Welfare - World Horse Welfare Highlights Horse Smuggling

Grim. Nothing I didn't already know, but that 'cartoon' hits hard. I know that they could have easily sourced real images and video, but some how the animation brings it home more.

Apart from ensuring my oldies never leave my care alive, I really don't know how this evil trade can be stopped. I feel so bad for 3 of the 4 younger horses I have sold over the years ( I only managed to keep close tabs on one). None went to dealers, but you can't ensure they won't end up there.

Chips can be changed, brands can be changed, covered or hidden - how on earth do you permanently and clearly identify a horse? Any technology you invent will be hacked 0 it is unwinnable arms race. The borders cannot check all the lorries thoroughly enough.

Does it just come down education, to prevent these horses ending up like this? I would rather the horses were slaughtered in the UK for dog meat, at a licensed and regulated abattoir, than endure those journeys.
 
We need to bring back well regulated slaughter houses for the pet food industry that can process horses in this country. And/ or we need to have proper sign-out laws that allow horses to be given medications and then a defined withdrawal process before they enter the human food chain.
And then animal welfare charities need to support that as an acceptable end for horses and help to make them as good as they can be, rather than blindly campaigning to end horse slaughter which creates bigger welfare issues like this.
 
I couldn't bear to watch the video, but completely agree, it seems crazy in these days of digital wizardry there is no manageable method to stop this and no real political will from any party that I can see to deal with it.

WHW did have a campaign for many years 'on the hook not on the hoof' (ie slaughter and then send abroad rather than the other way around)but I think that is too honest for the modern generation?
 
During my long life with donkeys, ponies and horses, I have only sold two. One that I rescued from a one-way trip to a meat market - he went to a friend in another part of the country and is doing wonderfully well at all sorts of horse parties. The other I rescued and loaned to a friend. Only she turned out not to be. She and horse disappeared. When I finally tracked her and the pony down, I discovered that she'd turned her out to roam on a marsh and she'd slipped and drowned.
As far as I'm concerned, my motto with selling on is "Trust No one".
 
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