There are different criteria for racehorses, though one person was interested only in color and priceI always hope that what I write is read, but usually I never know if it is or is not. Occasionally, however, someone takes exception to something I have written and then I hear from them. With both barrels. That is good; at least I know they have read it.
Twice, though, in the last several weeks I have found that at least two others read these words. Each has asked the same question: "Don't you ever work on any good horses?"
Well, yes, I do, but their stories are generally not as interesting and, anyhow, if they are really good, they have already received plenty of ink. And, too, there are a whole lot more bad (or, at least, not good) horses out there.
But over the years, there have been good horses under my care. As I no longer do track work, there are no current stakes horses I work on, but years ago I was the veterinarian for a Kentucky Derby (G1) runner-up. Fortunately for his owner and trainer, he was sound and all I had to do was worm and vaccinate him. And there were several other good stakes horses at one time or another.
Also, I have given early care to a number of foals that went on to glory on the track and to their dams on the farm, but few of their stories are worth the effort to put them on paper.
One horse, though, is worthy of mention.

The desire for a horse
A client-a woman named Charlene-had a farm on which she boarded several mares. Her brother, Charlie, a businessman who knew nothing about horses but enjoyed going to the races, was a frequent visitor to the farm. Eventually, he decided he wanted to own a racehorse of his own.
He talked to Charlene about it. She suggested to him that he attend the yearling sales and buy one there; she also said that he should have me help him.
One day at the farm he approached me about it. Sure, I said, I would be glad to examine any horse he was interested in. "How much do you want to spend?" I asked.
"Seventy-five hundred max," he answered. "I should be able to get a stakes winner for that."
Uh-oh, I thought, we are in trouble. I tried to tell him that, just because he wanted a stakes winner, the chances were pretty good that he would not get one.
"He'll need to be. I want to stand him at stud," he explained.
Oh, boy. "So you're going to buy a colt?"
"A stallion. I want a black stallion."
As the conversation progressed, if that is what you call the direction in which it was going, it was determined that his criteria were only color, sex, and price: a black colt ("stallion") for no more than $7,500. Pedigree and conformation were not important. I told him that he did not need me. His sister could find one for him and he would not have to pay her as he would me.

The black stallion
Sure enough, in September she bought him a "black stallion" for $5,500. I first saw the colt a few days later at the farm. He was officially "dark bay or brown," but he did not miss black by much and he was not a bad-looking individual. The pedigree was borderline, at best-the nearest black type was offset in the second dam-but his dam had produced a couple of winners. Charlie loved him. He immediately named him Dandy Decision (not his real name).
His sister was not too happy with the colt, however. "He's nasty," she said. "He bites and strikes and won't get caught. I'll be glad when he leaves to be broken."
He did, in early October. She related his progress to me periodically-he was still mean as a snake and getting increasingly more dangerous to work around. One day when her brother was at the farm, she told me of a particularly nasty incident: Dandy Decision, now two, had seriously bitten his hot walker.
"Sounds like he needs to be cut," I said.
"Cut?" said Charlie. "What's that?"
"Gelded," I explained. "It'll improve his disposition."
The guy visibly blanched. "Gelded?" he gulped. "You mean ..." He appeared to be searching for the words. "You mean ... his-his ... balls?" He blushed.
"Yes!" snapped Charlene. "He's dangerous!"
"But-but ...," stammered Charlie.
"It's okay, man," I said. "We're talking about his balls, not yours."
He blushed again. "But he can't stand at stud then."
"Look, Charlie, the odds are so much against your horse being successful enough to stand at stud as to be almost unimaginable," Charlene told him.
"He's gonna be a stakes winner!" Charlie insisted. "He'll be a stud!"
Charlene and I looked at each other. She shrugged.
Dandy Decision continued to be a problem. Two of the trainer's employees quit because of him.
Many weeks later, Charlie approached me at the farm. "What's a riggling?" he asked.
"A riggling? You mean 'ridgling.' It's a cryptorchid."
"A what?"
"One testicle is undescended. Because of the heat in the abdominal cavity, the retained testicle produces a higher level of hormones and makes a ridgling even more studdish than a horse with both testes descended. Is that Dandy's problem?"
"That's what the trainer says."
"Then he has to be cut."
Charlie had heard this so often that he no longer recoiled from it; he just got very defensive. "He's going to be a stakes winner and stand at stud!" he insisted for the umpteenth time.
The racing career
Dandy's training continued, and, from the reports I heard, he was getting ranker by the day. He could not work successfully with other horses because he preferred to savage them rather than run. One employee quit. He slapped a groom in the face with a front foot and broke his nose.
Finally, though-somehow-he got to the races in June. He was a crazy horse and so intent on eating the horse and/or jockey next to him that he finished dead last. Three weeks later he ran again and beat one horse, but acted so badly in the gate that the trainer was told not to enter him again until he had been okayed again. The trainer shipped him directly to the farm and told Charlie that that was the last straw. He would not train him anymore.
Charlie was morose. Charlene and I explained again the losing battle he was fighting. But "black stallion at stud" was all we heard.
Charlie sent him to another trainer, who returned him in less than a month. "I don't need horses that much," the trainer told him.
Finally, Charlene's employees refused to work with Dandy, just after I refused one day to worm him. "Life's too short as it is," I told her.
Charlene told Charlie the horse had to go, so, at last, Charlie consented to geld him. He came to realize that Dandy would never win a race if he would not train. We sent him to a local clinic where the surgery was performed. Ninety days later he was a different horse and went back into training with his original trainer.
Dandy Decision raced until he was seven or eight and won seven stakes and nearly $400,000 along the way. At the end, he was still running in allowances. He was a good horse.
Charlie talked forever about what a great stud his "black stallion" would have been. He never forgave Charlene or me for "ruining" him.
"I never should have listened to you," Charlie told us every time Dandy Decision ran.