Finding Homes for Two Horses

[Trixie]

Hey,

 We have two horses that have pretty much too old for lessons now -- although they're sweet-tempered and healthy, they're just too old to be ridden. Unfortunately, we can't afford to keep horses that we can't use in lessons, so we'd like to give them away as pasture companions or horses that are used for indoor lessons or something.
 My question is, what would be the best way to go about doing this? Local newspaper, local horse publication, or the Chronicle? We'd like for them to have the best homes that they can... Has anyone else done this? Any suggestions?

thanks,
Sarah

[Trixie]

The only real condition of this would be that they’re barely ever ridden and that we get to check on them every so often – see how they’re doing. These horses have been with us forever and we HATE to see them go… however, since it’s a school, it’s really not the barn staff’s decision. One can do walk/trot maybe, but not a lot. I guess we’ll advertise them as companion animals all over the place… I’m kind of scared of newspapers though.

[Dementia_13]

Well, getting back to the point of Trixie’s question - have you tried the Equine Rescue League or Days End Farm? I know both are pretty full right now, but even if they can’t take the horses, they might also have some suggestions for you. Where I used to board, they had a little pinto pony who unfortunately had heaves. We gave her to Equine Rescue League and she ended up doing great in their pony ride program.

They also have links to other rescues on their website - here’s the address:

www.equinerescueleague.org
www.defhr.org

Good luck with this.

[Dementia_13]

Whatever, honey. It was just a suggestion. Maybe don’t ask for suggestions next time if your going to bite people’s heads off.

[Caros_Folks]

It takes a LOT to offend me. I wasn’t really offended just confused.

Maybe I wasn’t making myself clear? I read and article in a magazine that talked about how easy it is for people to misinterpret what we write in letters, faxes, emails, etc due to the fact that most of us write the way we would speak, that is, not necessarily with great respect to literary rules and structure. The main difference being is that when we speak we add inflection which can be used to convey the very same message/words in different ways.

Anyway I just wanted to tell you that I DID consider putting her down. Many recommended it. But, I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t. Call me a Wuss or whatever you want but I simply could not find it within myself to make that decision with this Horse. I have had others where I had to and like you say, it’s an AGONIZING decision to make.

I still ride and compete. Just not with a consistent team mate that I/we can call our own (for the moment). Just “catch riding” which has taught me SOOOO much.

[Cactuskate]

Have you checked theraputic riding programs? I think sometimes they need animals that are just handwalked and loved on.

The general paper is frightening. I would be afraid to believe someone that answered. For fear they would end up in a “can” if you know what I mean.

Good luck and if you can take plenty of time with this process.

“The older I get, the better I used to be, but who the heck cares!”

[JAGold]

As a practical matter, I found myself having to find homes for horses my college’s equestrian team could no longer use–and therefore no longer provide for. I found that rescue groups do not, generally, provide free retirement for otherwise safe horses; those groups have all they can do to take care of horse in immediate danger of abuse or neglect. Often, the best situations I found for several of our horses were as companion animals.
Trixie–my experience was on the other side of the country, but I am in DC now–if you’d like to chat, feel free to e-mail me: jgoldberg@cbpp.org
I appreciate what you are trying to do for these horses. --Jess

[Louise]

I think you better do a little research on equine rescues before you go slamming them. Especially on a forum where a lot of people just got together and donated enough money to the Exceller Fund (one of those rescue type places) to save a horse.

[Trixie]

We’re going to check out theraputic programs within driving distance – an hour or two, so maybe once or twice a month we can go and see them, just to check and make sure they’re doing good.

Yeah, exactly. I guess we’ll skip the newspaper

[breezymeadow]

Don’t have any personal experience with them, but have you checked out “Crossed Sabers” in West Virginia? They have a really nicely put together extensive website (www.crossedsabers.com) on their rescue/adoption/donation program & deal with all types of horses - rideable & unrideable. In addition, they seem to really care what happens to these horses, performing in-depth background checks, etc. It’s at least worth a phone call &/or visit.

[Trixie]

I HAVE worked for a horse rescue and I have also written an article about one for a newspaper that I work for. I know they give their horses quality care, but it always seemed like nothing was certain there, and secondly, there is no way that the barn manager would even consider it. Like I said before – These are not my horses, and this is not my decision. It’s not my money to spend or not spend. The only thing I can offer is suggestions (which I was asking for help on) and horse care on campus.

It’s not required that they go today, tomorrow, or even next week. You can say “well, maybe they shouldn’t have horses if they’re going to get rid of them after all those years” all you want, but the truth of the matter is that they do and we want to do the best we can for those horses that were so good to us. Again, that’s why I’m asking for suggestions.

I was wondering if maybe some of you have been in similar positions or had ideas to help us out. I apologize if I insulted anyone here, but I wasn’t asking for a massive arguement about the virtues of horse rescues and retirement homes. Should I know better by now than to post questions like this on these boards? Probably.

While some of you have been really helpful and have given me some good ideas, I really wasn’t trying to start an arguement about horse commitments. I just said that we don’t get to make all of our own decisions. If it came down to the horses being overworked, our barn manager would make a stand. But we’re trying to avoid that happening for a reason – they debate eliminating the barn at least once every two years. We don’t want to give them newfound reasons to kick us out. And it would be EXTREMELY difficult to find homes for fifteen horses, especially a few old ponies that haven’t been off the campus in 20 years and can’t do too much work.

I’ve got to leave now, I’ll finish this post when I get home.

[Caros_Folks]

Have you looked into retirement facilities?
You should check local publications (I don’t know what’s in your area-we have Horsetrader in California and there are ads every issue for retirement facilities).

But, if you are dead set on the Therapuetic Program-can’t you perhapa broaden you 2 hour driving time window. Seems to me that kinda limits what you will find.

I understand that you want something whcih is convenient for you but realistically, if you find a good place and visit it a couple of times and are comfortable with the level of care, how many times per year would you really go and visit? Would an extra few hours of driving to get to the “Perfect” facility be to much of an inconvenience for the added benefit?

These horses have obviously provided you with lots of their hard work and it seems like you care for them enough to find them a place to retire-why not go the whole distance and find the right facilty first and deal with the logistics later?

[Trixie]

The administration never said in these words “You can’t keep these horses now that they aren’t useful.” What they said was basically that this is your budget, you have to give this many lessons a week and teach this many children. And for that, we need a certain amount of rideable school horses, and when we retire them, we won’t have enough. We refuse to overwork the animals we have because it’s cruel. And sadly, if we can’t provide the appropriate number of lessons, this WILL result in the barn getting shut down if it can’t run.

HOWEVER, the budget for the barn is not a big one, and it’s hard to make ends meet, and they really can’t afford to keep these horses. And try as we might for more money, they aren’t really very into giving it to us because it’s enough to cover the horses that we do have… but if these guys can’t be ridden and they stay here, we can’t afford to feed their replacements. We’re pretty much set to a certain amount of horses. And we’ve got to keep our part of the deal so that we can continue to have a barn.

And we have tried to get a bigger budget. Whatever arguements we give, they counter it and threaten the program (“we can’t afford to give you guys more money. If you can’t work this out, we’re going to have to eliminate that program.”)

We’re going to look into as many options as we can. Like I said before, the admin doesn’t really care what horses are there and what they’re doing: what they’re really saying is “you have this much money, and you have to be able to provide this.” In order to do that, we’ve got to be able to provide proper care for all of our animals, and we need to have a certain amount of horses that can do a certain amount of lessons.

Being as that these animals were faithful and wonderful to us for years, they will stay with us until we are POSITIVE that they have the right home. The school’s aware that they can’t just trash them, but they’re adament that we continue to provide the same amount of lessons. We want to keep it fair to all of our horses, so we have to look into other options than retiring them here.

[breezymeadow]

I don’t think anyone’s offended here, “Trixie”. It’s just that you’ve asked for suggestions to fit your “monetary” budget that are difficult to find to also fit your “compassionate” budget.

The only reason why I suggested Crossed Sabers is because they personally vet-check all incoming donations & they have so many really heartwarming stories re: the horses they place - many involving just “companion” horses. If I were put in a position like yours, I have to admit that I would prefer the animal placed in a position of stall, turnout, friends, & love, as opposed to a herd of 20-50, a run-in, & an occasional toss of hay.

I know where you’re coming from, but as mentioned above, if you ask for suggestions, you have to be willing to accept what comes from all angles. I don’t think you should feel that you shouldn’t have asked in the first place. I think we are all just trying to give you as many options as possible.

[Evalee_Hunter]

There should be quite a few therapeutic riding programs to choose from. We live in northern Delaware (about 2 hrs. NE of Washington) and I know of five therapeutic riding programs within 45 minutes of our house & I bet I don’t know about half of the ones out there.

[Trixie]

Also, there is no way whatsoever that we’re sending them to a horse rescue. They don’t deserve that, and we’re not going to reward their years of hard work by sending them to a rescue. We’re going to place them in a home, theraputic riding, or retirement facility that we choose and find to be adequate – NO MATTER WHAT.

[Trixie]

I’m aware that it’s a difficult situation. I kind of do feel like I shouldn’t have asked because sometimes here it feels like you don’t only get opinions from all sides – you get yelled at from half the sides, and that’s not only not necessary but completely not helpful.
I can explain repeatedly that these aren’t my horses, but since I am involved with that barn and the barn manager’s overworked, she asked me to see if I could come up with some suggestions to find them a home. I don’t know what their exact budget is, I just know that the barn’s budget is quite tight and that we’ll still have to teach the same amount of kids. That’s irrelevant now. The point is that we’d like to find homes for these horses, and I’m wondering what the best way to do it is.

You’ve given me some good suggestions. I’m going to check out the place you mentioned, Breezy, because it sounds awesome. Thanks to everyone for their ideas.

[Bumpkin]

Theraputic riding facilities don’t take just anyone or everyone who have a horse.
The local one to mine, loved our horse Poncho, but did not have room for another horse.
I called another one, and told them how much the first one thought he was perfect and had even suggested I call facility #2.
Facility #2 was not interested at all because Poncho has ringbone. He is totally sound with the min amount of bute, but they did not care and only want horses that have no problems at all.
Theraputic Centers still use the horses daily, and they are basically like a regular riding school, only at a more leisurely pace.
The retirement home route is most likely your best bet.
Good luck. My prayers are with you, as the whole thing is very frustrating. I know.

[Janet]

There are ads for three retirement places in the current Chronicle.

[Spunky]

<BLOCKQUOTE class=“ip-ubbcode-quote”><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Caros Folks:

I have always thought that there should be some kind of a license that allows people to own/ride horses. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Funny, I have always thought that birth control should be mandated and that people should have to pass a test in order to become parents.

I guess it’s a good thing we don’t all think the same way, isn’t it? Because there are lots of people out there who shouldn’t have children as far as I am concerned – but I bet you they don’t feel the same way!

Unfortunately, horses are luxury animals and it is not always possible for people to retire them to pasture after the end of their useful lives – let’s face it, many become unrideable due to injury at an early age. Caros, it sounds like you don’t need to worry about an expense such as this, even if it were for 20 years or more.

Trixie, sounds like these horses should be able to find good companion homes or possibly a job in a therapeutic barn. If this cannot be done, you might be forced to consider euthanasia as a humane alternative to an uncertain future.

Good luck!! There are so many therapeutic riding programs in your region, I am sure someone will be glad to have these two trustworthy – and trusting – souls.