(4th December 2012)

After the appeals circulated in the last weeks, according to which the “little horses of Giara” were dying of starvation and thirst, we wanted to clarify and tell you how things really are.

The emergency was unfortunately real but, as it often happens in the modern digital era, the keyboards’ tam-tam has generated a lot of confusion. Many news have circulated on the net: from petitions to the monitoring of the situation with special envoys, to the birth of rescue groups (virtual, of course). Everything is good when there is an uproar and maybe it is a way to get some visibility.

We have written several times to the addresses from where the first appeals from Sardinia had been launched, offering our availability to participate if someone was coordinating the aids, but we never got an answer.

In all this sea of updates, photos and comments on the web, only a few understood what is the real situation of the Giara Horses and how, in reality, this is not a single emergency due to drought and lack of food, but a far complex matter.

Thus we tried to clarify the situation by talking with the mayor of Gesturi Gianluca Sedda and with our volunteer Marzia Trudu, who lives nearby the Giara plateau and knows well its geography and history.

Marzia, who went on place carrying some hay, collected for us the stories of some inhabitants and workers of the Mountain Community and Cooperativa Sa Jara Manna, which manages the Giara archaeological area.

She tells us that “the Giara Horse is a breed that nowadays lives exclusively on the homonymous plateau in Sardinia. There is a lot of uncertainty about its origins, as some scholars set it around V-VI BC, while for others it dates back to 6.000 BC. There is uncertainty even on the actual number of horses: from the 100 individuals mentioned on Wikipedia page (700 in its English version!), to the about 400 estimated by the local inhabitants. It is known some are public heritage while others are privately owned...the latter can be recognized as they are often branded.

One of the few certain facts is that, despite it is considered a breed in need of protection because is threatened with extinction, the Sardinia Region didn’t find necessary to include it in the list of the protected species. (attachment 1, Regional law L.R. 29 July 1998, n.23).”

The more recent history tells that for decades these horses, free and wild, have been subjected to single captures by local shepherds or true raids by traders, as told by this RAI documentary filmed many years ago (Warning: some scenes at minute 5:00 and in the last 3 minutes of the documentary could hurt your sensibility).

We thus asked Gianluca Sedda, mayor of Gesturi, to tell us about the current situation of the horses. “Up to the early 2000’s, the little horses were considered all privately owned, even in the complete absence of a register and documentation. Later on they were acquired almost in their totality by public heritage; more precisely they were purchased by the Mountain Community. This was disbanded in 2008…and the little horses were “inherited” by the townships of Gesturi, Tuili and Setzu, which don’t have enough funds to maintain the animals and can no longer access to the “mountain funds” (up to 150.000 euros per year), vanished along the Mountain Community. All of this in the continuous absence of a register for the little horses, the uncertainty about their numbers, and the fate of many animals that end in the hands of private owners.”

Let’s try to sum up: in theory the Giara little horses should be supported by the townships of Gesturi, Tuili and Setzu and should live free and wild. In reality, however, at least according to some press news (such this one on La Nuova Sardegna), a part of them is managed by the Region through AGRIS, which it is defined as: “the Region Sardinia’s agency for the scientific research, experimentation and technological innovation in agricultural, agri-industrial and forest sectors”.

We wonder if it is part of their tasks to “produce” and give in free “loan for use” the Giara horses, as written in a 2010 note (LINK).

Lastly, another consistent part of the horses were captured along the years by private citizens or breeders, which manage them in a personal way: they let the animals roam free on the plateau until they decide to take the horses to sell them or to send them to slaughter.

At our question about how it is possible to talk about protection and safeguard in such a scenario, mayor Sedda answers that he has been making proposals for a while, but that most of them were not listened to. “First of all the Giara little horse should be included among the protected species. A specific fund from the Region should then allow a mapping and the creation of a register, separating (and identifying according to the laws) the privately owned animals. From that moment on, the population should constantly monitored and controlled, avoiding interferences from private citizens and breeders, and resorting to contraception to limit the number of individuals should their numbers grow too much.”

As Italian Horse Protection we cannot but endorse and support these proposals, offering our availability to support them, also considering the high scientific value these horses would have in the moment their freedom and remoteness from human manipulation was guaranteed.

However, speaking of money and interest from the institutions for the animal protection, we point out a recent deliberation of the provincial council of Sanluri (30th May 2012), about the “Approval of the Project of custody, maintenance, enhancement of the Giara archaeological and naturalistic areas—Year 2012.” In this deliberation it is stated how it has been approved the project proposed by the Società Cooperativa Sa Jara Manna (which, what a coincidence, in the various appeals was listed as the authority caring for the Giara Horses) for a total cost of € 688.510,93 of regional funds.
For what activities? Ordinary maintenance and cleaning of the archaeological areas; ordinary maintenance of the road system and various paths; management of the admittances in the Giara Plateau; management and maintenance of the settlements pertaining to the rural/pastoral archaeology; activities of control of the archaeological areas and of other interesting places of the Giara.

And the horses? Is it possible that not even a part of this huge funding can be destined to a project to put order in the current chaos and safeguard the horses from evil-minded people and spare them from the terrible scenes we saw in the last weeks?

We wait for future developments, and promise to return soon on this matter: even as we publish this article, there is an ongoing meeting about this theme held by the Region Sardinia.


PHOTOS BY MARZIA TRUDU












PHOTOS BY MARZIA TRUDU