Horse Mess

[kayshapero]

Karen Schnaubelt Turner Dick posted this on Facebook - dunno the details but Karen's pretty trustworthy.

Upping the bandwidth for my "horse people" friends: 52 thoroughbred horses need homes. Will go this Saturday for slaughter. Gentleman died and his son wants nothing to do with them. Most broodmares are broke and some are in foal weanling, yearlings, 2 yrs and 3 yrs old most are gelded. FREE and papered. Friend of the deceased is trying to find homes 440-463-4288 or 440-4...63-4288 Barnesville, OH.

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Update: Apparently the anonymous poster was correct - everything is fine; someone just panicked. Sigh... If you have an emergency message to pass to the Internet, also have an update site for people to check: use something like live journal or Face Book so people can be sure it's not a physhing site or something. And when you find someone repeating an urban legend/mistaken report, explain politely, and non-anonymously for maximum credibility.

Comments

[lemmozine.livejournal.com]

Drat! They don't allow horses in metro Denver where I live. Has this person called the local TV stations and newspapers? A story on the TV news could produce some positive results.

[kayshapero]

Someone stating that they're a friend of a friend of the deceased just posted anonymously that everything is fine and the OP got it wrong.

[(Anonymous)]

so are there free horses or not?

[kayshapero]

not this time, but see below. BTW - one of the annoying things about LJ is that it won't let you sign in a name if you're not a member, but it's generally a good idea to sign anonymous posts.

[dawn hershberger (from livejournal.com)]

so are there horses being given away or not?.

[kayshapero]

Nope, not this time - BUT - the reason this was at all credible was that there ARE people in dire financial straits who have found themselves unable to care for livestock they could not immediately unload, and must resort to rescue societies which themselves are always in need of assistance. Worse, while I don't know if this has happened with larger animals, some pets have been flat out abandoned. So if you do want to help in any fashion, check out your local animal rescue organizations. (For any species - I could've had my weight in iguanas awhile back if I'd wanted, there were so many coming in to the reptile rescue organizations. They should put a sign in pet shops - warning - when this lizard grows up, it will be half as long as your couch... Or longer.)