News from Sky Ranch Sanctuary - Sky Ranch Sanctuary

November 27, 2015 By skyranch

Digger’s Arrival

Meet “Digger” – he’s our newest resident here at Sky Ranch Sanctuary – a bay thoroughbred, probably in his mid-20’s.

Imagine losing your long-time owner, and the helpless feeling of ending up in the hands of someone who didn’t know how to properly care for a senior horse. Digger came to us emaciated, and with teeth that were in very bad shape.

About a week after arriving at Sky Ranch (giving him some time to settle in first) Digger has had his teeth “floated”. He’s also getting as much senior feed and hay pellets as he can eat, along with a little hay.

The vet wormed him on the day he arrived and has prescribed psyllium as Digger has a lot of sand in his digestive tract. Other than that, he seems to be healthy and we think he will recover his weight with good care.

Digger is a real sweetheart; it was love at first sight for all of us at Sky Ranch. Please “Like” or “Share” this post to show your support for our newest family member, Digger.

If you’re feeling extra generous, you can even buy him some carrots.

November 24, 2015 By skyranch

Poco

Poco was a beautiful “typy”[someone told me] Thoroughbred mare, being sold at the training barn where I formerly took lessons, and formerly boarded Ditto. Rumor had it, she didn’t care for men, especially men who wore gloves. She was tried at the track as a young horse and had a bump on her nose indicating that perhaps she hadn’t gone along with the program and was treated severely for that. Until she got more pasture time after she came to live with me, she swayed in her stall, most likely from being cooped up during her days at the track.

It seemed I decided on purchasing Poco the minute I heard she was for sale. Deciding to take on an animal, dog, cat or horse, usually happens to me that way. It’s mentioned, and then it’s a done deal. I think the universe gives us many suggestions, which we can take or not, but for me when that suggestion involves an animal, it seems more like a command!

Poco was an “alpha” mare, and when she got used to being around the less secure, more worried, Ditto, she decided to become his guardian angel. At one barn in Michigan, the owner would put out a large round bale of hay for the horses, and the pecking order became readily apparent by observing who ate when. Poco was first, and then because Ditto was “with her,” he got to be second. If the other horses thought she wasn’t looking, they would try and assert themselves, putting Ditto in his probably bottom of the heap spot, and Poco would come to his rescue threatening with a bite or a kick.

She seemed to love being sprayed with fly spray as though it were her “preferred fragrance.” She put up with Snitch (an Arabian I purchased a few years later) and only occasionally got testy with his incessant pestering. Poco was a very sensitive horse and when riding her, the signals had to be very clear. I once observed a rider trying to get her to go from a canter to a trot. It didn’t happen. The rider became exasperated, and Poco wore an expression indicating she was just doing what she was asked to do, so get over it!

Poco lived out her retirement at our California Ranch. There were subtle signs that something wasn’t right. Her legs would be scuffed up in the morning, and the vet suggested maybe she was having trouble getting up. Then one day, she couldn’t get up. With the help of the workers at Scott’s shop on the property, we tried helping her up and just turning her, using lead ropes. Nothing worked. Finally hours later in desperation, knowing the risk to her life to be down that long, we hired a crane to pull her up. Her legs were useless to her, and she couldn’t stand. After many hours of her suffering to try and stand, and all of us trying to help her get up so at least the vet could examine her, the decision was made to put her down. It was unbelievably sad because she seemed ok in all other respects.

Looking back I recall the comments years earlier that she was “cold backed”; a chiropractor said her spine was “extra stiff” when treating her, and others made similar observations. Maybe I should have seen those as clues. She had always seemed vital and moved well. What could have been done to prevent the paralysis?

She was 27 when she died, and I think she liked her life, moving with us first to Michigan from LA and then back to California. A neighbor stopped by to comfort me. Her horse had died a few years before, and she knew how I felt. A shared grief. Horses are large creatures and take up a lot of space in the heart. Poco was a noble horse and carried herself with the maximum dignity until she could no more. There will never be another like her.

November 23, 2015 By skyranch

Horses and Hearts

Ditto was my first horse. I bought him from a training/riding facility in Los Angeles when I was 42 years old. A long wait for someone who has loved horses since she could put together the sentence: “I want a horse.” No opportunity presented itself for me to have a horse or even take riding lessons when I was a child, though I did get to occasionally sit on my grandparents’ working draft horses while they chomped hay in the barn.

My daughter Jenny was born when I was 39 years old. A “high risk” birth that culminated in a diagnosis of possible severe developmental disability. This was devastation and fear of the future such as I had never known. I couldn’t get my bearings, and I decided to take horse back riding lessons as therapy for me in between the numerous therapy appointments for my daughter. I signed on at a local hunter jumper training barn, and a new chapter of my love of horses began.

I nervously trotted through my lessons on wonderful “school horses” (most of whom should be awarded medals of valor for what they put up with from unskilled and often misinformed students) and a year or so later one of the Thoroughbreds owned by the training stable was up for sale. My trainer suggested I buy him. Though Ditto was far better trained and experienced than I was, we had a great initial ride together, and I think it was love at first canter!

I bought Ditto and the new chapter began. Ditto was a high strung, delicately built Thoroughbred with a kind but skittish disposition. I’m a bit skittish myself so we were a perfect match emotionally if not so perfect for performance! People would comment: “Why not choose a calm, more seasoned Quarter Horse? Wouldn’t that better suit you and help you get over some of your riding anxieties?” I ignored this advice as I was too much in love with this spirited horse, who sometimes was downright silly with his worries….as am I.

So….Jenny’s birth and horses: I often cried about Jenny. Wondering about her future, who would protect her when I was no longer here? How would she be received in the world? What could I do to give her a life? And it seemed a lot of this crying would occur in the car on the way home from my riding lessons or while just visiting Ditto and the other horses in the barn. What was that about? I asked a wise person and she told me: “It’s because horses and Jenny are both about your heart.”

I think for many of us who are “into” horses, it is about our hearts. Many animals are beautiful. But for us there is something so big and yet so delicately ephemeral about these creatures who challenge and enchant us simultaneously. There’s just no explaining it to those who don’t “have the bug.” A mother, who was at the training barn while her 11 year old daughter took riding lessons, told me she asked her daughter to explain the attraction to horses: her daughter replied, sticking her nose in her horses’ neck: “I just love the way they smell.” Maybe that’s it. It clearly defies definition or explanation. My daughter and my horses bring me much joy, but as with all things of the heart, they can also make me cry. They live large in my heart.

November 21, 2015 By skyranch

Digger, our newest resident

This is Digger (“Dig”) our newest horse; a 20 something Thoroughbred gelding. He’s been here a week and had his teeth done yesterday. He needed pretty extensive dental work, including two extractions. Dig’s owner died and he fell through the cracks. We hope he’s as happy here as we are to have him at Sky Ranch. We will update his progress.

November 17, 2015 By skyranch

Fires

California is my home and I wouldn’t have it any other way… but these fires… of course the loss of human life and the destruction of homes is more than tragic, but when you love the other creatures of the earth it gets really scary.

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We don’t have a horse trailer (though hope in time to have one) and though we have a friendly connection to H. E. E. T. (Horse Evacuation Team/ a wonderful, skillful group of volunteers who help get horses out of all sorts of difficulties..natural disasters, traffic accident, swimming pools, you name it) it is a little nerve wracking when there are fires within 30 miles of a horse barn.

Though the fire danger is ever present each year, the drought has made us ever more mindful of how fires, either created by natural phenomenon, mindless human action or worse yet, deliberate dastardly acts, can pose a great threat. Many years ago when I lived in Santa Monica there were great fires nearby that sent soot and ash drifting into our usually clear ocean air. On the TV news, I saw footage of a coyote facing burning brush on the hillside by the 405 Freeway, clearly trying to figure out which way to run. I can’t forget that image and only hope s/he found a safe way out. Fingers crossed that the fall/winter rains are not long in coming.