An enthusiastic chestnut bursts into the ring, her turquoise and silver native costume gleaming in the lights of the arena as she hand gallops to the cheering of the crowd. Behind her a slew of greys, bays, chestnuts, and a buckskin come streaming in, all ready to put on their performance. The event? The famous Equine Affaire!

Each year, thousands of people flock to the Ohio Expo Center for a weekend of clinics, shopping, and being able to be up close and personal with nearly every single breed of horse. The best of each breed is brought in to demonstrate the various disciplines their horses are known for, and some like to showcase what their breed can do that others weren’t aware was an option. Nearly every horse presented in the demos is also available to be seen back at the public stalls, so the public can meet one on one with the horses that were their favorite.

We’ve been lucky to be invited back a few years in a row with our KAHABA horse, Written In The stars (better known as Izzie). While Izzie enjoys the performance aspect of Equine Affaire, she has always much preferred the interaction with the public. The past two years, our group has upgraded to be in the public stalls to allow more interaction with the crowd. This year, we even took up both sides of an entire aisle to showcase our beautiful Arabians!

Throughout our time there, we were able to change many opinions on our breed. The most common comments were “I’ve heard Arabians are spooky!” “I don’t want an Arabian, they are crazy!” “They are way too small!” All I had to do was ask “do any of these horses look crazy?” Every single one of our horses were greeting the public with ears up and a kind eye. Each ready to meet the smallest child, the oldest adult, and the most timid of all. We had height ranges of 14 hands (true pony size) all the way up to something around 16 hands. We explained how the Arabian was the tent horse for the Bedouins. That their most prized animals were left with the wives and children to protect them, and literally staying in the tent with the family.

With the few years we’ve gone, I’ve honestly lost track of how many people walked away from our horses saying “my next horse is going to be an Arabian!” The beauty of our breed is we allow half Arabians to be registered, which makes them eligible to be shown. This creates an even larger market for our breed. A lot of people don’t understand the Arabian was bred to carry a full grown man while galloping across the desert, so height is often a stopping point for some. Being able to cross the Arabian on a larger horse allows these people who worry about height to find something they are comfortable with. However, there are also MANY large Arabians, which we were very lucky to have a large purebred demo with us in the past!

Equine Affaire is one of the best places to showcase our breed. It’s a very large, sometimes overwhelming environment that takes a special horse to take it all in stride while maintaining a wonderful performance to wow the crowd! So to show a breed that everyone has tried to label as crazy in such a stimulating scene really shows people that the Arabians are far from crazy! What we often tell people is they are just flat out smart!

I do want to take a moment to try and write down all the horses that joined us this year! We had A LOT of horses from Kentucky travel up to Columbus to present, and this event couldn’t have done it without everyone and our fearless leader Jennifer Tucker. – submitted by Katie Lauer.

The horses, along with their disciplines, were:

Written In The Stars (Izzie) – Dressage (KAHABA horse)

Arkynstone (Diego) – Sport Horse In Hand (KAHABA horse)

Groovin’ – Dressage

CF Hot Diggity (Sadie) – Native Costume (In Kentucky)

SRC Laurel Bay (Lolly) – Sport Horse Under Saddle (Kentucky bred)

MSU Supersticious (Sparty) – Native Costume

SF Lil Bit O Texas (Texas) – Jumping (Bridleless!) (In Kentucky)

D Caprio – Halter

Triton PA – Hunter Pleasure

WM Great Scott (Scotty) – Western Pleasure (Kentucky bred)

LC The Cavalier – Ranch Riding (In Kentucky)

Prometheus PA – Ranch Riding

AO Gazelle – Sport Horse In Hand