FEI Assembly Response to "Blue Tongue Dressage" Uproar: Steward Control, Partners with World Horse Welfare for More Studies on Hyperflexion

The follow statement was received today from the Federation Equestre Internationale (FEI) General Assembly meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark. The statement is in response to international furor over a clip of videotape from a warmup arena at an FEI World Cup dressage competition last month, as featured on this blog.

The clip has become known around the world as "blue tongue dressage" and refers to a horse ridden harshly (in the opinion on many people) on the curb rein so that the horse's tongue turned blue, as seen when it flopped out of the horse's mouth for a moment and just happened to be caught on video. The tight frame exhibited in in the video is known as hyperflexion of the neck, formerly called "rollkur" or "bite the chest".

Here is the exact statement from the FEI, released today:

"The FEI condemns all training methods and practices that are contrary to horse welfare. The welfare of the horse has always been and will always be at the core of every aspect of the Federation’s work as the international governing body for equestrian sport.

"During its meeting in Copenhagen (DEN) on 15 November, the FEI Bureau had extensive discussion on the issue of hyperflexion. The FEI Bureau insists that, with immediate effect, stewards in all disciplines use the disciplinary measures available to them, such as verbal warnings and yellow warning cards *, to prevent any infringement of FEI rules.

"The FEI is now engaged with World Horse Welfare, a leading international equestrian organisation, in addition to continued consultation with riders, trainers, officials and veterinarians to thoroughly research the issues. The further education of stewards will also continue to ensure that welfare issues at FEI events are dealt with promptly and professionally.

"The FEI acknowledges and welcomes public opinion and will continue to ensure that the welfare of the horse, which has been central to this debate, will remain its absolute priority.

"* If a rider receives two yellow warning cards within one year, he / she is automatically suspended for a period of two months immediately following the event at which the second yellow warning card was received."

The Jurga Report will have more on this important news story as more information is released. Please check back.

Blue Tongue Dressage: British Horse Society Protests to FEI President, HRH Princess Haya

by Fran Jurga | 3 November 2009 | The Jurga Report at Equisearch.com

It's not always easy being a blogger. On Friday, October 23, I took a deep breath and posted on this blog a video I had been sent by a colleague in Europe. I posted the video and simply asked people what they saw, and explained the furor that the video was causing in Europe. Click here to read that post.

American dressage fans had a similar reaction. I didn't know if the story would escalate or just go away, as so many things do. "Blue tongue dressage" became one of those viral news stories that took on a life of its own. It was the horse world's equivalent of "balloon boy". Everyone knew immediately what you were talking about when you said "blue tongue" at the barn.

And they chimed in with their take on a few minutes of video taped half a world away.

It's hard to think of the sport of dressage as having a grass roots level--it's more like a carefully-laid strip of seeded sod--but it has been activated, with opinions running from "leave the professionals alone" to "boycott Rolex and other FEI sponsors". A white-hat protest has been proposed for the 2010 Alltech World Equestrian Games in Kentucky; after all these years of preparation, will the Games be shrouded in controversy?

And last week at the Global Dressage Forum in Holland, the FEI representative announced that the world body of horse sport would be looking into the matter. On Monday, this statement was released to the media:

"The FEI is aware of the video filmed at the FEI World CupTM Dressage qualifier at Odense (DEN) and posted on YouTube. FEI’s main concern has always been and will always be the welfare of the horse. We are taking the issues raised in the video and in the comments made by members of the public on social media and by email very seriously and have opened a full investigation. The conclusions of this investigation will be made public in due course."

The problem, if there is one, is that the FEI has already looked into rollkur, or hyperflexion, and decided that there is no concrete evidence that it harms the horse. They do advise that it not be maintained continuously over a long period of training, as has been claimed that the rider in Denmark did in the presence of stewards at an FEI World Cup qualifier. There are no hard and fast rules about rollkur, only a vague advisory.

Click here to read the FEI's advisory on hyperflexion/rollkur.

But the forthright British took things a step further this week with a formal letter to HRH Princess Haya, president of the FEI. It is laced with classic British understatement and yet expresses determination to uphold their reputation as defenders of the welfare of the horse.

Your Royal Highness,
You cannot be unaware of the disquiet – not to say anger – which has arisen following the depiction on Epona TV of Patrik Kittel’s horse in apparent distress as it competed in Odense on 18th October.

As you are doubtless aware, in terms both of membership and breadth of interest, The British Horse Society (BHS) is the largest single equestrian organisation in the UK. Our examinations system, and the training and education which underpin it, have earned for the Society international recognition.

No less important is our work to promote the highest standards of equine welfare, which suffuses every facet of our work. I am pleased to report that our commitment to equine welfare is shared by all our colleagues within the British Equestrian Federation, although on this occasion I am writing solely on behalf of the BHS.

Let me acknowledge straight away that no representative of the BHS was present in Denmark to witness the horse’s apparent distress, nor do we have the benefit of a contemporaneous veterinary report. Moreover, we do not for one minute suggest that Patrik Kittel at any time sought to treat his horse other than with proper care and respect.

Nevertheless, in matters of equine welfare, the precautionary principle must always apply: if, despite the absence of conclusive proof, the wellbeing of a horse is called into question, there will exist a strong moral obligation on the FEI to respond immediately.

In our view, the concerns so widely expressed are reasonable and therefore deserving of an urgent two-part investigation: first, an inquiry into the treatment of this particular horse on this particular occasion; and, second, a broader inquiry into the ethics and consequences of hyperflexion.

In this second aspect The British Horse Society stands ready to assist the FEI in any way it can.

Please note that we pass no comment on the aesthetics of seeing a competition horse contorted in a way it never appears to choose for itself when in its natural state. Our concern is only to speak out when we believe that the welfare of horses demands it.


Yours sincerely,
Patrick Print FBHS
Chairman, The British Horse Society

This carefully crafted letter was delivered to Princess Haya just two weeks before the opening of the 2009 FEI General Assembly. Will other countries take similar polite but firm first steps? Will the USA speak up on this issue?

By pure coincidence, the FEI's meeting will take place in Denmark, where the Blue Tongue videotaping took place.

Something tells me we haven't heard the last of blue tongue dressage.

Blue Tongue Dressage Outrage Goes Viral and Global; Rollkur Opponents See Abuse on Video, What Do You See?

by Fran Jurga | 23 October 2009 | The Jurga Report at Equisearch.com



It was just a video clip posted on YouTube. But in a few days, 19,835 people all over the world had seen it.

It was just a group page on FaceBook. But within 24 hours, 841 people had joined it, again from all over the world.

The viewers and Facebookers are gawking at the four minutes of warmup arena action you see posted here. This latest incident in the moral outrage of the rank-and-file horse sports supporter has surpassed the snarly debates over eventing safety, Isabell Werth medicating her horse and Big Brown (who?) losing the Triple Crown combined. And it did this only by showing a horse's discolored tongue, swishing tail and unnaturally bent neck. They took it from there.

This video clip was shot at an FEI World Cup Dressage qualifier in Europe last week. Videographers Luise Thomsen and Julie Taylor from Epona TV were surprised that a rider at this level schooled this stallion for as long as two hours in a hyperflexion frame.

They grabbed the camera when they noticed that the horse's swollen tongue had turned blue. The horse's lips were curled and apparently even the rider could see it, as he stopped and put the horse's tongue back into its mouth.

Apparently the schooling ring steward did not see anything wrong with this rider's method.

Click here to read the full story about this videotape and about the effects of the curb bit of a double bridle on the horse's tongue.

FEI rules discourage what is called hyperflexion, rollkur or "bite the chest"--riding with the horse in an overbent neck and head position for a prolonged period of time. The practice is the subject of last year's best-selling horse book, Tug of War: Classical vs Modern Dressage by German veterinarian Gerd Heuschmann.

Rollkur first made the news a few years ago when Dutch Olympic dressage champion Anky Van Grunsven was videotaped in a warmup arena riding her horse in the allegedly abusive manner. A German dressage magazine pumped up the volume and an international outcry concerned the FEI that it was not protecting the welfare of horses at its competitions.

A panel of world-class biomechanics and equine anatomy experts met in Switzerland on January 31, 2006 to discuss the problem with the FEI, who concluded that there was no evidence that rollkur caused direct harm to the horse, stating in a press release, "There was clearly none evidence that no structural damage is created by this training exercise, when used in the right way by expert riders." They did add, however, that it could cause harm if used incorrectly by inexperienced riders and that hyperflexion cannot be self-maintained by the horse for an extended period of time.

Since last spring, Heuschmann's DVD If Horse's Could Speak has been on sale and goes even further than the book to tie overschooling, disconnected riding and especially overflexion/rollkur to unsoundness and musculoskeletal injuries in dressage horses. But it is very, very hard to prove the dots are connected.

In a special interview with Olympics champion Anky Van Grunsven on Epona TV, filmed at the same FEI World Cup qualifier as the blue tongue, Anky defends her use of hyperflexion as a training method, saying that she uses it for a few minutes at a time, then lets the horse relax, but that she only uses it on her advanced horses, and horses that are strong enough to do it, and for whom it is easy to go to that frame.

In other words, she paraphrased the parameters under which rollkur is more or less allowed as a warmup method by the FEI.

The FEI can only rule on what has been proven by research, even though some things seem very logical. "Welfare" and "comfort" may not mean the same thing in translation...or in a court of law.

But after this weekend, stewards may be more aware of blue tongues in the warmup rings. The blue tongue dressage virus will make sure of that. No one will be immune to this one.

Thanks to Romy from my dressage group for infecting me with the blue tongue virus and to EponaTV for allowing the video to be embedded here.

Blue Hors Matine as Broodmare? We'll Always Have Aachen...and YouTube

by Fran Jurga | 16 August 2009 | The Jurga Report

Make it nine million and one.

Say it isn't so!

European news sources, including our friends at London's Horse and Hound, are reporting that the Danish Blue Hors Stud has decided to retire the spectacular mare Blue Hors Matine to their breeding program.

I'm sure many others, like me, were waiting for this horse to make a huge comeback for the 2010 FEI Alltech World Equestrian Games in Kentucky. The Alltech European championships later this month at England's Windsor Castle would have been the natural re-entry point but the decision was made instead to retire the mare.

A van loading accident at the 2007 FEI World Cup in Las Vegas led to a long layoff from competition for the gray mare. Now, after two years, the decision has been made to remove her from competition consideration altogether.

Matine captivated the world in 2006 when she literally danced her way around Aachen's huge arena in the World Equestrian Games freestyle with rider Andreas Helgstrand.

Television commentator Richard Davison ran out of superlatives. A star was born, albeit a star whose light shown in a most unusual way: A virtual unknown to mainstream dressage fans around the world, Matine became a YouTube star, possibly the fist viral equine celebrity.

Matine's video has been viewed more than 9 million times. (Stacy Westfall's viral reining video, by comparison, is considered huge at 300,000 views.) I'm pretty sure that the video was illegally posted from an off-the-air recording by an Australian television viewer named Dan. The rest is history.

After all this time, I was finally get the pronunciation memorized on her name. It is "mah-teen-AYE". I only know that because, like so many others, more than one of those nine million views was mine.

Have a nice life, Matine. We'll see you on YouTube, again and again and again.

No-Clone Zone: AQHA Postpones Cloning Decision (Again)

by Fran Jurga | 9 March 2009 | The Jurga Report at Equisearch.com

Clones are knocking on the door of the American Quarter Horse Association, seeking legitimate places in the largest breed registry in the world. "Go away! Come back next year!" came the cry from within at yesterday's AQHA committee meeting. (Fran Jurga/Puppet Tool software image)

Yesterday was billed as the Day of Decision at the annual convention of the American Quarter Horse Association in San Antonio, Texas. The issue: the AQHA's Stud Book and Registration Committee was scheduled to vote on the inclusion of clones (genetic replicas via engineered reproduction and DNA replacement) in the definition of an American Quarter Horse, opening the door for clones to be eligible for registration.

First reports from the San Antonio meeting indicate that a motion to postpone the decision for another year was passed by the committee. However, I believe the committee's recommendation needs the official stamp of the larger organization, as well as the appointment of a task force to further study the implications of registering clones, leading up to another airing at the 2010 AQHA Convention.

This story is not dead. Just like the late great Quarter horses who have been cloned, the story keeps having new life breathed into it. Over the past 10 years, the AQHA has progressed (or regressed, according to your political view) to allow frozen and fresh artificial insemination...then survived a lawsuit that opened the door to allow embryo transfer...and finally winds up with genetic clones on the doorstep of the registry office.

Clones may be the ultimate and most expensive "unwanted horses" in the universe, at least temporarily, when it comes to registration-paper legitimacy. That will surely change, even as multiple clones of champion cutting horse Smart Little Lena grow up in their "equus non grata" state of limbo. Other clones are replicas of favorite horses engineered for a fee for individual owners.

Clones are technically allowed to compete in cutting and reining, but the whole point of cloning Smart Little Lena or the mare Royal Blue Boon is not to compete, but to breed. And breed. And breed, thus infusing the breed with the bloodlines of champions who would otherwise have limited offspring. The number of foals sired by Smart Little Lena could be infinite in the future....as could be the number of exact genetic replicas of Smart Little Lena himself standing at stud all over the world!

Cloning is wonderful technology and yesterday's decision gives one hope that when the AQHA allows clones to join the registry--which surely seems inevitable--it will do it with a plan that is responsible and fair.

The much bigger story here is that once the AQHA allows cloning, other breed registries will surely follow suit. The framework and perhaps welfare of our entire horse world depends on the AQHA to lead the way, if it decides to, in a way that will encourage other breeds to be responsible in their policies and ensure the safety and welfare of horses and the viability of breeds and breeding.

You know what the critics are asking: Are we ready for offshore breeding laboratories, unauthorized DNA capture, and lawsuits over the implications of mitochondrial DNA? Are we entering the age of Dr. Frankenhorse or a new era of genetic analysis and engineering that may be able to better all breeds?

Something I've been wondering: Couldn't the cloned AQHA halter horses be manipulated so they have feet of proportionate size to their bodies?

If I was to give advice to the AQHA, I'd suggest that for every dollar a clone costs, an equal amount be put into research to predict, analyze and remove threats of genetic disorders from the breed. The same energy that figured out how to select a coat color for a clone could certainly go a long way on the health front. HYPP and HERDA may be only the tip of an iceberg, and those who want to register and breed clones should be responsible for any headaches and heartaches their engineered horses introduce to the bloodlines of the horses the rest of us just want to own and ride.

Stay tuned for more news!

Update: After this post was published, a press release from AQHA confirmed that the vote had been postponed to the 2010 convention and that a task force had been formed to continue to investigate how cloning might impact the breed, and vice versa. Click here to read the official announcement from the AQHA.