Goat and Horse Meat

Yucca, thanks for a true statement. I would hope no one ever has to be hungry. Many people think they will not eat certain food. It is great to have that option, many don't. It is real hard for a person who has not ever been hungry to begin to understand what hunger will do to a person.
To all the people who say they will never eat a certain food I hope you are not ever put in that position. Anyone who has been truly hungry knows that there isn't any food they will decline.

I for one, enjoy a good bear.If you get one away from garbage and not feeding on salmon, they are prime table fare.They stuff themselves with berries and occaisionaly honey[ beekeepers will welcome you wityh open arms]I smoke the hindquarters and make the rest into sausage- darn good food.Trchinosis was always considered to be an issue, but as a surgeon friend told me, that was typically back in the logging camp days when they had hogs, and the bear would eat the offal.He said it he had never seen evidence on trichinosis in any bear he had shot- although he also froze it for 30 days and cooked well-just in case.

Eating horses is disgusting. Unless you are starving it's just wrong. Mankind has a long-standing deal with horses and a special relationship with them, just like with dogs. Dogs and horses have helped us hunt, travel and haul things for thousands of years. The relationships that we have with horses, individually and as a species, are unlike those we have with cows, goats, etc. It's more personal.

I'm not saying that there should be a law about eating horses. But we all know perfectly well that a horse is not like a cow or a chicken. Eating them is sick and it is only a few steps away from cannibalism. Almost every culture has it's list of sacred animals and we are no different.

-Jack

''we all know a horse is diferent than a cow''-pray tell- in what way?In some cultures mares milk is used as in ours, cows and goats.Just because we have made''pets'' out of annimals doesn't preclude us eating them, and to impose that standard on other people is nothing more than prejudice.

Personally, I don't have a moral problem with eating horses, but I have issues with the way they're transported to slaughter. Make the transport humane, or have them butchered locally, and I don't see a problem with it. I actually think it's better to use the meat on a horse that needs to be put down anyway (i.e., injured) than to waste it. But one strong concern I have with horses is what they've been fed. THERE IS NO CONTROL over what went into that horse before it was bought at auction and sent to slaughter. Not just medications -- but, for example, I used to own a mare who drank water from a well for close to ten years before I got her that was KNOWN categorically to be contamined with DDT and dioxins and various heavy-industry chemicals. And she grazed on a field irrigated by treated effluent. There was no obvious adverse effect to her, but when she passed away (of a twisted gut) I had the option of donating her meat to a zoo which takes dead horses here locally and decided to bury the body -- deeply -- instead.

Can you imagine that meat -- which was almost certainly contaminated -- getting into the human food chain?

Leva

I will continue to use my horses to get me into the mountains to get deer and elk out and for recreation and I do love them as "pets" but Hart, Jack and Candy and her yet to be born foal will provide nutrious meals long before the family goes hungry...

the question of eating uncontaminated meat is a very valid one- and for that reason I prefer wild game rather than domestic farm raised animals, or if I do, would prefer to know where it came from, and who raised it.However- that said, I also recognise ''natural'' meat is not available to the masses, and equally, how many people are prepared to support small holders if their meat is higher priced due to the higher costs involved?Wecan't have it both ways....

I agree with this 100% (and - obviously - think it shold apply to any animal being slaughtered for meat).

I've never had horse - nor goat - but only because of a lack of opportunity. Don't see anything wrong with it. I see nothing wrong with dog either but I'd have a real problem eating *my* dog.

i was very leary of goat the first time but it was one of my favorite meats much better than venison or even pork wouldnt mind trying horse from a healthy animal ,i cut up one for disposal as dog food once and the meat had a very tender grain looked very good ,cut tender and it was a very old animal. My milk cow is as much a pet as any horse but when her productive life is over she will be beef,if she dys of natural causes then she will be dog food, it is a shame when good horses go to slaughter but all horses are not top quality , my mares will probably be here till natural causes of very old age claim them ,

There's a local zoo here in AZ that takes donated horses for feeding the carnivores. I'd have donated the mare I mentioned above to them if not for the fact I was concerned about toxins in the meat. They have a guy who picks up the horses and puts them down and butchers them. I know of a couple of people who have donated horses to the zoo -- one old guy with chronic founder, about forty years old, and a foal born with birth defects so severe as to be nonviable.

*shrug* Once an animal's dead, it's DEAD and gone. The body's just meat. Might as well put it to use.

Leva

"but I have issues with the way they're transported to slaughter."

Part of the PETA-like hysteria that surrounds the slaughter and eating of all kinds of meat animals.

Think about it - an animal goes to slaughter and the price you get is deirectly dependent upon the weight of an animal. FEW are willing to sacrifice any more weight off of an animal than necessary. Suppliers don't get paid much anyway, and every pound is precious. Buyers on the other end demand a quality product for human consumption - pet food somewhat less.

The vast majority of the horror stories you read about are purely fiction - designed to sway the "feelings" that too many humans substitute for logic and fact.

That said - I raise more and more of all of my own food as I prefer the highest quality available.

Just a tiny reality check here. People keep saying that horses are special because they've provided transportation and draft labor for us over the millenia. Well, so have cattle. In fact, cattle pulled the wagons in the wagon trains, and provided milk for the meals on the trail. Sometimes the same animal did both!

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