PBS "My Bionic Pet": Putting Hooves and Paws and Tails Where They Weren't

On Wednesday, April 9, the PBS documentary series Nature will focus on pets who are missing parts. The star of the show will be the all-time star of this blog, Molly the (Three-Legged) Pony, but you'll also meet Chris P, the piglet who lives in a wheelchair or Mr. Stubbs, the alligator who needed a tail, and a pack of pooches who are running with the best of them but without as many legs.

Vote Online for "The Shoe" in HRTV's Santa Anita Horseracing Film Festival!

Santa Anita Park in California and HRTV, the all-horse sports network for North America, have joined forces to run the first-ever non-fiction documentary competition at a racetrack. “A Day at the Races,” is open to film students and filmmakers who have made a short Santa-Anita based film.

One of the entries is called "The Shoe" and is more or less about horseshoeing and features some nice footage and comments by glue-on shoe innovator Wes Champagne, who shoes horses at Santa Anita.

"The Shoe" was made by film student Alex Ehecatl from Mexico.

If you like this little segment, here's what you need to do:
1. Watch the film.
2. Go to the film festival link and vote for it! (http://www.hrtv.com/filmfestival/)
3. (We think you can vote more than once but don't tell anyone we said that.)

You can see other films in the competition at that link as well. The catch is that the online voting ends this weekend, so please vote soon! Or, better yet, now!

“A Day at the Races” entries are being judged by a panel of racing and entertainment professionals. The competition offers a first prize of $10,000, and an additional $10,000 first prize will be awarded to the winner through this on-line poll. 

Who's Alex Ehecatl and why did he make this film? Here's what he said in an email earlier this week:

"I'm a student and I liked horses. My uncle used to be a well-known horseshoer in México and he inspired me to do this documentary. I wrote the script.

"This is just five minutes (of the film) and depending of how well-received is this version and how much money I can raise to finish it. I'm planning in doing a larger version with more information and more people from the horseshoeing world. Thanks for your interest."

Can you invest a minute or so to vote for Alex's film? Thanks!

© Fran Jurga and Hoofcare Publishing; Fran Jurga's Hoof Blog is a between-issues news service for subscribers to Hoofcare and Lameness Journal. Please, no use without permission. You only need to ask. This blog may be read online at the blog page, checked via RSS feed, or received via a digest-type email (requires signup in box at top right of blog page). To subscribe to Hoofcare and Lameness (the journal), please visit the main site, www.hoofcare.com, where many educational products and media related to equine lameness and hoof science can be found. Questions or problems with this blog? Send email to blog@hoofcare.com.  

Follow Hoofcare + Lameness on Twitter: @HoofcareJournal

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I have not received any direct compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the brands, products, or services that I have mentioned, other than Hoofcare Publishing. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

Farrier Model Dean Dibsdall Wins British Reality TV Show; Next Project Is Documentary of His Life Shoeing Horses

Farrier Dean Dibsdall has been in the news in England lately for his victory in a reality last-man-standing show called "Playing It Straight".  He also works as a model and next month will be the star of a documentary about...himself. (Photo courtesy of Horse and Country TV)

You never know who your friends are. In this case, a perfectly nice farrier from England turned out to be have a second career as a model and, I found out, was even a finalist in the Mr England competition.

And the next thing I knew, he was on a reality show similar to the USA's "The Bachelorette" but with a twist--some of the eligible bachelors were gay. But which ones? And was Dean gay or straight?

I honestly didn't know which he was, but I was cheering him on from the USA anyway.

Dean Dibsdall DipWCF ended up winning the "Playing It Straight" show (was it his burnt hoof after-shave?) and a lot of money. Now the British network Horse and Country is planning a documentary about what it's like to be a farrier celebrity--they'll even follow him when he competes in the farrier events at the National Shire Show in a few weeks.

When I played "do you know..." with Dean, I found that he could rattle off at least three names familiar to American farriers: he lives next to Billy Crothers; he was apprentice to Carl Bettison's second apprentice, Daniel Harman; and he has worked for James Blurton in the past. That seems like the start of a great resume, or like meeting your second cousin, twice-removed, for the first time.

In the farriery world, Dean is four years into his career and shoes horses around Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire, all north of London.

Dean Dibsdall really does shoe horses. "Being a farrier and working with horses is the most important thing in my life," he said in an interview. (photo courtesy of Dean DIbsdall)

It seems a long way around, but if the documentary comes out as Dean describes it, it could well be a great promotion for the farrier profession, as has been his smiling face on the reality show these past weeks.

Let's all celebrate his success and wish him well and  hope that we can figure out a way to see the documentary in the USA.


Here's the press release from Horse and Country TV, and some information from the Hoof Blog files about other farrier models:

Dean Dibsdall, winner of Channel 4’s Playing It Straight series, is to be the subject of a documentary on Horse & Country TV (Sky Channel 280), it was announced today.

The hour-long show, Dean Dibsdall: Model Farrier, will be shown on the British channel in April.

Horse & Country’s cameras will follow Dean as he deals with his new-found fame while working as a specialist in horse hoof care. As well as being a full-time farrier Dean, 28, from Leighton Buzzard, also works as a part-time model. He won the title of "Mr Bedfordshire" last year and represented the county in the final of the "Mr England" competition.

“I’m very excited to be doing this show with Horse & Country TV,” says Dean, ”being a farrier and working with horses is the most important thing in my life.

“I hope fans of Playing in Straight will tune in and be really entertained while at the same time experience a world they wouldn’t normally get the chance to encounter.”

Dean's not the first British farrier
model; eventing specialist
Jamie Goddard was model for the
TeamGBR clothing line a few years ago.
He shoes for riders like Australia's Paul
Tapner, winner of Badminton Horse
Trials in 2010.
(Jamie Goddard photo)

Jonathan Rippon, Head of Programming at Horse & Country, adds: “Dean is a complete natural on camera and has a hugely engaging personality which will make him a hit both with our regular viewers and those new to H&C.”

The show will highlight the tremendous variety of Dean’s professional life including working with miniature Shetland ponies, alongside vets to help lame horses, visiting a range of livery yards and taking part in a farrier competition at the Shire Horse Show as well as following his new experiences as a fledgling celebrity.

Dean has been a farrier for four years, following in a family tradition that has seen three of his cousins become farriers too. After setting his heart on working with horses Dean underwent more than four years of intensive training at college as well as shadowing a qualified farrier.

“I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do when I left school so one day went out with one of my cousins who was already a farrier and I just took to it straight away,” says Dean, ”It’s a physical job and you get to work with animals outdoors in the fresh air – plus you’re your own boss.”

Working in such close proximity to horses isn’t without its dangers but Dean says: “I’ve had a few broken bones and cracked ribs but you don’t mind when you’re doing something you love.”

British farrier Nick Partridge was the star of a
full-page ad for Herring shoes in the magazine
 for the 2011 Ascot race meet. I thought it
was a horseshoe ad. Fun to see such a well-
shod farrier!

On Monday night British television viewers saw Dean win the E4 network's reality TV series  “Playing It Straight” in which straight and gay guys competed to win the heart of female contestant Cara.

If one of the gay contestants had successfully deceived Cara and been picked by her, he would have won the show’s £50,000 cash prize. Because she chose Dean, one of the genuinely straight contestants, the two of them split the prize, receiving £25,000 (approximately $40,000US) each.

The documentary has been commissioned by Jonathan Rippon, Head of Programming at H&C TV, and is being made in-house at H&C by the production team responsible for other series on the channel such as Top Marks, When Nicki Met Carl and magazine show Rudall’s Round Up.

Refresh your anatomy knowledge with a high-tech, easy-to-use animated
3-D lecture series and user-operated leg model.  Order online!

© Fran Jurga and Hoofcare Publishing; Fran Jurga's Hoof Blog is a between-issues news service for subscribers to Hoofcare and Lameness Journal. Please, no use without permission. You only need to ask. This blog may be read online at the blog page, checked via RSS feed, or received via a digest-type email (requires signup in box at top right of blog page). To subscribe to Hoofcare and Lameness (the journal), please visit the main site, www.hoofcare.com, where many educational products and media related to equine lameness and hoof science can be found. Questions or problems with this blog? Send email to blog@hoofcare.com.  

Follow Hoofcare + Lameness on Twitter: @HoofcareJournal

Read this blog's headlines on the Hoofcare + Lameness Facebook Page

 

Disclosure of Material Connection: I have not received any direct compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the brands, products, or services that I have mentioned, other than Hoofcare Publishing. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

New Bolton Center: "The Rest of the Story" with Radio Legend Paul Harvey

The University of Pennsylvania built a world-class equine hospital and research center outside Philadelphia in the 1950s. "New Bolton Center" is now a household word to Hoofcare and Lameness readers, but it was big news when the clinic opened almost 70 years ago. It was such big news that legendary radio commentator Paul Harvey had to tell America "the rest of the story".  The equine surgery unit is known worldwide for its innovative anesthesia-recovery pool.

Update: I am sorry that the original recording of the 1950s Paul Harvey radio program describing the futuristic wonders of the Penn Vet New Bolton Center equine hospital is no longer available.

It seems like a long time ago, but as soon as I hear the voice, I'm taken back in time. At our house, there was a radio on the kitchen counter. It came on when a blizzard or a hailstorm was predicted. It came on when Something Big happened in the news. It told me that Martin Luther King had been assassinated, that Nixon had resigned, that Secretariat had been syndicated and retired to stud. 

That radio played right through mealtimes and while our bodies were fueled, our brains were alternately bombarded and enriches with the news of the world and, on summer afternoons, the Red Sox games. It came on at breakfast, lunch and dinner: the news seemed especially important at lunch.

Lunchtime was especially important. My father came home from his office to check the farm every day at noon, and lunch was on the table at exactly 12. We might talk right through the news but a few minutes after noon, the room went silent and we all listened for about four minutes. A man's voice filled the kitchen and he told us a story.

Radio storyteller Paul Harvey

It wasn't the stories he told, but how he told them. Many of the stories were about everyday things. He had a sing-songy voice, though, and the story was always a puzzle. He'd talk in a staccato rhythm that almost hypnotized you. 

On and on he rambled and then, bam! He'd hit you with an ending you weren't expecting. And every day's story ended the same way: "And....now...you...know the REST of the story..."

We'd look at each other. Usually, none of us had any inkling what the rest of the story was until Paul Harvey let the storyteller's cat out of his bag.

I don't think I was listening the day he described the medical wonders of the University of Pennsylvania's new futuristic medical center--with the punch line that it was horses, not people--but I know my family would have cheered.

How did he come up with those stories, day in and day out? I don't know, but if he was writing now, he'd surely be a blogger.

I didn't grow up with the tradition of radio as my primary source of news and entertainment; I was a product of television (Thanks, Bullwinkle! Thanks, Mr. Ed!), to be sure, but I think there must have been such magic to gather around the radio in the days before television and be carried away by the talented people who finessed that medium.

There's a little of it left today, and you can hear it on Christmas when NPR broadcasts the radio play of Dickens' A Christmas Carol, or on some of the great NPR, APR and BBC radio shows like This American Life.

I experienced what I call one of my "Paul Harvey moments" when I listened to a radio documentary tribute to John Lennon on the anniversary of his death last December. I was driving through New Jersey on my way home from the AAEP Convention, serenaded by song after song by John Lennon. It took a while before I realized that what I was listening to was actually a documentary. As I continued to listen, the documentary ended and the broadcast went live.

I started to listen a little more closely.

Then it happened. At precisely the moment when John Lennon had been shot outside his Manhattan apartment 30 years earlier, I realized I was leaving New Jersey and climbing up the ramp onto the George Washington Bridge. I'd be driving over the Hudson River, with the lights of all of New York and New Jersey twinkling as far as the eye could see.

New York's George Washington Bridge

I knew that people would be gathering in Central Park's Strawberry Fields far below me. I didn't know, though, that Yoko Ono would light two candles on the windowsill of the dark apartment where she and Lennon had lived, as a signal to the fans standing vigil in the park. But I do believe that at just that moment, when the radio played Give Peace a Chance and I was crossing the middle of the span, all the lights of Manhattan below me blinked off and then came back on.

I had to keep driving. You don't take your eyes off the road for more than a second on the George Washington Bridge. You can't stop and ask the guy in the toll booth, "Did that really happen?"

A minute later I was in the Bronx, rocketing toward Connecticut and home.

I don't know what will happen one week from today, on September 11, to mark the tenth anniversary of the World Trade Towers attack and disaster. But I wish I had the bird's eye view from the top of that bridge, and I wish Paul Harvey was still alive to talk to me from that little radio, so he could tell me the rest of the story.

I think I'll turn off the television that day, and turn on the radio, so I can really hear what someone has to say. Radio has a power all its own, as I've known all my life but just realized now.

 TO LEARN MORE

Paul Harvey's obituary in TIME Magazine
University of Pennsylvania's New Bolton Center web site

© Fran Jurga and Hoofcare Publishing; Fran Jurga's Hoof Blog is a between-issues news service for subscribers to Hoofcare and Lameness Journal. Please, no use without permission. 

  

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I have not received any direct compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the brands, products, or services that I have mentioned, other than Hoofcare Publishing. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

Buck Brannaman Documentary: Real Life Horse Whispering at Robert Redford's Sundance Film Festival

Congratulations to Cindy Meehl and Cedar Creek Productions. Their documentary "Buck" was not only selected to be shown at the prestigious Sundance Film Festival this week in Park City, Utah--it has won the Audience Award!

Buck chronicles the horse training phenomenon Buck Brannaman. Or should I say non-training. Or anti-training. Or alt-training.

Whatever you call what Buck Brannaman does, you can be sure that this film will spread Buck's non-violent horse handling word.

It will spread it around the world, as a matter of fact. The documentary was acquired by Sundance Selects for distribution in North America; it was also picked up for theaters in Australia and New Zealand by Madmen Entertainment.

I'm sure a lot of blog readers who've been around the horse world for a while will see the irony in this story. Buck Brannaman was the inspiration for the 1998 Nicholas Evans novel, The Horse Whisperer. When that novel was made into a film, it starred and was directed by Robert Redford. Technically, I guess you could say, Robert Redford played Buck Brannaman.

And Robert Redford is the man behind the Sundance Film Festival.

And so it goes.

Buck Brannaman and Robert Redford at the Sundance Film Festival last week. Buck's the star of the film this time. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images North America, mirrored from Zimbio.com)

The trailer gives a hint at how the film approaches who Buck Brannaman is and what he does. Once it gets to the theaters (unless you happen to be in Utah this week), take people to see it. Horse people, non-horse people, just people. They might learn a lot, so might those of us who think we know it all already.

© Fran Jurga and Hoofcare Publishing; Fran Jurga's Hoof Blog is a between-issues news service for subscribers to Hoofcare and Lameness Journal. Please, no use without permission. You only need to ask. This blog may be read online at the blog page, checked via RSS feed, or received via a digest-type email (requires signup in box at top right of blog page). To subscribe to Hoofcare and Lameness (the journal), please visit the main site, www.hoofcare.com, where many educational products and media related to equine lameness and hoof science can be found. Questions or problems with this blog? Send email to blog@hoofcare.com.
 

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