March 31, 2013 A Horse's Tale, Involving Veterinarian Scott Taylor of Golden Spike Equine Hospital of our City By BECKY CAIRNS Standard-Examiner staff bcairns@standard.net Secretariat could run like the wind, Trigger was a movie star and Mr. Ed could talk. As horses go, Soren is special, too, although you won't see why when first meeting him face to face. But as soon as this big red horse turns around, you will discover something is missing — his tail. Well, Soren does have a tail, but it's really more of a stub. A nubbin. A stump. Call it what you will, the short outgrowth of hairs on his rump gives Soren a rather distinctive profile. "From the moment I saw him, I thought it was adorable," says Becky Cousineau of Clearfield, who, with her husband, Jason, adopted Soren more than a year ago from a local animal rescue group. Soren's been out and about in the Top of Utah, so you may have already met him. He gave rides at last year's Utah Renaissance Festival and Fantasy Faire in Marriott-Slaterville and the Utah Pirate Festival in Willard, participating with Ogden's Pack 'N Pounce Animal Rescue. Last September, he and pals Molly and Jack also marched in Brigham City's Peach Days Parade. And everywhere Soren goes, there are questions, naturally, about that missing tail. "They do ask about the tail and why we cut it off," says Brenda Gordon, who, as president of Pack 'N Pounce, rescued Soren and found him a home with Becky Cousineau, who is her sister. Soren, estimated to be about 15 years old, had no tail when Gordon first spotted him on a cold, rainy day in the fall of 2011. The horse was standing across the street from a Syracuse pasture where Gordon had gone to look at some other horses needing assistance. Soren was on his way to auction, Jason Cousineau says: "Without a tail, chances are he was going to end up in someone's dog food bag." But Gordon says, "I just took one look at him and it didn't matter if he was ridable or not, he was coming home with us." Curious tales A horse like Soren is certainly an oddity, says one Top of Utah veterinarian "It's very, very uncommon. I can't think of one (horse) right now that doesn't have a tail" says veterinarian Scott Taylor of Golden Spike Equine Hospital in Marriott- Slaterville. Andy Fishburn, a breeder of quarter horses at Heritage Farms in Farr West adds that he's raised a lot of horses and never seen one without a tail. It's not just the hair that's missing from Soren's tail — it's the tail itself, the "dock" or bony vertebrae that are an extension of the horse's spine. Normally, a horse has about 18 inches of this bony tail structure, but in Soren's case, only about 2 to 2 1/2 inches remain. Although the hair on a horse's tail will grow back if cut, there would be 172