Sunday, June 29, 2008
SLAUGHTERING THE FACTS ABOUT HORSE SLAUGHTER
25812.1
http://www.timesgazette.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&SubSectionID=1&ArticleID=154771&TM=40286.44
6/28/2008 10:10:00 AM Email this article • Print this article
Slaughtering the facts about horse slaughter
By John Holland
Shawsville, Va.
Times-Gazette readers should know that they are reading a very special publication. Following an article by guest columnist Bill Horne titled Law causes additional problems, The Times-Gazette became aware that the premise of the article was incorrect and that a proposed federal law against horse slaughter (which Horne blamed for assorted woes) has never been passed.
What makes The Times-Gazette unusual is that the newspaper actually published a retraction and set the record straight. As a writer and horse lover, I belong to a small group that monitors stories on horse slaughter and tries to get such stories corrected. Doing this is like nailing Jell-o to a tree. Occasionally, we get equal space for a response, but this is one of only two retractions I have seen in six years.
The slaughter issue was complicated enough before the larger agriculture industry concluded that a ban on horse slaughter would be merely the first step on the slippery slope to vegan domination. As a result, lobbyists and PR agencies have been working overtime to spin the reality and to convince Americans that they need to give up their instinctive feeling that horse slaughter is wrong. To do this, they try to convince us that an end to slaughter would be bad for the horses themselves.
In February of 2007, after a prolonged legal battle, the courts upheld a Texas law against the selling of horse meat for human consumption. The two Texas plants were forced to close. Almost immediately, an AP article was carried in dozens of papers worldwide claiming that horses grazing on a reclaimed strip mine in Eastern Kentucky had been abandoned there because of the reduction in slaughter over recent years. It claimed Kentucky was “awash” in unwanted horses.
The Kentucky story, like Mr. Horne’s, was based on a false premise. The horses were not abandoned. Ironically, the horses at the strip mine had been the subject of yet another Associated Press story only a month earlier when teenagers had shot several of them. Yet, when presented with their own story identifying the ownership of the horses, the AP stonewalled and refused to even acknowledge the criticism. To this day, and despite denials from the state police to the governor, articles still appear referring to the plight of the abandoned horses in Kentucky.
In September the last plant, Cavel, was closed by a new Illinois law against slaughtering horses for human consumption. This event set off a torrent of stories about all the problems being caused by a lack of slaughter.
An AP story from the Oregonian claimed that abandoned horses were a “growing dilemma” for ranchers. It told of a Mr. McKenzie who had nine horses dumped on his farm, and it quoted an under-sheriff Wolfe about how hard it was to determine who dumped such horses.
But Wolfe’s incident report showed that only one horse had been reported (by McKenzie’s granddaughter) and even that was determined to be unfounded. County records for a three-year period showed no such abandonment cases. Did the Oregonian print a retraction? Nope! Faced with the document showing their story to be false, they said they were “standing behind their reporter.”
The complete inaccuracy of these stories made no difference to Senator Larry Craig either. He announced on the Senate floor that these reports were the reason he was blocking the AHSPA (American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act). It was only then that the full strategy of the disinformation campaign became apparent.
Since that time there have been countless stories butchering the facts at almost the same rate as the horses dying in abattoirs abroad. Some stories claim that the price of horses has dropped to almost nothing because of the plant closings. Still other stories insist horses are being neglected and starved for the same reason. And while there are areas in which these problems have increased, it has nothing to do with the plant closings. Yes, some breeders are struggling economically but that is not because they can’t sell their culls for slaughter, it is because of the high price of hay and corn, staples of the equine diet. Ethanol anyone?
Yes, the U.S.-based slaughterhouses have been closed, but American horses are being exported to Mexico and Canada for slaughter in numbers almost identical to those before the plant closings. Within a week of its closing, Cavel’s Belgian parent company, Velda LLC, was contracting with the much larger Natural Valley Farms plant in Woosley, SK Canada to kill its horses. As a result, Canadian slaughter almost doubled in one month and American horses were soon being butchered at the same rate as before the closings according to U.S. Department of Agriculture records.
The confusion caused by this disinformation is made worse because horse slaughter is an emotionally charged issue with a complicated history. For example, there was a budget amendment passed by Congress to shut down the horse slaughter plants by removing the funding for required inspections. This should have shuttered the U.S. plants in March 2006, but the USDA instituted a pay-for-inspections program that kept the plants going until the state laws finally ran them to ground. This might have been the seed of Mr. Horne’s factually challenged article.
How much of the present misunderstanding of the horse slaughter issue is due to intentional disinformation and how much is just confusion caused by that disinformation is impossible to know. But if we are to make informed decisions on this and other important issues, we must have solid information. If other publications would follow The Times-Gazette’s lead and return to responsible journalism, we might have a chance.
John Holland is a freelance writer and the author of three books. He writes frequently on the subject of horse slaughter from his small farm in the mountains of Virginia where he lives with his wife, Sheilah, and their 12 equines.
Posted by Shelley Abrams on 06/29 at 06:33 PM
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Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Animal Law Coalition Press Release
www.animallawcoalition.com · (435) 644-3333 · Fax (435) 644-3339
Contact for more information: Laura Allen, Executive Director, (435) 644-3333 or
Study shows no increase in equine abuse following closure of horse slaughterhouses
Kanab, Utah (June 2, 2008) A nationwide study of equine abuse and neglect has recently been concluded by researchers working with the Animal Law Coalition. The data was taken from the national on-line database of reported animal abuse cases at http://www.petabuse.com.
The study tabulated the number of reported cases of equine abuse and neglect and the number of horses involved in those cases over a period starting in January of 2006 and ending in March of 2008. The goal of the study was to quantify the combined impact of the plant closings, the economic downturn and higher grain and hay prices in the past year.
Researchers admit to being surprised by the results. The study found that while there had been some regional increases in the frequency of such cases, there had been other areas of the country where reductions more than offset the increases. The conclusion was that on average the year of 2007 was no worse, and in fact slightly better than 2006.
Joyce Jacobson, the researcher who first proposed the study, said “The results were so surprising that we completely repeated the data search to assure it was accurate. Then we waited for several months after the last tabulated month to assure all the data was in.”
Asked to explain the unexpected results, John Holland, senior analyst for AAHS (Americans Against Horse Slaughter) said “A significant number of media stories had assured us that abuse and neglect had increased dramatically following the closing of the Texas horse slaughter plants in February of 2007 and the Illinois plant in September. What we see is that this clearly never happened.”
Holland went on to say that the number of equine rescues nationwide has increased dramatically in recent years. “It appears” he concluded, “that the rescues were able to take in the horses pushed out of their homes by these adverse economic conditions.”
Steve Rei, President of the National Equine Rescue Coalition said that a poll taken of the organization’s member rescues earlier in the year found that about 60% were at financial capacity; while very few were at space capacity. Rei went on to say it was clear that with more financial help the rescues could handle even more horses.
Details about the study’s methodology and the supporting data will be made available upon written request.
___________________
About Animal Law Coalition
Animal Law Coalition works to stop animal cruelty and suffering through legislation, administrative agency action, and litigation. ALC offers legal analysis of the difficult and controversial issues relating to animals. Join ALC and together we can take action for animals nationally and in your state and community.
Posted by Debra Lopez on 06/04 at 11:58 AM
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Monday, May 26, 2008
And They’re Off - To Slaughter
http://www2. tbo.com/content/ 2008/may/ 25/tr-and- their-off- to-slaughter/
And They’re Off - To Slaughter
By PHILIP MORGAN
The Tampa Tribune
Published: May 25, 2008
Updated:
TAMPA - All eyes smile on Big Brown as the chestnut beauty races toward
a possible Triple Crown.
Meanwhile, at lesser tracks across the nation, forgotten has-beens are
finishing out of the money. The lucky ones will settle into pastoral
retirement as reward for their moneymaking years.
Others will become featured entrees on foreign dining tables.
It’s the dark side of the horse racing industry, and it’s just beginning
to catch the public’s attention, horse rescue activists say. This month,
HBO’s “Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel” focused on the sale of faded
racehorses to dealers working for Mexican and Canadian slaughterhouses.
The program included graphic footage of a horse surviving several head
blows from a bolt gun and another being stabbed in the spine to paralyze
the animal and make it easier to slaughter.
In memory of Barbaro, the late, lame Kentucky Derby champ, Tampa lawyer
Vanessa Nye is doing what she can to help stop the practice. A
part-owner of five thoroughbred racehorses, Nye is a member of the
national group Fans of Barbaro, which promotes legislation to ban
transporting horses for slaughter.
A number of other organizations, among them singer Willie Nelson’s
Society for Animal Protection Legislation, are pushing for reforms,
raising money for rescue and trying to establish funds to assure that
thoroughbreds can retire to pasture.
All kinds of horses end up in slaughterhouses, from work horses to pets.
But it’s an extremely common fate for thoroughbreds, Nye says.
“I think to a lot of people, they’re commodities. The horse gets older,
injured, isn’t producing, coming in third, and they don’t want it
anymore,” she says. “‘Get a better one. Get rid of this horse.’”
If owners have no alternatives, they can at least pay to have a
veterinarian humanely put down the horse. That would cost about $60.
Some owners would rather make $300 at an auction.
Last year, more than 100,000 horses were sold for slaughter in the
United States, says Barbi Moline of Americans Against Horse Slaughter.
The meat is especially popular in Belgium, France, Italy, Switzerland
and Japan. The demand for it becomes clear on a Google search for horse
meat recipes: 221,000 hits.
A Winner’s Nearly Dinner
A 5-year-old gelding, Little Cliff was headed for the dinner table in
March, 10 days after the thoroughbred’ s last race, until Pennsylvania
rescuer Christy Sheidy saved him from a slaughter pen. Little Cliff,
once a stakes-class horse trained by the famed Nick Zito and winner of
$202,762, had placed seventh in a low-level claiming race - where horses
can be purchased up to a few minutes before the race starts. No one had
“claimed” him, and his showing earned only $170 for the trainer-owner.
The Thoroughbred Times reported that Little Cliff was turned over to
what the industry calls a “meat man” despite a notice in his file from
Zito and his wife offering the horse a home in retirement.
The trainer-owner said he gave the horse to a man he thought would
provide it a good home, says Sheidy, co-founder of Another Chance 4
Horses rescue in Bernville, Pa. The man sold it to a meat man, she says.
“It’s a real common shuffle - ‘Oh, they didn’t know,’” Sheidy says in a
telephone interview. “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard that.”
The public watched in horror this month as Eight Belles, the filly who
broke two legs in the Kentucky Derby, was euthanized on the track.
Members of the racing industry have called it a rare tragedy in the sport.
“What they fail to mention is that the race industry has thousands of
fatalities annually - in the form of slaughter,” Sheidy says.
In the past few years, individual states have closed down this nation’s
last horse slaughterhouses. Representatives of Canadian and Mexican
slaughterhouses outbid others at auctions and transport the animals out
of the country, horse rescue activists say.
Legislation Proponents, Opponents
Many times, Nye says, the horses are ferried under cramped conditions
and given no food or water. Her group wants people to pressure
legislators to pass the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act, which
would ban the transport of living American horses for slaughter. House
Bill 503 and Senate Bill 311 are stalled in Congress.
Barbi Moline of Stuart is a Florida group leader for Americans Against
Horse Slaughter, which is pushing for the law. Moline, who has two
retired rescued thoroughbreds, says the lawmakers blocking the bills
come from big beef states.
The chief opponent, activists say, is Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho. A group
called the National Horse Protection League has put an appeal on its
site to “Stop the Larry Craig Stall,” referring to his arrest on charges
of soliciting sex from an undercover officer in an airport men’s room.
The beef industry is fighting it, Moline says, because beef sellers fear
it will jeopardize practices for slaughtering cattle and pigs.
“They fail to realize that horses are and always have been companion
animals,” she says. “They’re bred to be companions. Slaughtering horses
is the same, basically, as slaughtering dogs and cats.”
The possible domino effect of the horse bill is a concern of the
National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, spokesman Joe Schuele says. Some
members oppose the law because they use horses in their operations and
need a way to dispose of old, injured and unmanageable animals, he says.
When horse slaughter was allowed in the United States, laws required
that the animals be humanely killed. Also, horses didn’t have to be
transported long distances.
Not everyone can have a horse humanely put down and buried on the farm,
Schuele says, and rendering plants, which turn horse carcasses into
products - including pet food - charge to remove the horse.
Banning transportation for slaughter would leave the country with too
many old animals to care for, he says.
Nye insists, however, that if enough thoroughbred owners take the time,
most can find a home for their retired horses. The animals can be used
in psychological therapy and prison rehabilitation programs, for
example. If necessary, rescue groups will take them.
“Being a thoroughbred owner, it’s so sad when you see horses coming in
last at low-level claiming races,” Nye says. “You know any day that they
will end up in auctions.”
Reporter Philip Morgan can be reached at (813) 259-7609 or
com.
Posted by Shelley Abrams on 05/26 at 01:56 PM
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