Rhetorical Look at Horse Ads

By MaryKay Ruble

Most horse owners, and certainly all horse lovers, have at some time perused classified ads in search of a horse, or merely scanned the ads as a source of entertainment. Entertainment? Well, yes. Have you seen the lengths that sellers are willing to go to when trying to move “Pretty, Pretty Pony”, (barn name: 3P-CO ), down the road? And all the lingo that goes with it?! I offer my sincerest apologies to anyone who actually had to use the following terms in their ad:

“Project Horse”- This title, used in an ad, never fails to bring visions of a 7^th Grade Science Fair to mind, usually visions involving test tubes and Bunsen burners, crossbreeding and formaldehyde. It makes me shudder! Even though I willingly purchased my own “project horse”, the two of us, along with a trainer, have yet to figure out what exactly the “project” is going to be. Perhaps line-dancing…she does a mean grapevine. Can the two-step be far behind?

“Registered Palomino” – should simply make any horse person want to scream “Which registry?” Registered to vote? Registered in the horse-witness relocation program? Not to mention that the word “registered” contains more letters, important to any typesetter worth his or her ink, than the acronyms PHBA and AQHA together in the case of a (gasp) double-registered animal!

“Ground work started- sweet disposition”- please, can you really tell a horse’s disposition when you haven’t placed 100% of your body weight plus the weight of the average 17” Circle Cook-Y western saddle, over the horse’s spine and asked it, the horse, not the saddle, to do something? In some barns, “sweet disposition” on the ground and “sweet disposition” under-saddle are two totally unrelated ideals!

“Two-year old, anyone can ride, great kids’ horse” –read this one as: “Train wreck looking for a place to happen” Sure, the professional trainer’s kid, a strapping 6 foot tall youth, age 17 ½ years old, rode the horse for 15 minutes in the arena on a lunge line…but, hey, he’s a kid, so the horse qualifies! Some bold sellers toss a couple more words into this ad: “green” and “broke”.

One ad placed recently described a team of driving horses, two mares, directly quoted as “mother/daughter (horses)”. Let’s assume that the seller in this case is, well, a man, for the sake of entertainment value, nothing more. Was he afraid that we might think he was selling his mother- in-law and wife, both capable behind the wheel, for the bargain price of $2500? Do they clean stalls and feed horses?

Smile and have fun where you find it!