Near the Biomega blood farm, a group of 300 mares is moved by two gauchos on horseback on a stony gravel road. They are on the way to a nearby pasture. The horses’ condition is variable: some look healthy, on first glance, and have an adequate body weight, while others are extremely emaciated. The horses have neglected hooves, some with cracks, and…

From 8:15 until 10:30, more than 200 pregnant mares go through the blood extraction procedure. They are moved through the raceways and into the restraint boxes by brute force. The mares are hit with iron hooks, including on their heads, and poked in sensitive body parts. Wooden sticks are also used. Once they are inside the restraint box, the…

The blood extraction starts at 8:15 in the morning. Blood is taken for 6 to 13.5 minutes from the pregnant mares. The handling by the employees is extremely unprofessional and cruel. Different objects are used to force the horses into the restraint boxes: long wooden sticks, short pointed sticks, ropes and rubber strings. The mares are…

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…

In the late afternoon, we arrive at the estancia “San Miguel”, which is only 7 km away from the pine forest pasture. According to our information, this is where the mares are covered in spring (September). When approaching the farm, we observe two horses on a pasture, about 200 m before the entrance. One of them is lying on the ground. When the…

At noon, we drive to the pine plantation where the blood farmer keeps a part of his mares, about 40 km away from the blood farm. We do not see any horses, but the pasture is very large and we only inspect about one-tenth of the pine plantation. We find many fresh horse droppings, what confirms that horses have been grazing here recently. On…

At 9:00 in the morning, we return to the blood farm to see if the group of 200 mares has arrived during the night, which is not the case, so we decide to look for them around the area. Driving from the blood farm to the stud farm, we observe a group of four horses on land which belongs to the blood farmer, according to the neighbour we talked…

At 14:00 we drive to the forest pastures where the blood farmer keeps mares according to his neighbour. Just a few kilometres before arriving at the place, three gauchos and a herd of about 200 horses cross our way. As we find out later, these are blood mares that are taken from a forest pasture to the blood farm. We follow them for a while and…