[ SHOWGSD-L ] Downside of Slaughter Ban: Kentucky Swamped with Unwanted Horses
- From: "Ginger Cleary" <cleary1414@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Showgsd-L@Freelists. Org" <showgsd-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2007 12:47:01 -0500
With this news report, the unfortunate reality of the predictions of the
horse slaughter ban bills passage proves to be correct. Can you say "I
told you so"?? And KY is not alone in this I am sure.
Ginger Cleary - Rome, GA www.rihadin.com <http://www.rihadin.com>
"Laws against something 'that other guy' does will eventually get US because
we are all someone's 'other guy.' " Walt Hutchens,2007
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Kentucky Swamped With Unwanted Horses
By JEFFREY McMURRAY
AP
STAFFORDSVILLE, Ky. (March 15) - The bidding for the black pony started at
$500, then took a nosedive.
Downside of Slaughter Ban?
There were no takers at $300, $200, even $100. With a high bid of just $75,
the auctioneer gave the seller the choice of taking the animal off the
auction block. But the seller said no.
"I can't feed a horse," the man said. "I can't even feed myself."
Kentucky, the horse capital of the world, famous for its sleek
thoroughbreds, is being overrun with thousands of horses no one wants -
some of them
perfectly healthy, but many of them starving, broken-down nags. Other parts
of the
country are overwhelmed, too.
The reason: growing opposition in the U.S. to the slaughter of horses for
human consumption overseas.
With new laws making it difficult to send horses off to the slaughterhouse
when they are no longer suitable for racing or work, auction houses are
glutted with horses they can barely sell, and rescue organizations have run
out of
room.
Some owners who cannot get rid of their horses are letting them starve;
others are turning them loose in the countryside.
Some people who live near the strip mines in the mountains of impoverished
eastern Kentucky say that while horses have long been left to roam free
there,
the number now may be in the thousands, and they are seeing herds three
times bigger than they did just five years ago.
"There's horses over there that's lame, that's blind," said Doug Kidd, who
owns 30 horses in Lackey, Ky. "They're taking them over there for a
graveyard
because they have nowhere to move them."
It is legal in all states for owners to shoot their unwanted horses, and
some Web sites offer instructions on doing it with little pain. But some
horse
owners do not have the stomach for that.
At the same time, it can cost as much as $150 for a veterinarian to put a
horse down. And disposing of the carcass can be costly, too. Some counties
in
Kentucky, relying on a mix of private and public funding, will pick up and
dispose of a dead horse for a nominal fee.
The cost is much higher other places, and many places ban the burying of
horses altogether because of pollution fears.
Sending horses off to the glue factory is not an option anymore. Adhesives
are mostly synthetic formulations nowadays, according to Lawrence Sloan,
president of the Adhesive and Sealant Council. And because of public
opposition,
horse meat is no longer turned into dog food either, said Chris Heyde of
the
Society for Animal Protective Legislation.
Eventually, anti-slaughter groups insist, the market will sort itself out,
and owners will breed their horses less often, meaning fewer unwanted
horses.
Nelson Francis, who raises gaited horses, a rare, brawny breed found in the
Appalachian mountains, said the prices they command are getting so low, he
might have to turn some loose. He houses about 57 of them, double his
typical
number.
"I can't absorb the price," Francis said. "You try to hang on until the
price changes, but it looks like it's not going to change. ... What do I
do? I've
got good quality horses I can't market because of the has-been horse."
"Kill buyers" used to pay pennies a pound for unwanted horses, then pack
them into crowded trucks bound for slaughterhouses that would ship the
horse
meat to Europe and Asia.
However, public opposition to the eating of horse meat has caused the
number
of horses slaughtered each year by American companies to drop from over
300,000 in 1990 to around 90,000 in 2005, according to the U.S. Department
of
Agriculture. Only one U.S. slaughterhouse - in Illinois - still butchers
horses
for human consumption.
"What do you do with them all?" said Lori Neagle, executive director of the
new Kentucky Equine Humane Center in Lexington. "What do you do with 90,000
head of horses? That's something that has to be addressed. It'll be
interesting to see if people financially can do the right thing or if they
will leave
their horses to starve."
Federal law prohibits the use of double-decker trucks for transporting
horses to slaughter. Many members of _Congress_ (javascript:;) have also
been
pushing a national ban on the butchering of horses for human consumption.
While California is the only state that has expressly banned horse
slaughter, in a 1989 ballot initiative, similar measures are under
consideration
elsewhere, including Kentucky, Maryland, New York and Illinois. Connecticut
has
made it illegal to sell horse meat in public places, and many states have
tightened up the labeling and transportation requirements governing horses
bound
for slaughter.
A federal court ruled recently that Texas must start to enforce its
long-ignored 1949 ban on the transportation and possession of horse meat.
That put a
stop to horse slaughter at the two slaughterhouses in Texas that engaged in
the practice.
While the market price for horses has plummeted, the cost of food, lodging
and veterinary care has not.
Kathy Schwartz, director of Lisbon, Md.-based Days End Farm Horse Rescue,
which adopts abused and neglected horses, said that rescue operations that
choose not to euthanize horses are generally full.
"We had one horse we brought in that was a rack of bones - in pain both
from
starvation and parasite infestation and injury," Schwartz said. "His owner
thought life was better than going to slaughter. Well, life is - if you're
going to feed it and take care of it."
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