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CaliBigWill t1_jde4ojp wrote

But dont catch one yourself. That's a crime. You have to pay for your horsemeat.

Seriously sad that alot of these animal do end up as food

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No-Neighborhood2152 t1_jdeokx9 wrote

There is a problem with not allowing them to be used for food though...

Having a horse market for food puts a floor on the price of a horse. Meaning that if you cannot afford to care for a horse, feed the horse and the horse is not suitable to be sold you can send it to an auction where it will typically be sold for slaughter, not necessarily for human consumption.

The cost for putting down a horse in my area is about 400 dollars plus a travel fee. Around $750 for me in total. People that can't afford, or just plain suck, will stick the horse out to pasture and not provide food or care, or release it to the wild. I'm a horse lover so I do not like the end of life of a horse sent to a kill plant, but I would argue that the alternative is often far far worse.

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Doctor_Expendable t1_jdew8z3 wrote

Where my parents live it seems like everyone has a horse. Not as a beloved family pet, or to ride, or to work. Just to have.

You've never seen more horses standing listlessly in fields that are too small for them. No shelter in those fields. No other horses. Out of eyeline from the houses usually too.

I'd rather eat a horse than see those horses "live" like they do

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tinman82 t1_jdg5e6s wrote

Man I've seen tons of that. It's crazy. I always assumed horses were inherently expensive to care for. They don't look good though. I also saw a cow in a plus size dog house and a pen that was crazy.

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GenJRipper t1_jdey6qc wrote

Damn I spent like 1k to put my dog down when it was her time. Spent like 10k on bills the previous 6 months to keep her around so it didn’t seem like much to me since I would have paid anything to make her healthy again. For a large animal like a horse that seems.. cheap I guess?

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Dramatic-Caramel-670 t1_jdf315z wrote

It does not cost 1k to have a dog put down. You got seriously ripped off.

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BabyTRexArms t1_jdf8mn1 wrote

Yeah I am wondering how in the f it cost $1000. And $10k for the last year of life. I live in Seattle, super high CoL and vet costs in the city. That would be insane even for here multiple times over.

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camwhat t1_jdfr8r3 wrote

Seems like something they would do out here.

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GenJRipper t1_jdfvul8 wrote

The cost for her last months of life was she was on a ton of meds and I was taking her in like every week for assessments and check ups. She was my girl so I didn’t mind. I’m in SoCal with ties to Seattle. I was giving my dog like 15 pills a day before her GDV happened. I’m glad I got my 14 years, she was likely closer to 17-18 when she passed

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GenJRipper t1_jdfulxa wrote

It was I think the fact that I brought her there that morning and a couple things where done during the assessment. You are correct when I look back it wasn’t just the putting down part that cost me that much.

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GenJRipper t1_jdfxmwx wrote

The biggest cost to me was losing my dog, GDV is a son a a bitch that more owners should be aware of. Nowadays when a dog gets fixed they can do something to prevent it.

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WillingPublic t1_jdf16gs wrote

You are correct, but public opinion is so out of wack on this topic that it is hard to have a rational conversation.

Several years ago I was involved in a zoning process in a rural county with many active farms on it. Coincidently, someone else was trying to build an abattoir to process horse meat. This is absolutely an allowed use in an agriculturally zoned area, and the developer just needed what should have been an automatic approval. Long story short, the county turned down the approval and more-or-less said “sue us.” So even though it was legal in fact, public opinion made it illegal.

As I recall, the abattoir was being developed to process horse meat for export.

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furiousfran t1_jdis5ct wrote

>You are correct, but public opinion is so out of wack on this topic that it is hard to have a rational conversation.

We could feed people with all the millions of unwanted dogs and cats too but if you bring that up everyone thinks you're a monster 🤷

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Thetrueredditerd t1_jdkn3wk wrote

Just get a shotgun and aim for the head and just bury the thing 6ft feet under.

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NorthSideSoxFan t1_jdfcdu8 wrote

Why is it sad? They're livestock

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CaliBigWill t1_jdfizi0 wrote

They weren't. They were free roaming wild animals. Rounded up. Penned and potentilnally abused. Then bought en masse and sold for meat.

Whole herds that were free. Not livestock. There is a difference.

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BarnabyWoods t1_jdfn4jh wrote

Actually, they're feral domesticated animals, which now occupy this weird gray area where they're called "wild", but they're not managed like other large wild animals such as deer and elk. Despite the fact that "wild" horse herds increase in population by 20% per year, there's no hunting season on them, and it's illegal for anyone but BLM to round them up. In most of their range, there are no natural predators to keep their numbers in check.
So they chew up habitat that other native wildlife depend on. So in essence they're national pets, costing taxpayers tens of millions of dollars per year to maintain.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdfq2ht wrote

So actually or not - Not Livestock.

The only way these horses cost Taxpayers any money is when the BLM gets involved. They're the ones spending the money to do these roundups, maintain holding facilities, and the large costs of the adoption program (which takes up nearly a third of the annual BLM wild horse budget of $11.6 million), 

Wild horses used to range in the millions. They're down to about 50,000. Is that not thinned enough? BLM arguments in favor of these gathers are kind of weak ranging from maintaining health to protecting them from overgrazing.
So they waste millions, not spend.

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BarnabyWoods t1_jdfw3o2 wrote

>Wild horses used to range in the millions.

You just made that up. Before the Wild Horses and Burros Act was passed in 1971, wild horse numbers were kept in check by ranchers and state wildlife officials.

As for BLM's roundups, they're required to do that by federal law. They're required to define herd management areas and set appropriate numbers for each area, and then round them up when those numbers are exceeded. This is not discretionary. You don't like the law? Complain to Congress, not BLM.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdfxyy3 wrote

I'm not the one who made the numbers nor the only one posting it..

As for the rest of your paragraph. Thank you for your contribution.

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snow_michael t1_jdjdnrx wrote

The US has never had wild horses, and feral numbers at their peak were around a million at most

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NorthSideSoxFan t1_jdfp4ml wrote

... they're an invasive species from Eurasia that have no place in the local ecosystem, brought to this continent to be livestock.

Horses are livestock.

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furiousfran t1_jdisk8i wrote

Feral cats don't either and they're probably worse for ecosystems but everyone shits themselves when you point out the only way to truly solve the problem is extermination, so instead we get these bullshit Trap neuter release programs that do fuckall for the birds and small animals that have to live with them.

Let's eat them instead, they taste like rabbit.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdfqfes wrote

After about 600years running In the wild I'd like to disagree.

Are wild hogs livestock?

Edited for math- not 800

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NorthSideSoxFan t1_jdfqvcr wrote

800? Are you sure about your math on that one?

In so far as they don't belong and should be fair game to eat? Yes.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdfu23s wrote

Math is off a bit 5-600 years. Brain isn't working.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdfti6i wrote

Brought by Columbus in the 1490's. Close to 800. There were other explorers here before him. That's a different argument. Cortes was here in the 1500's. 700 some odd years ago.

I'm not saying they shouldn't be eaten Meat is meat.. I'm saying these type of round ups are wrong and the treatment of the horses after they're gathered is wrong. And honestly to me its disgraceful that we have to send them to another country to be slaughtered. Our own government doesn't condone eating them but if there's a profit by damn let's do it!

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NorthSideSoxFan t1_jdg0h49 wrote

I'd much rather the federal government end the backdoor-moratorium on horse slaughter in this country.

I also think that most uproar over sending "wild" horses to slaughter is because they're seen as cute and have been miscoded as pets. When someone tries to do their part and eat Asian Carp out of the Mississippi watershed, for example, no one whines on the internet about how those fish are treated.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdg1xh7 wrote

There is a big difference between Asian carp and wild horses. The destruction they actually do far outweighs overgrazing. That argument isnt very good anyway.

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CptJaxxParrow t1_jdg04az wrote

Yes, Hogs are not native to north america, they are an invasive species brought from eurasia as livestock

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CaliBigWill t1_jdg1gsa wrote

That's not the argument. Are wild hogs livestock? Not were they.

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Lvl99Dogspotter t1_jdfr4u4 wrote

800 years?

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CaliBigWill t1_jdftv84 wrote

Ok. Math, - . Columbus brought horses. 1490... 600 years, yes. Cortes brought horses. 1500's. So about 500year. . Brains not on full

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Amadacius t1_jdfyfc1 wrote

Wild hogs are exterminated en masse because they are an invasive pet brought over from Eurasia. Probably the worst thing you could have compared a horse to.

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snow_michael t1_jdjdzq9 wrote

Very accurate comparison - destructive feral species not being properly managed

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Pinglaggette t1_jdhar7i wrote

Feral horse populations come from the American Civil War, not from the first instances of Eurasian horses arriving in North America. The Union couldn’t afford to house and feed the massive amounts of cavalry horses they had acquired for the war, so they just let them loose, figuring that they wouldn’t survive. Well, they did and they are literally destroying the environment and killing off the actual native populations out there.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdhsys4 wrote

You're trying to tell.me there were no wild horses in the US from 1500-1865?

You're dismissing 300years of history?

Early explorers and settlers chronicled the presence of horses throughout North America. In 1521, herds were seen grazing the lands that would become Georgia and the Carolinas. Sixty years later, Sir Francis Drake found herds of horses living among Native people in coastal areas of California and Oregon. In 1598, Don Juan de Oñate described New Mexico as being “full of wild mares.

And those weren't European horses..

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Pinglaggette t1_jdi1ks3 wrote

You’re misunderstanding what I’m saying. Yes, there were horses in the US in earlier times, introduced by early Europeans (and yes, they were European horses. American horses went extinct 12,000 years or so ago). Native peoples started buying and breeding their own shorter stature ponies ideal for the region. But the massive overpopulation (and the reason that this is such an issue) came from the release of union cavalry. That would be why the current “wild” horses all resemble mustangs and not the sturdy, shorter stature ponies raised and used by the natives in these regions.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdi6ng1 wrote

Scientists are questioning whether wild horses populations in the Americas went extinct and some Native Americans will tell you they didnt. Native Americans did not buy and breed.

https://www.yesmagazine.org/environment/2020/04/27/native-horses-indigenous-history

There was no mass release of horses at the end of the Civil War. Horses died by the millions in that war and at the end they needed to obtain more horses.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army_Remount_Service

The US Cavalry still existed (and does exist) and still had to function (American Indian Wars)

The mustang is a free-roaming horse of the Western United States, descended from horses brought to the Americas by the Spanish.

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snow_michael t1_jdje6wr wrote

There have not since the end of the last ice age (c.11000 years ago) ever been wild horses in the US

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Amadacius t1_jdfyjvl wrote

>They were free roaming wild animals. Rounded up. Penned and potentilnally abused. Then bought en masse and sold for meat.

That's the definition of livestock.

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CaliBigWill t1_jdg19h4 wrote

Livestock” means livestock as defined in sec. 602 of the Emergency Livestock Feed Assistance Act of 1988 [7 U.S.C. 1471], as amended, insects, and all other living animals cultivated, grown, or raised for commercial purposes, including aquatic animals.

They were not grown or raised and US Law specifically bans them from being sold for commercial meat. Not Livestock

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Amadacius t1_jdg4f2x wrote

The crux of your argument seems to be that it free-range meat is more cruel than factory farmed meat. That if an animal lived a good life before slaughter it is more tragic than if we birthed them in a cage, deprived and abused them consistently from start to finish.

We round them up because they are an invasive species that disrupts the local ecology. We slaughter them because nobody else wants them. But every ounce of meat produced this way seems infinitely more ethical than the more systemic methods.

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boomstickbutcher t1_jdeez5i wrote

Horse meat is kinda delicious

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furiousfran t1_jditc4o wrote

So is dog if you feed it right. People are so touchy about eating dog when we've been eating them for millennia, there's even meat breeds of dog. If it's hairless, it's a meat breed.

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boomstickbutcher t1_jdjnotn wrote

I agree. I’ve never eaten dog knowingly, but I imagine any meat can be prepared to taste good.

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boomstickbutcher t1_jdevgwf wrote

People are so touchy about eating horse. In Europe it’s a delicacy. And my tribe it is one our many cultural traditions, and serves as a form of respect to the horse. I understand many white Americans don’t like us Natives, but the feeling is mutual.

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snow_michael t1_jdizr69 wrote

> And my tribe it is one our many cultural traditions

Pretty damn recent 'cultural tradition'

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boomstickbutcher t1_jdjnhr7 wrote

Wow, pretty damn racist response

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snow_michael t1_jdq47oy wrote

Horses were only introduced into the North American landmass in the late 1400s

They were not widely distribured until the mid 1600s

My university college has older 'cultural traditions' than that

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boomstickbutcher t1_jdq87s9 wrote

Like I said, one of many of our cultural traditions. I never said it’s an old tradition you cunt.

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snow_michael t1_jdq8jhx wrote

And I never said it wasn't a tradition, just not an old one, you illiterate cunt

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boomstickbutcher t1_jdq8rz2 wrote

I read your stupid little words and understood the point you attempted to make with them. You are a racist, and a twat, enough said.

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snow_michael t1_jdq8z0y wrote

> understood the point you attempted to make

Well, you're the one who ultimately said it's not an old tradition, which was my original point, so I'm delighted to accept that and move on

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boomstickbutcher t1_jdq9akj wrote

Your use of quotation marks around the words cultural tradition says it all. It’s some dismissive and passive aggressive white guy thing to do that disregards others cultural practices. It’s like using finger quotes sarcastically to dismiss someone or something. It’s petty, and little. One thing you will learn about indigenous people if you ever spent the time, would be that indigenous cultures are highly adaptive, we wouldn’t survive if we weren’t. Unlike many of you European cultures that are static and unchanging for a thousand years.

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snow_michael t1_jdswnf3 wrote

If that's how it came across, dismissive of the peoples themselves, as opposed to calling something depending upon an animal introduced only 400 years ago not culturally traditional, then I am in the wrong for using those quotes, and I accept that I have offended those who saw it as dismissive of them. And I apologise for that

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Ok_Shine_6533 t1_jdet91r wrote

That used to be the case. The BLM has put a lot more protections in place to prevent that from happening nowadays. Not saying it never does, but it's much more rare (and illegal) than people are lead to believe.

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PatrickMorris t1_jdiuelq wrote

Why is this more sad than any cow being used for food?

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CaliBigWill t1_jdivxug wrote

Herds of wild free animals rounded up and decimated. The methods are questionable. Helicopters driving the herd into pens. Foals cant keep up, trampled,separated. Others panic and are injured. Once they're penned the rest is just as bad.

Cows are bred and raised to be food. They usually arent roaming free and suddenly they're food.

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PatrickMorris t1_jdiyl7w wrote

Sounds to me like cows have the sadder life, the horses get a taste of freedom for a while at least.

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BJ_Blitzvix t1_jdf36ex wrote

Wait... People in the US eat them?

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CaliBigWill t1_jdf7i4x wrote

Not usually. Due to US laws(USDA) horses are usually sent over the border to Mexico for slaughter.. Horses arent illegal to eat but they cannot be sold for commercial consumption here.

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beans3710 t1_jdhpcn7 wrote

This year in New Mexico they are just shooting them and leaving them laying on the ground.

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