Horse Care & Education

HAPPA & RSPCA agree that currently England (UK) is in an Equine crisis. Horses recently have been known to be rehomed for free or for as little as £5 because people can't cope with the responsibility. There have been more cases of equine cruelty and neglect over the past year and HAPPA alone answered 3000 calls to their Shore Hey Centre. 

"Horses abandonments are soaring and rescue centres are at crisis point. We and other major horse charities are calling on the government in Westminster strengthen the law and protect horses."

There is no one 'perfect' way to care for all horses and ponies because every animal and every situation is different. It is up to you how you look after your horse or pony, but you must take reasonable steps to ensure that you meet all its needs.

Owning and caring for a horse or pony is great fun and immensely rewarding. But it is also a big responsibility and a long-term commitment, in terms of care, hard work and finances.Horses and ponies have very complex needs so looking after them well can be challenging. If you own or are responsible for a horse or pony, even on a temporary basis, you are required by law to care for it properly.

This forms in conjunction with the:  Animal Welfare Act 2006. 

The Welfare act ensures that animals don't suffer unnecessarily before action can be taken. Preventative care and education is far better than curing animals and dealing with the consequences of bad owners. 

Section 9 of the Animal Welfare Act places a duty of care on people to ensure they take reasonable steps in all the circumstances to meet the welfare needs of their animals to the extent required by good practice. 

In short it means they must take positive steps to ensure they care for their animals properly and in particular must provide for the five welfare needs, which are:

need for a suitable environment

need for a suitable diet

need to be able to exhibit normal behaviour patterns

need to be housed with, or apart, from other animals

need to be protected from pain, suffering, injury and disease.

http://www.rspca.org.uk/getinvolved/campaign/horse/-/articleName/CAM_HORSES_MAINPAGE

In October 2012 the major equine rescue and rehoming organisations in England and Wales released a report showing the immense pressure they are under due to the increasing number of horses and ponies needing their help. The organisations warned that, should there be another harsh winter, they will be physically unable to cope with the estimated 6,000 horses that were at that point defined as being at risk. 

Problems:

Overbreeding
The population of horses in the UK is unknown but is estimated to be just fewer than one million. The vast majority of these are owned privately for leisure (according to the British Equine Trade Association Survey 2011), but this is the most unregulated of the horse sectors, unlike those bred, for instance, for horse racing.
Irresponsible dealers are at the heart of the problems in the equine market. They are still buying, breeding and importing horses but as the market has become saturated the market prices for horses and ponies have crashed. Animals can now be found at sales for £5 and still remain unsold. 

Most of the horses rescued by equine charities are those suffering from welfare problems, and the number of welfare cases has increased. The RSPCA report an increase of 117 percent in the number of convictions for horses in 2012 compared to the previous 12 months, and in the first quarter of 2013 investigated over 7,000 complaints involving horses compared to 25,900 for the whole of 2012. World Horse Welfare investigated 22 percent more welfare complaints in the first quarter of 2013 compared
to 2012. This upward trend is also apparent for dogs and cats but is more extreme for horses. Two important factors seem to be at play. 

ECONOMICS – The continued poor economic climate has meant that horses, which can cost up to £100 per week to look after, are suffering as people cut back on veterinary costs, routine care, shelter and feed. 

Fly Grazing

The practice of leaving horses to graze on public or private land without permission has long been common across England and Wales, particularly among the travelling community (but by no means restricted to them). This has caused little concern on a national scale up until now but within the past two years more incidents of fly grazing have been reported across all areas of Britain. Increasingly, fly grazing has become a significant problem for landowners, farmers and local authorities and in some cases posing risks to the public. It is also leading to increasing welfare problems as the animals are left to fend for themselves. As these horses are kept communally animals continue
to breed despite there being no market for them.
This, in turn, puts pressure on the local authority who may have no choice but to euthanase certain groups of horses should charities be unable to take them in. 

There are also owners who let their horses breed indiscriminately then become overwhelmed with the numbers produced, resulting in welfare problems. Some of these cases can involve around 100 horses.
So where do these horses go? Some go into the meat trade and as the horsemeat scandal of 2013 underlined, some horses on fraudulent passports were going to abattoirs. There were five to seven abattoirs operating in the UK, paying around £230 for a horse or around £80 for a pony to dealers for meat, which was, and still is, exported to The Netherlands, Belgium, France and Italy. The number of horses sent to slaughter in the UK for human consumption has almost doubled since 2008. The lack of control on this business could have played a role in driving up the incentive for dealers to breed and trade in horses. The recent closure of two of the abattoirs may also be resulting in an increase in horses being fly grazed and abandoned. Invariably, those with welfare problems
end up with equine charities. 

Photographs from magazine:

Behaviour around horses & equines: 

Horse care leaflets given to me by the grooming staff:

I found that these leaflets tend to be a mass of information and not broken down into smaller chunks to make them easier to read. The charities are a small budget but information could be shown online. As a child I also had several different horse care books as I completed several certificates in horse management. However I found that a large proportion of the audience is younger people and the books are quite outdated in their imagery and colour schemes. 

(Robinson's store website) 

http://www.dk.co.uk/static/spreads/all/6/6/9781405366366L_006.jpg

I think to make children and teenagers read the correct information and think about correct horse care the information needs to be presented in a creative way in the form of booklets that are designed to be colourful and in smaller chunks and the type of product HAPPA and other charities could give out as part of the Second Chance Sponsorship packs.

 The information could also be produced in the form of a website and appear to have several different bite size chunks of information which could also be put onto social media such as twitter. I think this would make a really large impact on the charity as education is extremely important to younger people who are interested in having their own horses. 

When speaking to the grooms I found that they thought a lot of neglect wasn't through purposeful cruelty but the fact that a lot of horse owners do not know the correct information.