Horses intercepted in Dover

[kathantoinette]

Heartbreaking. This just highlights how some owners are all too happy to pass along and cannot face up to the task of putting to sleep.

 

[humblepie]

It’s appalling the whole way round.

 

[Smitty]

I can't read beyond the first 4 or 5 posts. This really brings home to me that money is the root of all evil.

 

[Caski]

Interestingly, there has been nothing reported in the local press about this criminal incident, only through Facebook from WHW, and that only seen by a minority.

There are problems at Dover in respect of Port Health as the local authority fund the operation but can't afford to continue. Hopefully Defra will take on the cost but in the meantime I suspect things may be slack, all this in the midst of dubious meat imports!

I cannot accept live export for slaughter in any terms ,so there will be an abbatoir waiting at the other end, but how long do these poor horses have to travel?

 

[SEL]

I regularly donate to one of the charities that stops the Amish draft horses heading off to Canada for slaughter. I have a soft spot for drafts and wish the US would slaughter on home soil so these poor horses could get put out of their misery quickly.

I've seen the WHW appeal for these guys. Pregnant mares amongst them

 

[Velcrobum]

Surely the holding facility knows which transporter has dumped this infected load in their premises!! I suspect there is considerably more to this than is being reported. Given how much grief owners of competition horses go through getting them across the channel when it seems a wrong punctuation mark blocks transport how are these bulk transporters managing to apparently circumnavigate the Brexit regulations?????

 

[pistolpete]

I’d forgotten when my first horse was pts by knackerman I got the meat money for her. This was normal back then. She was still shot at home eating polos. £260 in 1982. RIP Gypsy. She was a sweetheart.
The hideous act of exporting live animals is disgusting and needs to stop!

 

[scats]

This is why I’d far rather have an unrideable or problem horse PTS than pass them on. You just never know where they will end up or how horrific those final days will be.

 

[rabatsa]

You have the money to have yours done by the vet if you really can't find someone to shoot them. There is no foxhound pack that will shoot horses in Cheshire now. The ones I contacted in December directed me to a man who did their own horses for them. I had a choice of at least three, one north, one south, one east. Farm stock will always need shooting in emergency situations and they will do the horses too. Foxhounds are not required for that service to continue, only sheep, pigs and preferably cows.
.

Unfortunately the farm stock firm that is local got taken over by another one and now no longer shoot horses for you.

Fortunately there is another one a bit further away that will still come and do the deed here, even donkeys - which many people consider unlucky to pts.

 

[ycbm]

Unfortunately the farm stock firm that is local got taken over by another one and now no longer shoot horses for you.

Fortunately there is another one a bit further away that will still come and do the deed here, even donkeys - which many people consider unlucky to pts.

I hope everyone in your area knows they need to have the best part of £1000 in savings to pay for injection and incineration. My last horse vets now charge £600 for a big horse and there are collection and incinerator costs on top.
.

 

[marmalade76]

I hope everyone in your area knows they need to have the best part of £1000 in savings to pay for injection and incineration. My last horse vets now charge £600 for a big horse and there are collection and incinerator costs on top.
.

And this is the reason, IMO, why so many are passed on rather than PTS, it's not cheap.

 

[Velcrobum]

I hope everyone in your area knows they need to have the best part of £1000 in savings to pay for injection and incineration. My last horse vets now charge £600 for a big horse and there are collection and incinerator costs on top.
.

Our local service will PTS via pistol and remove for £288.00. If you want the ashes then it is £996.00 in an oak casket with a brass name plate. Do not know how much vets charge for lethal injection but that would be on top of the disposal. There are 2 Equine crematoria in the area the one I have always used as they are so respectful and gentle prior to PTS, the other is spoken well of and their prices are similar I understand. The one I use https://www.graftoncrem.co.uk/ and it is the one my vets use for disposal.

 

[Goldenstar]

It’s vital that people have access to affordable convenient ways to have equines PTS where the horses are kept.
However I doubt that why these poor horses ended up in Dover

 

[Steerpike]

I hope everyone in your area knows they need to have the best part of £1000 in savings to pay for injection and incineration. My last horse vets now charge £600 for a big horse and there are collection and incinerator costs on top.
.

My vet charged me £300 and it was £250 for collection, this was last year and the price hadn't changed from the year before.

 

[Ditchjumper2]

The shutting down of local decent abattoirs has not helped at all. Back in the day old riding school horses etc.went to the meat sales and were sold for meat. It meant that these old and unsound horses had a value. As long as they are travelled locally, safely and slaughtered humanely then there is no issue. It meant people disposed of their old lame horses rather than then getting passed from pillar to post. Because they had a value. Once they are dead what happens to the meat is of no consequence really. When I was a child it was commonplace.
We are blessed with hunts around here to PTS and take away. Our hunters all ended up at kennels.

 

[webble]

My vet charged me £300 and it was £250 for collection, this was last year and the price hadn't changed from the year before.

Yup I paid a similar amount in 2021

 

[AandK]

My vet charged me £300 and it was £250 for collection, this was last year and the price hadn't changed from the year before.

Vets £460 and collection £280 (no ashes back) in August last year.

 

[marmalade76]

My vet charged me £300 and it was £250 for collection, this was last year and the price hadn't changed from the year before.

I paid that back in 2017.

 

[TheresaW]

My friend had her horse PTS a couple of weeks ago. Vet was £380, and was a Sunday call out. Collection and ashes back was £480.

 

[Jenko109]

I thought we still had one or two abbatoirs that do horses in the UK?

Is it purely down to not wanting to freeze the meat to travel it that they are doing live export?

I would have thought France was rural enough to farm their own horses to meet the demand? Perhaps the demand for horse meat is far greater over there than I anticipate?

 

[TheMule]

I thought we still had one or two abbatoirs that do horses in the UK?

Is it purely down to not wanting to freeze the meat to travel it that they are doing live export?

I would have thought France was rural enough to farm their own horses to meet the demand? Perhaps the demand for horse meat is far greater over there than I anticipate?

There is 1 abattoir but the UK has stricter passport rules and most of our equines get signed out of the human meat chain. Which is a tragedy for horse welfare IMO and a real own goal by animal rights campaigners.
Most of the meat producer here gets exported straightaway to mainland Europe in refrigerated lorries

 

[Maddie Moo]

This is probably a stupid question and I’ve tried to Google it but it just brings up Animal Aid etc. Are Drury & Son and Potters both still operating? I was always under the impression they were two different places, one in Taunton and one in Tockenham but the more I read, the more confused I get!

I know at uni that our dissection specimens were from Potters but that’s going back a decade now.

 

[meleeka]

There is 1 abattoir but the UK has stricter passport rules and most of our equines get signed out of the human meat chain. Which is a tragedy for horse welfare IMO and a real own goal by animal rights campaigners.
Most of the meat producer here gets exported straightaway to mainland Europe in refrigerated lorries

Why an own goal? Surely if a horse has been given medication which renders it unsuitable for the meat trade, it’s a good thing that it doesn’t end up there, in this country at least?

I do think it’s a shame that it costs money to have a horse shot, but I’d guess there would still be people who would rather pass it on and it not be their problem anymore. Some people just don’t consider anything more than their own wants with animals and don’t care what happens once they’ve offloaded.

There’s fields full of cobs not far from me. The whole field empties periodically, so those horses go somewhere. I’m going to guess they don’t even have passports, so no worrying about being signed out of the food chain for them

 

[TheMule]

This is probably a stupid question and I’ve tried to Google it but it just brings up Animal Aid etc. Are Drury & Son and Potters both still operating? I was always under the impression they were two different places, one in Taunton and one in Tockenham but the more I read, the more confused I get!

I know at uni that our dissection specimens were from Potters but that’s going back a decade now.

Potters moved to near Swindon from the Taunton site

 

[Maddie Moo]

Why an own goal? Surely if a horse has been given medication which renders it unsuitable for the meat trade, it’s a good thing that it doesn’t end up there, in this country at least?

I do think it’s a shame that it costs money to have a horse shot, but I’d guess there would still be people who would rather pass it on and it not be their problem anymore. Some people just don’t consider anything more than their own wants with animals and don’t care what happens once they’ve offloaded.

There’s fields full of cobs not far from me. The whole field empties periodically, so those horses go somewhere. I’m going to guess they don’t even have passports, so no worrying about being signed out of the food chain for them

There is a field of cobs by me too and the same thing happens with them.

Potters moved to near Swindon from the Taunton site

Thank you, much appreciated.

 

[TheMule]

Why an own goal? Surely if a horse has been given medication which renders it unsuitable for the meat trade, it’s a good thing that it doesn’t end up there, in this country at least?

I do think it’s a shame that it costs money to have a horse shot, but I’d guess there would still be people who would rather pass it on and it not be their problem anymore. Some people just don’t consider anything more than their own wants with animals and don’t care what happens once they’ve offloaded.

There’s fields full of cobs not far from me. The whole field empties periodically, so those horses go somewhere. I’m going to guess they don’t even have passports, so no worrying about being signed out of the food chain for them

Because a horse has 1 medication and then is signed out for life (or often no medication at all, it has become normal for them to be signed out before any veterinary treatment is considered, and TBs are now automatically signed out) In reality, it should work like cattle where there is a defined withdrawal period recorded in the passport, then it can go back in.

And it’s an own goal because it hasn’t done anything to improve horse welfare and has probably actively harmed it by causing some horses to travel long distances in unsuitable conditions.

 

[Jenko109]

Because a horse has 1 medication and then is signed out for life (or often no medication at all, it has become normal for them to be signed out before any veterinary treatment is considered, and TBs are now automatically signed out) In reality, it should work like cattle where there is a defined withdrawal period recorded in the passport, then it can go back in.

And it’s an own goal because it hasn’t done anything to improve horse welfare and has probably actively harmed it by causing some horses to travel long distances in unsuitable conditions.

I completely agree.

I wish people in this country would be more open minded about the consumption of horse meat.

You dont see fields of starving beef cattle. These fields of crappy, malnourished coloured bog ponies would assumedly be better looked after if they had more worth as a meat product in this country.

 

[meleeka]

You dont see fields of starving beef cattle. These fields of crappy, malnourished coloured bog ponies would assumedly be better looked after if they had more worth as a meat product in this country.

The sort of people that farm ponies wouldn’t know how to care for them adequately. They’d obviously be happier to get more money for them, but I very much doubt the extra profit would be reinvested into the animals.

A malnourished 2 year old can’t have a lot of meat on its bones surely? I’d have thought a well looked after one would already be worth more?

There are laws in place to stop it happening and yet it still does. If the passport law was properly enforced, it wouldn’t be worth their time to deal in the meat trade and it wouldn’t be worth the overbreeding of poor quality cobs.

 

[ycbm]

Why an own goal? Surely if a horse has been given medication which renders it unsuitable for the meat trade, it’s a good thing that it doesn’t end up there, in this country at least?

There are very few medications (none?) that make the meat unsafe to eat for all time. Most drugs are out of the system in days or a few weeks.
.

 

[rabatsa]

Any replacement passports and these include ones issued as a first passport to someone who is not the breeder is already signed out of the food chain before you recieve it, even though the animal may never have even been so much as vaccinated.

The reason for no meat withdrawal times are given for horses is that it is not financially viable for the drug companies to do the trials to get them.