[Appsolute]

I will always remember the day the “old timer” rancher (and life long horsemen) brought this BEAUTIFUL quarter horse home from the auction. Really nice looking horse, seemed to have decent undersaddle training. Appeared to have good ground manners.

Any way, we are standing around talking, he is grooming his new horse – and runs his hand over the top of the horse’s croup – and that horse IMMEDIATELY DOUBLED BARRELED – boom! Boom! Boom! with both hind legs!

We were both startled, and VERY lucky to happen to be standing to the side of the horse, and not behind it in any way. Rancher says, well I’ll be! And carefully runs his hand over the same area – same response BOOM! Double barreled kick!

He says “well now I know why THIS one was at the auction!” – horse also earned his new name that day. “Bonkers”

Really never know what you are getting into with an auction horse. Especially the fat, sound, pretty ones – maybe it is bad luck, or maybe they have a serious skeleton in the closest.

[Alagirl]

I will always remember the day the “old timer” rancher (and life long horsemen) brought this BEAUTIFUL quarter horse home from the auction. Really nice looking horse, seemed to have decent undersaddle training. Appeared to have good ground manners.

Any way, we are standing around talking, he is grooming his new horse – and runs his hand over the top of the horse’s croup – and that horse IMMEDIATELY DOUBLED BARRELED – boom! Boom! Boom! with both hind legs!

We were both startled, and VERY lucky to happen to be standing to the side of the horse, and not behind it in any way. Rancher says, well I’ll be! And carefully runs his hand over the same area – same response BOOM! Double barreled kick!

He says “well now I know why THIS one was at the auction!” – horse also earned his new name that day. “Bonkers”

Really never know what you are getting into with an auction horse. Especially the fat, sound, pretty ones – maybe it is bad luck, or maybe they have a serious skeleton in the closest.

it's been a while now since somebody suggested to auction goers to pass on the fancy looking steed with clip/trace clip, that seemed to be too good of a deal, since insurance companies sold their 'loss of use' write offs through auction as well...
Or at least not look at them when looking for a future H/J star...

[Nootka]

I worked for a lady that would go to the VA Marshall sale. We would go and look at horses and I was the rider. One mare we got had the nicest jump.. fantasic smaller mare. Another.... OMG she was a hanoverian and we should have known better. Nice bright chestnut sold as green broke. Well, that heffer has the meanest buck I have ever been on. The lady I worked for ended up selling her to a foxhunter older lady as unbroke. I wish I knew what happened to her (I had no part in the sale) both the horse and the lady. I think the mare had a screw loose.. she would get this realllllly weird look in her eye when you would work with her.

[findeight]

None of this may apply to this little mare with owners who hit a rough patch. Or, maybe it does. But don't assume reasons it is at the auction unless you really know.

The best way to know is to develop a relationship ( in real life, not with an Internet "self") with one of the auction riders or handlers, They do 100 head a month? They know what's hit hard times and what's the original nightmare. Auctions are not the root of all evil, they are our creation to deal with the must sells- and if you are armed with knowledge and contacts to tell you what to look for? One owners financial collapse can be you gain if you learn to look thru the stigma and a little hair at an auction.

Just remember back 1200 years ago when some Egyptians dumped chariot horses with issues to a group of invading Romans bidding for the chance to own them. Romans who then shipped them home only to coin tbe term caveat emptor.

[harnessphoto]

I got a pony in training who was like that. Well built, flashy mover, young sound. $200 at Camelot. Turns out he had a wicked, wicked buck and had landed several people in the hospital. With some miles, though, he turned out to be worth his weight in gold. He does first level dressage, jumps 2'6" in his sleep, and has schooled BN XC. He is currently ridden (safely) by teenagers and even loves to hack out on the trails... alone or in groups.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-l7MmK902yy...0/IMG_3829.JPG

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VR-expauNw...0/IMG_9934.JPG

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ee1OVpLo_3...0/IMG_8906.JPG

My guess is the mare either has a behavioral issue or the owners hit desperate financial times.

[enjoytheride]

Here's a link to my blog where I attended a local auction. I've seen everything from skin and bones, rank and dangerous, kid safe, show ring worthy. It depends on what gets brought in. This auction is run by someone who buys everything that people don't bid on and sends them to slaughter.

http://weanieeventer.blogspot.com/20...on-review.html

Notice the price difference, the Camelot horses are at "horse sale to sucker on the internet" prices and not true auction prices.

You have to be really really careful at auctions. You can get a horse that has heaves, or rears, or just one that someone dropped off because they got divorced.

[Gloria]

Six years old, green broke, walk/trot only (no canter yet), needs intermediate/advanced rider, and even though she is really cute, she isn't that great conformation wide. I don't think there is a lot of market out for this kind of horses... $625 seems fair to me...

[danceronice]

Horse for sale to sucker on internet, or horse who was already $50-100 to buy, who's sitting back in the pen eating hay that would be cheap at $8-10/50lbs bale? Remember the house needs to at the MINIMUM double its money plus pay for the food it's eating while he holds it instead of just selling it. (Not allowing for the ones who are $50-100 from New Holland, eating hay, and had gas money to haul it from New Holland.)

[Appsolute]

Biting my lip regarding a previous posters success story, as I know she also came into trouble with one that did come with other "issues".

That said, I used to attend auctions with a woman who would buy cheap, feed them up, I would ride them - and she would resell them (before the horse market tanked). There were some real gems in the rough. MOST had some sort of issue to overcome.

Best horse was a lovely saddlebred (really fell in love with that horse). Heart of gold - he had also put the last trainer on his back in the hospital when he freaked out on the trail. With slow and careful retraining, he became a nice horse.

Cheap / sound / sane and trained is a rare combo at auction.

[Isabeau Z Solace]

They actually sell the horses at Camelot to people that bid on them? That has not been my understanding. He sets the price and you take it or leave it.

There was a regular auction at Camelot for many years BEFORE the 'rescue' folks stepped in an attempt to stop horses from getting on a truck to ship out of the country. That relationship with the 'rescue' folks has been rocky over the years. Very rocky at times.

But Frank has a good deal with them. I have friends who have purchased off of the 'rescue' listings. Some of those worked out well, some were complete wrecks..... I have friends who purchased at their 'select breed sale.' I have attended the auction looking for something and sold horses there in the past. I have also attended the PAS auctions at Frying Pan Park in VA (and one they had in NJ a number of years ago) both shopping and selling.

Over the past 10 years a few other farms in my area have taken cracks at running auctions. But it's a lot of freaking work when you are not a pro at it and not set up to do it regularly.

My experience at all of these is that you can probably sell your horse at these auctions if you are willing to let the price down low enough. Only the few really nice top horses bring any money at these auctions.

The 'rescue' folks do get horses rehomed thru the Camelot sale. BUT they also create a lot of hysteria about what goes on there. The pressure they create means that more than a few people buy horses they did not plan on buying. At times, those horses are looking for a new home again pretty quickly.

I have been on the receiving end of more than one plea from a pro who said "my client 'rescued' this thing from Camelot and it's a buck/rearer we need to dump it ASAP. You know anyone who wants a free horse? She will be happy if I just tell her it 'went to a good home." That is the part that the 'Camelot Weekly rescue' group does not advertise in their regular pleas.

Also, I've got a few friends who regret their mule 'rescue' acquisitions from the Camelot Weekly listings. Apparently mules need to be handled regularly.... Who knew?

[FlashGordon]

The best education I ever got was working at a barn that regularly got in truckloads of 15-20 horses at a time from very low end sales. Man we found some real gems-- horses with no vices who just needed groceries and riding. We found a lot of horses that ended up being useful but had some "quirk" that made them interesting and perhaps undesirable. And we had a lot of horses that were either dead lame, or dead crazy. I saw horses do things that I did not know was possible-- really it is pretty amazing the kinds of evasions they can come up with.

The crazy and/or lame ones ended up back at the sale. The good ones are still owned by the same barn, 12 years later. Many of the in-betweeners found their niche, too, either in the barn's program or sold to private owners. It is amazing the stuff that ends up at auction and you do wonder how the good ones got there... one of my favorites was a big grey WB, 10-12 years old, who had clearly had excellent dressage training and been well loved. We never did find a "hole" so to speak in his brain or his legs! He was in good condition, mane pulled, good weight. Only thing he ever did was give you the hairy eyeball when you mounted, never acted on it. In all the years I've known him he has never, ever put a foot wrong.

Buying an auction horse is not for the faint of heart and you better be a good rider/horseman (or else rich enough to pay someone else to ride and handle it) It helps if you are ok sending the thing back through the sale if it doesn't work out. Or else, have a whole lot of acreage to retire it on. Sad, but true.

[harnessphoto]

It helps if you are ok sending the thing back through the sale if it doesn't work out. Or else, have a whole lot of acreage to retire it on. Sad, but true.

This is why I don't get even the most tempting horses from the auction. I wouldn't have the heart to send them back if they were lame or nuts. I'd end up having a herd of useless horses. Haha.

[Lord Helpus]

However it comes about, Camelot seems to give some nicer horses a chance to get off the conveyor belt to a can. And that is a very good thing. The Mimi story is wonderful.

I don't see anything wrong with the Camelot way of doing business. He is just pinhooking horses (buying with the intent to flip the horse and make a quick profit), It is SOP at TB auctions. The fact that he is pulling them from New Hollard and reselling them is a good thing. Many people are afraid of New Holland, so they don't go. This man is taking resaleable horses and making them available to those (and other) people.

But, if a horse is run through 3 - 4 of his sales and doesn't find a new home, the possibility exists that he will recycle an unwanted horse back into the New Holland hell hole.

Perhaps the people who look askance at Camelot are confusing it with New Holland?

[Laurierace]

I have no problem with Camelot's business model either. I do have a problem with the constant pleas to save the pretty horsies, that flood FB and elsewhere but it is good intentioned I guess. I think people end up with horses that they are unprepared for out of fear of what will happen if they don't save it.

[quarterhorse4me]

This is why I don't get even the most tempting horses from the auction. I wouldn't have the heart to send them back if they were lame or nuts. I'd end up having a herd of useless horses. Haha.

Oh, I live at Hotel California where you can check out but you can never leave! Sadly for the horses, I avoid those places like the plague; otherwise, I would no longer be married!

When we were kids we had an older gentleman, who would buy horses at a local auction, he brought them home and turned the neighborhood kids loose on them. As kids we thought he was a Saint; as an adult I realized he was a great businessman. By the time most of those horses made it back to the auction they were absolutely bombproof and he made a nice profit. He loved to take us with him and put about three of us on the back of a horse as it was run through the Pikesville Auction.

I got a 3 year old mare from him when I was in 4th grade. She lived to be in her late 30's.

[Chestnut Run]

I don't have any personal experience with Camelot, but just wanted to chime in about New Holland. It's really not that bad. Of course it used to be absolutely horrific. But now, the horses have unlimited hay in front of them while they are there, and there is a waterer in front of every horse. Yes, KB do buy here, but you would be amazed at some of the horses that come through there.

Over the past 6 or 7 years, I've bought probably 2 dozen horses out of there to reschool and sell. Of those 23/24 I've only had to take 2 back to resell. One was crippled lame--had obviously been drugged to the gills. And it was a shame, he was a VERY beautiful horse and a lovely mover before the drugs wore off. And sweet. The people I bought him from were there as I was bringing him in, and kind of sighed and bought him back for what I had paid for him+feed/gas/etc for the week. The second horse, I had kept for a month working with her. She was "half-broke" as they say. Had a vicious buck, but an amazing jump in the jump chute--she jumped over 5" easily, and was only 14.1h. I'm a pro, but her buck was out of my ablity even after a month of twice daily ground work sessions. I took her back, but the auction went too fast, I didn't get to see who bought her. I got a call several months later (my info was on all her papers) from the lady who bought her. She ended up in Massachusetts, and they sent her to cowboy for a couple of months and the lady's teenage daughter was riding her and showing her. But, that was TWO out of two DOZEN! Ask me how much money I made on those other 21/22 horses? LOL

I've bought everything from TBs that still had racing plates and poultice on their legs, to a really nice WP QH that loved dressage when she realized she was allowed t move out, a really nice TB/Draft cross that is now doing 3rd level with his owner, some amazing all around horses, a Morgan that had some really nice training at one point but was a 2 on the body scale when I got her, and even some gaited horses that I schooled in basic dressage, fed them up, and resold for trail horses. The key to shopping auctions is to either have a very specific type of horse and price range that you are looking for and be ready to come home with nothing that day, OR be very open minded about what you might buy, but have basic "deal breakers" guidelines in place in your mind. You need to be a really confident horse person/rider, or have someone help you. Auction houses like New Holland can be amazing places to find really nice horses if you know what to look for.

If anybody who hasn't been to New Holland, and wants to see it for themselves, but doesn't want to go alone, I would be happy to take you. They also have a tack sale before the horse auctions, that can have some amazing deals.

Sheila

[Laurierace]

Most people don't have the heart to take a horse back to a place like New Holland knowing what their fate is likely to be. I guess you are fortunate that way.

[FlashGordon]

Chestnut Run, I can appreciate your post, but being able to pick horses out in an auction setting and having the ability to reschool them appropriately is not a skill set the average adult ammie has.

And like Laurie said, it is hard to have to send them back through a sale. I know when I worked for the barn I mentioned earlier, I cried every time the dealer came and loaded the "undesirables" on the trailer to take them back to the low end sale. Some were sweet, but lame. Some were crazy as hell, but you still didn't wish them a bad fate. You also worried about the people buying on the other end-- at this point we'd likely had them at least a few weeks so they'd been fed and groomed and handled, and looked good. You wondered/worried who might take a chance on the pretty horse and find out Tonto liked to flip over, throw himself into walls, buck like a bronco upon mounting, or whatever and get hurt in the process.

Hence my comment that even above skill, one has to have the guts to be able to send them through the sale again, or else a "back forty" to retire them if they prove to be unsuitable/lame/dangerous.

I guess my beef is that the rescue/auction groups on the internet and FB have sort of romanticized the whole notion of buying from a sale. YES there are great horses there but you do have to know what you are looking at, what you are looking for, and be able to deal with whatever surprises might come once horsey gets home. For the average joe rider who boards, it is a large risk.... that sometimes gets lost when you see a picture of a pretty face on AC4H or Camelot or whatever....

[Chestnut Run]

Most people don't have the heart to take a horse back to a place like New Holland knowing what their fate is likely to be. I guess you are fortunate that way.

Just curious what you meant by I'm fortunate that way?

Sheila

[enjoytheride]

I don't know, at the auctions I attend plenty of people purchase their trail horses at an auction. If it doesn't work out they send it back and try another one. Not everybody is willing to keep a lame or unsuitable horse its entire life.