Updated: Medicine Hat Paint Mare Going to Slaughter Monday 6/10/13 Near Shippensburg

RESCUED
Medicine Hat Paints are rare. Add one blue eye as she has and they are even rarer. This mare was sold to a Kill Buyer near Shippensburg, Pennsylvania. A Kill Buyer travels around the country looking for horses to buy and then has them transported to slaughter. Sometimes as in this case the Kill Buyer will offer the horses for sale. She is 8-9 years old, friendly and said to ride. She needs her hooves trimmed and has a few scrapes and a little sunburn. She is being sold for $495.00. There are many horses listed on this same facebook page as she is, but none of them tore at my gut the way she has.

A Medicine Hat Paint (Pinto) is a horse that is predominately white with very few spots and one in particular around the ears like a war bonnet or hat--the colors of the paint can vary. There are some that claim the horse must have paint on the chest (the war shield)--but actually the less paint the more magical. One blue eye or two is considered very lucky. There was a certain (and still is) mystique to the Medicine Hat Paint especially to certain Plains Tribes of Native American. It was thought that the Medicine Hat could render their rider invincible in battle and protect the rider from spills. The horse could also bring good luck and protect from danger--even sense danger. In some tribes only the chief or medicine man was allowed to own a Medicine Hat.





It is a national disgrace that some many horses like this mare are ending up in Kill pens waiting to be shipped off to be slaughtered for meat because it has become increasingly difficult for owners to afford horses, their upkeep and vetting. Have you ever seen one of these transport trucks on the highway? They come through Tennessee quite often. Some with no protection from the elements and the horses packed in improperly.  Such fine and regal beasties deserve the respect they so richly deserve as companion animals and God in Heaven they don't deserve to be packed off  and slaughtered for meat as if that is the only thin left for them.