Sidebar: Legislated Cruelty
JUNK
As the horse comes through the chute it stops, frightened by the metal door slamming shut, the noise of the crowd, the darkness of the ring, the strange smells. The horse turns around to bolt back, but is blocked by a closed gate.
A man wearing jeans and a baseball cap, sitting on the rail of the chute, grabs a long plastic rod used for herding cattle and starts whacking the horse on the rear.
The horse whinnies.
It does not want to go into the ring. The man pokes and hits the horse in the face and neck.
The frightened horse sells for $65.
It is purchased by a buyer who has already purchased four “junk” horses headed for Mexican slaughterhouses.
Many Valley horses destined for slaughter end up here, at the Pacific Livestock Auction on the Gila River Indian Community. Lucky horses are purchased by people who will care for them, but “junk” horses—animals that have been starved, abused, neglected, or have gotten too sick or old to be useful—are bought by “kill buyers” who ship the horses to Mexico and sell them to slaughterhouses there. (It is illegal to slaughter horses in the United States.)
In tough economic times, some Valley horses can’t escape this fate. Their owners can’t afford to care for them. Some owners release their horses in the desert, where there is little food and water. Some owners sell their horses at auction. Other owners let the animals starve in backyard stalls. The abused horses are picked up by the Arizona Department of Agriculture, which by law must release them to auction houses.
A sign at the beginning of the dirt road leading to the Pacific Livestock Auction site reads: Private Property. No Trespassing.
On a Saturday, trucks and horse trailers pull in and out; the parking lot is packed with at least 60 vehicles. On the fences, the sides of the auction house and on the auction ring are signs read: Absolutely no cameras, including camera phones and video cameras. Not allowed on the premises at anytime without the written consent of the Pacific Livestock Auction. Posted 10-15-2004.
And: No guarantee on condition or health of livestock sold. Buying at your own risk.
The horses are held in stalls at the back of the auction lot until the sale. Some horses are held by themselves. Sometimes, three or four horses are crowded in a stall held together with rusty wires. If they kick and bite each other no one seems to care.
A white mare standing alone in a stall has a fly-infested gash on her cheek. Two black horses next to her are no better off, one is severely underweight with protruding hipbones and ribs; the other horse suffers from overgrown, cracked, splitting hooves. Further down, two huge thoroughbreds share a stall. The red roan is boneythe outlines of its ribs show. The bay next to it has a long gash on the top of it head near the right ear. The wound is fresh and blood pours down the bay’s face.
Two men dressed in cowboy hats, western shirts and jeans walk down the row of stalls talking about the horses for sale.
"You don't want any of the horses from back here, these are all the junk,” says the cowboy wearing a blue and white striped shirt. “All the good ones are saddled up front."
Inside the auction house, the auctioneer rattles off prices a hundred miles a second. The stale smells of dust and cigarette smoke hang heavy over the blue, scuff-marked bleachers.
The "good" horses are selling from about $250 to $500. One miniature pony, including the tack to fit it, goes for $925, but that is a rare circumstance.
The "junk"-- the bony, injured or frightened horses—sell from about $40 to $150.
When the auction is over, the kill buyers drive down the dusty road, their trailers and trucks heavy with horses.
TWO WOMEN WHO CARE ABOUT HORSES
It is 3 a.m. in New River. The sky is cluttered with stars and the moon is directly overhead. While most people sleep, Soleil Dolce gets up to start her day. Dolce, 37, works full time from home for a Valley financial service company and spends her day running a non-profit horse rescue organization called the Arizona Equine Rescue Organization, or AERO. She begins her day at the computer replying to e-mails, scheduling meetings and keeping the rescue’s paper work up to date.
As the sun rises so does Dolce’s housemate, Carol Hobson. If it’s a weekday she is dressed in business casual attire. After Hobson and Dolce have their coffee together, Hobson, 39, commutes to her financial service job in the Valley.
Dolce stays home to care for 11 rescued horses and two donkeys.
Had it not been for Dolce and Hobson, the 11 horses and two donkeys may have been killed at a slaughterhouse or died from neglect.
The horse rescue is located on Hobson’s two and a half acres in New River. Her chocolate brown adobe style home takes up the northeast corner of the property; a large arena sits in the northwest corner. A barn stands behind the house and the arena. It has seven covered stalls and two turn-out arenas, where horses run and play.
Every morning, Dolce throws eight-pound flakes of hay into a hefty wheelbarrow and sorts grain into 12 different feed buckets. The hungry horses paw at the dirt, rattle feeders and whinny at the sight of Dolce. In between filling water barrels and mucking the stalls, she puts her cell phone on speaker to participate in a conference call at the financial service company, where she works as a supervisor of technology.
She sleeps only a few hours a night. She’s often exhausted at the end of the day. She knows she can’t rescue all the neglected and abused horses in Arizona.
But she knows she can save a few.
Soleil Dolce and Carol Hobson rehabilitate horses that are “severe medical cases” resulting from abuse, starvation and neglect. They save horses from probable slaughter or euthanization by enabling horse owners to donate their animals to the rescue (releasing all ownership). AERO, the non-profit, pays for surgery and horse rehabilitation, and then arranges for horses to be adopted into a loving home.
The horse rescue also takes in cruelty seizures from the agriculture department and “duty calls,” from neighbors who call AERO to intervene.
Dolce doesn’t publicly disclose the non-profit’s location because she knows that horses will appear the next morning tied to the fence. Some financially strapped owners who can’t afford their horses want them to be rescued, but AERO can't afford to take in more horses in an economic downturn. Non-profits rely on the generosity of donors, and as the local and national economies slump, the number of donors who can afford to donate has also spiraled downward. Ironically, as AERO’s donations go down, more horses need rescuing.
From January to November, the Arizona Department of Agriculture fielded 1,577 calls from people concerned about abused or neglected horses. That’s a 23 percent increase over the same period in 2007.
“We have seen an increased number [of calls] in the animal care investigation… We think that it may be related to the price of feed and the overall economic situation,” John Hunt, associate director of the animal services division for the agriculture department, says.
The cost of a bale of hay has gone up approximately 400 percent, from $4 per bale in the late 90s to the current price of $16 per bale and higher. Today, a bale of hay feeds one horse for about three to five days and costs owners about $2,000 a year.
“As [the] price of hay and grain went up it was a concern all over the country,” Hunt says.
Food is not the only major expense associated with horse ownership. Owners must also pay costly veterinarian bills. When some horse owners have to come up with $5,000 or more for surgeries to correct colic and lameness, they start looking at other options such as euthanasia, auction or slaughter. The kindest option in some cases may be euthanasia, but it can cost $300 or more and some horse owners are unwilling to pay for it.
Even before the dramatic economic downturn of October and November, Dolce anticipated that the non-profit would have to apply for more grants than ever before. AERO has depended on minor grants from companies like PetsMart as well as donations from private donors. But donations are down 10 percent from last year, from $39,720 in 2006 to $35,840 in 2007, according to AERO’s federal tax return. According to AERO’s federal tax returns for 2004 and 2005, donations and grants were consistently higher —totaling about $40,000 each year. (In 2006, Dolce and Hobson moved the horse rescue to New Mexico, but returned when they could not get sufficient funding.)
It costs an owner about $4,000 a year to take care of an average horse, Dolce writes in an e-mail. That includes bedding, food, veterinary care, hoof care, and incidentals expenses.
Horses with medical problems are more expensive. The veterinary care for rescued horses cost AERO at the least $20,000 a year. This means the rescue currently operates at a deficit.
The best-case scenario for AERO would be getting enough public recognition to build up an endowment that would create steady income for the non-profit. Although AERO has no endowment now, Dolce dreams of the day when the non-profit would have enough income to support itself.
Most potential donors don’t know about the plight of abused horses in the Valley.
They don’t know that in a bad economy, horse rescue operations fill up quickly.
Sometimes, if the slaughterhouse is the only alternative, it is kinder to euthanize an unadoptable horse that has been severely abused or neglected. Dolce and Hobson, in consultation with their veterinarian, have made such hard decisions. If a horse faces a lifetime of suffering, or cannot be safely adopted out, and if a veterinarian recommends euthanasia, AERO will euthanize it.Dolce and Hobson recently approved the euthanization of a 26-year-old gelding with multiple severe medical problems. In a bad economy, with so many healthy horses in need of a home, the gelding would not be placed.
“We could have brought him back from the dead,” Dolce writes in an e-mail. But bringing the sick horse back from the dead would siphon funds away from healthier horses that could be adopted out.
Before a lucky horse is adopted out by AERO, prospective horse owners must demonstrate they have the time, money, and space to take care of a horse. They must also be proficient in horse care and relate well to the horse they plan on adopting.
Dolce and Hobson strive to keep AERO in operation not just because of the rehabilitation it provides to horses, but because of the impact that AERO's public service programs provide to the community of Cave Creek and the state of Arizona. Rescued horses are used in therapy programs for kids with behavioral problems through a partnership between AERO and the Cave Creek Unified School District.
Hobson created this children’s program because horses helped her find solitude and comfort throughout her challenging childhood. She lived with her adoptive grandparents when growing up and only felt like she belonged to someone when she was around horses.
Hobson and Dolce also participate in large-animal rescue programs, where they help educate law enforcement officers and other interested people on the proper way to rescue large animals in emergency situations.
A HORSE NAMED SUNDANCE
In 1996, Soleil Dolce moved from Washington to Arizona with her husband so he could study opera at ASU. She gave up a job she loved with Microsoft and moved to a place where she didn't know anyone. A few years later the couple divorced. Dolce studied massage therapy and threw herself into volunteering by helping other people and animals. She began volunteering at a barn in Tempe and grew attached to a horse named Sundance.
Sundance was an older horse that had leg problems. The barn couldn't keep him so Dolce adopted him. She started rehabilitating the old horse, but needed help.
She worked at the same financial service company as Hobson, but had never spoken to her.
One day Dolce saw Hobson walking in the hallway and stopped to ask her about Sundance. They started talking about AERO, which Hobson had founded in 2001. . The non-profit branched out when Dolce joined AERO, in 2003, and started the community-based programs for at-risk children and the large animal rescue. Opening up to these programs gave the rescue much needed exposure and fundraising outlets.
SATURDAY MORNING WITH GUS, RUTHIE AND ZEPHYRUS
On a Saturday morning in November, Carol Hobson works with the horses. She is dressed in a gray T-shirt, blue shorts and dusty Adidas sandals. Her blonde hair is pulled back into a ponytail and she’s wearing a black baseball cap with a cartoon dog in the center and the phrase “Life is good!” embroidered on the bill.
Dolce is going through a box of black backpacks with red crosses and red trim on them. The backpacks are gifts for participants of a fundraiser. Dolce’s blonde hair is pulled back and she is wearing cut-off denim shorts, sports sandals, and a navy blue shirt with an imprint of a firefighter and a horse and the words: Large Animal Rescue.
Five Roughneck garbage cans are lined up in the barn, along the back wall, and they are filled with grain and supplements. A shelf directly above the cans is lined with Celtic sea salt, apple cider vinegar, cold pressed aloe vera juice and other holistic remedies for the horses. In the corner of the barn there is a mini fridge stocked with water bottles for the volunteers and medication for the horses. Charts on the barn door show each animal’s name and its diet. A calendar on the door has spaces for volunteers to sign up for the community outreach and education program. Posted flyers advertise the rescues training events and horse bonding workshops.
Hobson’s backyard is filled with volunteers on this Saturday morning.
Volunteer Sheryl Vendl stands at the end of the barn. She has curly, dark brown hair cut into a chin-length bob and eyes that sparkle when she smiles. Her navy blue T-shirt and jeans are dirty from cleaning the stall of donkeys Ruthie and Gus.
Vendl rescued Ruthie and Gus after she found the donkeys foraging for food in a field in Chandler. Vendl was appalled at the state of the two donkeys; their fur was matted together with sharp burrs, their hooves were chipped and crumbling away, but the most noticeable sign of neglect was their vast difference in weight. Ruthie was severely underweight, while Gus was severely overweight.
The donkeys were being fed by compassionate grocery workers who threw them scraps from the neighboring grocery store.
“The grocery workers would bring carts of old bread and tortillas out of the store and throw them in the field for the donkeys,” Vendl said. “Gus would run up to the fence to greet me with tortillas hanging out of his mouth, but Ruthie would never touch the stuff.”
Vendl began bringing the donkeys carrots and apples. She eventually purchased the donkeys and took them to AERO.
Ruthie walks with a limp. Her front legs are stiff because her bones may have been damaged by malnutrition. But that isn’t the only factor that caused Ruthie’s injuries, Vendl says that the previous owner told her that cowboys tied Ruthie to the back of a truck to make her run so they could rope her.
Even though the two donkeys are returning to health, Ruthie still shies away from people she doesn’t know well. It takes time for her to trust strangers, especially men.
The horses in AERO’s stalls have each faced physical and mental challenges, but some horses have a longer road to recovery than others, and more obstacles to overcome.
Walter Badet, the official horse trainer for AERO, trains rescued horses in behavior and under saddle therapy, getting them prepared for adoption. Badet is a tall, slender man with shoulder-length golden brown hair pulled into a low ponytail. His English has a soft French accent and his voice is soothing as he leads a tall bay gelding named Zephyrus into the arena.
Zephyrus came to the rescue when he was 2 years old and weighed 450 pounds when he should have weighed 900 pounds. Because of his malnutrition, Zephyrus almost died during surgery after a reaction to the anesthesia.
He was a brutally abused horse, emotionally and physically. Badet has only worked with Zephyrus six times, but Dolce has noticed a tremendous improvement in his behavior.
“Zephyrus went from being a severely dangerous horse to a moderately dangerous horse,” Dolce says. “And with more training, we will be able to safely adopt him out.”
Badet invented a “barebonding” technique, which involves relating to the horse on its own terms without the use of a rope, reins or a saddle. In the arena, Badet uses barebonding to teach Zephyrus respect and boundaries.
Badet attempts to jump on Zephyrus’s back and the horse tries to bite at him. Badet is never aggressive with Zephyrus, but persistent. Badet jumps next to the horse higher and higher until Zephyrus stops nipping at him; then Badet rewards the horse with love. Badet jumps one more time and gracefully gets on Zephyrus’s back for the first time. Badet lies on the horse’s back and they just stand still calm and immersed in one another.
Badet barebonds for about 10 minutes before Zephyrus nips at Badet’s boot. Badet knows he has overstayed his welcome and retreats out of Zephyrus’s space. He wants to leave the horse wanting more.
Dolce wishes that AERO could afford to have Badet train at the facility more frequently, but it is too expensive. AERO pays Badet $75 an hour. However, Badet encourages AERO volunteers to watch his instructions and techniques for free, so they can apply those skills to other horses.
TWO FRIENDS SAVED FROM SLAUGHTER
Misty and Doc looked like fur-covered skeletons when they were rescued in February, 2007.
A veterinarian spotted Misty, a sorrel mare, in a Scottsdale barn. The veterinarian notified AERO and also called the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office, which seized the horse for neglect. When Dolce picked up Misty from the sheriff’s office, one of the officers talked her into taking an old horse named Doc, who had bonded with Misty. Doc had been abandoned in the desert and had been picked up by the sheriff’s office.
A year and a half later, both horses are much healthier. But they have a long way to go. A malnourished horse can gain back its weight in three months, but it takes longer for a horse’s internal organs to recuperate from starvation.
“They will look fine on the outside, but on the inside there is still nominally functioning liver and kidneys, typically,” Dolce says. “Their kidney function interferes with their muscle formation because of improper amino acid assimilation.”
Doc has other medical problems. He is 35 years old, partially blind in both eyes and has a third degree heart murmur. Because he is so bonded to Misty, it would be cruel to separate the two horses. Instead, the two horses will stay at AERO, earning their keep in the children’s program. Had it not been for Soleil Dolce and Carol Hobson, the two horses might have died of starvation or ended up in a rusty stall at the auction house.
Just two junk horses.
