Feeding Raw Horse Meat

[Daxilly]

Prompted by a news article about a butcher in WA being threatened for selling horse meat for human consumption, would you feed your dog raw horse meat?

I have also just finished reading the Nature's Gift web site and they are very anti horse meat. They make a point of never using it, emphasising that it is almost as a moral issue.

My pet food supplier has just started stocking horse meat. It is very lean and looks like a nice piece of meat. While I have no issues with the concept of feeding raw meat, I am having problems with the concept of horse meat. Not so much my dogs eating it but me having to touch it. I am having a food aversion on my dogs' behalf.

I know lots of countries eat horse as part of their diets, but I am still not comfortable with the idea.

What makes lamb necks or kangaroo tails OK but horse unsettling?

Interested in people's opinions.

Edited July 24, 2010 by Daxilly

[poodlefan]

A lot of people regard horses like dogs - historical companions and servants to humans. They are lovely animals.

From a more pragmatic perspective, the transport and slaughter of horses makes a lot of horse lovers profoundly unhappy - there is nothing to recommend the practice from an animal welfare perspective. The horses that currently end up slaughtered are often the old, the sick and the unwanted - hardly "prime" animals from a consumption perspective.

In other countries it can be different - some horses are raised (notably draught breeds) specifically for slaughter.

If the health and welfare aspects of the trade in horse meat were resolved, I'd have far less issues with it.

As it stands, I can't see my dogs eating it anytime soon. You'd be hard pressed to feed it on the bone for dogs of the size I have anyway and my dogs eat next to no meat without bone.

[westiemum]

What she said. I rode as a kid and I can't see me feeding horse meat to my westies any time soon.

A lot of people regard horses like dogs - historical companions and servants to humans. They are lovely animals.

From a more pragmatic perspective, the transport and slaughter of horses makes a lot of horse lovers profoundly unhappy - there is nothing to recommend the practice from an animal welfare perspective. The horses that currently end up slaughtered are often the old, the sick and the unwanted - hardly "prime" animals from a consumption perspective.

In other countries it can be different - some horses are raised (notably draught breeds) specifically for slaughter.

If the health and welfare aspects of the trade in horse meat were resolved, I'd have far less issues with it.

As it stands, I can't see my dogs eating it anytime soon. You'd be hard pressed to feed it on the bone for dogs of the size I have anyway and my dogs eat next to no meat without bone.

[The Ark]

I asked this question of Laucke Mills (who make Uncle Alber's & Great Barko) and was assured that they don't use any horse meat/by-products in their dog food either. There are enough alternatives - we don't need to support the slaughter of horses for pet food.

[JulesP]

About as comfy as I am feeding dog meat....

[Daxilly]

My pet food supplier has horse necks so they are very big, probably about 2 feet long. If you didn't know you would think that they were beef.

I know when he was contemplating stocking it even he had to think twice. I know it made it easier because it didn't look like horse.

[stormie]

I will be feeding Orbit horse as of next week.

Maybe I'm a hard ass but I don't feel too awful about it. No more than I do when he's eating beef or lamb. I don't think horses are farmed for meat anywhere in Australia (?), not like other animals are anyway. I just see it as not being wasteful. The horses have ended up at the abattoir for whatever reason, I like to think mostly due to injury/age etc, but to have their lives ended. If their meat can be used to not be wasted, then so be it. I hate that they've ended up there, but afterwards, they are dead and have left their bodies.

And yep, I'm a horse person and at the time when he did have a bit of horse, I had my own horse.

Unfortunately, for me also, there are no other alternatives. I have a very allergic dog who cannot eat many foods. I now need to do another food elimination diet and horse is the only thing thats (mostly) novel, that is accessible.

[KOE]

would you feed dog meat same thing in my eyes

[stormie]

If a dog has had an awesome life and gets to the point where he needs to be pts, what does it matter what happens to the body afterwards?

My problem with feeding a particular meat is to do with the life the animal had before it was ended. I would think that the horses that are used in pet food most probably had reasonably better lives than the cattle and chickens used. I am sure most of the meat used in commercial foods wouldn't be free range, either would the meat/carcasses bought from supermarkets/butchers, unless specified.

I know the horses used in the abattoir I use spend a good few weeks out in the paddocks, just being horses, unless they are in terrible pain. Probably it's to put condition on them, but atleast they're just 'being horses' and not being fattened up in some tiny pen or being continuously bred...

Edited July 24, 2010 by stormie

[poodlefan]

If a dog has had an awesome life and gets to the point where he needs to be pts, what does it matter what happens to the body afterwards?

If his body was possibly full of drugs like bute or steriods, I'd not be wanting to eat it. Ask yourself what sort of drugs the trotting industry uses. Plenty of off the track standardbreds end up as pet food.

Horse meat for pet consumption doesn't have to pass the same strict testing that it will for human consumption. If you have no choice in the animal you feed your dogs, then at least make sure its not going to do them harm.

[ravenau1]

If it were raised ethically, and killed humanely, I have no problem with it. Just as I have no problem with cows, sheep, chickens, deer, pigs etc in the same circumstance. They are all lovely animals.

ETA: I wouldn't feed it to my dog unless it was human grade though.

Edited July 24, 2010 by ravenau1

[stormie]

If a dog has had an awesome life and gets to the point where he needs to be pts, what does it matter what happens to the body afterwards?

If his body was possibly full of drugs like bute or steriods, I'd not be wanting to eat it. Ask yourself what sort of drugs the trotting industry uses. Plenty of off the track standardbreds end up as pet food.

Horse meat for pet consumption doesn't have to pass the same strict testing that it will for human consumption. If you have no choice in the animal you feed your dogs, then at least make sure its not going to do them harm.

For sure! I didn't mean just feeding all dog meat. It was just a point I was trying to make, that hypothetically, feeding dog meat once it has died (assume by some other means, not lethabarb) suits me more ethically, in that the dog had a great, fun, loved and happy life with a family, where as a lot of the meat used to feed pets, unfortunately, probably lived a life of pain and discomfort and born entirely for the purpose of being killed.

Yep - I'm aware the horse meat I'm feeding isn't undergoing strict testing. But it's a choice I have to make, to help my dog. If I didn't have such an allergic dog, I wouldn't be feeding it. I would be like most normal people and feeding chicken and other 'normal' meats

[poodlefan]

Yep - I'm aware the horse meat I'm feeding isn't undergoing strict testing. But it's a choice I have to make, to help my dog. If I didn't have such an allergic dog, I wouldn't be feeding it. I would be like most normal people and feeding chicken and other 'normal' meats

You can't get camel??

[stormie]

Yep - I'm aware the horse meat I'm feeding isn't undergoing strict testing. But it's a choice I have to make, to help my dog. If I didn't have such an allergic dog, I wouldn't be feeding it. I would be like most normal people and feeding chicken and other 'normal' meats

You can't get camel??

not in Sydney that I've been able to source both meat and bones. But so very happy to hear of a contact!!!!! I know WA has camel but I've never seen in here. I've tried getting venison and goat but the cheapest I've found of that is about $7/kg which to feed a Dane, just isn't practical. I'll spend a fair bit on him, but $10 a day on food is just out of the question

[Mas1981]

I have also thought about feeding my dog horse meat but then decided against it as horses have usually had some medicines and vaccinations in their lives and I wasnt comfortable with that.

My old horse was put down ( back in the country that I come from) in the beginning of the month - he was old but not sickly, his carcass was fed to the lions and I had no issues with that as in his death he is feeding another animal.

Edited to add that the horse was put down on the retirement farm and his body was then transported to the lion park, its the easiest way to get rid of a carcass in a rural area and some other animals gained from it too

Edited July 24, 2010 by Mas1981

[poodlefan]

My old horse was put down ( back in the country that I come from) in the beginning of the month - he was old but not sickly, his carcass was fed to the lions and I had no issues with that as in his death he is feeding another animal.

No, I'd not be upset about that either.

[Mas1981]

We have camel here in WA but I have been warned that there is something that dogs can catch from camel meat that makes them ill which is why I stayed away from it too, I used roo and sweet potato for my elimination diet, my boy is back on regular meats though from tomorrow.

[oakway]

Well here goes,at least I tell the truth........ here goes.

I breed horses, I ride and show horses and yes I have fed the the dogs horse.

I have a friend that when one of the horses had to go, it was used to feed the dogs.

Always remember death to one can be life to another.

[The Ark]

I don't have a problem with the disposal of bodies as such, particularly if the horse is PTS on its own property - but I can't stomach the terror that horses must endure on their way to an abbatoir.

[rubiton]

If a dog has had an awesome life and gets to the point where he needs to be pts, what does it matter what happens to the body afterwards?

If his body was possibly full of drugs like bute or steriods, I'd not be wanting to eat it. Ask yourself what sort of drugs the trotting industry uses. Plenty of off the track standardbreds end up as pet food.

Horse meat for pet consumption doesn't have to pass the same strict testing that it will for human consumption. If you have no choice in the animal you feed your dogs, then at least make sure its not going to do them harm.

Doubt the SBs would have anymore drugs than any other equestrian use horse (Tbs must be drug free and that includes steroids to race and since the trotters dont have bute/lasix noted against them as they do in the US would assume that they are also under similar rules). And then you have the ones with no drugs (eg the brumbies and horses left in paddocks til someone runs them through a doggers sale) but god knows what worms and other things that have not been treated in them.

INteresting article in the SA paper last Sat was about the bloke who buys & sells to Peterborough and how he has to hold them for 6 months to ensure everything is out of their system (he also sells on for equestrian use any that seem sane & sound if he can).