Why Santa doesn't use horses to pull his sleigh...

The question finally had to be asked?  Why does Santa use reindeer instead of horses to pull his sleigh?  Barbara Wright caught up with Santa ice skating at the lake in Evergreen, Colorado, and here's what he had to say:

BW:  Santa, so many of our readers have asked , "Why doesn't Santa use horses to pull his sleigh at Christmas?"

Santa:  Ahem.  Well, we really don't have anything against horses, you know.

BW:  The ESCT newsletter readers think horses would make an excellent team.

Santa:  Early on, we did try them, yes.  In fact, we tried dogs, too.  Seemed logical to use sled dogs.  But the tail-wagging thing created too much air turbulence.

BW:  So, tell us what happened with the horses?

Santa:  We ran into a few problems with them that got us way behind schedule, so we had to look for alternatives.

BW:  What problems, Santa?

Santa:  Well, first off, most of the applicants were Arabians and they turned out to have a fear of heights.  In fact, they had a fear of air in general.  Their snorts and feet-planting would bring the sleigh to a complete stop and pitch off the packages. 

Then the Standardbreds showed up and that fast trot, winging thing doesn't work well in the air because it tends to propeller and pitch us around in the sleigh.  They were great at pulling, though.  Faultless.

We ended up auditioning a team of heavy drafts and their ground drill was top notch, but they didn't get any lift-off.

Saddlebreds didn't get any air either because they have those dead weights on their shoes and there's that winging thing again.

A friend of mine, a cowboy in Texas, sent me a team of reigning and team penning horses to try, but every time they got near a cloud cluster, they'd run crazy circles around it and throw us off course.

So, we auditioned some Baroque horses - Lippizaners, Andalusians and Lusitanos - figuring they could do airs above the ground and get lift-off.   That didn't end up well because they wanted me to wear one of those flouncy Spanish riding outfits with a three-cornered hat instead of my Santa suit and cap, so I couldn't very well show up looking like King Ferdinand on Christmas Eve.  As good as they are in the air, so bad they are at landing.  Belly flops every time.  Sad.  No injuries, though.

For the hunter/jumpers, we were finally wearing the right color - red, but the fox didn't like being the lead all the time. 

The thoroughbreds were fast as lightning, but we missed all our test stops - yup, blazed right past every single one.

Then we found out that mustangs are called "mesteno" in Spanish, which translates as "you can never get these horses to do anything in harness, much less in unison."  They didn't speak English, anyway, and my Spanish is lacking.

 

 

As a last resort, we called in the old, reliable quarterhorses but only half of them showed up for the audition.

 

BW:  Hmmm.  I can see the challenge, yes.

Santa:  Interesting thing was that the horses all had one spook in common.  They just couldn't overcome it.  Really strange.

BW:  What was that?

Santa:  Fear of elves.

BW:  Wow!  That's amazing!  Do you think Equine Stress Control Therapy might have helped them get over that?

Santa:  Not sure what that is...

BW:  Well, let me tell you all about ESCT, Santa.  You gotta minute? ...

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