Showing posts with label unwanted horses. Show all posts
Showing posts with label unwanted horses. Show all posts

2/21/12

Unwanted Horse Coalition"It WAS the Economy After All!"


Help for Horse Owners is On the Way

Published: Saturday, February 18, 2012, 11:01 PM     Updated: Monday, February 20, 2012, 9:19 AM
 
"Help! I can't keep this horse anymore."

Sarah Ralston, a Rutgers University associate professor, is all too familiar with that cry of distress during a financially difficult era in which the phrase "unwanted horse" has become an unhappy part of the equestrian lexicon.
"A lot of horse owners have fallen on hard times and can't afford to do the right thing for their horses," she said, but there's more to the unwanted horse problem. Too many people who lack the basics of horsekeeping take on an equine without knowing what it will cost, both in terms of money and work, and have no idea how to deal with a large animal which may be untrained or simply too much for them to handle.
An Unwanted Horse Coalition study that drew more than 27,500 responses showed that indeed, the predominant reason for horses winding up in the unwanted category was because owners could no longer afford them.
But there are other problems, too. They include the horse being too old,injured or unmanageable; the owner's loss of interest, no time to spend with the horse, divorce and children who had ridden the horse moving away from home. Ralston, who is also a veterinarian, noted there is a lot of emotional pressure on the public to rescue horses that otherwise may be headed for slaughter. If the horse turns out to be inappropriate for the new owner, that horse winds up being the last the novice owns, rather than the first of several.
To help find solutions, Ralston is organizing a group promoting responsible horse ownership, which goes beyond the unwanted horse problem. It's called WHOHO (pronounced Whoa-Ho); We're Horse Owners Helping Horse Owners. She sees it as a way "to increase the awareness and utilization of the extensive resources already available through the Rutgers Equine Science Center, The N.J. Agricultural Extension Service and the veterinary community."
Although such resources do a lot aimed at educating the horse owner, Ralston believes there are those, including adopters who get horses from rescue organizations, that are "falling through the cracks." Some may not realize how little they know. Others can be intimidated by experts.
She cited a survey of horse owners that found their most common source of information was other horse owners, not the extension service or expert websites. Unfortunately, some of the information disseminated, whether from a person or a website, may be wrong, or not useful in solving a problem.
Her idea is to turn that around with "a cadre of well-informed volunteers who are aware of the resources available" rather than operating by the seat of their pants. Volunteers would have to be certified, and Ralston envisions an educational program to get them up to speed, though there may be other ways of making sure those involved are qualified.
A core group had its first meeting earlier this month and is getting together again this weekend to continue laying groundwork for the project, which Ralston envisions along the lines of the Master Gardeners program. Karyn Malinowski, the executive director of the Equine Science Center, also suggested that the Environmental Stewards Program or the Woodlands Steward Program that is forming may provide helpful models.
Eventually, Ralston sees the concept going regional, and equestrian experts in neighboring states agree with that concept.
In New York, Karin Bump, a professor of equine business management at Cazenovia College, said a small group has been working for months on the Equine Welfare Assistance Program, a public/private partnership.
"It has some cross-overs to the kinds of things Sarah is talking about," said Bump, the president of the National Association of Equine Affiliated Academics.
"The problems we face with horse welfare and care are national problems, but are going to be best solved by local and regional approaches," she believes.
We clearly need more coordination and communication. There's lots of people doing lots of things, but only in a few instances are there state vehicles by which things get coordinated and communicated so you can put everybody's talents together and see where you're crossing over and where your gaps are."
She noted WHOHO "very much complements the kinds of things we're working on here in New York State. Unwanted horses are a continuing concern, but there's always been an issue of horse welfare and what do horse owners do when they don't have the resources or a horse no longer fits their needs?"
In Pennsylvania, Donna Foulk, Penn State extension educator/equine natural resources, said, "I like this idea, it's pro-active." Foulk recalled that Pennsylvania offered a Crop Master program for farmers, who were supplied with current information that was designed to be passed along to other farmers, and said that was quite successful.
Having the informed farmers help out insured that people got good information, and also had the benefit of letting officials know what concerned the farmers who were being aided, when the volunteers reported back to extension employees.
Regionally, she felt it could work and suggested offering short courses on topics such as hay and nutrition on both sides of the state line.
"I really think we should have stronger ties," said Foulk, who formerly worked at Rutgers.
Malinowski pledged support from Ralston's colleagues in the animal science department and the ESC, while suggesting webinars for some of the programs to make it more convenient and reach out to speakers not based in New Jersey.
Those interested in becoming involved with WHOHO can contact Ralston at ralston@AESOP.Rutgers.edu.
Enhanced by Zemanta

4/11/10

No Country For Horses

No Country for Horses

More from Twyla Francois: Selected responses about the transport and slaughter of horses in Canada

Last Updated: Thursday, October 8, 2009 | 1:05 PM ET

The following are selected responses about the transport of horses from the U.S. and the slaughter of horses in Canada from interviews between CBC News reporter Mellissa Fung and Twyla Francois (TF), Regional Director of the Canadian Horse Defense Coalition.

ABOUT BREEDING HORSES AND THE MARKET FOR HORSE MEAT

TF: I think one of the big problems – what I was finding in the feedlots in the States and in Canada – we have a number of them here in Canada and there’s one just down the road from me in Manitoba – they’re breeding (horses) as well, and so there’s this indiscriminate breeding that’s going on. Even with the racehorse industry, they breed hoping for that one-in-a-million horse and all these others end up as surplus. So I think that if there was no more market, if horsemeat becomes illegal and you can’t slaughter them anymore or the market dries up in Europe, because that’s where most of it is going – is France, and Japan, actually, then the industry would have to react. If there’s no market, they’ll just stop all this indiscriminate breeding, because then suddenly there won’t be a dollar value to it.

THE WAY HORSES ARE KILLED

TF: There are only two ways to legally kill a horse in Canada - with a .22 or with a captive bolt pistol. A .22 is much more humane than a captive bolt pistol, because the problem with horses is that they’re very head shy. So when you try to put anything near their head, they’re going to flinch, they’re going to move around. Whereas a .22, it can be aimed at a bit of a distance and it’s a quick, penetrating bolt and they’re gone. But with a captive bolt, it seems that it requires more learning. A captive bolt pistol is a contraption that’s held against a head and a metal bolt comes out, and retracts. And it causes enough damage to the brain that an animal is rendered unconscious quickly. And I have seen it done and it does work, but the difficulty is with horses, they’re head shy. So if you try to put anything near their head, they’re going flinch, they’re going to move, they’re not like a cow. So what we’re wondering is – (when we see dead) horses who don’t have captive boltholes, could they be the ones where the bolt missed? Is it hitting them elsewhere in their face? Is there pressure to continue the line because they’re killing 200 horses a day, which is a massive number of such a large animal, and it takes a long time to process these bodies? So could there be so much pressure that even though they’re not being rendered unconscious, that they’re just pushing them through the line? Bleeding them out while they’re still conscious? We honestly don’t know and the implications are really, really frightening. There’s one method of slaughter that’s being done in Mexico that’s called puntilla, and this is where they use an ice pick and they jab it in the back of the spinal cord. And it doesn’t stop pain. It doesn’t render them unconscious. It just immobilizes them. And I hope this isn’t being used here, but we really have no idea what is being done with these horses.

WHEN THE HORSES SENT TO SLAUGHTER ARE EX-PETS

TF: One of the big issues with horses specifically is a lot of these horses have known human companionship. They seek comfort from us, and it is the ultimate betrayal, that after owning an animal for so long – and at the auctions I see a lot of 20+ year horses – they become injured or they require medical treatment and they’re close to death and the owner knows it’s going to cost quite a bit to bury them, then they’re brought to the auction and these animals are so frightened. You can see them in the ring, that they search the ring looking for a friendly face. We have been comfort for them, and then we take them to slaughter. We see this at the slaughterhouses too, where they’re still seeking out affection from even the slaughterhouse workers themselves. I went to some auctions in Colorado and New Mexico and Texas, and through the States and what we found was a lot of these horses are ex-pets. They’re 20 year-old horses that have been in somebody’s backyard, and then they get ill and it becomes expensive to care of them, expensive to bury them…and so they bring them to auction. But they’re not aware of what they’re inflicting on these horses. And one thing we saw that really broke my heart was, you would see the workers walking by the pens and the horses would rush the pens, looking for comfort from these men who were going to kill them. It just seems like such a betrayal. I think just because of the history of the horse and how they are treated, here in North America and what they’ve experienced in their own life, nothing can prepare them for the journey they have ahead of them after they’ve been given up.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN COW AND HORSE SLAUGHTER

TF: There is a large difference because a horse is a flight animal and their immediate response to fear is to run. And this is what we’ve seen with the handling, because if you’re handling cattle, they follow. They just tend to follow one another. They’re quite calm, whereas what we saw with the handling of horses – electric prods are being used. They’re scared, they’re frightened, they’re frantically running one way, and if they come across any kind of barrier, they would all flee back the other way and then they would all whip back over. So it’s just this reaction they have of pure fright. They also are extremely head shy so trying to hit the captive bolt cleanly, to ensure a clean hit, is much more difficult. There’s a much higher risk of having to shoot them multiple times and just that their reaction is very different. They’re a flight animal. The problem is also with the transport issue, that because they’re such a tall animal and we’re still allowing transport on double-deckers – it’s such a grueling, grueling ride for them -15 to 25 hours of not being able to stand upright. It’s a much more difficult ride for a horse.

ABOUT THE REGULATIONS ON HORSE TRANSPORT

TF: The regulations need to be updated. They’re archaic. We’re worse than the United States. Monogastrics like horses and pigs can be transported up to 36 hours with no food or water, and keep in mind that these horses are often coming from the United States, and in the United States, they can be transported up to 28 hours. But the problem is when they hit the border, the clock doesn’t go back to zero - it continues on. So they can literally be doing 50, 60 hours with no food or water or a break.

ON THE ROLE OF THE CANADIAN FOOD INSPECTION AGENCY

TF: There is always the question of a conflict of interest, because part of their mandate is to encourage the consumption of Canadian foods. But yet they’re supposed to be providing this protective role as well, for our health and for the welfare of animals. But we question whether they can really give welfare what is required, because even if we call a CFIA inspector about an animal, they aren’t authorized to euthanize. So we can have this animal that’s suffering very badly, and we call in the federal authority and they can’t even do anything about it.

ON A HUMANE WAY TO SLAUGHTER A HORSE

TF: For horses in particular, the fear in them is really shocking when you see them in the slaughterplants. So (humane slaughter) would involve not actually being transported, because there are so many problems transporting horses. It would be slaughter on farm, with a mobile slaughter unit, it would be the only way you could more humanely kill a horse. Our concern with the slaughter a horse is it can’t be done humanely. The only way to humanely kill a horse would be to put it down on the farm. And so we really don’t believe that slaughtering horses could ever be made humane.

THE RAISING OF AWARENESS

TF: Something I’ve been discovering is, I don’t think people who have horses really know what the slaughter process is about. If they knew that it wasn’t this very quick overnight – killed instantly – they wouldn’t be sending them. And I think this is something we have to do – is a large education campaign. As Canadians are becoming more aware of this issue, we’re getting rescue shelters popping up all over the place. People care about horses and they don’t like to see this happening to them, and if they hear of any case of suffering – and I get these calls every day. People just don’t want to see horses suffer. So people will respond - they’ll donate, shelters will come up.



Reblog this post [with Zemanta]

Does this picture upset you? If is does, are you doing anything to have this horror stopped? Show you care! http://www.savingamericashorses.org/home.html

2/23/10

We Can't Slaughter our Way To Horse Welfare - May 26, 2009

This was written before the issue of American horses being unfit for human consumption because of contamination with drugs even came up. 

“May 26, 2009

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Duane Burright

duane_burright@yahoo.com

We can’t slaughter our way to horse welfare by Duane Burright

CHICAGO, (EWA) By now everyone is familiar with the subject of horses being neglected or starved, along with the claims from those in agricultural circles that slaughter is “necessary” to prevent horse neglect and that it is a way to dispose of unwanted horses. I’ve been hearing that litany from all of the agricultural publications and blogs, the American Quarter Horse Association (AQHA), the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), the National Cattlemen's Beef Association (NCBA), various state Farm Bureaus and from a group of clueless politicians including Illinois Rep. Jim Sacia, Sue Wallis of Wyoming and former Texas congressman and paid slaughter lobbyist, Charles Stenholm.

I find it odd that they see slaughter as being the solution for horse neglect, but when it comes to neglected or starving cattle, they are stumped. In this USA Today article Starving cattle amid high prices for feed in Neb, Steven Stanec, executive director of the Nebraska Brand Committee, a state agency that helps police the cattle industry stated that “Neglect cases are on the rise, and what’s causing it, I’m not sure. We’re having whole herds of hundreds of cattle being neglected.”

In doing a simple Google search I found other related headlines which show that cattle starving to death is a fairly widespread problem. Officials raid farm with 30 dead, 100 plus starving cows, Starving cows rescued near Paisley on road to recovery and Starving cattle seized in Lake County.

According to the National Agricultural Statistics Service, 34.4 million cattle were slaughtered in 2008, that’s an average of 94,247 cows slaughtered per day. According to Cattle Network, beef production is up over last year.

Now with all of those cattle going to slaughter, one would wonder why cattle neglect is happening. Using the logic that the AQHA, AVMA, NCBA, Farm Bureaus and the other proponents of the horse slaughter industry apply to starving or neglected horses that “slaughtering prevents neglect”, one would think that we wouldn’t have problems with starving or neglected cattle. Yet guys like Steven Stanec aren’t sure why cattle neglect cases are on the rise.

What further weakens the argument that "slaughter is needed to prevent horse neglect" is that while all of these articles have been written about neglected and starving horses, the option of horse slaughter has been available in the United States. Horse owners can take the horses they no longer want to keep to the local livestock auction and the neighborhood friendly kill buyers will happily take the horse off their hands.

According to statistics from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) 134,059 American horses have been slaughtered at the European owned plants in Canada and Mexico in 2008. American horses still continue to go to slaughter as you read this, so the slaughter pipeline continues to function despite the claims to the contrary.

The reality is that slaughter has nothing to do with animal welfare. Since slaughter apparently doesn’t magically solve the problem of starving and neglected cattle, it is fallacy to think that slaughter will solve the problem of starving and neglected horses. The problem of cattle being neglected is due to the current economic crisis, that same economic crisis is making it difficult for horse owners.

In fact, a study released in June of 2008 showed there was no correlation between horse slaughter and neglect, but a clear linkage between unemployment and neglect. Prophetically, the study warned in its conclusions that if economic conditions continued to deteriorate an upward trend in neglect could be expected.

The AQHA, AVMA, NCBA, Farm Bureaus and all of their political allies put a lot of time, energy and money into supporting horse slaughter. If these special interest groups were to focus all of those resources on solving the nation’s economic problems rather than supporting a foreign owned industry that doesn't even pay their taxes, we might be able to get something done.

It is a pity they are so narrow minded.

Duane Burright is a software engineer by trade, aside from horses and their welfare he’s also interested in American musclecars, vintage electric fans, computers and software design. He has been involved in the campaign to make the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act (AHSPA) law since 2003 and is a supporter of a nearby wild horse sanctuary.”

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]

2/21/10

The Economic Reality fo Scarce And Toxic Horses

from horsetalk.co.nz

The economic reality of scarce and toxic horses


February 17, 2010


I was not surprised that Dr Tom Lenz, past president of the American Association of Equine Practitioners, readily credited the organisation for coining the phrase "Unwanted Horse" in his article "The Unwanted Horse in the United States - International Implications". It is a coup d'etat of language choice for those American equine practitioners lobbying hardest to maintain a US export market for horsemeat.
Dr Lenz manages to equate "unwanted" with "slaughtered for human consumption" and with "should be slaughtered for human consumption, but aren't, because we need additional slaughter plants on American soil".
Slaughter advocates might consider it nothing short of a stroke of genius.
The phrase "unwanted horse" may well play a role in much of the mass confusion in the debate on horse slaughter among the American general public, horse-owners and horse welfare advocates alike.
Horses slaughtered are neither privately nor socially "unwanted", for they command a positive price both at auction and at the slaughter plant gate - and I suspect that if they did not, we would not be having this debate at all.
As any Economics 101 student can tell you, positive prices signal not "unwanted-ness", but scarcity.
There is no question - and what drives fear into the most vehement supporters and even some opponents of horse slaughter - that a universal ban on the slaughter of American horses will eliminate a source of demand for horses in the lower end of the market, as slaughter plant buyers and associated dealers exit.
This shift down in demand - in the efficient second price auction markets that are by far the largest source of horses to slaughter - will unambiguously reduce equilibrium prices, thereby increasing private ownership of auction-intermediated horses, and reducing private supply to those markets.
However, even better news is that this credible, permanent contraction in financial rewards to disposal of low-value horses through auctions will, assuming that breeders are rational decision-makers, reduce the incentive to produce such horses at all.
Over a period of time, such a reduction in supply at all prices will, by increasing scarcity in the American equine industry, raise equilibrium prices and - one would hope - the average quality of horses produced.
Natural results will be a substantial contraction in auction intermediated sales of horses and, ultimately, a higher value and higher quality horse market.
All of which leads me to wonder why the elimination of horse slaughter is so hotly debated at all, for reducing the excessive production of poor quality horses will presumably render the American equine much more "wantable".
In a very important sense, Dr Lenz is correct, however. The issues of his "unwanted horse" and the horse processed for meat cannot be separated.
In announcing its response to new EU restrictions to assure horsemeat safety, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) has acknowledged what has (presumably) long been known. Phenylbutazone - or "bute" - an extremely common equine non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medication, is a banned substance in horsemeat for human consumption.
Specifically, the CFIA classifies bute as a "veterinary drug not permitted for use in equines slaughtered for food", its residue causing permanent toxicity in horse meat, with no period of quarantine being able to eliminate that toxicity.
This public and socially responsible CFIA acknowledgement brings a new clarity to the "unwanted horse" debate.
After all, of Dr Lenz's "unwanted horses" - the old, the injured, the sick, the unmanageable, the incurably lame - how many have not had bute administered at some point in his or her life?
As one public example, a brief glance at the Daily Racing Form is sufficient to confirm that the vast majority of American racehorses, who are known to ship frequently to European Union-licensed plants in Canada and Mexico for slaughter and export to European diners, certainly have had bute administered.
So let me suggest that Dr Lenz's "unwanted horse" be renamed "the toxic horse" - unwanted but not slaughtered, unwanted and slaughtered, unwanted and should be slaughtered, it matters not.
The flesh of "unwanted horses" is acknowledged to be toxic when consumed by humans. And who among the politicians, equine practitioners, and veterinarians lobbying to prevent a ban on the slaughter of American horses - in the name of equine welfare - would wish to be responsible for the deleterious impact for human welfare associated with promoting the slaughter of toxic horses?

Caroline Betts holds a PhD in economics. She is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at the University of Southern California. The views expressed in this article are her own, given in a personal capacity, and do not represent those of the university.

Horse slaughter in the news

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]

2/1/10

A Study of Equine Slaughter/ Abuse Patterns Following Closure of Horse Slaughter Plants in US

Joyce Jacobson, researcher; John Holland, senior analyst AAHS; and Darrell R. Charlton Jr., researcher, © All rights reserved

Introduction


Horse slaughter has become a hotly contested issue in the United States in the past year. A large number of articles have appeared in the print media claiming that the closings of the three US based horse slaughter plants, all of which were foreign owned, in 2007 caused crisis levels of horse abuse and neglect and even wide scale abandonment of horses. None of these articles, however, cites any evidence for these claims beyond opinion or the occasional anecdotal story.
The purpose of this study is to document trends that have occurred in the wake of the closing of horse slaughter plants in the United States, to include the numbers of horses slaughtered and where they were slaughtered during the study period. This period was selected to include one year before the first closings to provide a baseline. The further goal was to establish what effect, if any, the closings of the US based plants might have had upon the frequency of abuse and neglect.

Background

All three of the foreign owned horse slaughter plants operating in the United States were closed under state laws during 2007. On January 19th, 2007, a federal appeals court overturned a lower court decision and ruled that a 1949 Texas law prohibiting the sale of horse meat was constitutional and valid. Although the two Texas plants continued to slaughter for some weeks under an appeal to the Supreme Court, they ceased operations in February when the airlines refused to ship horse meat to their customers in Europe.
The Texas plants had been responsible for more than half of all the horses slaughtered in the United States. Within weeks of their closings, the Cavel plant in Illinois increased their production to take advantage of the opportunity.
On May 24, an Illinois law prohibiting horse slaughter went into effect. After closing briefly, the Cavel plant appealed the decision and reopened under a TRO (Temporary Restraining Order).
At the federal level, an amendment to the 2006 Agriculture budget had been passed with the goal of closing all US horse slaughter plants by removing USDA funding for their required ante-mortem inspections. This amendment, which should have taken affect in March of 2006, was sidestepped by the USDA when it instituted a pay-for-inspections program.
The USDA program was the immediate subject of a law suit but the plan was allowed to continue under another TRO as the suit worked its way through the court system. The lower court decided against the USDA as did the appeals court. The result was that the Cavel plant closed briefly on several occasions before slaughter ended there on September 20th of 2007 under the new Illinois law.

Data sources

Several data sources were used for this study, including the Illinois Department of Agriculture, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Illinois Department of Agriculture (ILDA) and the online database http://www.pet-abuse.com/.

Limitations

There are several complicating factors in gathering and analyzing the data available. The most comprehensive data available is from the USDA and the CFIA. While these statistics give accurate numbers for horses slaughtered in the US last year, as well as exports by country, the US numbers are not differentiated between the three plants that were operating in January of 2007. These were the Cavel plant in Dekalb, Illinois, the BelTex plant in Fort Worth, Texas, and the Dallas Crown plant in Kaufman, Texas.
The biggest challenge is in obtaining and properly interpreting data on abuse and neglect. The first problem is that there is no way of knowing directly how many equines are being abused or neglected. The only metric available is the number of cases of abuse and neglect that are charged. Additionally, not all cases charged result in a guilty verdict, and the fact that a case does not result in such a verdict may be for reasons other than culpability.
Another issue in regard to charged cases is that they can take months or years to work their way through the court system. Therefore, this study uses each case on the date it was charged, whether or not it results in a guilty verdict, with the assumption that this metric will average out to be roughly proportional to true abuse levels over time. The study period is sufficiently brief that significant changes in law enforcement vigilance over its course are unlikely and the data should be valid for determining trends.
Moreover, very few states keep centralized data on equine abuse and neglect cases charged, and those that do keep it in a variety of formats. This study will look at one such state and analyze the correlation between its data and other metrics including slaughter rates and economic conditions for reasons that will become clear in the analysis.
The only centralized database that tracks all states is http://www.pet-abuse.com/. There are significant limitations to this data source and they will be discussed in a later section. Since these limitations could draw doubt as to their validity, a significant effort was made to verify and otherwise test the data extracted from the database. This will be discussed in more detail in the section dealing with that analysis.

Historical Perspective

Before looking at the data for 2006 and 2007, it is useful to gain a historical perspective on horse slaughter. While it is widely known that horse slaughter was at much higher levels in 1990 than in recent years, it is less well known that the United States has been exporting horses to slaughter in Mexico and Canada for this entire period, and to Japan since 1999.
Canadian and Mexican horse slaughter operations are quite different in nature. Canadian horse slaughter plants ship most of their product to Europe with a smaller fraction being consumed domestically. In Europe the meat is considered a delicacy and it brings relatively high prices. The plants tend to be similar to US plants because they must meet EU (European Union) approval.
Horse slaughter is more common in Mexico than in the US. There are two types of plants in Mexico; EU suppliers and domestic suppliers. There are two EU supplier plants located in central Mexico at the towns of Jerez and Fresnillo. In contrast there are dozens of smaller local plants throughout Mexico that are owned by the municipalities and that supply horsemeat for local consumption. Unlike the European consumers, the Mexican consumers view horsemeat as an inferior substitute for beef and it is often used as filler.
Figure 1
                                                                           Figure 1
Figure 1 shows the number of US equines slaughtered and exported for slaughter each year since 1989, as well as the countries to which they were exported. There are several notable features about this data. The most often referenced feature is the famous steep decline in total slaughter between 1990 and 2002. There were over ten slaughter plants in the United States in the late 1980s and only three by the 2000.
Anti-slaughter proponents have long found this decline their most unassailable argument against the claim that slaughter protects horses from abuse and neglect. They argue that since slaughter decreasing by 81% did not bring about a crisis of horse neglect, ending it would not have such consequences either. This argument has yet to be countered in a meaningful way by those who espouse the theory that only "unwanted" horses are slaughtered. The question remains, however, whether the decline occurred because of supply limitations, legislation, market demand or other causes.
The possibility that the decrease was caused by limitations of supply is easily discounted by horse population studies1. During this period the horse population of the US grew by 3 to 5% per year.
The effect of legislation on this decline is minimal but should be mentioned. Between 1989 and 1998 there were no legislative restrictions on the slaughter of horses in the United States. In 1998, after slaughter had already dropped from over 400,000 equines a year to under 100,000, California passed proposition 6 which banned the slaughter of horses and the export of horses from the state for purposes of slaughter. Since there were no slaughter plants operating in California at the time, there was no noticeable impact on the total slaughter in the United States. Despite many legislative initiatives, no other legislation affected slaughter until early 2007.
We can see from the export curves in Figure 1 that the overall decline was almost entirely driven by the decline in US slaughter and a parallel decline in exports to Canada. This parallel tracking phenomenon can be seen more clearly if we change the scale on the exports to Canada as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Exports to Canada tracked US slaughter during the precipitous decline of the 1990s in stark contrast to exports to Mexico. Since US and Canadian slaughter plants share the same customer base in Europe, this leads to the implication that slaughter and export to slaughter are driven primarily by market demand and not the supply of "unwanted" horses. If supply had been driving the market we would have seen similar patterns in exports to Mexico.
Finally, an Italian study6 of horse meat consumption confirms that it followed the same trend as US slaughter during that study period between 1995 and 2001. This further indicates that demand in Europe was likely the strongest determinant of US slaughter levels. Interestingly, this study will show that there may have been yet another component to the famous decline of the 90s.
The only other notable non-market influences on the reduction of slaughter were the burning of Cavel West in Redmond Oregon by arson on July 21st, 1997 and the burning of Cavel East in Dekalb Illinois by accidental causes on Easter Sunday of 2002. Cavel in Dekalb was rebuilt and was back in operation by the summer of 2004.
The burning of Cavel in Illinois came just as slaughter had ebbed and was beginning an upward trend that has continued to date. The relationship of abuse and neglect to slaughter during the period surrounding the burning of Cavel East was the subject of an earlier study2. Ironically, the burning of Cavel appears to have saved approximately 50,000 horses while we will see later that the closing of all of the US based plants in 2007 saved only about 22,000 horses from slaughter.
The other two features of interest in the graph of Figure 1 concern exports to Mexico and Canada. Much has been made of the "unintended consequences" of driving slaughter over the border to Mexico and Canada, and later graphs will show that has indeed been the case. However, Figure 1 exposes the little known fact that these current export levels are not historically unique.
Particular focus has been placed on Mexican exports because of the barbaric slaughter methods used in some of their local plants (as documented by undercover videos by HSUS and others). While Mexican exports accelerated dramatically after the plant closings in 2007, they also spiked in 1994 when domestic slaughter in the US was at levels over 100,000 horses per year. Likewise, exports to Canada were higher between 1991 and 1994 than in 2007.
Thus while it is true that the closing of the US based horse slaughter plants in 2007 drove American horses over the borders to Canada and Mexico, the converse is not true and domestic slaughter has not historically protected American horses from going to these countries in similar numbers.

Slaughter trends following US plants closures

As previously mentioned, all three slaughter plants in the US were closed during the year 2007. The two Texas plants ceased operations in February and the Illinois plant in late September. Figure 3 shows the resulting slaughter patterns from January of 2006 through March of 2008.
Figure 3
                                                                                 Figure 3
As can be seen from the red curve in Figure 3, the overall slaughter of US horses (domestic slaughter + exports) did not drop as dramatically as might be expected following any of the closings, even though domestic (US) slaughter did decline steeply following both the Texas plant closings in February and the Cavel closing in September.
The two temporary interruptions in Cavel operations discussed earlier can clearly be seen in the dips in April and again in July. Despite this, the industry had completely recovered to its peak slaughter levels by late September when Cavel slaughtered its last horse.
Two things happened during this period. First, Cavel ramped up its operations from its design capacity of 500 horses per week to well over 1,000. There is evidence that this ramp up had already begun well before the closings and was simply accelerated. This volume offset losses during the two interruptions and from the Texas plant closings. Secondly, Cavel management began making arrangements to move their operations over the border to Canada. When they were finally closed in September it took only weeks for Cavel to begin slaughtering operations at the Natural Valley Farms in Wolseley (SK) Canada.
The curve of Mexican exports (blue) shows an interesting and little known fact. Mexican exports had already been increasing since mid-2006, well before the Texas plants were closed. During the months following the Texas plant closings these exports continued with an even more rapid increase. This increase was boosted for a period of several months as BelTex dumped thousands of horses from its feedlot in Morton, Texas to slaughter plants over the border.
By September of 2007, the glut of horses from Texas feed lots had been exhausted and the exports to Mexico had begun to decline. This decline was partially offset by the continued strong flow of horses to Canada. By March of 2008 exports to Canada were approximately 50% higher than those to Mexico.
Figure 4 demonstrates how incredibly quickly Canada slaughter houses absorbed US horses. Remarkably, Canada more than doubled its equine slaughter in a single month. This was done by converting existing beef processing plants that had been struggling to compete with US beef slaughter plants. Some of these facilities had been built in response to the closing of the US border to Canadian beef due to an earlier mad cow outbreak in Canada. The number of slaughterhouses processing horses in Canada rose from three at the beginning of 2007 to seven at the end of the study period.
Figure 4

Figure 4
We can see from Figure 4 that Canada now depends on the US for the vast majority of the equines it slaughters. Before the closing of Cavel about 50% of the horses slaughtered in Canada were from the US, but between the closing and the end of the study period, 79.5% of all the equines slaughtered in Canada came from the US. (It should be noted that USDA numbers for horses exported to Canada for slaughter are considerably higher than the US import numbers released by Agriculture and Agri-food Canada. The USDA numbers appear to be the correct ones given their correlation with CFIS slaughter statistics as shown in Figure 4.)
To help illustrate what happened with the slaughter of American horses, Figure 5 provides a year to year comparison of the total slaughter of US horses for 2006, 2007 and the first quarter of 2008.
Figure 5
Figure 5
The 2006 (yellow) line represents the baseline year before any of the slaughter plants were closed. The blue line represents the slaughter rate during 2007, and the magenta line represents slaughter for the first quarter of 2008. This method of comparison is commonly used in accounting and government reporting because it provides year to year comparisons that take into account seasonal trends.
There was a significant but largely temporary drop in the 2007 slaughter level following the closings of the Texas plants in February. The slaughter rate then lagged below the 2006 levels until September when it reached parity just in time for the closing of the last US based plant (Cavel). Although slaughter again fell below 2006 levels in the last quarter of 2007, by the first quarter of 2008 it had returned to the same levels as both the previous years. The gap between the 2006 and 2007 curves represents the temporary reduction in slaughter and thus the number of horses spared from slaughter.

Summary of slaughter trends

While the slaughter of US horses and other equines dipped during 2007, it quickly returned to the same levels as before the plant closings. There were 122,459 US equines slaughtered or exported for slaughter in 2007 compared to 142,720 in 2006, a reduction of only 17% for the year. By the first quarter of 2008 the exports to Mexico and Canada had entirely replaced the reductions in US slaughter.
Returning to the stated purpose of this study, the desire was to determine whether the closing of the slaughter plants was a possible causative factor in any subsequent increase in abuse and neglect. The only mechanism by which this could have happened would have been if the closings caused a significant and sustained change in slaughter volumes. Since the resulting reduction in slaughter was quickly replaced by exports, there is no ongoing volume impact from the closings, and therefore no possibility it could significantly affect abuse levels.
The only increase in abuse caused by the closings has been the longer trips and more brutal slaughter conditions that the horses are subjected to.

Abuse, Neglect and Abandonment

At this point it has been established that any increase in equine abuse and neglect must be the result of factors other than the slaughterhouse closings, such as economic and weather (forage) conditions. The year 2007 saw declines in the economy, especially in the second half of the year and serious increases in feed and hay costs. The question is whether these factors did indeed cause a dramatic increase in abuse and neglect.
As discussed in the introduction, quantifying abuse and neglect is a much less exact science than tracking slaughter. Fortunately, there is no need to put too fine an edge on any conclusions drawn from the available data. The stated purpose of this study is to simply establish whether or not a "tsunami" or even a significant increase in equine abuse had occurred as has been claimed by some articles.

Abandoned Horses

If reliable data quantifying abuse and neglect is difficult to find, data concerning "abandoned horses" is even more problematic. This is largely because state and local governments do not recognize such a category. The closest data is on "Estray" horses, which reflects the fact that it is almost impossible to determine whether a horse was intentionally released or simply escaped, and only a few states track even this data. As a result, almost every story must be tracked down individually.
The first story about abandoned horses appeared in the mainstream press just weeks after the closing of the Texas plants. The story titled Kentucky, Land of the Thoroughbred, Swamped with Unwanted Horses, was written by Jeffrey McMurray, a college basketball stringer for the Associated Press (AP). The piece was based on horses seen free grazing on a reclaimed strip mine in Eastern Kentucky and claimed they had been abandoned because of reductions in horse slaughter forced by animal rights activists.
However, the slaughter rates shown in Figure 1 contradict McMurray's claim of decreasing slaughter in the years between 2002 and 2007 and the Texas plants had been closed for only a month when the story appeared. More tellingly, it was determined that the "abandoned" horses were in fact owned by Trish Hayes of Breaks Riding Stables in Breaks Virginia. The horses had been the subject of an earlier AP story when teenaged boys were charged with shooting some of them. But by that time the story had gone international and many writers still reference the story as if it were valid.
In October a second AP story appeared in the Oregonian titled Abandoned Horses a Dilemma for Ranchers. That story claimed nine horses had been abandoned on the ranch owned by a Mr. McKenzie, but the Malheur County Incident Detail4 (police report) later showed that the incident had involved only one horse reported by Mr. McKenzie's granddaughter and it was determined to be unfounded.
To this day stories continue to surface in respectable publications that contend there is an abandoned horse crisis in America. Yet research into individual cases3 has determined that very few are accurate and even then they involved fewer horses than reported.
Only a few sparsely populated western states even keep records of estray horses. Of the states that do keep accurate records, the trends are mixed but largely flat. The largest documented increase found in Estray horses was in Arizona5 which reported a 16% increase from 2006 to 2007. As a matter of reference, that translates to an increase of only about 16 horses statewide or 8 more than the three-year average.
The picture that emerges for horses is very different than that for dogs and cats, where abandonment is common. Any owner who would simply release a horse from its pasture is aware that there is a significant liability if that animal causes a traffic accident, and dropping a horse off at a distance from its home requires the ownership of a horse trailer or the collaboration of someone who does own one. It is not an easy crime to commit or conceal.
As a result, true horse abandonment appears to be rare. The more common method of abandoning a horse is to simply leave it to forage in its pasture without medical care or supplemental feed. Thus it was determined that the focus of this study would be on abuse and neglect where there is at least some statistical evidence.

Abuse and Neglect

Again, the analysis of trends in abuse and neglect was complicated by the fact that data is not available in a consistent manner from different sources. The picture that emerged, however, was that while some areas had indeed seen significant increases in abuse and neglect cases, others had, in fact, seen declines.
For example, there was a severe drought in much of the South during 2007, which drove hay prices up in some areas by 100% and more. Texas on the other hand, which had experienced several years of devastating drought, hay shortages and wildfires, enjoyed an abundant hay crop in 2007. More over, there have been significant fluctuations in the economy during the study period.
One of the states where good data was available and where a notable increase in abuse and neglect cases had occurred was, ironically, Illinois. Illinois was the only state in the US where slaughter occurred for most of 2007. In 2006, a study of the relationship between abuse and neglect in Illinois and total slaughter in the US 2 found that on average more slaughter was accompanied by more abuse. The variation was so great year to year, however, that the study concluded there was no meaningful relationship between the two.
Figure 6 revisits this comparison with the hindsight of two additional years of data. If a reduction in slaughter caused an increase in abuse and neglect, we would expect the two curves to be mirror images of each other. Looking at the two curves in Figure 6, it is clear that there is no consistent correlation between the sets of data.
There are two notable features to the curve of abuse cases (blue); a remarkable increase in abuse between 2000 and 2002, and another steep increase in 2007. The Cavel plant in Illinois burned on Easter Sunday of 2002. The next year the abuse rate flattened. Had this slaughter been preventing abuse we would have expected the curve to increase in steepness. The original study done in 2006 speculated that the changes in abuse were more likely the result of economic or weather conditions, but did not attempt to establish this correlation partially because the data set was limited at that time.
Figure 6
Figure 6
If, however, we now look at the abuse and neglect data from Illinois with respect to unemployment in the state, we see a very interesting correlation between upward trends in the two sets of data (Figure 7).
Figure 7
Figure 7
Although the upward slopes of the abuse and unemployment data have an uncanny correlation in the periods between 2000 and 2002, and in 2007, the downward trend of unemployment between 2003 and 2006 does not appear to be mirrored by a corresponding downward trend in abuse and neglect.
At first this lack of downward correlation appears to cast doubt on just how strong the relationship is, but that is due (at least in part) to a distortion in the way the government tracks unemployment.
A person is only considered to be "unemployed" while he or she is receiving unemployment compensation. People whose benefit period has expired before they get a new job are removed from the "unemployment" roles and from the statistics just as if they had found a job.
This trick of accounting biases the numbers by amplifying downward trends (good news) in unemployment. In other words, the downward trend in unemployment is exaggerated and may in fact be nonexistent. For example, if nobody at all got a job, every large increase in unemployment would be followed by an equal downward trend as benefits ran out.
Therefore, in reality, the shape of the true unemployment curve would probably be even more like the shape of the abuse and neglect curve.
The Illinois data supports the obvious conclusion that bad economic conditions lead to more abuse and neglect. This should come as no surprise, but the fact that slaughter does not affect abuse and neglect in a positive way (if any at all), may be surprising to the advocates of the "unwanted horse" theory about slaughter's beneficial contribution to the negation of abuse.

Measuring Nationwide Abuse and Neglect

The final question that remained to be answered was whether or not there was a major increase in abuse and neglect nationwide in 2007. The only source of such data nationwide is the online database of pet-abuse.com.
The data on this site is well organized for research, but there are significant limitations to its use. Data is entered as abuse cases are flagged from other media sources. If a case is not mentioned in the media immediately, it might not be represented in the data until months or even years after charges are first placed. The data thus has a tendency to "back fill" and one can safely assume that the more recent the data is the more likely it is to be understated.
The usefulness of this data becomes lower as one attempts to determine recent trends or to determine trends over shorter periods. Additionally, in any given month the data may consist of only a dozen or fewer cases, making short term trends more difficult. These difficulties and assumptions will be discussed further when the data is presented.
Several tests were performed to determine the data distortion caused by latency and backfilling of the data in the database. The period between September 2007 and January 10th 2008 was initially analyzed within days after the end of the period. It was again analyzed at two occasions a few months apart. Based on this comparison it was determined that the backfill issue was statistically insignificant after three months. Final data collection was performed three months after the end of the study period.
The journalistic nature of the data also presented issues. For example, some cases did not include the exact number of equines, but instead used variable terms (e.g., "several"). For purposes of uniformity, these descriptions were converted to numbers using a defined constant. For example, the word "several" was replaced with the number 6 and the word "dozens" was translated as 24. In any event, these cases were not common enough to significantly skew the results.
Both the number of cases and the number of equines involved in those cases are presented. It can be seen that the two roughly track each other. Again, the analysis of abuse was only used to determine if there had been a dangerous rise in abuse and neglect overall.
Finally, only cases of owner abuse and neglect were included in the statistics. Cases involving third party abuse were not included as the motive for such abuse is outside the purposes of this study. The results of this search yielded the graph in Figure 8.
Figure 8
Figure 8
As expected, the data was somewhat inconsistent on a month to month basis, but one obvious conclusion can be drawn. There clearly was NOT a catastrophic increase in abuse and neglect during 2007. Other conclusions that might be drawn are a bit more risky since they might possibly be putting too fine an edge on the analysis. There appears to have been a slight drop in abuse after March and a slight upturn at the beginning of 2008.
Figure 9
Figure 9
Finally, it is useful to test this graph against the nationwide unemployment rates to see if the unemployment rates could have predicted something close to what we saw from the pet-abuse.com database. Figure 9 shows that comparison. A drop in the unemployment rate is apparent in late 2006, and from June onward there was an upward trend to unemployment.
There are obvious reasons why the nationwide unemployment number is a less than perfect barometer for nationwide equine abuse even if the two are closely correlate on a regional level. For example, the average unemployment does not take into account the fact that some states have larger horse populations than others and unemployment varies significantly between states. Weighting each state was beyond the scope of this study.
Even so, there are some interesting similarities between the unemployment curve in Figure 9 and the abuse case rate as determined from Pet-Abuse.com. A drop in unemployment occurred slightly before a similar drop in abuse. (Note that a drop following a relatively flat period is less likely to be an artifact than one following a recent up surge). Except for a spike in cases that occurred in March, the comparison would have been even clearer, but as previously stated the abuse data is very noisy when observed short term. Similarly, a general upward trend in unemployment later in 2007 seems to have preceded the upward trend in abuse during the last quarter of the study (first quarter of 2008).
The Illinois comparison was performed on a year to year basis which did not expose this lag of a few months. The identified lag is logically to be expected since most neglect cases take several months to become apparent (horses don't starve overnight) and then to be acted upon by authorities.
The fact that unemployment is a general barometer of trends in equine abuse and neglect is not surprising as it has long been known to have the same relationship to domestic abuse and child abuse. In the case of horses, however, it gives us a historical view into the probable number of horses that were at risk of neglect and thus "unwanted" by the definition of slaughter advocates. Unemployment is thus also an approximate barometer of the number "unwanted" horses and this fact allows us to see if slaughter has historically increased when this barometer was rising.
Figure 10
Figure 10
Figure 10 explores the relationship between horse slaughter and the unemployment barometer of abuse and neglect. To have a beneficial effect, slaughter would have to rise following increases in unemployment but during this decade it has done just the opposite. The same antithetical relationship existed in the 1980s and until about 1993.
However, from 1993 through 2000, the unemployment rate began a continuous decline during a well known period of prosperity. It is entirely likely that this decrease, combined with the increasing number of horses being kept in the population put supply side pressure on the slaughter industry just as demand was faltering. There were plenty of horses, but their owners were not willing to sell them at slaughter prices, and new owners probably outbid kill buyers for surplus horses from racing and other horse industries. The result was a "perfect storm" for the horse slaughter industry which produced the famous long decline.
The implication is that the horse slaughter industry may operate on a thin margin on supply side price. This implication was recently tested when Pure Thoughts Horse Rescue (PTHR) attended the famous Sugar Creek slaughter Auction in Ohio. At most their weekly auctions the bulk of the horses go to slaughter, but PTHR, financed by a benefactor, was able to outbid the kill buyers on every horse. The average price paid was $432, not significantly above the average price seen for slaughter horses.

Conclusions

Despite the difficulties posed by the data limitations discussed, several conclusions about slaughter and abuse and neglect trends can be stated with confidence:
1. While the supply of low priced horses is essential to the slaughter industry, it does not determine the number that will be slaughtered. That number is set by the demand for horse meat in Europe. Slaughter therefore is useless as a tool for controlling the unwanted horse population and instead simply creates a low end market that competes with potential buyers of low end horses and encourages a continuous supply.
2. The rate of slaughter of US horses was only temporarily affected by the closings of the US based slaughter plants in 2007, and the slaughter rate has since returned to its previous levels. There was therefore no mechanism by which these closings could have impacted abuse and neglect.
3. There was clearly no epidemic of abuse and neglect in 2007 following the closings of the US based horse slaughter plants. None was predicted by the unemployment numbers and none was found in the database of cases. In other words, on the question of whether the closings were the cause of a pronounced increase in abuse we find that neither the cause nor the effect actually happened.
4. While US slaughter rates are clearly driven by the demand for horse meat in Europe, it appears the industry operates in a relatively narrow window of supply price. If we are to accept that horses sent to slaughter are "unwanted" then we can define an unwanted horse not as one with zero value but one whose value is greater to the slaughter industry than to a potential owner and that average value is probably under $500.
5. Abuse and neglect is largely determined by economic conditions. An upturn in unemployment seen in late 2007 appears to have translated into the beginning of an upturn in abuse and neglect in early 2008. As of the end of the study period, abuse and neglect did not appear to have exceeded norms for the baseline year of 2006, but to the extent that the economic conditions continue to deteriorate, this trend may become more worrisome in the months to come.

References

1.      Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service Study, David W. Freeman, Oklahoma Horse Industry Trends, Historic Estimates of Horse Numbers in US and OK. http://pods.dasnr.okstate.edu/docushare/dsweb/Get/Document-2087/CR-3987web.pdf
2.      A Study of the Relationship Between Horse Slaughter and Reported Cases of Abuse and Neglect. John M. Holland, 23 January 2006
3.      Deleting the Fiction: Abandoned Horses http://www.commonhorsesense.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=25&Itemid=1 Terry Torrence, John Holland and Valerie James-Patton
4.      Malheur County Sheriff Office, Incident # 01-2007-05662, Wolfe, Brian E, 11/27/2007
5.      Email correspondence with Ed Hermes, Public Information Officer Arizona Department of Agriculture
6.      Characteristics of Horse Meat Consumption and Production in Italy, F. Martuzzi, A.L. Catalano, C. Sussi

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]

4/7/09

AAEP Brochure

Equine Welfare

Unwanted Horse - Feb 3rd, 09

An AAEP Brochure

According to the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), animal welfare is a human responsibility that encompasses all aspects of animal well-being, including proper housing, management, nutrition, disease prevention and treatment, humane handling and, when necessary, humane euthanasia.
Both science and society have a role to play in deciding what constitutes an appropriate level of animal welfare. While science can determine what type of degree of animal welfare risk exists under specific circumstances, it cannot determine what type of degree of risk is acceptable – that is the question that society decides.
Different people emphasize different factors when evaluating the welfare of animals. None of these views is inherently right or wrong. And people may hold more than one view at a time. They may consider:
  • The basic health and function of the body (functional view).
  • How an animal “feels,” that is, its physiological state, such as pain, suffering or contentment (positive affective states views).
  • An animal’s ability to lead a reasonably natural life and perform behaviors in which it might normally engage (natural living view).
When the welfare of horses is assessed, their broad athletic, economic and recreational uses are also considered.

National Issues

A number of issues that affect the welfare of horses are a focus for many individuals and organizations, including equine veterinarians. The AAEP has developed position statements for the following issues:
  • Transportation and Processing of Horses
  • Management of Mares Utilized in the PMU Collection Industry
  • Use of Horses in Urban Environments
  • Use of Vesicants
  • Practice of Soring
  • Practice of Tail Docking
  • Thermocautery or Pin Firing
  • Therapeutic Medications in Racehorses
  • Therapeutic Medications in Non-Racing Performance Horses
  • Stewardship of the Horse
The plight of the unwanted horse also is a growing welfare issue. The Unwanted Horse Coalition, a broad alliance of national equine organizations joined together under the American Horse Council, is concerned that some horses may slip through the various safety nets within the horse industry. The Coalition is working to educate industry groups about this important issue and help people learn to “own responsibly.”

Local Issues

Veterinarians and horse owners have legal and ethical obligations to ensure the welfare of horses. Some states require veterinarians to report animal cruelty. The AVMA recognizes that veterinarians may observe cases of animal neglect and abuse as defined by federal or state laws, or local ordinances. When these situations cannot be resolved through education, the AVMA considers it the responsibility of the veterinarian to report such cases to appropriate authorities, such as:
  • Police Department or County Sheriff
  • Animal Control
  • Humane Society
  • State Department of Agriculture
Horse owners are not required by law to report instances of animal cruelty. However, most states require that an animal’s owner or caregiver provide a minimum level of care. Generally, this care includes food, water, shelter and veterinary care when needed to prevent suffering. Horse owners can promote equine welfare by becoming educated and working proactively to address widespread concerns within the industry and by reporting local horse neglect or abuse to authorities.

Euthanasia Guidelines

There may come a time when, for humane, medical, economic or safety reasons, an owner may need to consider euthanasia for their horse. The decision to euthanize, or induce a painless death, should never be made without careful consideration. The right choice is clearly the one that is in the best interest of the horse and the people who care for it. A veterinarian can aid clients in making a timely decision, prepare the owner for what will happen and ensure the horse’s life is ended as painlessly and distress-free as possible. The following questions may be helpful:
  • Is the horse suffering?
  • What is the likelihood of recovery or at least an acceptable return to usefulness?
  • Has the horse become depressed or despondent or does it continue to show an interest and desire to live?
  • How much discomfort or distress can the owner expect the horse to endure?
  • What kind of special care will this horse require and can the owner meet its needs?
  • Can the owner continue to provide for this horse economically?
  • What are the alternatives?

Welfare Issues

Below are Web sites that offer more detailed information that has been presented here:
The AAEP Ethical Guidelines and Position Statements are available here. An additional brochure – Euthanasia: The Most Difficult Decision – is available as well as Care Guidelines for Equine Rescue and Retirement Facilities.
The AVMA’s animal welfare policies, background information on issues and news articles on welfare can be found here. A brochure – How Do I Know It Is Time? Equine Euthanasia – is also available.
The mission of the Unwanted Horse Coalition is to reduce the number of unwanted horses and to improve their welfare through education and the efforts of organizations committed to the health, safety and responsible care and disposition of these horses.
The American Horse Council is the national association representing all segments of the horse industry in Washington, D.C.

Local Contacts

Your veterinarian ______________________________________________________________
Police or County Sheriff ______________________________________________________________
Animal Control ______________________________________________________________
Humane Society ______________________________________________________________
State Dept. of Agriculture _______________________________________________________________

This brochure/ article was produced by the AAEP. To order copies of the brochure for your organization, click here.




Reblog this post [with Zemanta]
"From my earliest memories, I have loved horses with a longing beyond words." ~ Robert Vavra