Bay 12 Games Forum

isn't cardinal arc the one we're currently on?

Short checklist (probably complete) on how to dump an item:

1) Make sure your dwarves are not set to ignore refuse (Orders menu (o))
2) If the thing to be dumped is outside make sure dwarves aren't told to ignore refuse outside
3) Make sure that said item is not placed in a zone marked as garbage dump
4) Make sure dwarves are not prevented from doing their duty because of burrows
5) Make sure there's a path for a dwarf with hauling enabled from the item to the zone marked as garbage dump (to check that, try to build walls and see if you can use some items from where dwarves linger, wood or bars, on both ends - garbage and item)
6) Mark the item for dumping, make sure the item is not forbidden
7) Check if item has no owner (ok, stones, i know, but I'm building full list here)
Make sure item is not an artifact (ok, it's getting ridiculous here, I'll stop )

Now, this will get you move the item to dump.

As for the corpses - are you hoping for dwarves to store horse that dropped dead in refuse stockpile? Shouldn't you be using corpse stockpile? (or enable corpses in your refuse stockpile) Got me once, took a sec before I figured out that one.

If all that fails, upload save and let us solve this mystery for you..

Not a direct solution, but can you pasture the horses somewhere? Grazers (horses, cows, sheep, yaks, etc) need to be assigned to a pasture that has grass in it. Pastures can be set through the i menu.

That won't solve the horse-corpses problem, but may help prevent more.  At the very least, you can pasture them outside and then when they die there won't be miasma.

About the corpses - have you designated them for dumping? Items won't be taken to the garbage dump until they are designed for dumping.   The refuse stockpile should be automatic, though.

Also, how many idlers do you have?  No idlers means that no one is free to pick up the corpses.  If you've done any mass dumping recently, this is probably the cause.

There might be a lot of jobs ahead of the horse-cleanup jobs in the jobs queue. You can check the job queue through the Jobs menu (it's a main menu, press j when not in any other menus). 

To avoid madness and tantrums, try de-zoning the dining room and designating it as a low-traffic area.  You'll need to reset it when the corpses are gone, but this might help.