THE EASIEST OF KEEPERS
Donkeys are part of the Equidae order that originated in the rocky, dry climes of Northern Africa. They are descended from the African wild ass, which is thought to have been domesticated about 5,000 years ago. Like their ancient counterparts, modern donkeys are both feral prey and beasts of burden. “There are donkeys in every country in the world taking on the role of mechanized equipment. They’re the most important draft animal in the world,” says Massachusetts veterinarian Stephen Purdy, DVM, author of Donkeys: Miniature, Standard, and Mammoth: A Veterinary Guide for Owners and Breeders.
In Greece, donkeys provide taxi service for tourists, despite the protests of animal-rights groups who consider the practice abusive. In some countries, they are eaten---barbecued donkey is considered a delicacy in Kenya, and Walmarts in China recently had to recall packages of its Five Spice donkey meat after they were found to contain traces of fox.
To most Americans, however, the thought of eating donkeys is abhorrent. In the United States, donkeys rarely work; the need for pack animals ended with the automobile, and they are no longer used to carry supplies into mines. It’s mules, not donkeys, who carry tourists around the Grand Canyon. The most controversial work donkeys are asked to perform in the United States is to participate in fundraising basketball games. Mostly, they are pets, companions and props in church Nativity pageants. They are doted upon like dogs, and, like dogs, their
numbers are increasing. Many people in the United States ride and compete with donkeys in equine or donkey- and mule-only events. Donkeys are also driven for pleasure.
The most recent Census of Agriculture from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, conducted in 2012, counted 292,590 mules, donkeys and burros at for-profit farms and ranches, a 8,782 increase since 2007. That figure does not include donkeys like Odie, who are at boarding stables or in backyards, only those at farms or ranches that sell animals.
Elizabeth Moore, a donkey enthusiast in New Mexico who runs a website called Eeebray.com, says there are an estimated 50 million donkeys in the world, but fewer than 500,000 in the United States, even as interest in them has increased.
“Donkeys are much
more efficient at converting their food [than horses], and so most of them never need any grain,” says Stephen Purdy, DVM.
The first donkeys to populate North America are believed to have come with Christopher Columbus; six were on a Spanish supply ship that accompanied the explorer on his second excursion here. Some 300 years later, George Washington would unwittingly start a new breed, the American Mammoth Jackstock, when he bred large jacks that had been gifts from the King of Spain and his French comrade, the Marquis de Lafayette, wrote Anita Gallion in her book, Small-Scale Donkey Keeping.
Donkeys proliferated in early America for many of the same reasons they do now: They are calm, stoic workers that, compared to horses, cost little to feed.
In fact, these days people tend to overfeed donkeys, says Purdy, who is also director of the North American Camelid Studies Program and has nine donkeys of his own. “Donkeys are much more efficient at converting their food [than horses], and so most of them never need any grain. They need to eat way less food.” “I have people calling me and saying they want a donkey and
they have 27 acres of great pasture, and I have to tell them, that’s not what they need,” says Ann Firestone, a former veterinary technician who heads the Save Your Ass Long Ear Rescue (www.saveyourassrescue.org) in New Hampshire. “These animals have evolved from desert-dwelling creatures that got by on minimal forage of poor quality. As a rule, they eat a lot less than a horse. They look at grass, and they blow up.”
And like horses, donkeys who eat too rich a diet are at risk for laminitis and founder. “Donkeys were made to eat sticks, basically, and we give them all this beautiful hay, and before you know it, they founder,” Moore says. “It goes to their feet really fast.”