Number of abandoned horses up in the area

When the two horse slaughter houses in Texas shut down in 2007, some people wondered if the closings signaled an age where unwanted horses would be left to die a slow death in an abandoned pasture.

However, those who work with neglected or abandoned horses in North Texas say that itÂ’s hard to tell if thatÂ’s the case. While that doesnÂ’t appear to be the case, there are horses feeling the effects of the bad economy, and itÂ’s hard to track potential slaughter horses due to the nature of the business and the ability to ship horses to Mexico.

The slaughter houses, including the Beltex Corp. plant in Fort Worth, processed horse meat for consumption abroad, mostly in Europe. Beltex was owned by Belgian-based Multimeat NV, and the place was a final destination for some unwanted or older horses.

When it shut down, some people were relieved, saying that horse slaughter was inhumane. On the other side were people concerned the horse that would have otherwise been killed there would instead live in poor conditions, unwanted and ignored.

“Horse people all over the country were like, ‘The streets are going be littered with dead horses,’” said Jay Six, chief deputy of the patrol division for the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Department. He oversees the livestock estray enforcement program, which handles loose animals.

“It certainly hasn’t been the tidal wave of abandoned horses that people expected,” Six said.

Instead, most of the stray horses found have escaped from a pasture or field and are reunited with their owners, he said. Those whose owners canÂ’t be found are eventually put up for auction, and he said the reserve price is set high enough to discourage kill buyers, or middle men who buy horses cheaply and then sell them to slaughter houses for a profit.

The Tarrant County SheriffÂ’s Department also handles possible neglect and cruelty cases in conjunction with the Humane Society of North Texas. Detective Lloyd Riddle, who handles animal cases, said he always tries to help educate an owner who appears to be neglecting an animal or treating it cruelly. If the situation doesnÂ’t improve, he can get a seizure order and the Humane Society will take temporary custody of the animals during a seizure hearing.

While he has not seen a significant increase in the number of horses investigated or taken into custody due to the slaughter houses being shut down, Riddle said he does expect an increase as the winter weather means horses need supplemented feed and the economy continues to take its toll on household budgets.

“I look for probably an increase this winter, where it comes down to that they have to afford to put food on the table or buy horse feed,” he said.

In 2007, the No. 1 reason the Humane Society of North Texas took horses into custody was because of negligence, said Sandy Grambort, equine and livestock coordinator for the organization.

However, she said the number of horses the Humane Society gets is increasing in 2008.

“We felt very strongly that the numbers were increasing because of the poor economy,” Grambort said.

In 2007, the Humane Society had 101 equines (which includes horses, donkeys, burros, and mules) seized or rescued, and just in the past three weeks the organization has gotten 16 new animals, she said. The Humane Society spent an average of $810 a month on each equine in 2007, including veterinary care and feed, and Grambort said the high cost of keeping an animal has prompted many people to look for ways to surrender their animals.

“We have seen way more of that sort of situation than people saying, ‘Oh, I wish the slaughterhouses were open,’” she said.

The Humane Society works largely through donations and relies heavily on volunteers, and foster homes take in most of the horses while theyÂ’re waiting for adoption, Grambort said. Volunteers must have prior experience handling horses in order to really be effective, and the economy has made it harder to find the type of donations that can help keep such large animals.

“It’s hard for us to knock on some doors and say, ‘We just took in 30 horses, can you buy us a couple of bags of feed?’” she said. “This is just such a critical situation for horses these days.”