Li'l Ponies Raised for Food Slaughter Now Getting Killed by Cars

Dartmoor National Park in southwestern England is home to the Dartmoor pony—a cute, fluffy-looking breed with short legs and broad faces. Sadly, these sweet li’l horsies are at risk thanks to an increase in motor vehicle accidents and, well, other things…

Reporting on a new initiative to paint the Dartmoor ponies with a stripe of glow-in-the-dark paint to make them more visible to drivers at night, CityLab’s Aarian Marshall reports:

Dartmoor ponies have lived in the southern Devon area for at least 3,500 years, but today their numbers are dwindling. That’s partly due to plummeting demand for horse meat, but motor vehicles are certainly no help. According to Karla Mckechnie, Dartmoor’s livestock protection officer, free-grazing ponies have been hurt in 74 road accidents this year. For the ponies, Mckechnie notes in an email, these accidents “are usually fatal.”

Plummeting demand for horse meat? What does Dartmoor National Park think it is? A 2013 Ikea restaurant?

I looked up Dartmoor pony meat and it looks fine. If you want to read an argument for eating pony (why not!), you can do so here. If you want to drive recklessly through Dartmoor National Park (setting of Hound of the Baskervilles!), please be careful.

In for a penny, in for a pound… of pony meat unethically farmed with the bumper of your car.