Thoughts?
I’m personally in favor of keeping horses officially designated as livestock rather than pets. I think an official “pet” designation could be a step down a slippery slope for horse sports and working horses. That said, my horse is absolutely my pet.
(Please keep the discussion focused on horses, not politics!)
My horse is my pet. But. As someone who has to deal with federal regulations in agricultural issues as a town commissioner…thank you god. I work with horses in agricultural/forestry activities, they are livestock, they are not pets. Ag. regs are so much more flexible and so much more ‘tuneable’ to specific problems/issues than any other regs out there.
I’m onboard with horses being livestock. Reclassifying them as ‘pets’ IMO is a slippery slope best to avoid.
How I feel (well, felt) about my personal horses was somewhere between livestock and pet and child :o ) but from a legal perspective… livestock.
I agree! Keep them livestock! Keep PETA a little less involved :lol:
They’ve got to stay livestock. It’s impractical for them to be pets as much as I love my horses. Many people love their cows, goats, and pigs just as much.
This is very accurate. Those PETA terrorists won’t be able to include horses in their ridiculous anti-captive pet agenda is they are classified as livestock.
I guess I’ll be the only dissenter here and say that I am NOT in favor of keeping them classified as livestock. I suppose the reason is that I work with rescue horses. We can seize abused and neglected horses when law enforcement calls us in for assistance. The problem is since they are classified as livestock and not pets, there is no legal way we can prevent the same person from going out and getting another horse the very next day. If someone has a history of abusing or neglecting pets, legally that person can be prohibited from owning another pet for a certain period of time. But with livestock? There is no such provision. So we can seize a neglected or abused horse under court order. And literally, the very next day, that person can legally get another horse. And there isn’t anything we can do to stop them.
In my jurisdiction horses are livestock and if someone is criminally charged with neglect, part of that punishment can be a ban on keeping horses in future.
You should lobby for a change to the rules on livestock in your jurisdiction, not to reclassify horses as pets.
I can see why you would feel that way with your experiences but we cannot let a few uncaring abusive idiots be the reason that horses get reclassified as pets. That would be a big ugly can of worms to open. Maybe a few laws that would punish the offenders would be better than punishing the rest of horse owners. Most people take good care of their livestock. We shouldn’t let the few that don’t direct our animal classifications for the rest of us.
Cl Moonriver…wouldn’t it be better to change the law so that abuse of livestock carried the appropriate penalties?
One of the worst things that has happened to the Connecticut horse industry, is that horses are now in a grey area. By and large they are still livestock. BUT, horse operations are not classified as agricultural land use unless a profit can be shown. Which seems reasonable enough, until one looks at how property is taxed in CT. (If in PA490, which only applies to parcels over 10 acres) If I have pasture and run a few cows, my property tax is assessed at the ag rates. Even if the cows are pets. If I have a horse, my property tax is assessed at the residential rate. If my hay field is producing hay for my horses…it is residential. If it is producing hay for cows…it is ag. Unless, I can sell the majority of the my hay and only keep some for my horses. The difference is thousands of dollars a year.
If horses ever get completely reclassed as pets, that sort of tax issue will get worse as it will start to impact not just backyard owners but all aspects of the industry. The horse industry will be literally taxed out of existence, not the horses, but the land.
Here is first google hit on this:
https://www.thesprucepets.com/are-ho…nimals-1887318
Designating horses as pets won’t keep abusers from abusing.
Here if any animal, pet or livestock is abused, we call the sheriff.
Then the judge decides where to go with the case.
Some times that will be that they can’t own animals, no matter if pets or livestock.
I could see this having an impact on transport issues
Agreed
very similar to Texas, maybe with an exception as feed is not taxed here, even feed specific to horses. Dog and cat food is taxed.
The odd thing here (at least in the city) my pastures are considered the same as a single building lot as the property is plotted as a single family lot… just multiple acreage… it is valued by the appraisal board at the same as a 5,000 sq/ft lot
Well said. Otherwise, we wind up facing the same sort of mindless regulations that some pharmaceutical/chemical purchases do because of meth manufacturers.
Animal abuse laws are state laws. This is a federal law. One doesn’t really impact the other in most cases.
The linked article said the Farm Bill wanted to define horses as pets for purposes of including them in the PAWS Act. This act would, in part, fund shelters for the pets of victims of domestic violence situations, since many abusers torture or kill their victim’s pets as part of their campaign of terror.
In SC, legislation was proposed that would include pets in Orders of Protection. As of now, in our state a victim might not legally be able to take her animal with her to escape a domestic abuse situation if the pet were marital property. It didn’t pass - I was disappointed to hear one of our family court judges speak of the bill in very disparaging terms. But again, federal legislation on this issue has nothing to do with states, except to “encourage” these kinds of laws at the state level.
That works too. To change the livestock laws. That would address my frustration over horses not having the same protections against abuse and neglect that say, a dog does.
and that is my thought also… back when the government was attempting to mandate reporting of movement of horses this was countered by those us who did not want the recording keeping (and potential $10,000 fine per incident) that our horses were Pets not livestock, not suitable for human consumption.
They have always been categorized as Livestock. Your title makes it sound like this is a big change. Hopefully, Congress has many more important things to consider than this.
I didn’t mean to imply that it was some sort of major change. I’ve seen it shared multiple places on social media, generally accompanied by a lot of righteous outrage that horses aren’t considered strictly companion animals. I personally think it’s important to make a distinction that horses aren’t purely pets, but I was just curious where other people on COTH (who presumably love horses, but are also likely to be involved in horse sports in some way) stood on the issue, that’s all.
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