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I found Medina at the local livestock auction last
Wednesday.  There are often Arabians there and I
didn't think much of her.  She was out of shape,
hairy, and had long feet.  I asked (as I always do)
the saleyard if any horses came with regisration
papers or a 'story'.  I was impressed that Medina had
papers, and I wrote down the info on the papers.  The
papers were signed by Tennesse Lane, who was the last
owner. 

I work in the afternoon and watched the auction on
line.  I saw that Medina sold to the 'kill buyer' for
.32 cents a pound, or about $300.  As usual, all but
one horse at this sale sold to the kill buyer. This is
a known fact. Medina's owner was not present during
the sale and did not offer a minimum price.  The horse
was sold only with her registration papers The other
one (a yearling) as bought by a rescue. When horses
sell without a history, without an owner, most people
won't buy them for riding horses.

I posted Medina's information on the Chronicle of the
Horse BB, where other people had watched the auction
online.  Our rescue, as well as most others, are full
and not able to house any more horses.  I mentioned if
someone on the BB wanted to buy Medina, we would help
co-ordinate.

By the next morning I had a friend in her truck with
trailer attached coming from 200 miles away to adopt
Medina directly from the feedlot, where she was spared
from the 8 AM truck.  I had phoned both the breeder
and last owner the night before.  I left a message
from the breeder but NEVER recieved a return phone
call from him.

I did reach Tennesse Lane that night.  She said she
never sold a horse at this auction and she "hoped" the
horse wouldn't wind up slaughter-bound.  I mentioned I
was interested in buying her from the feedlot. She
said she is a wonderful mare, well broke, we could
jump on her right now.  She thought the mare needed
front shoes, which she had on.  Tennesse said she was
moving and could not take the horse along. Tennesse
did NOT offer to take the horse back or help find it a
home. I asked for her financial assistance in buying
back the horse, and she was reluctant, but eventually
said "she'll see what she can do".  AS OF TODAY, 6
days later, our rescue has NOT received any funds from
the Tennesse towards the purchase of her horse from
the slaughter dealer.  Tennesse received just short of
$300 from the sale of her horse. I just sppoke with
Tennesse again this morning and she said she is
moving, needs the money and is NOT WILLING to donate
the few hundred bucks she got for Medina from the kill
buyer towards the purchase of another slaughter bound,
deserving horse. (We recently just purchased a 21 y.o.
crippled black stallion for $650)

The next morning on of our other horses got severly
injured, so much that euthanasia was an option.  I
asked people to stop leaving messages as the mare was
safe and we needed to keep the line open in regards to
the injured horse, but throughout the day I received
phone calls ans repeated messages from the same few
people.  When I had a chance to answer, I was accused
of horrible things. I tried to tell everyone only what
I knew- and that if I hadn't stepped in, Tennesse
would have taken her money and the horse would have
been shipped to slaughter.

Tennesse phoned me throughout the day and asked me to
take the horse off my website, and remove her
information.  By the end of the day she called me, and
someone I know, asking where the feedlot was so she
could go pickup her sold horse. This was nearly 24
hours after I first contacted her, and I already had a
qualified adopter picking the horse up and bringing it
to her vet, so I informed Tennesse that the horse was
already sold and not available to her.
Tennesse mentioned that she had received numerous
phone calls and now "learned her lesson" and wanted
the horse back. It seemed like she wanted to 'safe
face', but this was too late.  If our rescue had not
taken the immediate action we did and pulled the horse
off the truck and found a qualified adopter, by the
time Tennesse decided to help the horse would have
already been at the slaughter plant.

The feedlot dealer sets the price.  He asked $450, but
I talked him down to $400. The adopter paid the
feedlot dealer directly.  Despite what was posted
here, the price never went up. Our Rescue has not
received ONE DIME of contributions for this mare.  Our
cell phone alone that day used about 500-600 minutes
between the conversations and the messages- which is a
substainial amount of money.


All we care about is the horse.

Without our efforts the horse would have already been
slaughtered and been in the freezer in Europe
somewhere.  I sincerely hope that people can recognize
our efforts.

I am fustrated because of this ordeal and, since we
have used most of our cell phone minutes, we won't
able to assist with any other feedlot rescues during
the next few weeks. We also don't have any extra funds
to purchase a slaughter bound horse. It's a very
unfortunate situation.

Margaret
www.ColoradoTBrescue.org



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