This is a very logical question, as I am sure no-one who is a horse lover would intentionally sell their horse for human consumption, however, from personal experience I do know it can happen by accident.
It is for this reason that I would like to share with you the story of "Scooter".
The trainer I worked for was a good friend of mine's (Whitey if you are out there :) Uncle. They treated their horses well, and always tried to find a good home for them when they had finished racing. One day Whitey rang me and told me that "Scooter" was ready to finish up, and did I want him? Of course I did!
I took on Scooter, I can't remember how old he was, but not very, and of course he had not been broken to saddle. So, that was my first project. I had never broken in a horse before, so it was a great opportunity to learn on a horse that was dead quiet, and already used to lots of gear. It didn't take long at all, and within about a week, I was riding him around the paddock. He was a really kind natured horse, and soon enough I was taking him on trail rides, up and down steep hills, over small jumps, through creeks and easily traversing anything I put to him.
I had not had him very long when I decided to move to Queensland, maybe three months or so. Moving to Queensland is not a cheap exercise, and moving two horses just was not financially possible for me. I had to make the decision to sell one of them, and Scooter being the newest and easiest to sell I decided to sell him.
I put an ad in the paper, and had two or three people come out to see him. Two people wanted to buy him, one was a young girl who wanted him as her first big horse, and the other was an older gentleman who had been leasing a horse but had to give him back soon.
The girl was lovely, but, as we all know, green horse green rider is not really the best mix. The old bloke came out for a ride with me, took him up through the forest, up the hills, through the stream, over the logs and showed me that he rode very well, and Scooter was quite happy to do everything asked of him. During the ride he told me all about the Paint horse he had been leasing, and how the owners wanted to take him back, and how he was devastated because he was his company since his wife had passed away a year earlier. He even took me to see the Paint, because I wanted to see what condition it was in, if it was well looked after etc, and I wanted to feel confident that he would be a good owner for Scooter.
He also told me that he was on a pension, and wouldn't be able to pay the $500 I was asking, but he could pay him off at $50 a fortnight. A good home for Scooter was far more important to me than the money, so I agreed to that, on the condition that he would feed and agist both horses for me for about four weeks while I went to Queensland to find somewhere to live, and a place to take Caddillac to. I was very happy with the arrangement, because it meant I could go with no worry about what to do with Caddy while I was away as well.
So, a week later I left for Queensland, and had a relaxing holiday, as well as finding somewhere for my girl to live. I found a great pony club that had facilities, as well as stables etc, applied and was accepted that I could bring her up there. It was about August/ September at this time.
When I came back to Wagga to pack and get organised I went to see Caddy. She wasn't there, and neither was Scooter. As you can imagine, I started to panic. I drove to where the Paint horse had been, and he was not there either. By this time I was in such a state, I did not know what to do. A friend of mine offered to take me out the see the local "Horse Dealer/dogger" to see if he knew anything. It had never occurred to me that these people even existed, naive as I was.
We drove out to the dealers place, and there sitting on the back of a truck smoking a "rollie" was the old guy I had sold Scooter to. I was freaking out completely, charged up and demanded to know where the hell Caddillac was? He told me to settle down, and stop freaking out, and told me where she was. He said he had moved here because he found somewhere cheaper to keep her. It did not occur to me to ask if Scooter was there as well, I just assumed.
We drove to the address he had given me, which was a paddock that backed onto a house about 500m away. I could see Caddy, she was still in her winter rug, even though it was the middle of the day and getting close to 30 degrees. Again my level of panic started to rise as I looked around the paddock and realised there was no grass at all. It was all weeds. As we were walking up to her, a car screeched up beside us, a lady got out and started hurling abuse at me! How dare I abandon that horse in her paddock! The horse has been starving and never has it's rug off and she has been throwing her bits of hay! I could not understand what was happening?
I pulled her rug off, and could not believe what I saw. Caddillac was now a bag of bones, her coat was dull and matted, with bits missing out of it where the rug had rubbed her raw. I will dig out the photos and add them in here later. I also took numerous photos of the ground, to show there was no grass at all. She was literally starving to death.
It dawned on me to wonder what had happened to Scooter. We went back to the horse dealers place and confronted the old bloke. He told me it was none of my business as he owned the horse and could do with him what he liked, he had been making his payments and there was nothing I could do about it.
After doing some research, I found out that the Japanese market for horsemeat was booming at this particular time, and the average horse was being sold for about $1000 for meat, so he had doubled his money.
I went to legal aid, I tried to file a claim against him, stating that he had defrauded me, that there was cruelty to Caddillac, and tried every angle I could think of. At the end of the day, I had nothing in writing regarding Caddy, and he owned Scooter, so bad luck. He had no obligation to keep Scooter, nor to disclose to me what he had done with him. As long as he kept up his payments, there was nothing I could do.
The lovely lady who owned the paddock where Caddillac had been dumped, luckily agreed to feed her up for a couple of weeks so she would be strong enough for the truck trip up to QLD. I am so grateful to her, that she fed and cared for Caddy in those couple of weeks before she was well enough to come up on the truck.
When she arrived at the Pony club, she was a mess. It still took another couple of weeks before she looked anything like herself, and she never quite fully recovered. I wonder if the stress and anxiety of the situation ever left her completely.
As for Scooter, I can't imagine how he must have felt. He was such a trusting gentle horse, and it would have been terrifying for him. One of the classes I took involved dissection of horse legs, which were purchased from the knackery. I have seen exactly what damage these horses are subjected to when they are taken to the knackery. Their legs are covered in bruises and cuts, some of them would be lucky to be still walking by the time they are killed.
Please take the advice of the lady who asked the question "who would sell their best mate for meat". Please make sure you are certain where they are going, and please do your best to ensure they will be loved and looked after.
The "Save a Horse Australia" horse rescue and sanctuary do a great job of placing horses into "forever" homes. They ensure that if the horse is no longer wanted, or is unable to be kept, that it comes back to them and a new home will be found. They do an amazing job, please sign the petition, and please support horse rescues all over the country.
Thank you for your sharing your story, it is really sad & I can't imagine the guilt you must have felt after finding out how this dreadful man had deceived you. It is a story that everyone should read - you really just can't trust people when selling your horse
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