10-22-08

First on the to-do list was to get the stallion settled in.

We knew he was coming so we emptied a stall for him and made sure there were no in-heat mares next to him. It's so sad to see a stallion so lifeless. Stallions generally have more life and vigor than 10 geldings/mares put together, but this guy has been practically starved to death. We do not know what this guys future holds, but we want him to know that good humans do love horses, and that most humans will treat horses with love and compassion. We want him to experience love and a full tummy for the first time in awhile.

Next was separating all the Lucky 7 into their own pens so they can get grain and special feeds each day. A huge THANK YOU goes to our generous supporters, who looking beyond themselves, saw these horses in need and since yesterday have donated over $3,000 for their care. Thank you so much!

They are all in their own separate pens, each one happy and ready for their rehab with lots of food and goodies.

We picked up Flash today, now named Dakota. It seems that Dakota is the most popular name in the horse world this year, so her name is Dakota Flash. This horse has quite the history!

Flash was born to a PMU mare in Canada, a by-product of the hormone replacement therapy drug manufacturing process. A PMU rescue was working hard to get the foals placed, but they were unable to find her a home. If no home was found, at the age of 6 months she would have been sent to slaughter. But, over a long chain of events, someone stepped forward and paid the transporting fee and got her to safety.

Flash came to us April of 2005, she was donated into our program along with a number of other PMU yearlings.

When the PMU farm rounded up all the foals for sale they placed halters with tags on each foal. These are small foal halters. Unfortunately Flash's halter was never removed. She was a yearling wearing a foal halter when she came into our program. Her face was literally growing around her halter.

Two months after we removed her foal halter the imprint of the halter was still clearly marked on her face. Her bones and muscles looked as if they would be permanently marked by the neglected halter.

The good news is, she had a lot of growing left to do, and now you could never tell by her sweet face what a terrible past she had. Just a side note: her sire was grey, and as seen in her baby pictures she was black, grey horses generally start life off dark and get greyer as they age.

Her owners husband enlisted in the military and they are moving, so unfortunately she could not take Flash with her. With tears in her eyes her owner said "Goodbye" to Flash. Thank you for serving our country!

She also donated all of her tack.

Flash arrived back safely and she settled right in and is getting along great with the other horses here.

Brianna showed horses to potential adopters yesterday, and today they made up their mind and came to adopt Skelter. They met her yesterday and fell in love with her. They have adopted from us before and were wanting to add another horse to their family.

The adopters children were given a visual tour of what happens when you don't take care of your horses. Their eyes were open wide as they saw the skin covered bones of the Lucky 7.

Skelter did not want to get in the trailer. The adopter brought her 2 horse straight load, after we gave up on that, Skelter was not even interested in going into our large trailer. Finally we figured out which loading combination we needed and she managed to get in without hurting herself or others. We thought about backing up trailer to trailer, but it was getting dark and as Skelter's new home is only 7 miles away, Tawnee chose to just drive her over there. She got to follow the lovely 2 horse straight, empty...

Skelter arrived safely and is spending the first night in her new home in the round pen.

As you should remember Hugs, we got an update on her. We all suspected that she was pregnant while she was here. The adopters took her to the vet who confirmed that Hugs was indeed pregnant. Today she is the proud mommy of 9 puppies. They are all doing well, and they all look just like their mommy.