Warning to Florida Horse Owners

Warning to Florida Horse Owners

29 August 2016

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Stolen Horse InternationalTM/NetPosseTM  is issueing this warning to all Florida horse owners, but particularly those in the Miami-Dade, around the Tampa-St. Petersburg area, along the I-95 & I-75 corridors, Ocala, and the Lake City areas.  

We are getting reports of horses being shot and either killed outright or wounded badly enough that euthanasia has been the only option. In several cases, various means of stabbing and other torture was used. This has also resulted in the deaths of horses. 

It does not appear to matter if the horses are visible from the road or not. While drive-by type shootings are occuring, there are also reports of injury and death where the culprit had to trespass onto someone's property in order to get to the horses. In some cases, they actually entered barns and stalls. 

While there is no fail-safe way to make your barn and pasture 100% safe, there are a few things that you can do to make it less likely to happen. 

  • Keeping your horses away from the road at least makes it less likely that people will know that they are on your property. 
  • Only allow people you know well to hunt on your property and ask your neighbors to do the same. 
  • Report any suspicous persons you see IMMEDIATELY.  Sure, it might just be the neighbor's kid back from college and in new clothes, but better safe than sorry. 
  • If you can afford them, use motion activated cameras on the property. Make sure to get the ones that use infrared technology. You want the images that can be seen at night. 
  • Use motion activated flood lights-not the always on things. You want the people to turn the things ON-and if you have the motion activated cameras, too, what a bonus! You're on Candid Camera!
  • Keep guineas, geese, donkeys, pea fowl, llamas, or billy goats. These animals are territorial and can be noisy as heck to boot. They do not take kindly to strangers and will run them off the property. 
  • Have regular neighbor get togethers-when you know your neighbors and they know you-they'll look out for  you when you're not there and you do the same for them. Everybody has skin in the game. 

Please take whatever measures you feasibly can take to ensure the safety and well-being of your equine partners as well as that of any other livestock. While we can never understand why people do things like this, we can at least make it as tough as possible for them to do it. 

Remember, too, that we have Criminal Attack reports available to assist in finding the culprits and bringing them before a judge to answer for their crimes. These people do not operate in a vaccuum. They will talk to people to brag on their actions. What's worse-they will strike again and again. And they will-eventually-move up to doing this to people. That makes it imperative that somebody stops them. 

The FBI has even started a database to track these people-that's how important this is. Help us help you find and bring these people to justice. Criminal Attack reports are free. 

Stolen Horse International provides news and other resources for free on this website. As a charitable organization we survive on the kindness of people like you. Please consider donating to help fund the organization or purchasing a NetPosse ID for your horse, dog or cat to help protect your beloved animals!
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Debi Metcalfe

Founder | debi@netposse.com

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