Iconic ponies may have been sold for burger meat

7:02am Thursday 17th January 2013 in News Photograph of the Author By Patrick Knox, Senior Reporter

Are we eating New Forest pony in our burgers? Are we eating New Forest pony in our burgers?

THEY are the iconic symbols that attract thousands of tourists to Hampshire.

Ponies have been roaming the New Forest for 2,000 years, delighting visitors by wandering through the area’s villages.

Yet experts have today warned that the popular animals could end up on the plates of unsuspecting diners.

At least 200 pure-breed New Forest ponies were up for auction last year at Beaulieu Road Sales, with many destined for abattoirs because the “bottom has fallen out of the market”.

As it was revealed that scientific tests found horse meat within burgers sold by supermarkets such as Tesco, Lidl and Aldi, New Forest Verderer Colin Draper told the Daily Echo that unwanted ponies were being snapped up by English abattoirs for as little as £10.

They then sell them on to the French – where the rogue burger meat is believed to have originated.

He said: “It may well be that people are eating New Forest ponies.

“It is not something we promote.

It is a last resort but there are definitely a few that get taken to the slaughterhouse.

“The bottom has fallen out of the market since the economic slump because keeping them is an expensive hobby.”

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Strict rules Mr Draper said strict live animal export rules meant horses were now taken to two British abattoirs, in Cheshire and Bristol.

Dionis McNair, a Verderer and a member of the New Forest Pony Breeders and Cattle Society, blamed the oversupply on over-breeding and changing fashion in horses.

She said: “It is a very worrying situation. We would all like the ponies to be used as riding ponies.”

To alleviate the problem, the Verderers, who represent the interests of animal owners in the Forest, have reduced the number of stallions from 40 to ten in the past four years in a bid to reduce the surplus.

Lee Hackett, from the British Horse Society, said the ponies may be attractive to abattoirs because they have less medicine in them then more domesticated horses.

He said: “It means they are more likely to legally enter the food chain. I think the problem is that there are too many horses and there are not enough nice homes for them. Supply has outstripped demand.”

Horse meat accounted for about 29 per cent of the meat content in one burger sample from Tesco, according to the study carried out by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI).

Professor Alan Reilly, chief executive of the FSAI, said there was no health risk but also no reasonable explanation for horse meat to be found.

Tesco, Lidl and Aldi have told food safety chiefs they have removed all implicated products from their shelves.

Comments(31)

10 Minute Man says...
7:18am Thu 17 Jan 13

Eat local, eat organic.

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nedscrumpo says...
7:20am Thu 17 Jan 13

10 Minute Man wrote:
Eat local, eat organic.
I don't know about the bottom falling out of the market. I ate organic and the market fell out of my bottom!

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Lockssmart says...
8:02am Thu 17 Jan 13

Hay! This is the last straw

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Linesman says...
8:09am Thu 17 Jan 13

In Europe a lot of horse meat is consumed.

As we are members of the EU and import food products from Europe, should we be surprised if it includes meat from our own New Forest ponies?

It's called, 'getting our own back'.

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Ozmosis says...
8:20am Thu 17 Jan 13

At least the meat isn't going to waste...

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Outside of the Box says...
8:33am Thu 17 Jan 13

Apparently a new range of meatballs is being sold by supermarkets nationwide, report say they like the dogs b*****

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Sovietobserver says...
8:51am Thu 17 Jan 13

Low on fat. High on Shergar.

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derek james says...
8:57am Thu 17 Jan 13

hamburgers is an anagram of "shergar bum"

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Sovietobserver says...
9:03am Thu 17 Jan 13

Traces of zebra have now been discovered in Tesco barcodes.

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massimoosti says...
9:07am Thu 17 Jan 13

The low cost supermarkets are at fault as they asked the suppliers if they could make their burgers faster.

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business-guru says...
9:10am Thu 17 Jan 13

Lets not let facts get in the way of sensationalist headlines... horsemeat does not keep like beef. It has a much shorter shelf life and hence is never intentionally mixed with beef for packaged burgers. It is mixed fresh for burgers sold fresh in Europe but is not suitable for frozen burgers. So the fact that the horse meat is in those burgers shows that there has been an illegal or accident contamination. Finally is anyone saw what actually goes into pure "beef" burgers, there probably would never eat a burger again. The french eat mostly steak hache and not burgers, much healthier and nicer....

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ShellyBaldwin says...
9:13am Thu 17 Jan 13

What next? My Lidl Pony?

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Sovietobserver says...
9:15am Thu 17 Jan 13

Glad I did not get gelded by it.
Did it give anyone the trots ?

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Torchie1 says...
11:47am Thu 17 Jan 13

"Ponies have been roaming the New Forest for 2,000 years, delighting visitors by wandering through the area’s villages. "

That would be difficult as the New Forest was only established in 1079 !

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southy says...
11:56am Thu 17 Jan 13

Ponies have been roaming the New Forest for 2,000 years, delighting visitors by wandering through the area’s villages

Nearly 2,000 years, New forest ponys was interduce to the forest around mid medieval times, a Mountain and Moorland cross breed and is now a registered breed.
The originals ponies in this area was the Asturcon and Pottok ponies, a shared ancestry with Mountains and the Moor pony, The Asturcon and Pottok breeds was removed from the area by William I, when he turned this area into a Kings Deer Hunting ground

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southy says...
12:05pm Thu 17 Jan 13

massimoosti wrote:
The low cost supermarkets are at fault as they asked the suppliers if they could make their burgers faster.
Corporations Supermarkets like Tescos totally control there meat, they buy the animal at market or off the farmer, and contract a abattoir to kill, cut up and pack the meat, and put very tight conditions on the abattoir and have regular inpections. Romfords is one such abattoir.

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freefinker says...
12:27pm Thu 17 Jan 13

southy wrote:
massimoosti wrote:
The low cost supermarkets are at fault as they asked the suppliers if they could make their burgers faster.
Corporations Supermarkets like Tescos totally control there meat, they buy the animal at market or off the farmer, and contract a abattoir to kill, cut up and pack the meat, and put very tight conditions on the abattoir and have regular inpections. Romfords is one such abattoir.
.. well, this very incident with horse meat ending up in beef-burgers, totally disproves your little spiel, doesn't it?

Or are you saying Tesco knowingly did it?

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espanuel says...
12:39pm Thu 17 Jan 13

I ate a Tesco burger but I'm stable now.

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Sovietobserver says...
12:42pm Thu 17 Jan 13

To beef, or not to beef, that is the equestrian.

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Sovietobserver says...
12:46pm Thu 17 Jan 13

espanuel wrote:
I ate a Tesco burger but I'm stable now.
Is that the trHoof ?

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Sovietobserver says...
12:50pm Thu 17 Jan 13

I wonder if doner kebabs contain horse meat. Or is it just elephants.

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Sovietobserver says...
12:53pm Thu 17 Jan 13

I've just checked the burgers in my fridge.........and..
....."THEYR'E OFF ! "...

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rickey says...
1:21pm Thu 17 Jan 13

The only worrying thing about this whole story is that nobody knows how the horse meat got into the burgers.
If anybody is upset over the possible eating of these 'popular' animals then I suggest that they tune into lamb watch and remember those cute little lambs as they tuck into their Sunday dinner. Think about the poor old piggie, he is just food on legs and it appears that he also appears in Beefburgers.

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southy says...
1:30pm Thu 17 Jan 13

freefinker wrote:
southy wrote:
massimoosti wrote:
The low cost supermarkets are at fault as they asked the suppliers if they could make their burgers faster.
Corporations Supermarkets like Tescos totally control there meat, they buy the animal at market or off the farmer, and contract a abattoir to kill, cut up and pack the meat, and put very tight conditions on the abattoir and have regular inpections. Romfords is one such abattoir.
.. well, this very incident with horse meat ending up in beef-burgers, totally disproves your little spiel, doesn't it?

Or are you saying Tesco knowingly did it?
They very well could off known about it, making the product cheaper so bigger proffits are made, One of the things firms like Tesco enforce is when killing and cutting and packing of one kind of animal like say cow to lambs the whole abattoir is cleaned before starting the killing again and meat of one animal do not mix up with another, mixing of meats of more than one kind of animal is done after all killings and packing have been done, and again very tight conditions apply

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ohec says...
1:36pm Thu 17 Jan 13

If we didn't have these silly sentimental feelings for horses it wouldn't be a problem, we quite happily eat anything else from a rabbit to a cow yet we object to eating horse meat, if people were aware of the contents of half the food they eat they wouldn't want to eat it again, its another case of ignorance is bliss.

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southy says...
1:44pm Thu 17 Jan 13

southy wrote:
freefinker wrote:
southy wrote:
massimoosti wrote:
The low cost supermarkets are at fault as they asked the suppliers if they could make their burgers faster.
Corporations Supermarkets like Tescos totally control there meat, they buy the animal at market or off the farmer, and contract a abattoir to kill, cut up and pack the meat, and put very tight conditions on the abattoir and have regular inpections. Romfords is one such abattoir.
.. well, this very incident with horse meat ending up in beef-burgers, totally disproves your little spiel, doesn't it?

Or are you saying Tesco knowingly did it?
They very well could off known about it, making the product cheaper so bigger proffits are made, One of the things firms like Tesco enforce is when killing and cutting and packing of one kind of animal like say cow to lambs the whole abattoir is cleaned before starting the killing again and meat of one animal do not mix up with another, mixing of meats of more than one kind of animal is done after all killings and packing have been done, and again very tight conditions apply
What I think as happened here is that a Tesco storeage warehouse has slip up and sent the wrong product to the wrong place, would not be the first time that Tescos admin have slip up in this way, just that most of the time it do not matter as it normally the same product just got the wrong store name on the paperwork, this was more likely for the French market unless its a speical order for the uk

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southy says...
1:54pm Thu 17 Jan 13

ohec wrote:
If we didn't have these silly sentimental feelings for horses it wouldn't be a problem, we quite happily eat anything else from a rabbit to a cow yet we object to eating horse meat, if people were aware of the contents of half the food they eat they wouldn't want to eat it again, its another case of ignorance is bliss.
Go back about 50 years and horse meat was often on the table

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Sovietobserver says...
2:25pm Thu 17 Jan 13

I bet the supermarket consumer relations departments are having a mare day.

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Sovietobserver says...
2:36pm Thu 17 Jan 13

"Chiswick !", "Fresh horses !! ".......
Richard IV, your prayers have now been answered.

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huckit P says...
4:49pm Thu 17 Jan 13

Not really a huge problem. Horse meat was regularly consumed in the UK during times of rationing, and I suspect at other times as well. The real problem is the general public never really knows what is in their food unless they grow it and harvest (or kill) it themselves. Even whole chickens or pieces of steak have usually be contaminated with preservative and water (for weight).
Either accept it or get yourself an allotment.

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Fatty x Ford Worker says...
7:52pm Thu 17 Jan 13

Neigh, Neigh, Hee Haw whats going on then!`

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