Many people have asked us what the process of saving a horse is, and we realized that not everyone is familiar with what feedlots and kill buyers are. Kill buyers go to auction with stock trailers and purchase many horses which then sit on a feedlot waiting for another stock trailer to take them to slaughter in Mexico or Canada.

The tragedy is that some people who take their horses to auction have no idea that kill buyers go there to purchase horses destined for meat consumption and it is not unheard of to see cute little ponies who still have ribbons in their manes ending up on a feedlot.

Many race horses end up at auction and on a one way ride to Mexico, even famous ones whose owners made so much money with.

Horse slaughter was at an all time high in 2012 with 166,572 horses sent to slaughter and the number was 125,608 the year I saved 5 horses from a feedlot in Colorado.

Out of our 15 horses, 9 of them are rescues. Five horses came from a feedlot in Colorado and 4 minis came from So Cal Mini Horse Sanctuary.

I was very shocked when I saw the horses waiting on the feedlot I saved mine from. I was expecting all horses to be old and beaten up and although some of them were, there were plenty of young ones and even babies, some were sadly even born on the feedlot.

“In 2007, the slaughter of horses on US soil came to an end when a court ruling upheld a Texas law banning horse slaughter, and similar legislation was passed in Illinois. However, failure by the US Congress to pass legislation banning horse slaughter means that American horses are still being slaughtered for human consumption abroad. Tens of thousands are shipped to Mexico and Canada annually, where they are killed under barbaric conditions so their meat can continue to satisfy the palates of overseas diners in countries such as Italy, France, Belgium and Japan.” (Animal Welfare Institute - www.awionline.org).

To this day I have goose bumps when I think about how terrifying their fate was. I remember how scared they were, the patch of missing hair on their hindquarters where the USDA tag was glued on, the sad look on their face.

I saved a foal, 3 yearlings and a 2 year old, some of them were sick with strangles and they were all terribly wormy and underweight but they are thriving now.

Although I bought my horses directly from a kill buyer to rescue them, I do not recommend doing so as this contributes to the issue. With the money they make, they will ultimately buy more horses and continue this issue. It is better to go to auction and save horses there before kill buyers get hold of them. You can also save horses from reputable rescues which we did with our minis. So Cal Mini Horse Sanctuary had already brought our minis to great health and handled them beautifully.

Although the number of American horses being slaughtered is currently down from what it was, it is still a tremendous issue. Saving a horse life does not make a big difference in tipping these scales, but it does make a difference for that horse.