New West Blog
Montana Opens Door for Horse Slaughter
By Anne Medley, 2-26-09
Old, sick or lame horses may no longer be shipped to Canada and Mexico for slaughter if a bill passed by the Montana House of Representatives on Wednesday clears the Senate.
Since the closure of the last three remaining horse slaughterhouses in the U.S. in 2007, many ranchers and horse owners have struggled to find economic ways to dispose of their ailing animals, Montana reporter Matt Gouras reports for the AP.
The aptly named Republican Rep. Ed Butcher, a horse owner himself, sponsored the bill that would lead to the construction of a horse slaughterhouse in Montana. In increasingly tough economic times, Butcher noted that animal cruelty and horse abandonment cases are rising as ranchers and horse owners find they can no longer afford to care for their animals. A U.S. slaughterhouse, Butcher says, would be “a humane way to address the problem.”
Opponents aren’t so sure. Nancy Perry, the Humane Society’s vice-president of government affairs, says horses are more likely to escape kill boxes in traditional slaughterhouses. And Rep. Sue Malek, D-Missoula wants horses treated more justly and responsibly by their owners.
To read the full AP story, click here.
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And if Rep. Butcher had studied the horse slaughter issue further, he would have learned that horse slaughter is not a cure of a prevention to abandonment and abuse. People who abuse and neglect their horses, have never been known to take their horses to slaughter. The horse slaughter option has never been removed by the closure of the U.S. plants. Even from over the border last year, they were slaughtering more U.S. horses than they were when they were operating in the U.S. Auctions never stopped selling horses, and the kill buyers were buying an even higher number of American horses for export to slaughter after the plants closed. here. Because the slaughter option has been here all along, every abandoned horse claim last year and any current claims, are proof that slaughter doesn't stop anyone from abandoning a horse if that's what they intend to do. All they've had to do is just take the horse to a local auction, and if they can't be bothered by doing that, they're surely not going to bother taking it to a slaughter facility.
And I wonder if Rep. Butcher bothered to check into all the continued non-compliance violations that all 3 facilities were always cited for, such as polluting the streams and creeks with blood and offal, waste-water violations, and clogging up the city's sewage system. When he gets his horse slaughter facility, and finds he's still got abandoned and abuse cases, an increasing horse theft problem, and as well, problems from the facilities' pollution habits, he'll be getting exactly what he deserves. I'm just sorry that Montana citizens will be plagued with the problems as well.
http://www.animallawcoalition.com/horse-slaughter/article/686
Nice job, Butcher. Decent people will begin fleeing this state, leaving it to the mental and moral knuckle-draggers. Maybe that's what they've had in mind all along.
Montana will become known as the "Judas" state if this horse slaugherhouse comes to pass. I am sorry to see it. Montana was a wonderful destination vacation for me. I won't be back should they make the tremendous blunder of bringing this shame upon the state of Montana.
But folks, please don't blame "the people of Montana" as a whole. Many of us are heartsick and mad as hell about the indecency committed in our names by our so-called representatives. You are right-on, it's always about money and the greed for more money (and power). Please contact our governor, Brian Schweitzer, and tell him that your vacation dollars will no longer be spent in Big Sky Country if horse slaughter commences and wildlife slaughter continues.
http://www.slate.com/id/2212233/
Exactly the sort of thing Montana needs, this should boost tourism. When will legislators learn that politics and many of their silly policies are as much symbolic as anything. They continue to make Montana look silly, petty, and desperate.
I think this would be an ideal use of the horse plague that our public lands and native wildlife in the west are subjected to. Get these non native range destroyers off of our public land and feed them to the French, a win, win for everyone.
There are 2 problems with the reasoning for having slaughter houses.
1. Saying slaughter houses are a cheap and an easy way to get rid of a horse doesn't add up with the fact that ranchers can afford to ship them to Mexico!
2. Slaughter isn't humane.
A Montanan treats their 20 year old truck better than their horse. I'd like to see a Montanan send their old old pickup to a junk yard.
I have friends who keep anywhere from a couple to four rescue horses. When they die, or need to be humanely euthanized, they call a vet and then have the horse buried--it isn't illegal, it depends on where the water table is located. Do your homework.
After a Freedom of Information Act request was FINALLY granted, the USDA has been required to release pictures of horses who were injured or killed during double-decker rides to the slaughterhouse.
Humane euthanasia, or a bullet in the brain, is better than this.
WARNING: Extremely graphic. Don't look if you can't handle it. But if you want to know the truth, help yourself.
http://www.kaufmanzoning.net/foiaphotos.html
I'll give you credit. At least you're a vegan. Few things are as irritating as someone waxing sentimental about horses being friends while eating a ribeye. I admire that your have a firm set of beliefs that you implement in your life.
As a former vegan, horse and mule owner, aspiring gardener and chicken raiser, I choose to focus my food habits on local. Because of the petroleum required for shipping and packaging, it is far more environmentally sound for me to eat a chicken from my backyard or a cow from the Bitterroot Valley than soybeans farmed in South America (now among the leading cause of deforestation in the Amazon). I'm not perfect at eating locally, but I'm improving. It will always be tough in a northern state.
You are correct that factory farming is not a good thing. More calories are fed in the form of farm produce in feedlots than we later get out of the meat we eat. If most of us actually acknowledged how the animals were treated, we'd never be okay with eating them.
However, many places in the West are now focusing on "grass finished" and "free range" livestock. In the arid climate we live in, ranching is the highest food use of that land. In addition, ranchlands can still provide wildlife habitat. How many wolves, bears or eagles have you ever seen on a farm? Livestock raised in this way and then slaughtered humanely is environmentally sound.
Historically veganism is rare. Almost every culture ate meat for their sustenance. Even the Tibetans, so well known for doing no harm to other life, eat meat. In fact, their sensibility is often to kill fewer larger animal (i.e. a cow) instead of many smaller animals (i.e. fish), so that they get the most nutritional bang for their karmic buck.
Meat does have an important nutritional role for humans. Many vegans (perhaps you are an exception) require extensively processed protein and iron supplements to remain healthy or turn to some rare natural source that couldn't possibly provide enough iron or protein for the current human population. In addition, most gardeners use some form of manure for fertilization. There is a proper balance of meat and vegetables for sustainability.
As far as horses and slaughter goes, it's every individual's decision what they do with their animals. I personally appreciate the sentiment of not wasting perfectly good meat, but would not let the animals I love go through that experience. As for animals I don't love . . . it's really not my problem. I'd rather see them used than in a landfill.
Americans really need to face up to the realities of living. It requires the death of something, whether it's horses, corn plants, bunnies under the plow or migratory birds who find their nesting ground turned into a field. One of the realities of being a horseowner anywhere remote (most of Montana) is being prepared to end your partner's suffering with a merciful bullet instead of waiting hours for a vet to arrive or leaving a horse for dead in the backcountry. Those of us who have confronted that reality are going to have a different attitude from "stable and arena" horse owners.
As for all of you who now aren't going to vist Montana. Good Riddance! Go to Colorado instead. They're already overrun with tourists. We only need to sacrifice one Rocky Mountain state to ranchettes and "true western experiences." Most of you can't afford the luxury of and expensive vacation anyways now that the economy's in the pits.
Erin
Erin, can you please explain to me how diverting streams to grow feed and killing everything from gophers to predators is environmentally sound?
And veganism may have been rare in the past - people were forced to survive on any substainance they could. But we're speaking of today's situation... and odds are if anyone is reading these comments online - they have a Walmart or other "grocery store" where every choice can be made by what "humane" items are placed in the buggy. For the amount of fuel in transporting "meat on the hoof" - and the electricity in "processing" and keeping their carcasses/flesh cold/frozen... we could have built hundreds of hydroponic facilities even in the most remote areas of the U.S. And because industrial greenhouse farming actually creates 90% of the water it needs brings me to discuss the next wasteful resource about animal agriculture... water.
Because as far as livestock is concerned... if predictions are correct water will become more scarce in decades to come. The awful downside to animal agriculture, (be it on factory farms or natural conditions)... water used to "process" meat is off the charts in comparison. Not to mention the toxic contaminants in making "leather"... After all, the mandate seems to be to eek every bit of "profit" from these animals (as long as we're killing them anyway). Leather is one of the top polluters on the planet and can leave acres of land and miles of water shed "dead" for decades. So even the best of "free range" livestock uses an extreme quantity of water and also degrades fresh water as well.
And as far as "meat does have an important nutritional role for humans"... we consume more than twice what our bodies need in the way of "protein". Check your local emergency room sometime... odds are most are admitted because of obesity, diabetes complications, stroke and heart issues - attributed to meat-based diets. I doubt you'll find many in the hospital due to a lack of B12, iron... or "protein" defeciencies. Go to your doctor and ask him if he recommends you consume more vegetables or more "meat".
Back to horse slaughter - "wasting perfectly good meat"... wait! I thought these were sickly, diseased and starving horses? Or are they young healthy ones? Which is it? As long as it is profitable - people will continue to over-breed these animals. It's just simple, basic human nature... and a sad fact of "economics". Imagine if we were able to make money each time our dog or cat had a litter, simply by sending them off to slaughter? Think we have a pet overpoupulation problem now... At $20/dog: I shudder to think how many would find a way to break into that market. If you use animals as "commodities" - there will never be an end to their value - hence their exploitation and their suffering.
And of course life involves "dying"... After due time on this earth - no one will escape this - but you are talking about "killing" which is entirely different. Especially "profit motivated killing" - Most animals are killed as juveniles or at best young adolescents. Animal agriculture gives the illusion that these animals live "rich full lives". Let's examine: a broiler chicken goes from egg to slaughter in less than 45 days - life expectancy: 15 years. Pigs live well into their 20's... they are "bacon" at 6 months old. Cows - some on sanctuaries have lived into their 30's... They are *meat* at 10 months... And then animal agriculture can get even more brutal with "infantcide"... bob veal: 3 weeks old... Kip... born on the kill floor. Is this the natural course of "dying" that you were referring to?
I'm still standing my ground - animal agriculture is not only inhumane - because we don't "need" to kill animals but it's also unsustainable. If we reach 10 billion people by 2050... there simply will not be enough land, water or energy to live on a meat based diet. And heavens, I hope by then we will convert to a more compassionate and viable way of sharing this planet with other beings.
I think you hit the head on the nail all by yourself. Everyday you "read" about everything that happens up here in Montana. Come with open eyes, ears and mind and see it for yourself before you judge everything we do.
I'm not going to get into the wolf debate here. Suffice it to say, I'm glad that our President is removing them from the Endangered Species List and that wolves being scared of humans is better for both the humans and the wolves. Coyotes rarely pose a threat to cattle, and what's being done to the bison in Montana is ridiculous, absurd and unethical.
I was a vegan for environmental reasons - primarily unnecessary water consumption - and not animal rights reasons. I have never understood why animal rights activists are fine with killing plants but not animals.
I agree about industrial livestock production. It's not pretty and it's wasteful, and I'm focusing on changing my habits to not support it. I also agree that Americans eat more meat than is sustainable, but you're arguing for elimination not reduction.
As for what horses go, you're right that many young horses do go to slaughter. Some of them are permanently lame and will never be usable. Some of them are horses so poorly bred that they little to no use either due to physical or mental deficiencies - crazy horses do exist. Some of them have been handled so poorly in the past that quite frankly it's not worth anyone's time to try to bring them back.
I'm sorry if this sounds callous, but quite frankly I don't care very much if a horse or cow or dog or chicken dies that I don't have a personal connection to. It's not that I value humans more than animals. I value my animals whom I love more than most humans I know, but being a bleeding heart for each and every individual is a waste of time and unnecessary. I'm more concerned about the long term viability of habitat where wild animals can continue to thrive.
I actually have been to the emergency room for iron deficiency - aka anemia. It's a common condition for women, particularly those with a primarily vegetable diet. In additon, every female - and several male - vegetarian I have known who took a job doing physical work at a high eleveation - including myself - quit being a vegetarian within two months. Not eating enough protein or iron isn't nearly as big of a deal if you never use those red blood cells or muscles.
Bea, I think the main difference between us is the concept of naturalness. I would rather personally kill a million animals myself than see the wild country that I love covered with hydroponic farms and factories for turning iron into little non-violent pills. I see habitat destruction as a far greater violence than the killing of a single animal. You clearly disagree, but I have no desire to force you to eat cows, horses or dogs. Eat what you want.
I hope you transcend "basic human nature" and can meet all your energy needs from the sun, but I revel in the fact that I am an animal and an active part of both life and death. Remember that misanthropes by definition hate themselves. I think its a little more adult to accept that our actions to stay alive inevitably results in others - animal and plant - not staying alive and to face that and be willing to the dirty work myself instead of letting a grocery store supplier do it for me.
I maintain that it is more morally, economically and environmentally sound and results in less animal deaths to eat an omnivore local diet than to eat vegan at Walmart.
To Treehugging Cowgirl... "I have never understood why animal rights activists are fine with killing plants but not animals." Well, that goes to biology 101... you see, there's animal (that's us)... vegetable (the stuff that's food)... and rocks, dirt etc. Vegetables and rocks - trees, minerals, can't feel pain - nor is either "sentient"... grass is not "aware of the world" - nor is a copper mine "aware of the world". Animals are. All of us - we know we are in it. We know that we exist. We all, birds, cats, cows and man - wish to live. Potatos and stones don't have any concept either way. This is why killing animals, who have hearts, eyes, mouths, nerves, tissue and feel pain and bleed - *just like us* - is so offensive to some. It's called empathy -
And I don't know if you were intimating that I am a misanthrope. Actually, I love man so much that it sorrows me that every 4 seconds someone dies due to starvation. You see, a meat based diet will feed one person - while a plant based diet will feed the world... many times over. 10 to 1 actually. So I'm really not the people hater at all.
The idea of hydroponic farming doesn't mean an end to wild lands - in means preservation for it. Hydroponic farming is done vertically... using a fraction of acreage by the ability to go up & up and away - http://beaelliott.blogspot.com/2009/01/vertical-gardens-green-living-leave-cow.html It is the sustainable way to the future... and will restore our land to the pristine condition it was given to us in.
And finally, your comment about "iron deficiency - aka anemia" check the statistics at CDC - it's rare and mostly seen in infants, and females between the ages of 12 & 47. Who by the way, are eating an omnivore's diet. BTW - I'm 54, do 6 to 8 hours of hard, physical work daily... I take no supplements. Everything one needs to thrive can be found in a plant based vegan diet.
The horses they kill, by the thousands according to the usda reports of breeds are mostly quarter horses and standardbreds. Those horses come from breeders on large horse ranches,,,those breeders should pay for their excessive over-production of horses.
Horses are NOT CHICKENS or PIGs..please take their oversight away from usda and place them under companion animal oversight.
Horse slaughter just STINKS going back to the old days of the 1960s when you horse-killers killed off 500,000 wild horses a year!
MONTANA THE HORSE KILLERS STATE!! don't make this statement your new state! BUMPER STICKER.
Montana the horse killing State!
And you horse breeders..must be very proud to know you personally have the blood of 200 horses on your hands! what's next? skinning puppies for fur-coats?
Whoever said horse slaughter is a necessity because "wild horses are destroying the environment" is an ignorant fool. Anyone who has taken the time to read unbiased articles on wild horses and their "impact" on the environment and the reasons they are being rounded up would realize that these roundups are simply motivated by cattlemen who want the land only for their cattle and are interested in the extermination of wild horses for their own selfish reasons...not because of any environmental impact. They keep moving cattle further into the natural domain of these wild horses, forcing the horses to compete with cattle for food to survive. Secondly, no one should even buy the argument that horses sent to slaughter are old, sick or crippled. Numerous studies have been done regarding horses sent to slaughter and they have found 80% of these horses are in completely healthy and rideable. Many of them are pregnant horses and draft horses or draft cross, desireable since the kill buyers get more money for a horse depending on it's weight. I can't believe that this newspaper would print an article such as this without doing their homework first and spreading the myth that only the sick old and crippled horses are slaughtered, leading the public to think this is a humane alternative. If anyone wants the real story, all they have to do is google "horse slaughter" and they will find out the truth and how incredibly awful it is. People need to stop breeding more horses and taking responsibility for the ones they own and if they are no longer rideable or they cannot feed them, take them to a rescue, find a home for them or have them put down humanely....it's the least we owe to an animal who in many cases taught our children to ride, gave us their companionship willingly and hours of service.
cats, monkeys, and whales because these animals are considered to be pets or to be more intelligent than other animals. Other cultures hunt these animals and eat them. Its only a matter of taste and affection which differs among cultures or tribes.
And as far as being over run with deer and the potential problem of including horses in the mix -- Why don't we just stop breeding BOTH? A deer overpopulation "problem" only exists to facilitate the hunters enjoyment of the taking of them. Why else would we have more than 15,000 deer and elk breeding "farms" in the US? Of course it's for the money --- Same as breeding horses.
Really, the idea of sentient beings used as "commodities" is becoming less and less desirable by civilization. There's a reason why society is uncomfortable with it --- It's ethically wrong and not sustainable. These are slow steps that march to man's progress rather than keep him waist deep in the muck of our premordial ancestors. Please, for the sake of humanity itself... please evolve.