The continual sound of dogs barking and an occasional worried whinny was audible in the background as Dennis French, DVM, MS, Dipl. ABVP, of Louisiana State University’s (LSU) veterinary school, gave an update on the equine evacuees at the Lamar-Dixon Expo Center in Gonzales, La. There have been a handful of equine veterinary emergencies over the past several days, but currently all of the horses, anywhere from 250 to 350–French isn’t sure–are medically stable and doing well. Space is an issue, as it was expected to be, as waves of cats and dogs are arriving by the hour, adding to the already large volume of small animals and horses at the facility.

As for the owners that have been reunited with their horses, “a lot of folks are sort of walking around here starry eyed,” he said, as a result of the emotional trauma of the past 10 days or more.

“Probably our biggest problem here is just a space issue, and we’re just trying to sort it out,” French described. “We’re sharing space with the small animal people, and they’re just overwhelmed, I would say, because hundreds of dogs are coming in. Many of our horse trailers are going down and coming back filled up with dogs rather than horses…but the horses seem to be in pretty good shape.”

“Yesterday was a very tense day,” explained French, “People were overwhelmed. When you get about 60 new head of horses in and no stalls…I’ve thrown all my organizational skills up in the air