Lots and lots of news, some sad, some glad (I sound just like Dr. Seuss). We had a booth at the Mane Event in Red Deer. It was our first time there and we really enjoyed it. Met lots of new people and reconnected with others. We also had a booth at the Pet Expo the following weekend, manned by volunteers from the Calgary Equestrian Recreation group and from the rescue. Thank you to everyone who helped out. There is also a great article about the rescue in the May issue of Horses All magazine. These have all really helped to get our name out there and have contributed to a big increase in the number of calls and emails we are getting, which is keeping us even busier.
Thank you to the volunteers who came out and helped build a new rabbit enclosure. The bunnies are happy to have more room of their own away from the goats and sheep.
We gave away one of our male geese (went to a new home with a nice girl goose!) and thankfully the remaining goose has settled down a lot, he's no longer attacking us every time we enter the poultry enclosure (the 2 of them together were like a gang!) and he's not nearly as noisy any more either.
Somber left for his new home in April. Gracy#2 left for her new home today, and Trouble and her new foal Thor left for their temporary summer foster home today as well. Kat and Leyla will be leaving for their new home tomorrow. Kiki and Millie have come back to the rescue, along with new horses Echo#2, Buddy, and Shadow#2 and Traveller and Saffron left for their new home in April and have already come back again. Shamrock left to join Silk at a wonderful foster home in Sylvan Lake. I'll get the new/returned horses posted as soon as I can, hopefully in the next few days. I'd also like to get new pictures posted of especially the youngsters, as they've all grown and changed so much. We've also taken in another owner surrender, Major, a very nice, tall palomino Saddlebred gelding. He's joined the geriatric crowd at the rescue. And Granada, who I mentioned came in in the last update, was here less than 24 hours before a previous owner found out he was here and came and took him home! We also took in another 10 rescue hens.
Sylvia had her foal, a nice bay colt we've named Sebastian. Trouble had her foal as well, a flashy little dun with one blue eye and we've named him Thor. Very sadly, Twobits had her foal, a beautiful filly we named Topaz and we lost her 2 days later. She had a very large umbilical hernia and I believe it strangulated her intestine. She was running around and playing just fine and 2 hours later we found her and she was already succumbing to hypothermia as she'd been down for a while. We tried for over 2 hours to bring her body termperature up but she just stopped breathing at one point and that was it. We are so heartbroken and feel that we've let down Twobits as well. Fritzy is still expecting, I assume she'll have her foal in the next couple of weeks. Our heartfelt sympathies to Carolyn on the loss of Roseka, whom she'd fostered for us for many years. Also to Hazel, on the loss of Hawk, he was such a kind old gentleman.
Thank you to Nancy Blain for donating some pasture for this summer. Once we get the fences checked we will move the smaller herd over there. It's only about 20 minutes east of us and there's LOTS of grass! Farrah will be getting special shoes tomorrow, in the hopes that it will help straighten out her crooked foot. That's assuming we can get her shod of course. Thank you Brenden & Katherine! Red has an abscess so he's up at the house. It's started to drain and today Carmen and Sherral soaked his foot for a while. Gemma is doing great, she's on a low-dose steroid and has no trouble lying down or getting up. We did some interesting alternative therapies on Sarcee yesterday. She's had a recurring infection in her hind leg that has caused it to stock up severely. We had tried all the usual things - sweat wraps, long term antibiotics, cold rinsing, etc. Nothing has worked, so now we're trying the 'leech' treatment (very gross!) and we'll also be trying some herbal stuff. Next week, Tuesday, will be gelding day! We have at least 10 colts to geld, so we'd better get started on it. I've also started deworming and vaccinations on the horses at the house. Next weekend we are planning on doing the herd. Can't wait!
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