A horse is a horse, of course, of course, unless of course, it's a football prognosticator.

After years of dogs, cats, birds, camels, hogs and even lizards forecasting the outcomes of area football games, it's time for a little equine equality.

Dusti, a 7-year-old registered paint horse owned by Laurie Roger, granddaughter of Daily Iberian advertising clerk Dean Roger, is the latest in a line of animals chosen to predict football games in the weekly Pigskin Forecast feature.

Advertisement

Three human forecasters - Daily Iberian news editor Don Shoopman, sports editor Chris Landry and assistant sports editor Neal McClelland - pit their expertise against Dusti to see which one can correctly forecast the outcomes of more area high school, college and professional football games on a weekly basis for the 10 weeks of the high school football regular season.

Dusti resides at the home of Dean and Joey Roger, where she works with their great-granddaughter Adrianna, a fifth-grader who recently joined the 4-H club. Dusti and Adrianna will participate in 4-H shows doing halter and lead line competitions. It's a family tradition that the Rogers have enjoyed for nearly half a century, Dean Roger said. Her husband began helping his kids work with horses for 4-H with daughter Natalie, now 50 years old, and has also worked with his grandkids and even some neighbors' children.

"This is his fourth group of kids going through 4-H," said Dean Roger. "He loves 4-H. I think he got a horse when he was 6 years old, and he's been horsing since then."

Dusti won't be horsing around when it comes to her picks, however. The human forecasters may use any methods they wish to choose the winners of each game, but the animal picker follows a set formula for each pick. The respective teams in each game will be represented by identical snacks for the horse, and whichever one Dusti chooses first will be the team she has chosen as the winner of that game.

McClelland has won or shared the best record for the past four years, with the animal pickers taking a dramatic turn for the better in recent years. Ruby, a macaw residing at the Zoo of Acadiana, finished third in 2002, and Belle, a ferret owned by the family of then-Iberian librarian Chantell Villermin, was third in 2005. Last season, Lyzzy, an iguana owned by the Villermin family, also finished third. It was only the fourth time overall that an animal finished higher than fourth (last) place.

The first was in 1998 when Penny, a bulldog owned by Daily Iberian production manager Ted Uhall, also finished third.

The tradition of using an animal to round out the forecasters began in 1995 with Tank, a Bulldog owned by the Uhall family. Following in Tank's trailblazing pawprints were Timon, a mixed breed dog owned by the Shoopman family; Flash, a basset hound owned by then-Iberian sportswriter Brian Guilbeau; Penny the bulldog; Raymond, a cat owned by Daily Iberian Teche Life editor Jennifer May; Cocoa, a miniature poodle owned by McClelland; Ruby; Humphrey, a camel also residing at the Zoo of Acadiana; Redster, a hog owned by the Seguras, a local farming family; Madison, a black lab puppy owned by then-Iberian reporter Christine Moyer; Belle; and Lyzzy.

So Dusti has her work cut out for her to live up to recent non-human pickers.

Can an expert in tossing around the ol' horsehide (baseball) make the switch successfully to the ol' pigskin (football)? The end of the season will tell the tail. Make that tale.