As the United States representative on the initial board of directors for the newly formed International Equine Business Association, and the chairman, I have just sent the following letter, background information, and petition to the United States Department of Agriculture.  

Please take the time to write a letter of your own.  Feel free to use our letter as a model, but please include your own personal perspective. We have found that emails tend to be ignored, but have received response to our written communications. We greatly appreciate your support and effort, and would ask for two things as soon as possible:

1. Please email me at sue.wallis52@gmail.com so that we can add you to our list of proactive supporters, and please include any equine organizations that you are affiliated with. We would appreciate a copy of your letter to USDA.  
2. Contact your congressional delegations and brief them on the dire situation facing the horse business, and ask them to add their support to a bi-partisan effort to send a strong message to USDA and Secretary Vilsack from Capitol Hill. While you are at it, please ask them to oppose any and all efforts attempting to ban horse transportation and humane slaughter such as the Moran Amendment which has been attached through a voice vote in committee to the House version of the 2013 Ag Appropriations bill. Ask them to insist that this amendment be stripped off in the conference committee (when and if it ever gets there) just as it was last year. If you would like to use or adapt our talking points, please contact me.

It is very important that Congress understands the full ramification of these misguided measures that, if allowed to become law would doom thousands of horses to horrific fates, destroy what is left of the U.S. horse industry, eliminate the private property rights of horse owners, devastate rural economies, and cause major disruption in trade relations between the U.S. and our closest neighbors that would clearly violate international agreements. More than 74% of the horses processed in Canada in 2010 originated in the U.S., and probably a larger percentage of the horses processed in Mexico for export also originated in the U.S. The Moran Amendment as written defunds completely the APHIS Slaughter Horse Transport Program which ensures that horses are transported properly, and would prevent any horses from being exported for this purpose.

Friends, between drought, wildfires, no options, and an animal rights driven obstructive federal agency, we face a very grim winter...

Please feel free to email if you have any questions or concerns. Thanks so much for your support!

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Across the nation, U.S. livestock and agricultural resources are being wiped out by widespread drought, compounded by enormous wildfires destroying summer forage and winter feed. Headlines for just a single day scream the following: "Wyoming Drought Strikes Hard at State's Livestock Herd,[i]" " Drought forces Ozarks farmers to sell livestock much earlier than usual [ii]," "Arkansas Drought Threatens Cattle Industry [iii]," and because of the weather, "USDA slashes corn, soybean production estimates[iv]," "Drought-Driven Wildfires Challenge Western Producers [v] and "Oregon Wildfires Burns, Kills Cattle [vi]." Forage and feed in short supply means prices are sky rocketing and will continue to rise. Everywhere livestock owners are downsizing herds while desperately searching for winter feed without much hope.

Thankfully there is still a good market for cattle and sheep, and owners are receiving fair prices which will allow them to restock and rebuild their herds when circumstances change. Horse owners don't have that kind of predictable market so they stand to suffer in horrific numbers if USDA does not act immediately to implement the inspection of horse processing facilities.

One South Dakota rancher posted a common sentiment, one shared by nearly every livestock owner faced with these tough decisions. Robert Dennis writes:

"Well, we are in a drought. I have too many horses, as they stopped the slaughter of horses and I refuse to put any I like through what it would take to get them out of the country for a Mexican to stab them to kill them or ship them up into Canada on a crowded truck, let alone pay the fuel bill to get them somewhere where I might get $200 bucks a head, if I am lucky. So I will need to cull some of these older and not- good-enough-to-breed mares and fillies. I will take them out and give them a bite of grain and put them down humanely with my rifle. Then I'll haul them to the horse graveyard on this place. What would any of you do? Or do any of you want some free horses? Just come and get them... no really, I doubt I'd give a horse to anyone unless I knew them and how they would treat them. My feelings are, there are a lot worse things in life than dying. All of my horses live a good life, right up to the end.

I guess it's just come to the time for some of them to come to the end quicker than normal as I cannot afford to feed them this winter at these kinds of hay prices. Yeah, this is what happens when you take away horse slaughter plants in the U.S. Too bad, seems someone could have at least used the meat after they are dead....guess the coyotes and other scavengers will."

A Montana rancher, Kirk Green, burned out by massive fires, estimates he and his neighbors are faced with well over 200 head of horses that will not be able to winter out as they generally do because all of the forage is completely burned out.

"How quick can you get the plants open? We are going to have to do something with these horses. We can't let them starve, and it hurts me to let these out of the country buyers get them for nothing. It's a damn waste and a damn shame to even consider shooting them where they stand, but I guess we'll do what we have to do."

In Wyoming, a breeder and horse trainer, Ingrid Buchmeier, writes looking for help in trying to find any humane solution:

"I don't think advertising horse meat as pet food like selling beef would work until we do have slaughter houses capable of slaughtering horses. I think we would need to kill and harvest the meat ourselves and then sell it from our home. I am not sure if I am tough enough to do that, but I sure as heck don't want to send them on that highway to hell that goes from WY to Mexico. I was just checking since at $250 a ton for hay, if you can even find it, may necessitate drastic measures. In my own herd I have several retired horses and we normally put up plenty of hay. Our hay is a 100% loss, nada, zip this year. Quite a few folks are in the same boat as us in this area. The cattle can be sold, the sheep can be sold, the goats can be sold, but horses are a different story. These old retired horses (I have about six of them) will just go to feed coyotes or worms and it's a shame to feed our dogs corn and meat byproducts. I think it COULD be financially viable to sell horse meat for pet food right here in the good ol' USA. Do you know if you can ship horse meat across state lines for pet food?"

These are only three of many stories, all of which are just as dire.

USDA stands squarely in the way of enterprises that could offer some relief and a humane option for many of these horses. It has come to our attention that USDA is promulgating directives to states that indicate the agency has no intention of providing the inspection they are required by long-standing U.S. law to provide, and are actively discouraging state departments of agriculture from implementing any kind of state inspection. This is outrageous, and singles out one class of livestock owner for economic harm and persecution that is extremely detrimental. In the face of widespread natural disaster, some would say this is the height of hypocrisy and completely counter to the mission of the USDA to promote and responsibly regulate agriculture in this country.