Today is the Preakness Stakes, another thoroughbred horse race which highlights the sad reality that many of the horses participating in the event will most likely face the slaughterhouse when their racing days are over. Even winning the race provides no immunity from this horrible fate – look at Ferdinand, the 1986 Kentucky Derby winner who was reportedly slaughtered in Japan for pet food a few years ago.

Approximately 15 percent of horses in America slaughtered each year are former racehorses. LumberJack Farm is one of hundreds of farms around the country that rescue and rehabilitate former racehorses that have been injured or are too old to race anymore. LumberJack works with the non-profit organization ReRun, which gives rehabilitated racehorses a second chance as jumping show horses, or alternately places them in new homes.

Sadly, there just isn’t enough room at these rescue farms for all of the racehorses that are being sent to slaughterhouses. ReRun can only find new homes for around 40 horses per year. MidAtlantic Horse Rescue in Chesapeake City, Maryland can only care for about 15 horses at a time.

If Beverly Strauss (director and co-founder of MidAtlantic) has room back at the farm for a horse or two, she will try to outbid the kill buyers, the people buying horses for up to $500 to take to slaughterhouses. Or she will approach them after the auction and offer a few dollars more than they paid. She has no disdain for these people, she said. They are just part of the system.

Sometimes she will lie awake, thinking of horses that she did not save. Sometimes she will call the buyer the next day and make an offer. Sometimes, as she did three weeks ago, she will call too late. [NY Times]

Check out the full article at the NY Times. at the National Horse Protection League, or and see how you can help this expansive list of equine charities and rescue organizations, which rehabilitate and find new homes for horses that are retired from racing.

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