Wild horse bill – good intentions but bad results likely

Once again, too many Congresscritters have been reading “Brighty of the Grand Canyon” and then, as a result, writing what’s probably bad legislation.

Sure, a wild, Arab-mix white stallion looks noble.

But, a hammer-headed roan, from habitat confinement, overgrazing and inbreeding, doesn’t. And, the bill the House passed doesn’t force the Bureau of Land Management to come up with all the new land.

If passed, the bill would give the government authority to enter into cooperative agreements to create wild horse sanctuaries on nonfederal lands. Right. Fat chance of that.

That said, GOP grandstanding on the bill, saying Democrats were putting horses over unemployed people, is simply shameless.

Here’s the bottom line. Beyond it not requiring the BLM to set up more habitat, meaning all the problems listed above will continue, wolf predators are nonexistent across most the west, and mountain lions almost so. (Coyotes, for the unfamiliar, do nor normally hunt in packs; even on the rare occasions they do hunt in any cooperative manner, they’re still not going to take down horses.)

And, that’s that.

More idiocy from wild horse advocates

Not content with recognizing their advocacy in banning domestic horse butchering may have contributed to the growth in wild horses, wild horse advocates are now protesting plans to euthanize the rapidly growing number of Nevada wild horses.

Look, nimrods. What don’t you understand about the simple phrase “BLM doesn’t have the money” to do sterilization programs (which won’t affect the IMMEDIATE overrun, anyway) or other long-term solutions? Let alone, what don’t you get, Chris Heyde of the Animal Welfare Institute, that BLM HAD to start this roundup, and that it didn’t do it because it thought it could make a big profit from horse slaughter?

Horsemeat: It’s still what’s for dinner

In many places besides the U.S., that is.

As I and many other bloggers predicted several months back, the closing of the last three U.S. horsemeat slaughterhouses has done nothing to stop American wild horses from being butchered for food. They’re just being butchered in Canada or Mexico.

Part of why nobody’s adopting a wild mustang these days? Cost:

Room and board for a horse is around $200 per month now -- and the cost of fuel, hay and grain, and basic care is climbing. At the same time, because of a surplus of unwanted horses, auction prices have plunged, down to $100 or less from an earlier average of $300 to $500. If you figure in the cost of euthanasia and disposal at $750, it’s a swing of about $1,200 for the owner looking to get rid of an unwanted equine.

But, some people who want to enshrine the slaughterhouse ban into federal law are a bit shaky on history:

“Horses have never been raised as a food animal in this country,” says Stacy Segal, equine protection specialist for the Humane Society of the United States. “We give them medications that would never be allowed for a slaughter animal. None of the mechanisms to protect meat for human consumption are in place.”

Wrong on all counts. Many American Indian tribes, if not specifically raising horses for food, certainly considered that to be the normal end of a horse after it was too old to carry someone on its back. And, both Indians and mountain men had no problem “going heavy” on horses in a pack trail to allow for food for “filler.”

Lewis and Clark ate horsemeat without batting an eye, for doorknob’s sake. And, a century ago, it was still fairly common for white farmers and ranchers on the high plains to eat horsemeat.

As for Segal’s second sentence, sure, if a horse is a prize Thoroughbred, it gets all doped up. But, some Western rancher who actually rides a horse as part of the job? Not so much.

For a more visual experience on how the slaughterhouse ban is hurting wild horses, see the High Country News slideshow.

The law of unintended consequences kicks wild horses

Barring horse slaughter here in the U.S. just leads to a long trip to a crueler slaughter in Mexico.

Now, wild horse lovers want to ban exportation of horses for slaughter.

OK, are you going to write a personal check to cover euthanasia and carcass disposal costs for each horse? Better yet, as a preventative, are you going to stop your opposition to horse culls on federal lands in the west?