Some months ago, there seemed to be an increase in news stories about mistreated horses:\u00a0 horses starving on drought-blighted open range or neglected in too-small private fields.\u00a0\u00a0 Horses are such noble animals, I had always thought.\u00a0 How can anybody mistreat a horse?<\/p>\n
A rancher told me this was happening because of federal regulatory changes that forced the closure of all U.S. horse slaughterhouses.\u00a0 \u00a0There was no simple way to dispose of a no-longer-useful horse.<\/p>\n
Inhumane treatment of horses is back in New Mexico news.\u00a0 An animal advocacy group took video of sick and dying horses at an auction facility in Los Lunas. Then it was announced that horse slaughter would once again be legal, because Congress had restored the funding for agriculture inspectors; a few days later, a Roswell slaughterhouse owner applied to slaughter horses; and the protests started.<\/p>\n
According to some accounts, conditions for horses in transport and in the slaughterhouse were pretty horrible.\u00a0 The unintended consequences of banning U.S. slaughter were worse.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Horses were shipped to Mexico or Canada, in crowded trucks with no food or water.\u00a0 The video of the corral in Los Lunas was heartbreaking enough.\u00a0 Imagine those same sick horses forced to travel in such conditions.<\/p>\n
Without slaughter, the legal choices were to take care of the animal until its natural death, have it humanely euthanized and then dispose of the carcass in a legal manner, or take it to a state-licensed horse rescue farm.\u00a0\u00a0 Horse rescue farms are a great solution, except that the website of the New Mexico Livestock Board lists just nine of them, and they reportedly house no more than 20 to 60 horses each.<\/p>\n
Unwanted horses in the United States are said to number 100,000 or more.\u00a0 There are no accurate numbers for New Mexico.\u00a0 Some people confine horses in tiny enclosures;\u00a0 uncounted thousands roam on drought-stricken public lands and Indian reservations, where they compete with each other, wildlife and livestock for scarce food and water.\u00a0\u00a0 Who can say whether a slow death from thirst and starvation is preferable to slaughter?<\/p>\n
The owner of a rescue farm talked to me on condition that I say nothing about her identity or location.\u00a0 She gets up some mornings and finds a newly abandoned horse tied to her fence.\u00a0 She has no room for more.\u00a0 Others who talked to me didn\u2019t want to be quoted because, reasonably or not, they fear animal-rights extremists.<\/p>\n
Surprisingly, news reports said PETA \u00a0(People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals), reputed animal rights radicals, supported the reintroduction of slaughter in the U.S., because it\u2019s better than the treatment of horses trafficked across the border.\u00a0 But the Humane Society of the United States said, prior to the Roswell announcement, that anyone trying to open a horse slaughterhouse \u201cwill face pressure.\u201d\u00a0 It argues that horses slaughtered are not only the old and lame, but perfectly healthy horses.\u00a0 There will be new initiatives to ban slaughter again. I\u2019m not sure whether meat from a sick horse can be sold for human consumption.<\/p>\n
I would hope that if slaughter resumes, states can put regulations in place to assure that both transport and slaughter are done humanely.\u00a0 Of course, we humans don\u2019t always treat other humans humanely, and there is no space in this column to talk about other animals in agribusiness.<\/p>\n
As with so many issues of public policy, we attempt to do the right thing but don\u2019t go far enough.\u00a0 The issue in total is humane treatment of animals, including those nearing the end of life.\u00a0 Whether slaughter resumes or is stopped again,\u00a0 I would hope our policy makers could go the whole way and develop a complete plan that is fully consistent with the ideals it professes to embrace.<\/p>\n
Contact Merilee Dannemann at www.triplespacedagain.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n Triple Spaced Again, \u00a9 New Mexico News Services 2012<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Some months ago, there seemed to be an increase in news stories about mistreated horses:\u00a0 horses starving on drought-blighted open range or neglected in too-small private fields.\u00a0\u00a0 Horses are such noble animals, I had always thought.\u00a0 How can anybody mistreat … Continue reading