Texas suspends wild burro killing policy at Big Bend Ranch State Park

Cheyenne Rondeaux, 9, of Alpine, Texas, sits in the shade on Hannah a baby mammoth donkey, during a ride to the State Capitol by the Wild Burro Protection League and members of Red Horse Nation. Gov. Rick Perry refused to accept the hand delivered petitions. Image Rodolfo American-Statesman.

BETSY BLANEY reporting for the ASSOCIATED PRESS writes:

The Texas wildlife agency said Tuesday it is suspending a policy that allows the killing of burros in a state park along the Mexican border after the Humane Society of the United States offered to devise a nonlethal plan to remove the destructive animals.

The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department will contribute up to $10,000 toward a humane society aerial survey of the wild donkeys at Big Bend Ranch State Park this spring to establish baseline data, agency executive director Carter Smith said.

“We believe this could be valuable information to assess the problem with burros around the park,” Smith said. “We still have a long way to go to see if a viable, long-term plan can be developed.” Continue reading >>

In a post written by Tawnee Preisner, Vice President of Horse Plus Humane Society, Smith says he is “cautiously optimistic” a resolution can be found, but if not, they will return to their lethal control policy, in other words, gunning down wild burros to make way for Big Horn Sheep.

We will see if this turns out to be good news for any of the sheep or the burros.

If both are killed, it will benefit man by way of big revenues gained from the deaths these animals. Hunting licenses for Big Horn Sheep can reach as high as $100,000 per license.

Rescuers battle trend of ‘killer buyers’ at California auction houses (US)

Last line of safety against slaughter
By MARIA GINSBOURG
Correspondent for the Contra Costa Times

CALIFORNIA — When horse owners have to give up their animals in today’s depressed horse resale market, Northern California rescuers such as Tawnee Preisner are often all that’s left between a safe pasture and a slaughterhouse.

Preisner, co-founder and vice president of Nor-Cal Equine Rescue, said she is saving all the horses she can, but when small ranchers and private owners are scrambling to keep their jobs and homes, more horses have no place to go and no one to care for them.

Hours before bidding time at a recent Roseville livestock auction, Preisner walked through the corrals and picked out horses that few would want: the old, the young, the untrained, the race horses, the stallions and the injured.

Preisner said that if she didn’t buy them, it’s likely they would end up being sent to Canada or Mexico for slaughter.

The owners of the Roseville livestock auction said they don’t do business with so-called “killer buyers,” but it’s hard for them to know what happens to horses once they leave the auction house.

Nor-Cal Equine Rescue tries to find people who will feed and house unwanted horses until they die naturally. The organization’s placement rate is 95 percent, but Preisner said adopting out horses is becoming increasingly difficult in today’s economy.

“People can’t afford to feed horses. They’re losing their homes,” Preisner said.

Rescued horses that can’t be placed are euthanized, which Preisner said is more humane

than slaughter. Her organization offers low-cost or free euthanasia services.

“In Mexico, they’ll take a knife to the top of their neck and jab it in and out until they hit the nerve that makes their back legs paralyzed. Then (the horse) gets hung up by its hind legs and hoisted up in the air, and then they slit their throats. It’s the worst death possible, being slaughtered alive,” she said.

But Frank Borba of Oakdale, who has been in the horse business all his life, looks at the issue differently.

“Eat a hind leg of a horse,” Borba said, during a break in the action at Roseville. “If you don’t have a dead horse, get on that sound buck that you own that ain’t worth 15 cents, run him up 10 miles, get off him, cut the back leg off him, and take it home because that’s all he’s worth.” Read full story >>