09-23-08

We did it! All the needed funds have been raised for the hay barn, we will be ordering it tomorrow! This was a hard fundraiser to pull off, but thanks to your generosity it will be on its way. Now we need to get the tractors lined up, get the barn delivered and find some strong volunteers to help raise it on up! Thank you so very much, words cannot appreciate how awed and inspired we are by each and every ones generosity.

A sad note about Indus. Indus has been valiantly fighting strangles, and has been in quarantine ever since she contracted strangles, but she gave up the fight and had no will to live. We loaded her into our trailer on a stretcher and rushed her to the vet this morning as quickly as we could, but upon examination there was nothing that could be done, so she was humanely euthanized. She passed on extremely peacefully and is now forever free from pain and fear. We love you Indus, we are so sorry that we could not adopt you into your waiting home. Strangles is a really terrible disease, we strongly recommend talking to your vet about protecting your beloved horse from strangles. Strangles is rarely a life threatening disease but unfortunately at times it does take a precious life.

After Indus was taken to the vet this morning life got a lot happier. Patches, the 27th horse we rescued way back in August of 2004, came back today. Her adopters some time after receiving ownership, were leaving the country so they transferred ownership to another family. Due to the hard economic times they were unable to keep her, and as our doors are always open wide for horses we have adopted out, she came back today. She is a sweet 20 year old paint mare. She's in great shape other than her nose got sunburned, someone should have put on SPF-30!

Here is a photo of Patches at the livestock auction we rescued her at in 2004. It's the Cottonwood auction that no longer has a monthly horse sale.

The rest of the blog is dedicated to Brianna for working her tail off today! Thanks for all your hard work. Brianna came out and got to work mucking stalls.

After they were all clean, she took a break from working and harrowed the pastures making them extremely neat and clean, along with spreading the manure so the fly's have nowhere to lay their eggs. We can't wait, fly season is almost over!

Finally we were all able to take a break from all the work as some people wanted to visit the rescue. They flew in to Sacramento today and headed out to the rescue. In addition to visiting all the horses they got to see Dottie and Macho Man run around. Yes, Dottie and Macho Man are getting to enjoy each others company. Now they probably can't imagine life without each other. It was a great visit and after walking around we all sat down under the shade maker to do some visiting. There were a few words exchanged about the hay barn when...

... to our utter shock, amazement and disbelief $10,000 cash was on our picnic table. Good thing we got the picnic table! Yes, to our greatest excitement, the hay barn will be ordered. This is the largest cash donation ever made to Norcal at one time, we cannot thank Anonymous donors for their generosity. The additional funds are to be used wherever needed most.

We said goodbye and got to work on the afternoon project: concreting the horse stock, making a nice solid footing for giving baths, vaccines, wormings, etc. Foreman Macho Man lived up to his name and made sure the job was being done right.

Tawnee and Brianna, along with some supervision from Jason, mixed up the concrete and poured...

... and leveled and decorated the pad. Brianna enjoyed it all, we think, and is looking forward to her next volunteer visit.

Finally just before nightfall the pad was done! It looks great and will be extremely useful.

Ann Marie came out and make good progress with Sierra. She got a rope around her for first time today and Sierra got her first leading lesson. She gives to pressure really nicely.

This was Sierra when she was first rescued August 10th. This was her auction photo. She is gaining a lot of weight and is a lot happier looking.

What a day, it was the kind of day that takes your breath away in sorrow and then gives it back with an unexpected large donation!