First of all we would like to thank each one of you who donated to help with the abandoned horses. We first headed down to pick them up on December 29th. We had been told that they were left behind on a piece of property where the renter had been evicted from. If we didn’t take them they would got to whoever would take them, most likely ending up in the slaughter pipeline.
When we arrived the owner of the pasture (the landlord) told us that the horses were not actually legally cleared to transfer ownership, but that they could be moved, but it would be better to wait until ownership was transferred. He informed us that ownership was going to be transferred on midnight, Jan 4th. We evaluated the horses and found evidence of neglect.
Their hooves were in terrible condition, evidently the old owner did not care about the condition of his horses.
Halters were left on the horses so long that the metal buckles were eating into this horses face.
One of the horses had a old injury that appeared to be infected and oozing puss. It was not a good situation at all! Clearly the horses should not go back to their old owner and continue living like this!
To make matters worse one of the horses that had been on the evicted property was moved onto an adjoining property, not yet evicted, and put in a horse trailer.
Animal Control had been called out due to the horses severe neglect, the owner got a vet to give the horse some pain killer and antibiotics. Then the horse was locked in the horse trailer: out of sight, out of mind. The horse does have food and water, but the whole situation is extremely disturbing.
We promised the horses we would do everything we could for them and that we would be back. We couldn’t say ANY of this on the blog as we did not want the old owner spooking and doing something to mess up their rescue, dumping them at an auction or abandoning them somewhere else.
Everyone was hoping and praying that when Wednesday would come the horses who so desperately needed help would be legally abandoned and ownership transferred to the landlord.
Wednesday morning the good news came that we could come pick them up! The rescue rigs were hooked up and they hit the road. Tawnee and Cathy were in the front rig and Jason was driving the other rig.
When they arrived the landlord began signing the surrender paperwork. Everything was going so smoothly.
The chain was cut making it so we could drive into the pasture to load the horses.
The entrance was very narrow but Jason managed to thread the truck and trailer through the tiny opening. There was almost an extra inch of space on each side. Tawnee wondered how it would be getting the trailer out with a load of horses.
The trailers were lined up and ready for the precious horses to be loaded inside. Sadly the horses hadn’t been fed for a few days we were told.
Tawnee headed out to the other side of the pasture and got the first horse. Tawnee noticed a white truck stop along the road.
We would like you to meet Janie, a sweet mare who is about 14 years old.
Janie has pretty chipped up hooves and needs some TLC.
Meet Lucy, a 3-4 year old mare. She managed to stand still long enough for this photo but she is quite antsy.
When Tawnee was leading Lucy to the trailer she heard a guy yell at her “Lady leading my horse, if you touch my horses again I will shoot you.” Tawnee found this extremely concerning, Cathy felt that he was threatening her as well as she was working with the horses too. She asked Cathy and the landlord to call the sheriff for a civil standby.
Lucy has bad hooves too.
Tawnee was even a little more concerned when the person who threatened her life pulled over next to the fence where she was working.
He stood there watching and yelling, making threats and demands, the entire time they were loading horses.
They decided to continue working despite his threats, hoping against hope that the police would show up soon.
Meet Zee, a 7-8 year old mare.
This is Dolly, a 7-8 year old mare.
Dolly’s hooves are really bad. Look at that crack!
This is Shimmer, a 3-4 year old mare. She doesn’t really know how to lead and has learned the bad habit of running away, whether you are trying to hang onto the rope or not.
This is Ginger,a 4-5 year old mare.
Meet Jan, a 6-7 year old mare.
Jan has really bad feet, the picture doesn’t really show it, but her front hooves are dished, flare way out, are all around in just terrible shape.
This is Mollie, an older mare.
Mollie has an injury on her back leg that is still oozing puss and is infected. It was also covered in nasty mud.
Why aren’t there 13 horses? One the old owner moved into the horse trailer, and the landlord found good homes for 4 of the others, making less of a burden on our shelter. The old owner of the horses still has a lot of horses (about 30) on various properties that are in various stages of eviction since he chooses not to pay rent. We have no doubt that in the very near future we will be asked to help with these horses too. Thankfully the 8 that we rescued are all very safe now and the other 4 will have great homes.
When the horses were loaded up the old owner quickly rushed his truck in front of the only exit to the pasture, physically blocking our path to the highway.
The decision was made to cut the fence and drive through the landlord’s back yard.
Tawnee and Cathy were in the first rig. The old horse owner stood in front of the truck, keeping them from driving onto the road. This was the same person who threatened to shoot them. Tawnee honked the horn…
He glared at Tawnee.
Stuff happened we cannot speak of at this time. Tawnee was finally able to escape onto the road. Jason was following in the van with the other horse trailer. The guy laid down on the ground and kept trying to crawl under the van so he would get ran over. The landlord physically had to keep pulling him back from crawling under the tires.
Finally they were on the road and breathing a huge sigh of relief. The landlord called up…
The guy refused to move out of the road and was laying there. An ambulance was called and went rushing by the rescue rigs. The police finally showed up 2 hours later at the property. The landlord asked us to please come back and file our report with the officer.
Every person had to be interviewed, it was a long and lengthy process.
Finally late into the night the horses were finally at a secure location safely tucked in for the night. At this time we do not feel that the horses should be at the shelter. We need to find homes for them as soon as possible, preferably far far away.
Thank you all for your support both financially and emotionally!