As is usual we have been very busy - I started this blog on March 7th, and am just getting back to it today, April 4th!

I'd like to thank everyone for the wonderful support we've had lately: those who donated feed directly through our local feed supplier,  Mountain View Feed Company; Costen Insurance for donating $1330.95 to Bear Valley, their charity of choice for 2014; Johlian for selecting Bear Valley as your charity through Parkland Industries; Pomegranate.com for partnering with Bear Valley over Christmas with your lovely advent calendars;  donations through The Tack Collector which raised $2924.22 in 2014;  sales through Bear Valley used tack, organized by our wonderful volunteer Mary Ellen, which brought in approximately $9,000 in 2014 and an additional $800 through the Balzac 4H tack sale.  Most recently, we'd like to thank: the Calgary Stampede Queens' Alumni;  Val and family for the feed donation after the passing of their old pony; donations through donor's choice/workplace donation programs of The United Way; and for care of donkeys, Hands of Hope Students' Club and Four Feet Companion Foundation. 
A big thank you to everyone who has donated aeroplan miles to the Rescue - so far we have been able to redeem miles for $3,000 in Home Depot gift cards which we can use to purchase materials to finish the seniors' shelter! Here is the link if you'd like to donate miles - https://beyondmiles.aeroplan.com/eng/ There are lots more thanks due, too many to list, but we appreciate you all very much!

I never want to hurry time along as life is too short as it is but I am so glad to see the tail end of March as it was a very tough month.  We've had to say goodbye to a lot of special friends over the last while, including lovely Heathcote in January, Winky the donkey in February, and beautiful Penelope, and Emmy, Twenty and Prince, 3 of our seniors, all in March.  Condolences as well to the families of Ronin, Fonda, and Quill's foal Kit, all 3 of whom passed from colic over the last little while.  Between injury, illness or simply old age catching up, life ends and we are left to carry on.  We are always happy that we are able to provide loving care while they are here with us but letting go is hard.  On top of it all my mom passed away in March.  Although her passing was a relief because of her illness, it was still difficult.  With diseases like alzheimers and dementia you lose the person way before they die but you still grieve for them in the end.  For those friends who made donations to the Rescue in my mom's memory, thank you, that was so very thoughtful.

There is always some good news too.  Boston, Powder, Donovan, Raffles, Blossom, Inky, Pinky, Tucker, Leo and Rasta have all been adopted.  Salsa, Estelle and Tivio are back from Edmonton and still awaiting that special someone to adopt them.  Thank you so much Lara and Trendsetting Stables for your efforts on behalf of the horses, and the adoptions of Boston, Spitfire and Powder attest to that.  Roche, Snickers and Twix came back from 'winter school'.  Roche and Snickers, along with Inky and Pinky were gelded, and Beth, Wanda, Mr.Goat, HIghway, Kokanee, Cash and Missy got their teeth floated.   Mr.Goat has a new foster home, joining 2 other of our adoptees, Story and Odyssey, with Linda and Tim and their menagerie.  We have some new sponsors for some of the horses as well!  Sponsoring is a great way to contribute towards the Rescue and the animals that reside here. 

In the first part of this year we took in the 3 donkeys, Inky, Winky and Pinky, and about 80 red hens and 1 rooster.  We were able to find good homes for most of the hens and even a number of our roosters!  We took in 1 rabbit named Rambo, but when she was fixed she turned out to be a Rambette instead.  Sebastian has gone out for some handling, thank you Katrina for taking him on.  Vita has also gone out for training, thank you Michele for sponsoring that for her.  Mac and Plume both had abscesses but they've cleared up well.  Sasha, who is fostered at Janine's and fortunately close by, had quite the injury in February.  She slashed open her neck right at her throatlatch on the edge of the metal roofing on her shelter.  It was quite the gaping wound (graphic photo, sorry!) but for all that it could have been a lot more serious as she just missed her jugular and her trachea.  It took quite a few stitches to get her put back together again!

We had our annual general meeting in February.  The main focus of the meeting was on fundraising and volunteer development.  We'd like to welcome Baudina Slikker to the fundraising committee for the Calgary/Cochrane area.  She joins Stephanie and Laura Schmidt who are focused on the Red Deer area.  If anyone would be interested it handling fundraising for the Edmonton area (or any other area for that matter!) please email us about it at [email protected].  A number of the volunteers attended a fun clinic in March hosted by Joerg of Flowing Manes Equestrian on equine communication.  I think we all learned a lot!  We hope to have another similar clinic in the near future as space was limited and not everyone was able to attend.

Speaking of fundraising, Mary Ellen just wrapped up an online auction on facebook benefiting the Rescue.  Grand total raised was $2135!  If you have used tack or other items you'd like to donate at any time please email Mary Ellen at [email protected].

We had a really fun fundraising event for Valentine's Day.  Thank you to everyone who bought a valentine for their favourite(s)!

It took six months but finally, since January, Beth has been staying outside with the seniors group!  She still occasionally needs help getting up if she lays down but she has been doing really well.   It is really nice to finally get to sleep through the night again.  Here is a link to a video of Beth doing some gallivanting! - https://www.dropbox.com/s/bjqkdz42wbze1tz/beth%20videos%20002.AVI?dl=0

Coming up, we will have a booth once again at The Mane Event in Red Deer - April 24 - 26.  Stop by and visit! 

Also in the planning stage, we have an event lined up for July 4th at Horse in Hand Ranch in Blackfalds.  There is a website set up for the event -http://bearvalleyevents.wix.com/bear-valley-events#!events/c1h6a-  please check it out and share with your friends and family!  We are looking for sponsors for the event along with vendors for a country market we'd like to run in conjunction with the dinner, dance and silent auction.  It will be a great way to support the Rescue and have a fun evening out at the same time!

Be sure to look at the events and fundraising pages of the website for current news on what is happening or coming up.

Our Christmas fundraiser, decorating the tree for the animals, was a great success!  Thank you to everyone who contributed, shared, cared.  We even added a bunch of presents at the end.  Next year we might start out that way right off the bat, having people be able to add decorations or presents for individual animals.  It was a lot of fun decorating the tree.  Perhaps we'll do a valentine fundraiser, buy a heart for a horse!

Had a bit of a fiasco the other night.  I was up at 3 a.m. to get Beth up and let her out of the barn. Couldn't get back to sleep so got up again at about 3:30 and heard some banging outside. Went out to check and found Tyler had somehow fallen into the round bale feeder!  So we're out there trying to get him out, I'm in my housecoat, and it's -30C. Mike had to get the skidsteer out to lift the bale feeder up so Tyler could get up. Poor guy is a little banged up. He's not happy about it but I've put him in the barn in case he goes a bit shocky from the stress. And of course while we're trying to get Tyler up, Tucker decides to leave the paddock (I forgot to close the gate in my panic to help Tyler) so once I've got Tyler in the barn I'm running around trying to find Tucker. He was outside the gate but fortunately I got in front of him and turned him back and got him caught and put away too. Yikes, never a dull moment! So thankful though that I was awake and heard the banging.

Yesterday we were putting out hay for the herds and I noticed Simba is slightly off on his left hind.  Then I saw Mac was completely lame on his right hind.  Seems there is always something going on with someone.  I separated Mac, put him in the smaller paddock with Cola, Torque and Missy, hopefully they are nice to him and he won't have to move around too much until we figure out what's up with him.  Marvin's eye is healing nicely, he'll have a scar but it's at the back lower part of his eyeball so shouldn't interfere too much, if at all, with his vision.  He's learning now to stand reasonably quiet while I put the cream in, or at least get it smeared on his eyelashes or in the vicinity of his eye.   Marvin jumped the fence again, this time the 4 foot round pen panel!  Mr. Goat the woolly mammoth mini is back and I thought I'd put him in with Marvin to keep him company.  As soon as Marvin saw him coming he panicked and jumped right over the fence.  Marvin is only 11 hands high, if that, so it was quite a feat for him to jump that fence, though he certainly didn't seem to give it a second thought.  Mr. Goat is now next to the seniors pen instead.  Mr. Goat does have a possible foster home lined up for January as a companion to a mini-donkey, they'll make a cute pair for sure.

We were contacted the other day by someone who saw a horse listed for sale on a facebook page and recognized her as one of our previous rescues, Ghost.  In checking it out, it seems that the mare, Ghost, had changed hands a number of times and in the end was being used as a broodmare!   It was so disappointing to find this out.  So much for having conditions of adoption.  We realize that the adoption contract is not worth paper it's written on if people don't abide by it and don't care enough to pass them on to future owners but one would hope that people have integrity.  I think this illustrates a lot of what is wrong with horse owners and people in general, why you find 20 or 30 year old horses at auction that don't even have a name, why there ARE so many horses being bought and sold everywhere you look.  As Michele, our neighbour said yesterday, so many people view their horses as just another piece of equipment in their yard. You'd be hard pressed to find a dog even, for example, that has had seven owners in 14 years yet that is what has happened to Ghost.  She had at least that many, as there had to have been 1) the original breeder, 2) the horse dealer we bought her from at 4 years of age, 3) the Rescue, 4) the person we adopted her out to, 5) the person the adopter sold her to, 6) the person who listed her for sale on facebook, 7) the future buyer of her.  There most likely were other owners too, as it's very probable that someone else owned her between her being born and ending up at the horse dealer; also the person currently listing her for sale by my understanding bought Ghost at auction, another no-no from the adoption contract (she said something about saving her from a meat buyer).  I am so thankful that the lady who saw the ad went and bought Ghost, so she's safe again.  The other disturbing aspect of this whole thing is that I found out afterward that the husband of the seller said he wouldn't ever sell the horse back to us, Bear Valley Rescue, because of some perceived slight or issue from years ago to do with him losing some bid on some wildies, or something?  I don't know what the heck the guy could have his nose out of joint about, but it is disconcerting to feel that someone thinks ill of the us.
Well, as it's been said, you can't please everyone.  I'm just glad the Ghost is safe again, she has always been one of my favourite horses that has been through the Rescue.

Happy Birthday Mike!

Hope everyone had a happy and safe Christmas.  We've been dining on chocolate and leftovers the last couple of days.  Takes care of the 'what to cook' dilemma that's for sure.

My horse Bandit got an abscess on the side of his cheek and he's up here at the house so I can hot-compress it until it bursts.  All the horses are doing well.  With the milder weather we've had they've slowed down a bit in the amount of hay they have been going through.  The weather is supposed to get colder over the next couple of days though so we'll be blanketing some of the seniors today.  Still have to finish up deworming as well - we did a lot of them when we did feet last time but there are still lots more to do.  I have a couple of the horses here at the house that I'm not happy with their weight.  They will have their teeth done soon but in the meantime I'm going to deworm them with safe-guard and then eqvalan gold, make sure parasites aren't the problem.

I did some work on the website, moving a lot of the older and long-time resident mares from the adoption page to the foster or permanent resident pages.  Some of them have been here upwards of 8 or 10 years and are no longer good candidates for rehoming, either due to their age or lack of handling, or simply because it would be too stressful to uproot them at this point in their lives.  It would be so wonderful if we had unlimited funds and space to keep all the horses that come to us here permanently.  Unfortunately that's not the case so we do have to rehome when we can in order to make room for more animals needing help.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed so far towards decorating the tree for the animals!  We are at $9,135, almost to our goal of $10,000!
Thank you to Karen Graybern and Karen Middleton for your donations through United Way of Calgary and Area, and to Maria Dodsley, Kathy Estey, Cathryn Gough, Bonnie Edmunds, Michelle Forrieter, and Nishi Thusoo for your donations through the Cenovus Employee Foundation.

There was a little article on Bear Valley Rescue in this month's Equine Wellness Magazine - http://www.equinewellnessmagazine.com/articles/bear-valley-rescue/

We had the vet out for Beth this past week.  She'd been out of sorts and she'd gone off her feed a bit.  It turns out that, because she'd had a halter left on her that grew into her face, it affected the alignment of her jaws and teeth as she was growing.  She had a lot of really sharp points and needed her teeth floated badly - not what one would expect with a two-year-old horse but she's been through a lot in her short life.  She also has ulcers in both cheeks because of the sharp points.  The vet gave her a manual float and she'll have a proper power float in a couple of weeks once the ulcers have healed.  Beth is feeling so much better now!

Marvin's eye is improving, and of course it's not getting any easier to put the cream in his eye!  We are working on it though as it's going to take a while before his eye is completely healed.  Tyler also seems to be doing well, he hasn't had any more issues with his throat.

Thank you to Kendra for the donation of firewood - we filled up our 16' stock trailer and there's still more to pick up.  We heat all the buildings, including the feedroom, coop and barn, with wood.  Thank you to Terri Bodell for the donation of square bales, we picked up over 100 bales today.  Tomorrow we have the tree guy coming to take down a lot of poplar that are dead or dying in and around the paddocks.  We had a tree come down in a wind storm a month ago and it landed on one of our vehicles!  A couple of trees also came down on one of the fences, so we've decided we have to bite the bullet and pay to have some of the trees cut out that are most likely to cause damage if they come down, in addition to making it safer for the horses.  On the plus side, we'll have lots more firewood.

Our Christmas 'decorate the tree' fundraiser is off to a great start - $5425 raised so far - a huge thanks to everyone who has donated!  Wouldn't it be nice if we get the whole tree filled so we can start piling presents underneath it too.  Donating is so easy - you can donate online through the website (Canada Helps, ATB Cares, Paypal), through the mail by cheque, or on your cell phone through Mobile Giving (by texting HORSE to 20222). 

Thank you to: Cassandra, Colette, Linda-Lou, and Kim, who have donated feed so far through Mountain View Feed Company's 'Fill the Feedroom' event; Catalyst Changers for the $1,000 donation on behalf of their employees, customers and suppliers; Kristyn for the donation through Encana Cares; and to Four Feet Companion Foundation for the unexpected but very much appreciated $1,000 donation for the animals.

We would like to thank HorseJournals.com for their continued support, providing free advertising space for Bear Valley Rescue in their print and online publications.

Stiles left for his new home last weekend and he's fitting in wonderfully. 
Beth got up by herself on December 2nd!  She lay down in the yard in the sunshine and an hour later she was back up.  I'm disappointed I didn't see her get up as I'd like to have seen how she managed, but still, it's good news.

Tyler, the older Thoroughbred gelding who came in a couple of months ago, started having some issues.  I wasn't sure if he had a choke or cold or what, just had a bit of a cough and odd head tilt.  Our vet came out and was unable to tube him, there seemed to be some blockage up by his larynx.  Tyler is on antibiotics and bute for the time being to see if that helps.  If it doesn't help we'll have to take him in to the clinic to be scoped in order to see what is going on in his throat. 

Little Marvin, the pony, seriously injured his eye yesterday.  It was all pus-y and closed up.  Our vet came out (she seems to be here a lot!) to look at it.  He has a puncture above his eye and a laceration to the lower back part of his eyeball.  Hopefully it will heal up okay but he will have to be on meds for a while.  We'll see how long he's amenable to having cream put in his eye.  Good thing he's little! 

And in spite of being little, Marvin can jump!  He just jumped out of his paddock and took off back down to the main herd.  I think it was all Beth's fault, she was galloping (!) up and down the alleyway, and she bit him too.  Colleen, one of our volunteers, and I cornered Marvin in the bale yard and I led him back up to the house.  Now he's in the round pen, I'm pretty sure he can't jump THAT high.

We've been toiling through a very cold weather spell, seems like everything takes so much more time and energy with the snow and -20 to -30 temps!  We're spending most of our time making sure everyone has lots to eat and is keeping as warm and dry as possible.  The horses certainly don't seem to mind the cold as much as we do, they have been very playful and spirited!

We are starting December with one of our major fundraising events of the year - decorating the tree for the animals!  We can't do what we without the support of everyone out there and are so thankful for that support.  We've set a goal of $10,000 for this Christmas, we hope we can meet or even excede that!  You can donate through Paypal, Canada Helps, ATB Cares, or, new this year, through Mobile Giving Foundation for $5, $10, $20, or $25 by texting HORSE to 20222, starting on December 2nd, to a maximum of $30/month!  Plus there's always the old standby - cheque by mail!  With the 'text to donate' there are no fees to you, the donor, or to Bear Valley.  You can even get a direct tax receipt for your donation by visiting http://receipt.mobilegiving.ca.  Also, on December 2nd, Giving Tuesday, donations made through Canada Helps using Interac with be matched up to $25 by Interac!

Getting back to the horses and other animals, finally we have everyone home for the winter.  That's such a load off our minds, having everyone back here and in one place.  We got most of the new corrals at the main herd set up, and it's worked great as we had Pat our farrier here this past week trimming (a new record, close to 80 horses done and that was even with having to cancel one day due to the weather!) and we used the new set-up to separate the horses we were working on.  I think there were 8 or 9 youngsters that had their first trims and they were great.

Emmy the Paso mare that came to us in January turned out to be pregnant.  She's already 19 and has suspensory ligament problems and had a foal last year so it was quite a shock to realize she was expecting again, and in winter at that.  Her little foal, Duncan, was born on November 20th but sadly passed away on November 22nd.  He was unable to stand by himself, and though we did everything we could it was to no avail.

A couple of other sad notes: Katmandu, a gentle old gelding, was euthanized at his foster home.  He was in his thirties and his last few years were spent being a first horse to a little girl who loved him a lot.  And we were saddened to learn of the tragic sudden passing of Gypsy Too, a beautiful draft mare that came to Bear Valley as a filly a number of years ago and was adopted out to a wonderful couple, Tammy and Dave.
We took in a 25 year old gelding last month, Gypsy (#5!).  He's older but sure doesn't act it!  Colton and Stiles have been adopted, we're really happy for both of them as they will being going to great homes.  Colton and Stiles also both had their teeth floated - poor Colton turned out to have such sharp points he had ulcers in both cheeks.  He's feeling a lot better now!  Pet, our oldest resident at 38 years, gave us quite a scare last week when she had a choking episode.  So thankful to our vet, Dr. Erickson, for rushing over right away!  She managed to dislodge the blockage and though Pet was sore for couple of days she is fine now.

We have 2 birthday girls to thank for donations from their birthdays - Tristen Rangen and Soleil Miner.  Thank you both for your thoughtfulness!  The horses appreciate it!

Our local feed supplier, Mountain View  Feed Company, has created a wonderful opportunity for donors to make a feed donation to the Rescue.  They also just donated 10 bags of organic oats to the Rescue.  Thank you Matt and Sandra!

Our thanks also to buysellbyphoto.com Red Deer for the free ad placements, and to Laura and Stephanie for doing up the ads!

A reminder that we have Debra Garside wild horse calendars for sale - a portion of the proceeds is being donated to Bear Valley.  They make great Christmas gifts!  Also Pomegranate gifting calendars are a wonderful way to donate to lots of wonderful causes at any time of year.

Check out the news and events page for some great upcoming events in 2015 benefiting the Rescue!
Also coming up is Giving Tuesday, December 2nd.  And you can create your own fundraising campaign for Bear Valley Rescue through Canada Helps - check out their campaign creation page by clicking on the 'fundraise now' button!  We'll also be starting our 'fill the Christmas tree for the animals' fundraiser on December 1st - we had great success last year from all of your, our supporters, and filled TWO trees!

We were so thankful for the extended lovely fall weather but now winter is here full force!  About a foot of snow fell over the last day and the temperatures sure dropped.  We got a lot (but not all unfortunately!) of the fencing done and we're hoping the weather will improve by the end of the week so we can get more done, maybe even get it ALL done, plus we HAVE to get a couple of shelters built.  Today we have to brave the roads to try and get the remaining 20 or so horses still out on pasture back to the Rescue.  One trip we had to do we were able to put off to the weekend, thank goodness, as it would have involved driving east of Calgary and back with a couple of side trips in between.
We had 2 intakes last week, both Thoroughbreds, made possible through the efforts of quite a few people both before and after their arrival!  Thank you to Mary Ellen Lickfold, Jaclyn Skorpack, Marcie Thompson, Evelyn Sabraw (R3 Equine Rehab) and friends, Renee Ptolemy and Terri Bodell for helping save these horses and secure their future (and shine a light on their past):
Tucker is from the auction, he's a big, beautiful dark bay/brown gelding, about 12 years old.  Tucker was run through the auction with absolutely no information at all and was being bid on by only the meat buyer.  Tucker seems very friendly and quiet (especially for a Thoroughbred!), was obviously raced as he has blistering on his cannon bone and a lip tattoo.  He doesn't appear to be unsound but we'll have to see.  We will try and trace his tattoo - by what I figure it is, he'd be from Illinois.  Not sure how likely that would be?  He's already had his teeth floated and is putting on weight.
Tyler is an older sorrel gelding, supposed to be 19 years of age.  Someone became concerned because he wasn't being cared for or fed properly and was very underweight, especially with winter coming (which it sure did!).  The owner apparently got Tyler for free on kijiji as a companion for his mare but they didn't get along, and the owner was not making any attempt to care for him.  We were able to trace his tattoo and his registered name is Little Taylor and he's actually 24 years old.  Tyler is in poor condition but we've already had his teeth floated (he still has all his teeth, which is good) and he's looking better every day with the extra rations he's getting and all the hay he can eat. 

Speaking of teeth floating, Chanel, Colton and Russa also had their teeth floated this past week.  Russa has so few teeth that they don't meet up so she needs annual dental work to keep them even.  Colton, even though he's only 7, had a lot of sharp points (as did both Tyler and Tucker) and Colton also had ulcers on both cheeks as a result.  Poor guy must have been very uncomfortable but he'll do much better now.

Esperanza's adoption has been finalized and Felicity has been adopted. Zaz came back last week from his foster home, thank you Carolyn for having him for the last year and a half as a companion to your horse, and then Zaz left on the weekend to a new foster home to be a companion to a blind horse, thank you Anne!
We have a sponsor for Colton, hank you Jennifer Graydon for sponsoring Colton!

Sadly we had to say goodbye to Munsie a couple of weeks ago.  Munsie was a cute little mare that came from an estate dispersal a couple of years ago.  She was pregnant at the time and had a sweet little foal, Thunder, born that spring, but little Thunder was premature and though he seemed to be doing well he only lived 2 short weeks before passing away.  Munsie was unsound when she came in to the Rescue and she had ongoing issues with abscesses that progressively got worse.  It became apparent that there wasn't going to be any improvement and we had to make the decision to let her go.  Thank you to Janine, her foster, for caring for Munsie over the last few months, and to Julie, of Julie's Natural Hoof Trimming, for her work on Munsie.

I'm going to try and post more often so I don't have to remember so much at once of what has been happening.  We have had two intakes. Stiles is a lovely Thoroughbred gelding.  He's huge, but a gentle giant.  Donovan is a return, due to health and financial reasons.  He's a 3 year old Quarter Horse gelding (can be registered), very friendly and well started with ground work.  We are also expecting 2 new Thoroughbred mares in this Saturday.  Felicity's adoption is confirmed, and we're delivering Catch, Nemo and Bhodi to their new home tomorrow. 

Today we picked up a big load of firewood, thank you to Anne and Glen for the wood, and Anne and Peter for helping load it.  We filled the 16' stock trailer to the top.  Of course now we have to unload it all, too, darn.

Mike is SO happy, he finally finished hauling home the 835 round bales from our one supplier.  That's one big project that is off his plate, though we do still have 50 or 60 more rounds and several hundred squares coming from other suppliers.  Now he's back to paddock cleaning and rushing to get all the other things done that need to be complete before winter.

We moved seventeen horses to another pasture that has been donated for a few weeks, and we've brought a number of other horses home as well.  Thank you Anne and Glen for helping with the hauling, and the horses were all so good for the moving too.  It's always nice when they're cooperative and well-behaved! 

The volunteers held a special volunteer lunch on the 11th.  We have such a great group of volunteers, some that have been with us for years and some that are brand new.  Everyone brought something to the lunch, which was fantastic, and some recipes were shared. 

Thank you to Katrina and Bev from Rocky Mountain House for the donation of square bales.  Thanks Katrina as well for loading and hauling it down to us, and helping to unload as well.  Thanks to Charlene and family for bringing over a load of pumpkins for the pigs, they certainly enjoyed them.  Thank you to Karen, one of our volunteers, for purchasing a 'Back on Track' blanket for Beth.  Beth looks pretty snazzy in it and it may help her too.

We did get Mesa and Pinkerton gelded, and they've already healed up with no swelling at all.  We have a bout of ringworm going through their little group so they're in quarantine until it clears up. 

We received the Husky Employees Foundation grant.  Our sincere thanks to the ladies who worked so hard to get us into the program for 2013, it's just really unfortunate that Husky decided to cancel the program the next year!  But we do very much appreciate the support we got for that one year.

Once again we'd like to thank the Donner Canadian Foundation for their ongoing support. 

Wow, over 2 months since the last update!  I hope I don't forget to mention anyone or anything.

I usually start with adoptions, so here goes..   

We've had quite a few adoptions recently, which is always great news -  Thor, Count Decost, Ginny, Vita, Catch, Nemo, Ferrero, Zip, Oats, Spitfire, Yuma, Gabby, Valour, Clancy, Gizmo, Elvis and Bhodi.  Both Count Decost and Oats went straight to a new homes as soon as they came in.  Zip was a return and also went straight to a new home.  Other intakes we've had are: Mesa, a wildie colt with a huge umbilical hernia; Kokanee, a standardbred gelding; and Heathcote, an unsound 2 yr old Akhal Teke gelding (there's a breed I never thought we'd see here!).

I'm really happy to say Rain has a new home, with Ginny!  She's been here a long time, so it's especially nice that she has her own person now.  Macie and Kahlua are back from summer foster, thank you Carol for hauling them back home for us. Two other long-term fosters came back - Cash#2 the saddlebred gelding and Mugsy the old pony mare.  Cash seems to have possibly a stifle injury and his weight is not good.  Our vet will be checking him out next week.  Mugsy came back looking great, thank you Stella for looking after her so well.  Mugsy was companion for the last couple of years to Stella's own old pony mare until she was put down this fall.  Colton was returned after being adopted for only a short time and Elmo, a wildie who was adopted out back in 2009, came back as well, though unfortunately it would seem he's had little handling in the last 5 years.  Though Vita was adopted that fell through rather quickly so she's once again up for adoption.  Chanel has come back (her previous sponsor Kerry is very happy about that!) because she is not sound and a lot older than we'd originally thought.  She has joined Sasha, Munsie, Joanie and Monkey at Janine's (Larosa Home of Rest for Horses).  We took in a beautiful bronze turkey hen, thank you Sasha Ladawn and her husband for outbidding everyone else in a raffle to win her and save her life as she was supposed to be someone's turkey dinner! 

Lucky#1, Sebastian, Marta and Voodoo were out for a short period of time for training but didn't have much done with them before they came back a few weeks later due to personal circumstances.  Thank you Shelly for the time you did spend with them.  The six youngsters who were out for summer school, Rasta, Gizmo, Quentin, Morgan, Zora and Marnie, have come back now, with lots of experience under their belts (or cinches!), with Gizmo already adopted out.  Quentin needs more work on his hind feet as he is quite kicky, but with time we should be able to get him past that.  They've all done haltering, leading, tying, had stuff on their back and under their feet, etc.  We took Roche, Twix and Snickers to fall school now for the same sort of handling, thank you to everyone who contributing to their schooling.  They'll be a bit more work though as they are new to the Rescue and pretty well unhandled, save for Twix who had a bit of work done with her by our volunteers. Thank you Susanne for the work you are doing with these youngsters!  Hershey as well has gone out on foster for handling (he went with Clancy's adopters).  It looks like Trixie, Kirby and Felicity may stay at Marcie and Christian's for the winter to continue their training if we can get sponsors for them. Thank you to the ladies who have already sponsored Trixie's stay.  There is a possible adoption in the works for Felicity, so if that goes through only Kirby is still looking for sponsors.  If anyone would like to sponsor Kirby at $100/month (or any portion thereof) please indicate that on your donation when you send it in.  Estelle, Tivio, Boston, Powder and Salsa are staying on at Trendsetting Stables in Androssan to continue their training.  Spitfire was adopted from that group last month.

We were saddened to learn of the passing of Sharon Neary.  Sharon was prior owner of Wolf, one of our adoptees, and Old Red, who was one of our senior residents until his passing last year.  Thank you for the bequests in her memory.
We also received a donation in memory of Teresa Henry, and in memory of Nomad and Ramilika.  We had 3 different birthday donations, thank you Scott Bell, Cole Mclean, and Jacob Chisholm!  It's usually the girls who are horse crazy, so it's really nice to see this thoughtfulness from young men as well!

We were very busy in September fencing the new bale yard.  With over 800 round bales coming in for the winter we needed a better place to store the hay.  There's been a nice influx of new volunteers so we've been able to get lots done around the Rescue in the maintenance and clean-up departments.  The day to day care of the animals takes up so much time that things that need to be done outside those vital chores tend to get put aside and before long become an overwhelming list. Also with all the rain we had over the spring and summer, some things like paddock clean-up couldn't be done until things dried up, which they are FINALLY starting to do (in time for winter!).  Now we are starting to bring home the horses from the various summer pastures.  It is nice to have them back home and in one place, but the down side is that it also means we have to start feeding hay.

Lots of people to thank and I'm sure I'm going to miss someone important -
Cheryl Emblau for the senior feed
Horse n' Around in Red Deer for the nice halters and leads
Terri Bodell for the hay
The Tack Collector in Calgary for the great on-going support and the donations through your patrons
Merlin Integrated Solutions
Allardyce Bower Consulting
Gordon R. McLeod Fund at The Calgary Foundation
Christine from The Horse Store in Calgary
Jose Fornelli for the small blanket
Karen McLaren for the vet wrap
Sylvia, Amanda, Brad, Arlene and others for the sidewalk sale held in Sundre that raised over $800!
Equine Wellness Magazine - we were rescue of the month for September!
SOAAR - Supporters of Alberta Animal Rescues - for the donation towards our vet bill
Karen Allen for the special blankets for Beth
Spruce Meadows Masters for the feed - special thanks to John Garner, Lisa Murphy, and Laura Day

Photographer Debra Garside (http://www.sableislandhorses.ca/) has a beautiful 2015 calendar for sale of Sable Island and Alberta Wild Horses.  She has very graciously chosen Bear Valley Rescue to donate a portion of the sales proceeds to.  If you would like to order one of these calendars you can order them through the Rescue - email us at [email protected].  They are $26.50 each plus postage.

I was interviewed by Vets to Go Radio (http://vetstogoradio.com/) on Sept 7th, 2014, episode 48 (my interview starts at 22:00 minutes) about Bear Valley Rescue and our origins.  You can listen to the interview on their website, just scroll down the page to that episode.  Their show airs every Sunday between 11 am and noon on Calgary AM770 Radio.

Mike and I, along with a number of our volunteers, were able to take a day and go up to Lake Louise to Timberline Tours for a 2 hour trial ride. Paul and Sue Peyto from Timberline are great supporters of the Rescue and wonderful horse people.  They have adopted a number of our horses and we got to ride some of them!  It was a beautiful day, the scenery was breathtaking and we really enjoyed ourselves.

There has been a rash of foot abscesses affecting the horses, probably again due to all the moisture we had this year.  Penelope, Toby, Munsie and several others have had them.  Several of the younger pigs had a serious bout of some sort of respiratory illness, with Penny being the sickest.  Thankfully we caught it in time and after a few injections of antibiotics (now that was quite the experience, trying to give them shots!) they all recovered within a few days.  Our guinea hen decided to go hide in the forest and hatch some eggs and she came home with 16 keats (baby guineas) in tow!  Wilbur the cow had an eye infection and had to go into the vet, thanks Krystle for watching over him.  Joanie's leg has continued to fester so we had it debrided.  Unfortunately we don't know that we're any further ahead with in now either.  Thank you Janine for continuing to deal with it and with Monkey's leg as well (and Munsie's abscesses). 

The vet is coming out next week, we have Pinkerton and Mesa to geld and several teeth floatings to do.  Mike is still working on hauling home the round bales, he's almost half way done, then we have some square bales we have to pick up and also we have to finish moving the rest of the horses home before the snow flies.

We are in the running for a CREB (Calgary Real Estate Board) grant of $10,000.  Members of CREB can vote daily for a charity and the top 5 in each of 3 categories get a grant.  If you are, or know of any, realtor members of CREB please have them vote for Bear Valley!  Here's the link to the contest - http://www.calgaryrealtorscare.org/investinginhope/Nominees/Vulnerable_Populations/Bear_Valley/

WHOAS (Wild Horses of Alberta Society) will have their 2015 calendar on sale soon, available through their website or locally at the following locations:
Olds UFA
General Store, Water Valley
Sundre Museum
Millarville Christmas Market (Nov 6, 7 and 8)
Cremona Winterfest (Dec 6)
Olds Fashioned Christmas
There will be additional locations where the calendars will be available, posted on their facebook page.

We were heartbroken to learn of the passing on Fonda (Gracie), the draft filly, due to colic.  Our condolences to Rachel and family.  Also Maydie, a filly with a crooked foot who came to the Rescue in 2012 as a weanling, was euthanized at her foster home late this summer.  Thank you Jen for fostering her.