racing, the Louisiana-based trainer believes there’s nothing else he could have done for the horse. He had already claimed the horse to have had a suspensory ligament injury last May, but it appeared to have healed with no apparent need for time off racing, “He must have gotten (the suspensory injury) years ago; when it first happens you give them rest, but by the time I got him, it didn’t have any heat in it, it wasn’t sore.”
© equnews.com/ TheHorse
Racehorse Monzante has been euthanized by the horse's trainer. Jackie Thacker, the trainer who opted to euthanize grade I winner Monzante, said he made the call when it was apparent the gelding was in a state of suffering following a breakdown in a July 20 claiming race at Evangeline Downs Racetrack & Casino.
Even though the state veterinarians initially stated the horse’s injuries might be ‘salvageable’, they let the horse’s vet and trainer examine him further and make the call.
After speaking to the state vets, Thacker said, “So we loaded the horse into the trailer, took him back to the barn, cut the bandage off his ankle, and you could see the sesamoids were shattered. I don’t think there was any possible way they could have put that back together. My vet said, ‘I just don’t see it happening, Jackie.’ So we had to make the decision.”
“My vet and I talked about it and he said, ‘If we try to save him, there are still a lot of things that could go wrong with infection, and the fact some surgeries don’t hold,’ ” commented Thacker after having spent between $10,000-$20,000 on previous cases similar to this one, where the horses ended up euthanised.
“The money (involved in attempting to save the horse) wasn’t as much the concern as having to see Monzante suffer,” Thacker continued. “He had become like one of our family members. He was really my wife Geraldine’s horse. Every time she went by the barn she brought him a carrot or apple, so she was really upset about it. We didn’t want to see him suffer anymore. We thought we were helping him more than hurting him by going ahead and putting him down.”
Although this even has brought up once again backlash through social media about horse retirement and safety in racing, the Louisiana-based trainer believes there’s nothing else he could have done for the horse. He had already claimed the horse to have had a suspensory ligament injury last May, but it appeared to have healed with no apparent need for time off racing, “He must have gotten (the suspensory injury) years ago; when it first happens you give them rest, but by the time I got him, it didn’t have any heat in it, it wasn’t sore.”
© equnews.com/ TheHorse