An eastern Iowa sales barn is part of a "horse slaughter pipeline" that sells U.S. animals to foreign processing plants in Canada and Mexico for human consumption in countries that consider the meat a delicacy, three animal welfare groups allege in a new report.

Kalona Sales Barn sells about 300 horses a month to "kill buyers," according to the report released Thursday by the Center for a Humane Economy, Animal Wellness Action and Animals’ Angels. It also alleges that the horses, often already ill or injured, are frequently mistreated along the way.

The last U.S. slaughtering facilities for horses shut down in 2007, the report said, so the animals are purchased for export mainly to Canada and Mexico, which still have such processors. From there, the meat is “destined for small and shrinking pockets of foreign markets in China, Italy, Japan, Russia” and a few other countries, it said.

Congress "has not shut down the trade with our North American neighbors, allowing this economically and culturally marginalized industry to limp along." the report said.

The Kalona Sales Barn owner didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment Thursday. The groups said its report, illustrated with numerous photographs, is based on witness accounts and team observations at feedlots and inside slaughterhouses, interviews with industry employees and veterinarians, and transport data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other agencies and authorities.

The report said the investigators found the Kalona business “accepts horses for sale that have horrific injuries, are sick or severely emaciated.”

“Most of these animals are bought by one of the kill buyers. At the sale, the slaughter prospects are kept separate from the riding/pleasure horses and are put in large pens holding close to 50 animals,” it said, noting that their investigation took place over six months, visiting the Iowa sales barn most recently in August.

“The slaughter horses are separated before entering the auction ring by a hydraulic gate, which is very heavy and noisy,” it said. “After the first horse goes through, the gate begins to close and crushes other following horses, with full force across their bodies or heads.

“Some horses appear to be extremely dazed after the gate hit them and stand stock still as other horses rush past them," the report said.

Iowa doesn't regulate export of horses

Don McDowell, a spokesman for the Iowa Department of Agriculture, said in an email the agency has regulatory authority over animals imported into Iowa, requiring that horses meet certain health requirements. But the state doesn’t regulate the export of animals from Iowa.

Despite the condition of many of the horses, they're headed for dinner tables and not for dog or cat food because pet food companies abandoned using horses in their products decades ago, said Wayne Pacelle, president of the Center for a Humane Economy.

“The good news is that foreign demand has cratered for the North American horse slaughter industry and horse slaughter has been in free fall,” Pacelle, the former Humane Society of the United States CEO, said in a statement.

Through a series of legislative and judicial actions, horse slaughter halted in the United States in 2007, the groups said. Since then, the number of horses exported for slaughtered dropped from 140,000 to about 20,000 in 2022, the report said.

And the number of U.S. horses shipped to meatpacking plants in Mexico fell 45% over two years to 16,362 in 2022. Canadian meat processing plants received 5,139 U.S. horses in 2021, 26% fewer horses than in 2020, the groups said. They said last year’s data for U.S. horse exports to Canada isn’t yet available.

Report: No enforcement to ensure horses headed for slaughter aren't mistreated

Horses slated for slaughter are mistreated across the supply chain, a "predatory network of kill buyers, dealers, intermediate feedlots, transporters and foreign-based slaughter plants," the groups' report said. It said the investigation showed people “dragging downed horses from trailers, allowing foals to freeze to death outside and withholding help and relief to horses who cannot walk with obvious significant injuries for days while in holding pens.”

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“There is no enforcement structure to ensure compliance with laws and regulations, with the intermediate players in the industry having no rules and no government oversight,” the report said. "At export, there are limited disease surveillance issues, but nothing robust or designed to protect the horses from mistreatment.”

Kalona Sales Barn isn’t the only auction house in Iowa that sells horses for slaughter, said Karla Sibert, president of the Iowa Equine Rescue & Awareness League in Cedar Rapids.

The group works with law enforcement agencies to rescue neglected or abused horses, donkeys and other equines and helps families that can no longer care for their horses, Sibert said. The horses the group rescues are cared for until they can be adopted.

The group doesn’t buy horses at auction that are headed for slaughter, given their condition, she said, adding, “I can’t sit through that.”

Sometimes the animals the group is asked to rescue must be euthanized, she said, because they’re too ill, injured or old. A veterinarian makes that call. Families may bury the horses on their farms after they’re "put down" or they can sometimes send the carcass to an area landfill, she said.

Destroying a horse is difficult, Sibert said. And families may think selling the animal is a better option.

"Some people just can't do it," she said.

Donnelle Eller covers agriculture, the environment and energy for the Register. Reach her at deller@registermedia.com or 515-284-8457. 

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Report: Horses sold at Iowa auction house for food industry mistreated