All the Creatures at Today.com

I am bit of a history buff and I really like doing research into times past. I was at the local public library today and checked out the Sears and Roebuck mail order catalog of 1902. I had a chance to thumb through it this evening and toward the end of the catalog they had all the old clothes fashions.

I fully expected to see coats made of mink or otter but apparently those skins are too rich for the Sears catalog. I was astounded to see a full length men’s winter coat made entirely of black curly coated DOG! Remember the 101 Dalmatian movies? I guess that the story was not far fetched after all. The Sear item said that they used only the best curly coated (poodle or curly retriever maybe?) black, matched dog hides on the market. Now it makes me wonder who would be breeding that large number of dogs to be slaughtered for their skins for a company as large as Sears was in 1902? It has now gotten my curiosity up and I’ll be searching for more facts about dog hide coats in the early 1900’s.

There is an alarming rise in horse poachers. These are not the normal horse thieves that cut a pasture fence and herd a horse into a waiting stock trailer, never to be seen again. No. these killers sneak into your barn at night and kill, skin and de-bone your beloved pet horse for the local exotic meat market. The owners find their pet horse, or should I say what is left of them, on the stall floor.

So why is this going on? Well the USA has been having an influx of people from cultures that consider the horse a delicacy and will pay up to $20 a pound for horse meat. I am certain those people don’t realize that most if not all horse meat that they are receiving is full of horse wormer, pesticides and other chemicals that horse owners feed or spray on their horses to stop flies and internal worms.  Not only is killing horses for human consumption illegal in the USA it is also unsafe to consume.

So where is this all happening? In Florida for one. The Miami News has some very graphic photos along with an article detailing what has been happening in that area. Here is a link to that article .

If you are a horse owner please take more than normal precautions against intruders. These people are looking for a fast buck and it looks like horses are “it” in areas that are high in immigrant population.