Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, July 25, 1990 TAG: 9007250373
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B/4 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Every year for 65 years, the volunteer firefighters of Chincoteague have rounded up the wild ponies on the neighboring barrier island of Assateague and auctioned them off.
Today, the ponies will be driven across the narrow inlet that separates the islands and herded through the town's streets to a penning area. On Thursday, some of the foals will be auctioned off, with the proceeds going to the Fire Department.
Last year, the department sold 77 foals for $40,000. Some of the foals purchased are returned to the island at the request of the buyers.
The animals are thought to be the descendants of ponies that washed ashore during Colonial times from shipwrecks.
Animal-rights groups, such as the Charlottesville-based Voices for Animals and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals in Washington, D.C., say the rounding up, penning and auction are cruel, especially to young animals.
The ponies "must swim unfamiliar waters, after which they are stampeded through town, separated from their mothers and sold at auction," said Susan Weidman of Voices for Animals.
People for Ethical Treatment of Animals is upset that unweaned foals are being auctioned off. Such animals need special care if they are to survive away from their mothers, said spokeswoman Siriol Evans.
The Humane Society of the United States has been monitoring the annual event for 20 years.
Gail Eisnitz, a field investigator for the Humane Society in Washington, D.C., said conditions for the animals have improved. But in the past two years, six animals have died.
One year, animals ate choke-cherry leaves off bushes overhanging the pen, became sick from the toxic shrub and died.
As a result of six pony deaths in the past two years, the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge on Assateague threatened to revoke the Fire Department's permit to graze the animals on the refuge if the department did not provide a veterinarian for the swim, penning and auction.
Last year, the department had a veterinarian on call for the week-long celebration, which brings about 30,000 people to the tiny community. Two animals died last year.
"That was a misunderstanding and a lack of communication," said Roe Terry, a Fire Department spokesman. "We had veterinarians on call but when the horses got sick, we couldn't get ahold of them."
This year, Terry said, the Fire Department has hired a veterinarian to stay on the site full time.
The fire department works year round to help the herd, which numbers around 200. The animals are regularly checked by a veterinarian, and the auction is used to control the size of the herd.
by CNB