Durban - If it looks like a pony, then it is a pony. Right?
Wrong, says the Supreme Court of Appeal, which was recently tasked with resolving a dispute over who had sired an equine named Fire High Explosive. Was it the hackney pony which had been hand-picked for the job, or was it a hackney horse which, it was speculated, broke into mom Fire Carnation's pen and did the deed without anyone's knowing.
By all accounts, Fire High Explosive (FHE) was an impressive show "pony" and its success in competitions sparked suspicion among members of the SA Hackney Breeders Society, who demanded a DNA test. What it proved, according to the judgment handed down this week, was that FHE had mixed parentage - half horse and half pony - and, as such, it had to be deregistered from the SA Stud Book, run by the Animal Improvement Association.
The matter before the Supreme Court of Appeal was an appeal by the society against an earlier ruling by the Western Cape High Court, setting aside the deregistration.
Fire High Explosive's owner, Adam Majiet, opposed the appeal, disputing the society's rules that require hackney ponies to be descendants of two registered hackney ponies, and contended that they only required the equine in question to have the "phenotypical characteristics" - or the appearance - of a pony for registration.
DNA tests, in particular because there was no particular genetic profile for such ponies, could not supersede appearance, he argued.
The judgment, penned by Judge Azhar Cachalia (with four judges concurring), noted that Fire High Explosive was bred by the society's past president, Dawood Davids, and sold to Majiet with a registration certificate recording the sire as Retcharnis Modernaire.
But DNA found a perfect match with hackney horse stallion Retcharnis Field's Pride.
A meeting of the society's executive committee was held to discuss the issue.
"A copy of the DNA parentage certificate was given to Dawood Davids. He looked at the document for what felt like an inordinate amount of time, during which there was a hushed silence. And then, without looking up, he said: If this is so, then this horse needs to be scrapped,'" the judge said, recounting the evidence.
Davids "looked uncomfortable".
At a further meeting, Davids had not questioned the findings but had sought to exonerate himself. He said his brother worked with the equines, he had personally observed him "mating the two ponies" and he believed the certificate correctly reflected the equine's parentage.
"But, he explained, what might have happened was that the stallion had broken into the pen and sired FHE without his knowledge," the judge said.
The meeting accepted this explanation, but eventually the members passed a vote of no confidence in him and he was replaced.
The association, while abiding by the decision of the court, put up an affidavit explaining the importance of accurate information in stud books and placing on record that hackney ponies and hackney horses were different breeds.
The society, in terms of its constitution, had to preserve the pure breed of ponies, eliminate cross-breeding, maintain a standard of excellence for the breed and compile accurate records of studbooks.
Judge Cachalia said there was no merit in any of Majiet's arguments.
"One must feel some sympathy for him because he bought the animal believing it was a pony."
He ruled that the deregistration, which also included any progeny of Fire High Explosive, was lawful.
The Mercury