Six of seven missing pet donkeys recovered
Six of the seven pet donkeys that went missing on Sunday night, have been recovered.
The donkeys belong to Francois and Erica Potgieter, a couple who resides next to the N11 near Doornkop.
Mrs Potgieter said that a stallion went missing last week. The couple searched everywhere but they could not find him. On Sunday night Mrs Potgieter fed the remaining donkeys. The next morning they were missing.
The Potgieter couple feared the worst after hearing horror stories of how donkeys are skinned alive for Chinese medicine.
On Monday afternoon, Mrs Potgieter and one of her employers drove through the Doornkop settlement again. They came across a man who told them that someone named Rasta was busy chasing the donkeys back to their camp.
Also read: Couple fears the worst after seven pet donkeys disappear
When Mrs Potgieter returned home, her donkeys were on the gravel road next to her house. She says that one of the donkey stallions had several abrasions and the man that returned them told her that he suspects someone tried to use him to pull a cart.
One donkey stallion remains missing but the Potgieter couple are much more hopeful that they will manage to get him back alive than they were 24 hours ago.
• Medical Brief (www.medicalbrief.co.za) published an article about how Africa’s donkeys are being slaughtered for Chinese medicine called Ejiao.
Ejiao is manufactured when donkey skins are boiled to extract the gelatin. It is then used as a tonic in creams.
China Daily (chinadaily.com/cn) reported in 2016 that 5 000 tonnes of ejiao is produced in China annually for which they need around 4 million donkey hides. Local supply in China amounts to an estimated 1,8 million hides per year.
The Chinese news outlet reported that the number of donkeys in China has decreased due to their low fertility rate and long rearing period. This caused the price of a donkey hide to jump to 395 U.S. dollars (currently about R5 815) in that year.
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