From: Ellyn
Dear Jessica, I am sitting here just about screaming because I am so angry. I hope you can help me understand what is going on. I have an old horse, I don't know exactly how old he is but he is older than thirty. He is blind and doesn't have many teeth left. This winter he got very thin and looks neglected but he isn't, he's just old so he looks like a skeleton, a lot of old horses do, and he lies down all the time which is normal for old horses I guess. But here is what I did.
I called the horse rescue society and asked them to take him because he needs help and I think he would be happier in another home. My husband and I both have jobs, we have three kids and five other horses and I just don't have time to take care of this horse in a fancy special way. But I love him and we are not going to kill him just because he is old and thin! But that is what the horse rescue people basically told me to do when I called them, first they tried to talk me in to feeding him all this expensive stuff or make "soup" for him, whoever heard of a horse eating soup, they must be crazy.
And then when I explained we didn't have the time or money for a lot of vet calls and special vitamins (or making soup!) I wanted to give him to them and told them I would sign him over, they could keep him or find him a good home, they wouldn't take him even though I said it was okay if they couldn't find him a good home I would understand if they had to put him down.
They basically told me that I should put down my own horse. That is just so cruel it is unbelieveable. How could anyone say something like that to a person who just loves her horse and wants what is best for him? I am not the kind of person who would just have a horse put down, but now I don't know what to do. What kind of rescue place won't save a horse like this? I feel like I ought to just take him over there late one night and leave him so they would have to look after him or find him a good home. He used to be a good horse. Can you help me?
Ellyn
First, take a deep breath, and calm down. There isn't really any reason for you to be angry with anyone. You don't say where you live, so I don't know which rescue organization you called, but I'm very familiar with the way good rescue organizations work, so I can probably tell you a little bit about what the people at the rescue organization were thinking.
You need to understand that horse rescue organizations are set up to RESCUE horses. When horses are abused and/or neglected and the rescue organization gets to know about it, someone from the organization will usually come out and talk to the horse's owners. Let's make up an imaginary situation, and say that somebody a few miles away from you bought several horses and put them in a little paddock, and then lost interest in the horses, for whatever reason. Those horses are starving, they've eaten all the grass, they've eaten the bark off the tree in the paddock, and when someone notifies the rescue organization and a representative comes out to look at the horses, he sees that not only are they walking skeletons, they are BARELY walking because their feet are very long and turned up at the toes - which shows that the farrier hasn't been there in years.
Still with me? Okay. Obviously, these imaginary horses NEED HELP. The aim of the rescue organization, though, is not just to take horses away from people, it's to make conditions better for the horses, and their FIRST move will be to try to make things better by convincing the horses' owner to treat them better. So our imaginary person now goes and knocks on the door, meets the owner, and explains who he is and that the organization is worried about the horses. He explains the basics of horse care - because many horse-owners don't KNOW what a horse's basic requirements are. Then he says something like "I'll be back in two days, and I'll need to see that the farrier has been here, and I'll need to see that the horses have food and water." At this point, the horse's owner can clean up his act and keep his horses - if the rescue organization representative comes back and the farrier is working on the horses' hooves and the horses have access to hay and water, the rep will probably say something like "Good going, we'll be back in a week or so to be sure that everything is still going well." If, however, the horses are still starving and there is no evidence of any improvements, the horses may be impounded and taken to the rescue organization's facility. Eventually, some of the horses will be nursed back to health; some may not be strong enough to get healthy again.
Okay, that's an impoundment - a rescue. Now, let's look at your situation, which is completely different.
You aren't ignorant about horses - you know what they need, and you know that your very old horse isn't doing well. You have other horses that are doing fine, you're a responsible person with a husband and three kids and a job and a farm - so it's just THIS horse that's a problem. Since your other horses are fine, it's a safe bet that there is horse food on the place and that you do feed your horses. Since your old horse is missing a lot of teeth, it's also a safe bet that he isn't able to chew his food properly, which means that he isn't able to digest it properly either - and because old horses, like very young horses, need more and better food to stay healthy, what you have is a horse that (a) has access to food, but (b) is going downhill steadily. Your old horse is doing very badly, but it's unlikely that any rescue organization would be able to take your horse away from you.
What a rescue organization WOULD be able to do is just what your rescue society did - someone from the organization would (1) offer suggestions about how you might be able to get your horse into better condition, and then would (2) suggest euthanasia in the event that the horse is too far gone to respond to the supplements and feed. And by the way, "soup" - or slurry as I call it - is very easy to make (just mix complete pelleted feed into a bucket of warm water) and very palatable to old horses. Your horse can drink his meals instead of chewing them - he'll get more out of them, and it's really not much trouble. If you have five other horses to feed, you can pour the warm water into a bucket full of pelleted feed, then feed the other horses, and by the time that's done, the slurry will be ready. It only takes a few minutes for the pellets and warm water to become "soup".
And now we get to the real problem - those few minutes are minutes that you truly believe you can't spare! You are very busy, your husband is busy, your kids are probably busy too, with school and soccer and other such activities. You don't have to spend hours each day with your horses; healthy, well-maintained horses can spend years living happily in a field. As long as they have room to move, equine companionship, grazing and fodder, and they get regular dewormings and regular attention from the vet and the farrier, they can live happy lives even if you never spend any time with them. But it's different when a horse, because of illness or injury or old age, is no longer healthy. That horse is going to need a different type or level of care, including much more personal attention, if it's going to be "well-maintained". Your old horse is at that point, has probably been at that point for some time now, and it's up to you to decide what you will do about it.
It's not up to a rescue society to accept a horse as a permanent free boarder when the situation is simply that the horse is no longer wanted by its owners. It's the owner's responsibility - YOUR responsibility - to try to make life better for your horse, or to have him put down. It's not very realistic to expect someone else to be willing, much less eager, to take on your elderly, blind horse in need of special care and feeding. After all, you've had him forever, you remember him when he was healthy and young and sound and sighted and had his teeth and could be ridden, you have a HISTORY with this horse, you remember him when "he used to be a good horse", you say you love him, and yet - you don't feel that you can manage to take on those chores yourself.
The problem, Ellyn, is that both of those options are open to YOU, and both are YOUR responsibility. This is YOUR horse. You can't say "I'm too busy to do what's right, I'll just get the rescue society to adopt him". It doesn't work that way. The rescue society is there to save horses that are starving and dying because people are cruel or ignorant or just don't care; there is a LOT of that work to do, and it keeps most rescue societies busy full-time and sometimes more than full-time. The rescue society isn't there to serve as the equivalent of a free nursing home/hospice for elderly, infirm animals whose owners don't want to be bothered with them anymore and don't want to make the decision to have them put down.
You need to decide what you want to do. If you want to keep this horse alive, by all means implement the suggestions you got from the rescue society. If you take a long hard look at the horse and realize that he is too old and painful to enjoy his life, and that a horse that can't walk comfortably or eat properly is a horse with no quality of life left, then you'll need to make the decision to have him put down. Again, this isn't anyone else's responsibility - it's yours. You gave this old horse a loving home, and he's had a long life - but it sounds as though he has reached the point where "longer" isn't "better".
Instead of trying to find someone else to take the horse, call your vet and either work out a feeding plan (surely with five of you living on the farm, the horse could be given a bucket of slurry twice a day by SOMEONE), or, if that's just not practical or the horse is already too far gone, figure out how and when to give your old horse the very last gift you can give him: an easy and dignified death. If you can have the horse put down at your own farm, that would be easiest for him; if you can't, then having your vet put him down at the local veterinary hospital would be the next best choice.
I know it's hard to give up a horse you love, but you have to think about the horse, not about yourself. If this horse's life isn't worth living, don't force him to live it. In this case, there are two ways of trying to escape the horse-owner's responsibilities. One is to just let the horse get thinner and more painful until he eventually dies - that's not acceptable. The other is to try to make someone else do what we know WE need to do ourselves - that's not acceptable either. Our horses get older, our lives change, sometimes we run out of options, sometimes the right thing to do is the thing that makes us cry, but when we have animals in our lives, we can't escape our responsibilities - and we shouldn't try.
And speaking of that - taking the horse to the rescue society late at night and abandoning him there is not a good idea, and I think you already realize that. Think about your horse: Where is the kindness in putting your old horse into a trailer and pushing him into an unfamiliar field, at night, with horses he doesn't know? That would be traumatic even for a young, healthy horse, but for an old, blind horse .... don't even THINK about it. It would be too cruel - and (something else you need to consider) it would also be illegal, and there would probably be some legal repercussions. At the least, you could be arrested for trespassing. There might be fines... believe me, it will be less expensive and less inconvenient for you, and less painful and confusing for your horse, if you simply arrange to have him put down. Dropping him off and running isn't the answer.
Let me give you an analogy. If someone comes to you and says "I have a load of old tires I want to get rid of, you have a farm, lots of space here, so can I dump them on your farm?" you're almost certainly going to say "No". If that person comes to your farm late at night and dumps the tires ANYWAY, what will you do in the morning - say "Oh, look, kids, we've got a lot of tires, what fun!"? I don't think so. You're far more likely to ring the sheriff and complain, and the person who did the dumping will be in legal trouble - and will still be responsible for his tires. Even if you can understand why someone would want to avoid paying recycling or dumping fees to get rid of unwanted materials, it's that person's responsibility to do so, and he can't expect to get away with dumping his unwanted property on your land and expecting you to go to the inconvenience and expense of having it removed.
You probably haven't thought of it in that way, and of course a horse is not a load of tires, but still... this is effectively what you are doing when you try to make the rescue society take over your responsibilities and your expenses for your horse. Neither the idea nor the midnight drop-off is even close to acceptable, so don't go there.
I'll bet that if you ring the rescue society again and say "I think it's time for me to have my horse put down, can you help me?", they'll be able to give you some help. The problem you had before wasn't that they gave you the wrong answer, the problem was that you asked them the wrong question. Ask them how you can help your horse out of his painful life with the least inconvenience and expense to yourself - they'll understand that, and they'll be able to advise you. If all the horse-owners like yourself look after their horses well and give them a good death when the time comes, that lets the rescue societies do what they are there to do - give advice to people like yourself who really just need information, and keep the money and stall and pasture space for the horses that are existing under horrible conditions of abuse and neglect, and actually need to be RESCUED, with all that implies.
Your horse doesn't need to be rescued - he just needs his caring, responsible owner to do what she needs to do. You're not doing a bad thing by having your old horse put down if it's the right time to put him down - on the contrary, you're being a good owner ALL the way to the end. I know it's not easy to let a horse go, but if you keep horses until they are very old, there does often come a time when you need to do what's best for the horse, even if it's painful for you.
Jessica
Jessica Jahiel's HORSE-SENSE is a free, subscriber-supported electronic Q&A email newsletter which deals with all aspects of horses, their management, riding, and training. For more information, please visit www.horse-sense.org
Please visit Jessica Jahiel: Holistic Horsemanship® [www.jessicajahiel.com] for more information on Jessica Jahiel's clinics, video lessons, phone consultations, books, articles, columns, and expert witness and litigation consultant services.