A busy day! The team on the Bulgarian side of the border documents nine transports today. The morning starts with young heifers being transported from Romania. According to the drivers, the animals rested in the nearby control post, and indeed they look okay, but their number is worrying: over 80 on each truck! We are relieved to see that the…

Today we document three sheep transports crossing the border in the early afternoon. The heat is severe and the unshorn sheep from Romania suffer immensely on board of trucks. We see at least one leg trapped between the floor and the wall of the trailer. The sheep are breathing heavily, look exhausted, while overcrowding with insufficient headspace…

The team on the Bulgarian side watch the border from late morning. We see only one truck crossing during the day, others choose the night, with lower temperatures but longer waiting times to cross. Five of six trucks loaded with cattle look overcrowded, which means even greater suffering for the animals. Moreover, water troughs are dirty and full…

TSB|AWF and EonA teams are documenting the situation on the Bulgarian/Turkish border Kapitan Andreevo/Kapikule. In the night, the team on the Bulgarian side inspects nine long-distance transports of pregnant heifers waiting in a very long line-up to cross the border. The access to the border on both lanes is completely blocked by trucks. Therefore,…

During the summer, our FAS team decided to organize trainings about animal welfare for children spending their holidays at summer camps. Our farriers visited two places a few times: a rancho in Kochanow and a riding center in Srodborze. The trainings include a theoretical part in the form of a presentation, and a practical part based on everyday…

In July our farriers visited 25 farms. They trimmed hooves of 33 horses, several goats and claws of 3 cows. In most of the cases, our team was called to lame animals. In a few cases, the abscess was the reason of lameness. In one case, our farriers suspected joint injury. In the remaining cases, the lameness was caused by overgrown hooves.

The…

Today our team is inspecting the cattle market in Bodzentyn. There is much more animals than last time. We count about 600 animals. Half of them are young. We suspect it is because the subsidies were paid and farmers want to dispose of the animals. We notice one trader who wants to sell several very young calves. Some of them look very skinny, some…

In the afternoon, we drive to the estancia “La Paloma” of blood farmer Roberto Mailhos. We only see very few horses on the pastures next to the access road, where we saw more than 200 horses on our visit last year. Close to the estancia, we observe a mare standing next to her new-born foal that is lying in the grass. Besides them, there is a very…

We meet Martin Sanchez (name changed), a veterinarian who worked on a blood farm in the early eighties. The name of the company, which does not exist anymore, was Capo SA. He first worked on their farm in Uruguay and later in Argentina. His duty was to check the condition of the horses and to treat injuries which happened when they fought. He…