http://www.insidebainbridge.com/2012/02/04/wa-horse-rescue-operation-suspected-of-fraud-with-kill-buy-horses-destined-for-slaughter/

How I wish she’d just go away. She lies, kills horses AND steals people’s money. Can you get any lower than that?

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It is very well run. It’s nothing fancy, but the facilities are safe and the horses are well-cared for. Jill and Sally are wonderful with the horses and volunteers. A lot of the horses are old-timers who were dumped for one reason or another. Those just break my heart, especially when I think of my 30-year old pasture pet. But Shiloh gives the old-timers dignified final days.

I highly recommend to anyone in the Las Vegas area to take a trip out there to help out. They are more than accommodating. Or, if you go to Vegas to party, rent a car and set a day aside to volunteer!!

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In my family, we don’t get rid of our pets ever. Although a horse is an expensive pet, it is not a motorcycle or a mercedez, it is a living being that deserves different treatment than other belongings. So keeping it is one way to be responsible.

Another way to care for our pet is to train it so that it has value. The problem with this choice is that a horse has limited and diminishing value. Its value is limited to its working lifespan and that value diminishes as it ages, loses its atheletic ability, and therefore its commercial value, and becomes a financial liability. When we buy/obtain a dog or cat, we usually don’t worry about that because most of us expect to be able to afford food, vet care, the higher cost of housing (which allows us to keep a dog or cat), and ultimately, the price of euthanasia. The high price of horsekeeping seems to be a justification for dumping a horse. I don’t understand the logic of this, any more than I understand the logic of getting a dog and not planning for its future and dumping it when you move to an area and discover that apartments which allow pets cost more. (Go figure!) To me, the cost of owning a horse includes the cost of being responsible for it beyond its useful life. That doesn’t mean you have to own it its entire life, but that you take reasonable steps to insure its life by having a buy-back policy, following up and checking up on it, and taking measures to ensure that it is okay in its old age.

As an aside: The recent case with Earle Mack and his Thoroughbred, Star Plus, is a good example of a responsible owner and also an example of how things can go wrong. It seems like Earle Mack is doing his best to follow up with this horse which is in a bad place in spite of his good intentions, and in spite of the unbelievable negligence on the part of the Virginia and Pennsylvania Racing Commissions, Parx Racing, and the odious owner of Star Plus, George Iacovacci.

http://www.paulickreport.com/news/ray-s-paddock/saga-of-star-plus-doesn-t-this-horse-deserve-better/

A third way to be responsible is to breed good-quality animals and stand behind them, guaranteeing a return policy, and following up. Again, Earle Mack’s experience shows that even with good intentions and responsible actions, things can go wrong, but I’ll bet that if breeders guaranteed a retirement home, it would USUALLY go right, and that they wouldn’t actually get that many “returns.”

Bad Joke:
A guy walks up to a beautiful woman at a cocktail party and says, “Would you have sex with me?”
She laughs and replies, “No!”
The guy says, “Look, I know you don’t know me, and I’m not young and handsome, but if I paid you ten thousand dollars, would you have sex with me?”
The woman says, “Well, for a MILLION dollars, I guess I would have sex with you.”
So the guy responds, “How about a hundred dollars?”
The woman angrily replies, “What?!! What are you after? What do you think I am, a prostitute?!”
The man says, “Well, we have established what you are. Now we are just haggling.”

I realize it’s black and white, but that’s how I see horse ownership. Yes, it costs hundreds of dollars a month to keep a horse, but if you can’t afford it, don’t take the best years of a horse and them dump him to be someone else’s problem. It’s the same thing as getting a dog for a while and getting rid of it to get a cuter one. Most people would find the latter case to be morally objectionable, but plenty think nothing of the former, and the only difference is the amount of money involved.

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3 of their own kids, 3 fosters or adopted special needs kids and 30 horses that are pretty much useless/unadoptable as is. Oh yeah and apparently soon no home! These people need to focus on one thing at a time!!

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The Duggar thing is pretty sad on a lot of levels, but I admit that the most shocking one to me is the apparent disregard of one parent for the health of the other.. I can’t imagine my husband thinking it’d be fine for me to die popping out kid #21 or whatever when obviously her health is taking a hit from all this whelping. My husband didn’t even want to risk me on a second child when I had so much trouble with our first, and that, to me, is love and respect.

This ‘rescue’ is yet another example of crazy… almost nothing gelded, all fugly and untrained, and the only two marketable horses aren’t for adoption. And these people never believe they’ve done anything wrong and want to place the blame on the economy and anywhere but their own shoulders.

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I think Monty saw a good thing and grabbed it but it does not make his message any less true. I don’t think the original Horse Whisperer is even known, there have always been people who bucked the trend of,w ell, bucking the horse out!

As far as his family goes I don’t know how true the abuse stories are or not but I have yet to hear many people say Yeah that man used to beat that kid to a pulp and we just stood by and did nothing. It’s also not uncommon for one child to be singled out for abuse. I read their book and didn’t find it to be any more or less believeable than Monty’s was. In fact it was a little too much “Daddy was an angel” for me.

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