More than 300 horses gambol on a 40-acre desert ranch in a remote corner of the Antelope Valley. But if it weren't for Linda Moss and her army of volunteers, the horses would have met an entirely different fate--in the slaughterhouse.
"We have a little miracle going up there," said Moss, who runs a Glendale-based group called Equus Sanctuary.
The Antelope Valley ranch--whose location is a carefully guarded secret--costs more than $30,000 a month to maintain. It may be the largest preserve of its kind in the country.
The ranch had its beginnings 10 years ago when Moss attended an auction of Arabian horses in Pomona. Moss, who loves the breed, was shocked to see meat buyers snap up 38 of the 112 animals being offered for sale.
At that time, the market for horses was glutted. Before federal tax reform in 1986, horse breeding offered myriad tax advantages to investors. Others were drawn by skyrocketing prices for top horses.
But the breeding business took a cold shower after tax reform. Although many legitimate breeders welcomed the change, others suddenly found themselves with a glut of horses, unable to find buyers. The meat dealers began gobbling them up, often turning a quick $50 profit per horse by acting as middlemen for slaughterhouses.
"It was largely very wealthy people who dumped their horses all at once," said Moss, who gave up her career as a motion picture sound editor to form Equus Sanctuary. "It was just a blood bath."
Almost 3 million horses have died at a handful of U.S. slaughterhouses over the last 15 years, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Countless others met similar fates, jammed aboard double-decker cattle trucks bound for Canada and Mexico.
"You couldn't find an inexpensive horse for the kids, or just to ride down the trail. They had all been killed," said Cathleen Doyle of the California Equine Council of Studio City. "Every horse that sold for less than $1,000 was in jeopardy."
Slaughterhouses declined to comment.
Growing concerns about horse butchery led to an initiative banning the sale of horses for slaughter. The measure was approved by California voters last fall.
Although the California law--the first of its kind in the nation--makes the sale of a horse for slaughter a felony, equine advocates say that it has not been fully effective.
