Puzzled - "wrong horse put down" article?

popsdosh said:
Try telling Wetherbys they use micro chips as ID in racing and a horse is checked several times when racing. I have a chip reader on my phone as all the cattle here have electronic id . The truth is though there is no mandatory requirement that is being enforced for horse passports to be returned. With our cattle we have 4days to inform BCMS and we have to return the passport even then the only time at death there will be an ID check is if the animal is going into the food chain.
However you can blame whoever you like but in the past the biggest oposition to mandatory passports and id has come from the owners of horses themselves which is evidenced by the still huge number of young horses still being sold without a chip or passport all privately via adds.
The general horse owner will never accept the tough regime required to make a passport system work or the penalties for not complying you would not believe the possible fines that cattle farmers face ,it can run into many K. Just to add you cannot expect the veterinary proffession to police the system for you. At the end of the day many people can be responsible for the destruction of a horse .
Click to expand...

Excuse my naivety.

I've finally realised what many people already know it seems. That the whole system is a joke.

With no enforcement, I may as well wipe my arse with the passports :D
 
Donkey was an impulse buy at the horse sales. His microchip and passport do not match as was found out when he got sedated for his teeth and the ages did not match up. The vet then scanned for the chip.

As an average owner with no access to a scanner how was I to know the passport was the wrong one? The lack of whorls do match my boy as do the three that actually got recorded.
 
tallyho! said:
Excuse my naivety.

I've finally realised what many people already know it seems. That the whole system is a joke.

With no enforcement, I may as well wipe my arse with the passports :D
Click to expand...

No! It's a handy form for the flu jabs and it's got a pretty plastic cover :D. I think chipping has deterred theft and dealer misrepresentation, too, so I'm all in favour of that being in it.

Other than that, they're pretty useless for mongrels.
 
rabatsa said:
Donkey was an impulse buy at the horse sales. His microchip and passport do not match as was found out when he got sedated for his teeth and the ages did not match up. The vet then scanned for the chip.

As an average owner with no access to a scanner how was I to know the passport was the wrong one? The lack of whorls do match my boy as do the three that actually got recorded.
Click to expand...

Shouldn't that have been checked by the auction house? Because it might go for meat, I thought that was a legal requirement.
 
tallyho! said:
To add... in death, what is the point of a microchip? It's only useful while the horse is alive it would seem to prevent theft. Seems it's missing a job.
Click to expand...

I suspect so many people don't have a microchip in their horses, its never been registered under their name or it doesn't match up. It would seem anyone can put in a microchip even at the dog grooming they were offering to do it, I wonder how difficult it is to obtain the equipment, for me very difficult as I wouldn't know where to begin, to others no problem at all

Imagine how the owners felt when they were informed someone found their horses microchip in a shipment of meat
Don't press link if you are sensitive
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jul/26/horsemeat-trial-shines-light-international-fraud
 
tallyho! said:
I don't dispute anything you've said. I'm a law abiding person just like you and unfortunately (IME) am far to trusting. No one asked me for my cats documents - she was a stray and wasn't microchipped. I guess me paying thousands for her cancer treatment was proof enough she was mine.

Horses are a bit different to domestic animals though and I'm just so sad for the owner and now that I see the gaping flaw in the law I now know how easy it is for people to get it wrong unintentionally.... (and indeed intentionally (for a whole host of illegitimate reasons!)). There's a few greys on our yard and to the untrained eye they do look similar apart from maybe an inch in height diff. (all related). I can just imagine it happening to me with no one to check the paperwork and check the distinguishing features (e.g. chestnuts if recorded) even if the onus is on the owner. If I wasn't there, as in this case, and the passport wasn't there (as there's no requirement for it to be) then any one of those horses cold be pts if the reason wasn't visible. IF there was some responsibility of the person doing the deed to check, there would be a degree of inspection going on and someone to sign and say "this equine no longer lives" before it was sent back to PIO.
Click to expand...

With your situation on the yard this may work
If a horse is to be put down, the YO informs everyone on the yard that it is taking place on x day and if anyone wishes to move their horse, keep it in or whatever they wish to do arrangements should be made

Only problem I see with this is there will always be the odd person who wishes to involve themselves in other people's business eg You are cruel, I could save it or you should try tulip leaves as that is a wonder cure
 
Cecile said:
With your situation on the yard this may work
If a horse is to be put down, the YO informs everyone on the yard that it is taking place on x day and if anyone wishes to move their horse, keep it in or whatever they wish to do arrangements should be made

Only problem I see with this is there will always be the odd person who wishes to involve themselves in other people's business eg You are cruel, I could save it or you should try tulip leaves as that is a wonder cure
Click to expand...

That idea is flawed ^^
There will always be one who didn't get the message and lay blame on the YO and then they would become the guilty party
 
Cecile said:
That idea is flawed ^^
There will always be one who didn't get the message and lay blame on the YO and then they would become the guilty party
Click to expand...

Yep.

I have purebreeds as well so I see *some* value in passporting and microchipping these as there is a degree of self-regulation going on. The rest however, like ycbm points out is a con.
 
ycbm said:
Other than that, they're pretty useless for mongrels.
Click to expand...
Well, they're supposed to be useful for people who might eat mongrels, rather than mongrels or even their owners ;-)

For TallyHo and others - Passports were never intended to prevent any horse being PTS - only to keep some of them out of the food chain.

Re: Donkey with wrong passport - Vets at auction houses (or during a vetting in a private sale etc) should have scanners available. In the States there are volunteers who scan anything that might go for meat (sale price below a set amount) but I don't think (either here or there) there is a legal requirement to scan everything at auctions. But yes, there will be vets around who would be able to scan for you if you requested. Possibly equine market watch may be able to help/advise too?
 
GirlFriday said:
Well, they're supposed to be useful for people who might eat mongrels, rather than mongrels or even their owners ;-)

For TallyHo and others - Passports were never intended to prevent any horse being PTS - only to keep some of them out of the food chain.
Click to expand...

But they have also helped in competitive sport to reduce the number of "ringers" I can certainly remember in the days before microchipping ponies being renamed and reappearing as a "novice" once they'd reached their jumping limit. Stricter passports went someway towards helping deal with this.
 
tallyho! said:
:D:D:D:D:D:D Of course! ha! yes that idea works really well :D:D:D:D:D
Click to expand...

Agree that is funny - but again, passports were not really intended as a magic way of preventing crime - just a means of making information available. I'm totally cool with criticisms of both the objective and implementation... but it isn't really fair to complain they aren't any good at a whole bunch of stuff they never claimed to be useful for!
 
GirlFriday said:
Agree that is funny - but again, passports were not really intended as a magic way of preventing crime - just a means of making information available. I'm totally cool with criticisms of both the objective and implementation... but it isn't really fair to complain they aren't any good at a whole bunch of stuff they never claimed to be useful for!
Click to expand...

Fine, I'll stop complaining.

Don't want to get accused of jinxing the freedom of "information" - in whatever form that might be.

Whatever it is, it's a magic way of making money!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top