itsafluffthing

FOLLOW US ON FACEBOOK

FOLLOW US ON INSTAGRAM

HOW TO DONATE

We are a small charity and apart from our workers on the ground, we are only three admins to run the Facebook-page, website and reply to messages and emails. We don’t receive any grants and fundraising is done whenever we have time for it. The only reason we are able to operate is due to the financial help we get from our supporters, which pays for rent, feed, medication, salaries for the workers, vet fees, farrier… among many other costs that come with sick animals.

If you would like to make a donation, please use any of the Donate-buttons. The best way is to use Total Giving, which gives UK donors to opportunity to choose Gift Aid, and you are also able to make your donation monthly, quarterly or yearly. Due to changes made by Paypal we are no longer able to send personal thank you-messages to Paypal donors, but please know that we are still very grateful!

Total Giving

Bank transfer

Paypal

Welcome to Prince Fluffy Kareem!

PFK is a small, action-oriented group of people working to help horses, donkeys and camels by the pyramids in Cairo, Egypt.

The "pyramid horses" and camels are being used to take tourists and local Egyptians on rides around the pyramids and the surrounding desert. Horses and donkeys are also used as transport for locals and to pull carts selling various produce. Stables here are small and narrow and often filled with sand, so donkeys are used for both cleaning out manure and to bring clean sand inside.

Many of the pyramid horses are in poor condition, usually caused by a combination of reasons. The uprising in 2011 caused a dramatic drop in tourism, and thus affected the income of local horse owners. But the revolution in 2011 and then the contra-revolution in 2013 are only parts of a large, complex puzzle.

Most of the owners we work with survive on low incomes and many are illiterate. In addition to caring for their own family they often support other relatives as well. Many have dropped out of school early to work for their family – there are lots of children selling souvenirs at the pyramids and many children work with horses as well. Like people, most horses start working at an early age. They are working animals, not pets.

The low-income owners can only afford to buy the cheapest horses. These are horses that are underweight, injured and/or sick. It’s not uncommon for sellers to give the horse a good dose of bute so that the buyer will think it’s reasonably sound. Many pay a down payment for a horse that is already in poor condition, and are then forced to work that horse to be able to pay off installments. A low income means that owners cannot afford the good, experienced vets and farriers, and although medication is sold over the counter, they can’t afford to buy it.

While there are some excellent vets in Egypt, people generally have poor knowledge of horses. Living in a desert country no one has seen horses grazing naturally, and hard feed like corn, barley and fava beans is considered the best feed. Owners that can’t afford much hard feed usually feed clover or corngrass (depending on the season), chaff and some corn. Hay is rarely sold locally. Feeding so much grain causes colic, ulcers and laminitis, but knowledge about laminitis is minimal. After nearly six years we are still struggling to make people understand that they must be careful with grain. This goes hand in hand with little awareness about healthy eating habits for humans; Egyptians consume a lot of oil and sugar and a large part of the population struggles with overweight and diabetes.

Cairo is a city of nearly 20 million people, and like people’s houses, most stables in our area are small and quite cramped. The working horses generally don’t have their own boxes, but are tied up in rows. We see a lot of leg wounds caused by ropes, or other injuries like head wounds after horses have laid down and gotten stuck. Bite wounds are also common since so many horses live in close proximity to each other.

Babesiosis, a tick-borne disease, is very common due to enormous amounts of ticks, especially in summer. Clinical signs range from fever, anorexia and lethargy to colic, haemoglobinuria and jaundice. Many horses end up in a downwards spiral of babesiosis – weight loss – anaemia and liver problems – babesiosis again – more weight loss and so on. We have treated many severely emaciated horses whose blood tests show chronic anaemia and poorly functioning livers. Even for us, with a brilliant vet, IV fluids, supplements and lots of varied feed, it can be very difficult to put weight on these horses. For an owner with barely any money it’s impossible.

Much of the treatment is considered outdated in Western countries, or it’s based on wives’ tales and superstition. Like in many other cultures, Egyptians believe that the “evil eye”, or the “eye of the envious”, can cause illness and death.

Two methods that are widely used are linefiring and strings, called the “fatla” in Arabic. Many of you will know about linefiring from the racing industry. Here in Egypt the firing is a lot cruder and often done in the wrong area, without sedation. It is done by heating up wire or a rod of iron that then burns the horse. Typical cases are horses with tendon- and joint problems, but it can also be done for other reasons. Horses with high fever can be burned on their necks, as it’s believed that this will stop the fever from “reaching the head”, particularly in tetanus cases. Horses with poor appetite or mares that don’t get pregnant can be burned on, or get strings in their bellies.

One of our rescues had an abscess in his hoof that was “treated” by burning large holes around the coronary band. Horses with skin allergies can have cuts made in their ears as it’s believed that this will get rid of the “dirty blood”.

The “fatla” is a string that is threaded through the skin over the injured area. A horse with shoulder lameness can have one or several strings through his shoulder, a horse with a pelvic fracture might have strings through various places in his hindquarters. The strings are believed to “draw out infection” but unlike surgical drains they are not used in abscesses or hematomas, they are used in places where there is no accumulated pus or fluids and therefore they have no use. But horses undergoing “string treatment” are often allowed to rest, and will therefore improve.

It is important to keep in mind that these methods are not developed to intentionally harm the horses, they are used on humans as well. One owner we work with had back problems, and had his back linefired by Bedouins. Our stable manager’s mother used to suffer from migraines and the doctor would use a razor blade to cut lots of tiny cuts into her forehead, believing – like the above-mentioned allergy example- that this would clear out “dirty blood”.

The PFK patients that are too injured to have any quality of life are humanely euthanised. These horses are usually purchased by us for market price but more and more owners let us do it without asking for money. Animals that are too injured to work, but that can live happily as pets, are usually bought by us and retired.

PFK offers all treatment free of charge, whether that is feeding a horse for two months, x-rays, wound care, farrier work or surgeries. Most important of all, we educate. We can’t change the financial situation in Egypt, but we can help the owners to better understand their animals' needs.