Theonlyword...

[trackgal]

check out the conition of these poor mares they were too malnourished to go to kill

[Laurierace]

You might get more responses if you post the link.

[foothillsequine]

What mares would you be referring to? There is no link?

[Laurierace]

There are three of them at ACFH. I don't want to totally hijack the thread but if the link isn't here soon I can post it for her. Belonged to Paraneck stables and are now covered in rain rot and hundreds of pounds underweight.

[Marli]

Here is the story. They're all severely underweight and in very poor condition- heavy worm loads and crawling with lice. AC4H is hoping that once the worm treatment (gentle worming at that) and lice treatment begin to kill off the parasites they'll improve. They're also very hungry.

http://www.ac4h.com/TBHelpNeeded.htm

[foothillsequine]

Thanks for posting this. All I have to say is..frikken disgusting! What the sam heck is wrong with people?

[nferro9925]

And most came from Paraneck Stables - good 'ol Ernie -
Ya think he would pony up some bucks but I don't think he
has any class anyway.

[Crystal]

nferro, you read my mind.. I was just thinking all these horses came from paraneck or "fever stallions".. when they mentioned Artax and Adonis..

[jellac]

FYI - One of the rescued mares, Finely Decorated (by Well Decorated) has as her third dam, Panning For Gold, who produced the dams of CLASSIC VERSE ($291,784 - Won: Pa. Fut; Devil's River H; 2nd Iroqois H; 3rd Captain My Captain H and Capitol City H.) and of Canadian Champion 3YO Filly of 2005: GOLD STRIKE ($564,500 - At 2: Won Debutante S., Buffalo S.;At 3: Won Selene S. (G3), Labatt Woodbine Oaks; 2nd Star Shoot S.; 3rd Queen's Plate; At 4: 2nd Hendrie S. (G3) respectively.

[Sylvie Hebert]

For God's sake!...When will the racing associations/jockey club do something ?This kind of thing is happening everyday,everywhere...There's got to be a way to force racepeople into some kind of responsibility...How can i say it?: Stop breeding if you cannot keep all those horses...Haven't you got any sense at all?...

[ratherrapid]

unwanted horses going to slaughter. how about you doing something Ms. Herbert. And, I'm using your post as a e.g. instead of picking on you. everybody (that has any sense) understands that you are unable to carry on with equestrian activity and support each and every equine for life. Sad, but that is the way it is. Thus the question becomes, instead of declining to breed, or how terrible Paraneck is, what is a sensible humane slaughter policy for unwanted stock. I for one get tired of all the belly aching anti-slaughter idiots (if you want to understand the intelligence of this mindset read Alex Brown's blog some time) who want every body to support the unwanted animal, except themselves, of course.

As to these horses, would they have been better off to be put on the trucks BEFORE they got into this condition is the question. anyone care to address it. i'd doubt.

[Bunty Lawless]

For God's sake!...When will the racing associations/jockey club do something ?This kind of thing is happening everyday,everywhere...There's got to be a way to force racepeople into some kind of responsibility...How can i say it?: Stop breeding if you cannot keep all those horses...Haven't you got any sense at all?...

Instead of screaming, which I know is hard not to do, try this:

Write letters with pictures and web links of abuse, irresponsibility (and yes slaughter), along with success stories. Tell them the face of racing is taking on a really ugly shadow, and survival of racing and breeding is why the breeding and racing associations have to get involved in stopping the irresponsibility and supporting humane and responsible care or disposal of these horses with $$, not just talk and feel good programs.

The racing and breeding industries are struggling too (especially in this economy). They understand they need to change their image if they want to have a prayer of survival. Changing track surfaces has nothing to do with what happens to these horses if they are no longer 'valuable' to the person paying the bills to keep them. But look at the money spent on changing track surfaces so they would look like they cared and were doing something.

The racing and breeding industries are like the banking and investment industries--they went on far too long breaking common sense and decency rules and now the 'product' is going the way of all the money, only the 'product' is a living animal.

[ratherrapid]

I rather think racing needs to defend itself against the anti-slaughter self-delusionists. It does little good to pretend that racing will take care of retired race horses when it has neither the funds nor capacity to do so.

The best that can be hoped for is that all race horses would be retired into OTB disciplines and that they would be well cared for there and free from abuse or neglect. This is the delusion for the truth is that most OTBs, I am estimating 90%, either immediately find themselves in a neglect situation or soon will be there. How can you blame e.g. Paraneck for fate of a horse that they transferred to a new owner? And this is were racing needs to point out who is doing the abuse and neglect. Its the OTB, the darling of the anti-slaughter, instead of racing, for the most part.

[wilf]

It's the American Way, if someone protests the conditions of neighbouring horses to the authorities then they are "overreacting". My scumbag neighbour got out of jail and assumed the position of the abused owner who wanted her horses back even if they were far better off where they were. Two county sherriffs squad cars made sure she got them back ...........strangely enough they have not been fed in the two days since and that includes two mares with foals. I guess I should watch a few die before I call the Sherriff again.

[ASB]

Paragallo posted the following on another site--

This is Ernie Paragallo and I am writing to let every one know exactly what happened, I really don't care what any one on this board thinks about me but I want to get the facts out there so maybe some good can come from this and maybe it can stop it from happening in the future. The mares that are in question were the lucky one's in this terrible tragedy, there were a total of 24 mares that were given away to a breeder in florida in mid december. These mares were a part of a package of 60 horses that I had advertised with several bloodstock agents and breeding farms, I had offered the barren mares with a free breed back to any of my NY stallions or to my stallion King Of All Storms in florida. All the horses in this package of 60 were offered for free to the Bloodstock agents and farms, of the 60 horses we had given away about 6 to people in NY at a rate of 1-2 horses per person, in December I received a call from a person in florida who said he had received the list from a bloodstock agent and was interested in the horses, I asked how many and he answer ALL. This was a home run for my business we were going to move 60 horses that had limited value to us and were going to get the added benifits of having the mares bred back to our stallions and we had the potential to earn stallion awards for there offspring. Of the 60 horses 24 were barren mares withe breed back options, 13 pregnant mares where we were going to be co-breeders of the off spring, 10 old racehorses that were going to be used as ponies or pleasure/show horses and 13 2 Yo and 3 yo colt and fillies that they were going to race on a 60/40 split of income with then retaining the greater amount and also paying the entire upkeep. In December two vans arrived at our farm and picked up the 24 barren mares, the drivers said they would be back in a couple of days to pick up the rest. After a week we called back the gentleman who had called us but I never got an answer, safe to say he never came back for the rest. This morning I was called by my girlfriend crying to me about what she had been told and had read on the Rescue Website, I immeadiatly called the Rescue Group and try to find out what had happened. After speaking to them they told me that they knew who had sent the horses there and they believed he had done it before, they let me know that 8 horses had been rescued from the killing pen but believed the others had been slaughtered. This made me sick to hear as most of those mares I either foaled or had since they were babies and did not deserve that faith. This is what happened and I believed I had made the proper business decision but it did'nt turn out that way and it was a terrible tragedy. Like I said I don't care what any one thinks about me because you can not make me feel any worse about myself than I already feel. I have never sent a horse to the killer and I have never mistreated any horse i have ever own, I have gone to great lenghts to keep horses alive even when vets have told me to put them down, I was told by one of the most knowledgeable horsemen I know if they are eating and moving around and look happy there is no reason in the world to put them down.