Why are horses different to livestock?

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Patterdale

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Just a musing really, following on from buddy's mummy's free to good home thread.
I wonder why we think so differently with horses?

I would think that most of us happily eat meat without thinking, but the thought of killing a horse seems totally different.
We have over a thousand sheep here, but just 5 are mine. Of those, one is not in lamb this year, so next week she's going to the abattoir as it isn't economically sound to keep a sheep who is effectively having a years holiday.
We'll probably have 50 or so cull ewes that go off this year for various reasons, and I don't usually think about it too much. But I'm a bit sad about mine going as I feel I know her, and she's 'mine.'
And it gets a bit messy in my head when I think that if I really fought then I could keep her, as one ewe being a passenger for a year won't bankrupt us, but then where do you draw the line?
I tell myself that they have a great life with us and a humane end, which if course is true, but it still makes me feel a little sad and guilty.
And whenever I have to have a horse PTS I feel terrible, even when I know it's the right thing.

But why is it easy enough to eat meat and send the sheep off (usually!) but so hard with lame horses?

Sorry for the ramble!
 
It would not bother me eating horsemeat except that I would not be happy that the facilities and transport would be welfare friendly, also they tend to be less docile than cattle who are used to being herded eg in to a cattle crush.
But the main reason I did not have farm animals was the idea that my business was raising animals to kill them was too much, I did have a few sheep when I worked on a farm, but it did not bother me at the time.
 
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In other EU member states horses are livestock and this means that the owners of the holding do not pay rates on their indoor schools or stables one cannot imagine why the rating authorities oppose the change of a horse from lesiure animal to livestock.
 
nooo........ round here one of the sheep owners does not employ a proper shepherd, if they die they die........ and sheep will find numerous ways of dying, but is is cheaper than a shepherd.
I did not feel that the horses that I did in racing were pets,, though one or two were lovely persons, most were happy just to be horses and not interact with humans any more than necessary.
 
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I am a dairy farmer and whilst my girls have a lovely life, as far as possible, if you ignore being milked twice a day and having your baby taken away at 24 hours old. They have a bum scratch, an ear tickle and most have names.... however, they are a commercial business and an empty cow is not financially viable. My horses on the other hand are my pets, my friends, my passion and I feel it is the way we have been conditioned to treating them differently to livestock. Just my opinion.
 
First of all I do not eat meat but this year I raised a couple of pigs and took them my self to be slaughtered and butchered. I think the modern world has distanced most people from the reality of how our food is produced, they see cows only chopped up packets in the supermarket and pigs as bacon and sausages. Just because something is eventually going to be killed and eaten doesn't make you care for its welfare less, my pigs had a short happy life. Anyone who has looked into the eyes of a young Jersey heifer could get attached to her as much as an horse its just that most people to not have the facilities or the space to keep them as pets. I think the horse has the advantage that you can ride it and they are relatively trainable and people can dress them up in pretty rugs, but I think if people didn't want to ride there would be more going for the pot.
Its interesting that as there are more people keeping chickens for eggs and pets their are more for rehoming some coming complete with almost new hen houses. The reality of keeping any farm animal is not like Country Living/ Kath Kidson, its muddy, smelly and with no days off and no YO to feed or turn out if you want a lie in
 
I thought the same thing when I saw a luxurious horse box with one horse and a huge hay net, travelling behind a rusty cattle lorry crammed to bursting with cows.
 
We breed pigs and eat them, I look after them when they are born and every day - twice a day - till they go, it is sad when they go but as I like to eat meat I'd rather eat meat that I know where it has come from - what it has been fed, what free space it has to live in etc etc. I am sad when they go, I have cried in the past but I don't want to give up eating meat so this is a fact of life for me.

I have eaten horse and I would do so again, it's a very healthty lean meat high in omega 3.

If I could I would consider eating my horses, even though I love them very much, other than the fact they are all over 20 so probably too tough to eat really!! When they are gone they are gone, having seen bodies I am comfortable that there is nothing left of the animal/ person in the shell once they are gone - seems a shame to waste their bodies by burning, I like the idea of donating to a zoo for lions.

I appreciate not everyones opinions but these are mine.
 
For me it's because we build an entirely different relationship with horses because (being prey animals) they trust us enough to do things with them like sit on their backs - and for us we trust them not to kill us when we do (ride). I love my two dogs (and my people family and friends come to that) but I don't have to think realistically about how much they could physically mess me up on a regular basis.

That isn't to say that I spend all the time I spend with horses thinking "I'm in trouble here" - but I am very aware that there is a different level of trust - and that could be what generates a different, more emotional bond :)
 
mastermax said:
I am a dairy farmer and whilst my girls have a lovely life, as far as possible, if you ignore being milked twice a day and having your baby taken away at 24 hours old. They have a bum scratch, an ear tickle and most have names.... however, they are a commercial business and an empty cow is not financially viable. My horses on the other hand are my pets, my friends, my passion and I feel it is the way we have been conditioned to treating them differently to livestock. Just my opinion.
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You took the words out of my mouth. Though I will have a little struggle soon as a very special cow refuses to get in calf and will have to go. We will wait till her only daughter calves very soon, that way her name lives on.
The strange thing is if we have a cow put down on farm I feel we have abused her but I would NEVER send my horses away to be put down.
 
Humans and the feelings, emotional attachments and sentimentality we attach to certain animals when it suits us to are what we imagine to make a difference. Killing is killing and most of us swat flies without a second thought, taking issue with pts horses just smacks of massive hypocrisy to me from people who kill insects and support livestock farming. Humans are often irrational hypocrites imo.
 
FfionWinnie said:
Most horses fall into the pet mentality category. Most sheep don't (I'm a shepherd).
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This. A horse to most of us is probably very similar to a dog or cat. They are our companions. We spend a lot of time with our horses don't we whereas I guess if you spent the same amount of time and effort with a particular sheep then you'd get very attached to it in the same way - but generally farmers don't, their animals are left in flocks in the fields. I don't really like the whole eating animals thing, I don't eat cow or sheep. I am getting more repulsed by meat all the time though so will probably turn veggie eventually! I could never send my own animals for slaughter, and as my other half often has to visit abbatoirs and pig farms for his job - I regularly tell him to save one and bring it home :( I know if I went to an abbatoir, I would absolutely become a veggie. He, a big meat eater, is even quite horrified by abbatoirs.
 
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