radio 2 horse slaughter phone in now

I haven't listened to the debate but I have taken lots of horses to slaughter over the years until I decided they deserved a better end.
The last and only time I used the place they are talking about I waited in a queue of boxes in a line above the killing pen.
It was only when my box started rocking madly I realised the two horses in the back were overlooking the action and were bloody terrified.
So sorry, there is a difference in slaughtering horses (tho for all I know cows may be sh** scared also), and if you respect them it's far kinder to do the deed at home.
That particular place struck me as no respect or consideration for the horses whatsoever, in fact I shouted at their so called vet witness as he blatently ignored the man unloading hitting the animal with a piece of blue pipe! (I explained it was young , had never travelled before but would unload sensibly if allowed two minutes to get down the ramp.)
Would you prefer to go to a hospital to be shot or have someone quietly inject you in your bed at home?
I rest my case...
 
Potters does have its place, although I would rather they picked up dead stock than live to kill at the site where horses are concerned. We used to go up there for our dissection bits and pieces, it was quite disturbing to see amount of seemingly young wild ponies going through there.
They also picked up my mare when she died of colic as the Hunt wouldn't take her as she been euthanised with the lethal injection. It was more upsetting that watching her die. It was the guy's first day on the job and being a wet November day we had problems with getting the lorry into the field so we had to get a car to drag her to the gate. He then said that as the handbrake didn't work properly one of us would have to sit in the cab while they winched her in. I said I would as I just couldn't deal with man handling her poor dead body like that. The cab stank of death and I could see what was going on in the wing mirrors. It was terrible. We were blocking the drive and so some work men that were due on the farm offered to help to get her on. She was 16.2hh of solid TB. I think they didn't realise how heavy she was or how horrific it feels to have to move a dead animal of that size. The workmen, all tough men, looked sick after. I owe it to my livery yard owner in his brave face for helping me that day. I felt sorry for the disposal guy, he obviously was illequiped to deal with what removing dead horses involved, but angry with Potters for sending out a poor trained person with an unequiped vehicle that was not strong enough to winch a large horse on board and was not very road worthy.
I don't know if I could deal with that again.
 
Henryhorn I could not agree more with you and there is no way on this god given earth that I would send any of my horses to the slaughter house. They will be pts on site if the need arises. Be that at the yard or at a venue ( ie if I was on a trek, beach, show etc) if it is deemed that the horse would be in too much pain to travel because I would never let an animal suffer just because I wanted them pts at home.
My horse's needs will always come first.
Caroline
 
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