We arrive at the slaughterhouse General Pico at noon. The temperature is 30°C. No horses can be seen from outside, as there is a tall fence with visual cover all along the road blocking the view. We climb a nearby tree in order to get a view onto the premises. We immediately realize that there is insufficient weather protection for the horses. Only…

We return to the Lamar slaughterhouse at 14:00. It is again a hot and sunny day with a temperature of 29°C and the large majority of the horses are standing under the blazing sun. The pen area which is partly covered by a fabric roof is full to the bursting point, with only a few horses finding space in the shade.

Today there are about 100 horses…

When we return to the Lamar slaughterhouse at 12:00, the temperature has climbed up to 30°C. Today is the first time that a sufficient amount of feed is available. There are two straw bales in each of the large paddocks. However, weak and submissive horses are chased away by dominant ones and remain hungry. The straw should have been distributed in…

When we arrive at the Lamar slaughterhouse at 17:00, an employee is busy hosing down horses with water in the lairage area. It is a different employee than the one we observed last time and he sprays the horses even more on the head and in the face than the other employee. The horses are very nervous, some look frightened. There is a lot of…

When we arrive at the slaughterhouse Entre Rios at 7:50, the holding pens in the lairage area and the large paddocks in the back of the plant are empty. During our visit last year, we saw some dilapidated shelters with partially ripped fabric-roofs in the paddocks. These run-down shelters are all gone and the large paddocks offer no more weather…

When we arrive at the Lamar slaughterhouse at 9:30, we immediately realize that most horses have been slaughtered during the night or in the early morning. Slaughtering is still going on. Employees are observed moving horses from the pens in the lairage area to the entrance of the stunning chute. They hit the horses on their head in order to force…

We arrive at the slaughterhouse Lamar in the early afternoon. It is a very hot day with temperatures climbing up to 30°C. We are surprised to see that the large paddocks behind the buildings, which were empty and completely overgrown with plants on our last visit in April 2015, are now full of horses. There are approximately 300 horses. Like in the…

A camera installed inside the lairage area of Syntex has recorded five hours of the blood drawing process, from 8:00 to 13:00. The video footage shows that the blood is taken from the mares during 10 minutes. Approx. 8 to 10 litres of blood can be taken in 10 minutes. When the extraction is finished, the workers pull out the drain tube forcefully…

When we arrive at the Syntex farm at 21:30, it is already pitch-black. There are a lot of lights on, but all is quiet. The lairage area, where the blood is taken from the mares, is empty. There are approx. 14 individual stalls made of wood and alleys leading up to them. In the covered passageway between the stalls and the office/laboratory…