nina

Nina's story as it appeared in the October 2022 newsletter.    It is nice to help out a special person that aided HPS for many, many years.  Sometimes we end up in the right place at the right time to help a needy horse in Brunswick County. Our heroin talked to the neighbor and learned the old lady who owned the mare was in her eighty’s and had terminal cancer. The neighbor was able to talk the owner into selling the mare after owning her for about 10 -11 years. 

The poor mare had little to no attention in a long time. Where do you start when the girl has had no vet care, dental care, needed groceries and the farrier was needed? Slowly the mare had all her needs met. The veterinarian felt she was about 15 years old and he even helped to untangle a good part of her tail until it became almost impossible and the decision was made to cut the balance of the giant dreadlock out of her tail. 

She liked her name Nina. She has come a long way in a few short weeks, but there was a problem. Our heroin had her new heart horse and Nina didn’t want to share her new favorite person with another horse. Nina may be small, but she was tough on the huge boy.  Her big gelding already had a best friend and now what to do with Nina? Call HPS!

Nina is a beautiful horse and will be perfect for someone who wants a smooth riding horse, maybe me. 

"Yet to Be Named"  story as it appeared in the October 2022 newsletter.   When a call comes to us concerning a horse in trouble, we will do everything we can to help rescue the one in need. Sometimes the folks driving our truck and trailer for pickups may not be available on a Sunday afternoon. The gal who alerted us of the problem volunteered her husband to help rescue this poor mare.  

The couple met the mare when the owner first got her, and they were not impressed with his treatment of the horse. The horse was ridden on streets for hours by the owner. Then a person that was too heavy for the horse rode her at a trot. They had a winter blanket on her instead of a typical saddle pad. The sweat was running off her in streams.   

The owner had her at a place where the round bale of hay was left out in the rain. The feed was left open to the elements and wildlife. The second horse, the owner had become neurological, stumbling and running into things. The owner was not called, nor was a veterinarian. In the morning, the horse was dead and was buried before the owner of the horse was notified.  

Now one horse had died, and the tall mare was now a bag of bones, and showed signs of terrible pain, and was very unsteady on her feet. 

She was moved to a boarding barn in Surry County. The stable owner and the mare’s owner didn’t hit it off. The owner would not have the Veterinarian come to diagnose the horse. The stable owner gave the horse Bute daily so she could get up and move around. The horse’s owner was not even paying the boarding costs, and the expense was going with working to help her gain weight. 

The owner wanted one of his buddies to come and shoot her, which was met with an angry response. Next, he wanted to leave her in the woods and let nature take its course and other equally despicable suggestion. He made it clear that he only cared about riding her.  Everyone was fed up with him, and that is when they started calling equine rescues to find a safe place for her to go. An equine rescue suggested they call HPS. 

The first issue was getting the owner to sign the horse over to the stable owner, which was easily accomplished.  The caring couple was happy to pick the mare up in Surry County and bring her to HPS.  It was dark when they arrived at the sanctuary, so she was housed in one of the hospital stalls (12’ by 24’) for the night. We had put in a massive container of beautiful hay and about 50 gallons of water. We walked her in, and her head went for the hay, then a drink of water, and back to the hay. I don’t think she stopped eating all night. 

We needed Monday to evaluate what we were seeing and have the Veterinarian come Tuesday morning. She was so unsteady that it would have been too difficult to try and get radiographs of her hooves. She was put on medication to hopefully help her to make it easier in a week to do the radiographs. We had a blood panel done, and we had a sample sent off to check for EPM. Pulling her tail it would be easy to pull her down. Not good! We are going to start her on “Kelly’s EPM Treatment” right away.   

We received the results of the complete blood panel taken on. To everyone’s surprise, the blood panel was utterly normal. There was not one thing off, even a smidge. When the test for EPM arrived, it showed she was positive.  

We need to list possible names for the new girl so she can pick a name she would like. If we don’t get it right in the first list, we must go back to the drawing board and create a new list.