OUR HORSES |
|
|---|---|
|
BELLA BELLA is a beautiful girl – hence her name (Bella means “beautiful girl” in Italian). As a matter of fact, it’s Bella’s picture that appears in the Tierra Madre logo. When she got here, she had horrible back problems. Dr. Bill Wood, one of the best veterinarian/equine chiropractors anywhere, said it looked like she’d fallen off a truck or something for her back to be that bad. He fixed her up, though, and she’s good as new. She also has a big, swollen right foreknee that indicates a bad injury sustained back in her racing days. Doesn’t seem to bother her at all, though. As a matter of fact, Bella is – without doubt – the fastest horse at Tierra Madre. She’s capable of blinding speed and has often raced Hudson around the arena – she has no trouble passing him on the outside. Our guess is that she was once a darned good sprinter. She used to live in a large pen with Hudson, but was kind of overshadowed by his galoot-ness. She now lives alone in her own large stall and her beauty and personality just shines through. Except at feeding time. Then she turns into a dervish, chasing the horses on either side of her away like she hasn’t eaten in a week. Even though it’s been maybe three hours. As soon as her food is delivered, it’s back to being the beautiful one. If a name ever properly fit a horse, it’s Bella. Ciao, Bella. |
 |
BENTLEY BENTLEY Is a big, big guy. He’s black. He’s a Thoroughbred. He stands nearly 18 hands tall and weighed in the last time at 1490 lbs. Bentley is none-too-subtle, either. When he wants his head, neck, back or butt scratched, he simply walks in front of you and blocks out the sun. “Scratch, yo!” As big as he is, he’s nowhere near the leader of the herd and, truth be told, gets pushed around by several of the other horses. He does have his little cadre of a herd-within-a-herd, though. One-eyed Tarzan hangs with him continuously – Bentley acts as Tarzan’s other eye and serves as his early-warning system should another horse try to get stupid with Tarzan. Kiss is also part of Bentley’s posse and Suzie Q isn’t often far away. Bentley has the most expressive eyes of all the kids in the field. When he’s happy or contented, his eyes are very soft and gentle. When he doesn’t want company or if he’s not particularly happy with whatever’s going on around him at the moment, he glares at you with unbridled fire in his eyes. If you don’t read his eyes, be fully prepared for that big head to whirl toward you, led by a worthy set of choppers. Not that he ever bites, but that means he ain’t backward about being forward when the urge hits him. When Bentley gets to running and jumping and kicking around the field, you can feel the ground vibrate. True thundering hooves. |
 |
CHARLIE & MINI ME CHARLIE and MINI ME…..the odd couple. The very odd couple. Charlie is huge – the largest horse we have. He’s 18 hands tall (that’s six feet at the withers…..just standing, his head is a good eight feet off the ground) and weighed in the last time at 1540 lbs. His stablemate, MiniMe, stands about seven hands (28 inches at the withers) and weighs around 260 lbs. (and he could stand to lose a few, too). They’re inseparable. When Charlie first got here, he was one of the unhappiest horses I’ve ever encountered. I’d known him for a year or so before he came and used to stand in the back corner of the stall with his head in the corner. Didn’t trust people one bit. My belief is that, because he’s so big, while he was on the racetrack and even after he came off it, he was roughly led around with a stud chain over his nose. Not hard to control a horse whose nose is being brutalized. So we’ve let Charlie be a horse for the past couple of years and he’s responded famously. He’s always up at the front of his pen and doesn’t meet a stranger he doesn’t like. Stud chain? Uh, no. Sometimes Charlie and I take a walk without his even wearing a halter and lead rope. We just walk around free. Min never met a flake of hay he didn’t like. He will eat anything that won’t eat him first. We work hard to keep his weight down and have succeeded pretty well, though it seems he can put on pounds just by looking at food. He’s a funny little guy who is convinced he’s every bit as big as every other horse on the ranch. He’s pretty well convince the others of that, too. Certainly his personality is as big as anybody’s. So, back to the odd couple…..MiniMe is Oscar to Charlie’s Felix. |
 |
DAWN DAWN is my little girl. She’s a small (maybe 15-hand) white Arabian mare. Well, not really white – they call it “flea-bitten grey” (ugh!). Dawnie is the Queen of the May. She has a lock on Jim’s heart & knows it. She loves to be scratched & can be very demanding & exacting in just where she wants to be scratched & for how long. She simply points to the specific location with her muzzle (left rear thigh, right flank, etc.). If you’re more than a few inches off, she shows you the error of your ways by whirling her head toward the offending hand, ears back & teeth bared. Not that she’d ever really bite, but her little display of intimidation makes her displeasure quite clear. “Not there, you idiot, there, like I told you!” In the Summer, it’s every square inch of her tummy. Other times during the year, you can’t go wrong with a good five minute butt-scratch. Because she’s Queen of the May, Dawnie is often somewhat aloof around the other horses. She might have to live with them, but she doesn’t necessarily have to hang out on the street corner with them, so to speak. |
 |
GUESS GUESS is one of the world’s great dames. A perfectly-proportioned 16-2 Thoroughbred with a beautiful face and a true alpha personality (her nickname is The Queen Bee), she’s one of the great loves of my life. I met Guess a few years ago when she was at The Horse Rescue of North Scottsdale. Holly had asked me to work with some of the Thoroughbreds in hopes they would become good trail horses, leading to a better chance of finding a good home. I worked with Guess (who is one of the best trail horses I’ve ever met) and we developed a mutual love affair. Alas, one thing led to another and I had to move back to Los Angeles and Guess had to go to a new home. I cried when we parted. Fast forward three years. In the Spring of 2006, Holly called one day and asked me if I remembered Guess. “Remember her? She’s one of the great loves of my life!” Holly said her human could no longer keep her and would I be interested in giving her a home. “When can she be here?”, I asked. “Two hours.” When I went into the trailer to lead her off she looked me in the eye and buried her head in my chest. “You’re home for good, baby girl.” And she is and she will be for as long as both of us are still breathing. |
 |
HEIGHTEN Some friends of mine acquired Heighten a few years ago and asked me to train him to be a good trail horse. The problem was, nearly every time I got on him, he bucked his fool head off. He told me he was in pain and I relayed that to his humans. I told them I’d have Dr. William Wood, one of the premier veterinarian/equine chiropractors anywhere, to look at him if he were my horse. Well, they didn’t. A couple of years later, Heighten’s humans came to me and told me that because he was unridable, they’d gotten another horse or two and had to get rid of Heighten. Would we take him here? Sure, but Dr. Wood needed to be brought in. Dr. Wood said Heighten must’ve fallen over the inside rail on the track or something because his back was in such horrible shape. But it was surely fixable. After an hour or so of his magic, Dr. Wood declared Heighten good to go. The first time I got up on Heighten after his treatment, he bucked me straight off. I said, “Dude, your back is fixed. It won’t hurt anymore.” I got back up on him and I swear I heard him say, “Wow, this is great.” Heighten now loves to be ridden and he’s never seen a trail he didn’t like. What a terrific feeling it is to see a young horse go from a life of pain and misery to a life of joy and happiness. Good for Heighten. He deserves it. |
 |
HUDSON HUDSON is a big galoot. Big and strong-boned and beautiful, he’s a Thoroughbred with some of the best breeding ever – Bold Ruler, Mr. Prospector, Raise A Native, Foolish Pleasure - the list goes on. With that breeding, he should have been a superstar in the racing world. Ah, but remember, he’s a big galoot. Hudson kind of lives in his own happy world and doesn’t pay much attention to the things he’s supposed to be doing. So it’s easy to imagine him in the starting gate with the bells going off and the gates flying open and a stampede of horses bolting down the track and him just standing there thinking, “Why, that’s a pretty bird over there. Wonder where all those guys are going in such a hurry.” Must have thrilled his connections no end. He’s a real mild-mannered galoot, though. Under saddle, you can hear him asking, “Oh, you want to go over there? Okay.” And then he’ll amble off in the direction the rider was thinking and asking of him. No problem. Just don’t ask him to get there in a hurry, though. In his mind, that destination will still be there when he gets there. And he’s right. We could all learn a lot about dealing with life from Hudson. |
JANI JANI is a very sweet Quarter Horse mare in her late teens. Her folks – very nice people who are good friends of the Sanctuary – couldn’t keep her any longer &, given that she has ringbone in one of her hooves, wanted to make certain she had a good, loving home & wouldn’t be made to work hard. Jani has been a hard worker all her life – she’s jumped, run barrels, given lessons & been a trail horse – so she certainly has nothing left to prove to us two-leggeds. She was kind of reserved when she got here (“What’s going on & why am I here?”), but she’s settled in very nicely & loves to romp around the arena every couple of days. And nobody, but nobody, enjoys a good meal like Jani. She’s what is referred to as a “good doer” - & that’s putting it mildly. She’s in one of the ‘in-n-outs’ in the barn now, right next to the breezeway where we humans often hang out so she’s getting a lot of attention. And little Jani’s becoming downright gregarious. You don’t suppose it has anything to do with her proximity to the treat can, do you? Nah. |
|
 |
JOHNNY B. GOODE JOHNNY B. GOODE is the leader, or itancan, of the herd of ten horses that live in Tierra Madre’s pasture. Of his leadership there is no doubt, although John’s reign is characterized by his low-keyed confidence, subtlety and keen sense of fun. John arrived from Los Angeles on a truck one day with Jericho, another of the horses in the herd. I knew, and was great friends with, Jericho back when we were both associated with a riding stable at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center. John came from the same stable, but I didn’t know him at all. He got off the truck with no history and no name. Just a 16-hand dark bay Thoroughbred with an oversized right knee and a scar on his face that looks like he might have gone through a plate glass window sometime in his anonymous past. I called him Johnny B. Goode in honor of the great Chuck Berry. He had obviously been on the racetrack at some point because he has a tattoo that also tells us he was foaled in 2000. John always gets his hay first, directly in front of the water tank adjacent to the gate. See, John likes to dunk his hay in the water, thus affording us the opportunity to clean and refill it every morning as it’s full of hay and the water is green due to the cholorphyll leaching out of it. He’s always there to help, though, by either holding the cleaning brush or the hose in his teeth. He also loves to dunk one of his toys - an orange traffic cone - in and out of the tank, splashing water everywhere. Most mornings, there’s a beat-up cone lying deep in the murky green water. John also looks quite dapper in a cowboy hat. |
 |
KISS KISS, whose given name is Kiss the Spot (?!?), is a 17-hand big, gangly Saddlebred, who spent most of his prior life as a show horse. As such, he lived primarily in box stalls in barns and was pretty much always spotless and groomed to within an inch of his life. When Kiss was introduced into the field, he couldn’t believe the scruffy group of hooligans who greeted him. “But I’m a show horse”, he said. “Back of the line, chump”, was John’s rejoinder. It took ol’ Kiss quite a while to realize that he, too, was now a scruffy hooligan. But he’s adapted quite well. Not all the way – probably never will – he’s a little like Tony Bennett thrown in with a posse of rappers, but he holds his own and has found ways to be a darned happy guy. He was a little nippy for quite a while, but not in a bad way. Horses have a habit of lightly nipping each other when they’re happy together – the term “love bites” comes close. The problem is that humans aren’t very partial to horses’ love bites – they have a tendency to hurt a little. Anyway, Kiss was the king of love bites. He’s pretty much gotten over it now, though. I didn’t do anything in particular to make him stop, like yelling at him or giving him a rap on the shnoz – just didn’t give him a horizontal surface and made sure my hand was in position to gently push him away when he thought about nipping. He hangs out with Bentley and Tarzan and Suze and Venture when he feels like hanging out with some of the others – and that ain’t half bad considering where’s he come from and the difficulty he initially had in adapting. Who knew Tony Bennett could be happy hanging out with Wu Tang Clan? |
M’STOR M’STOR broke his knee in a race at Turf Paradise in Phoenix in the fall of 2006. A slab fracture, where the bone fractures like an earthquake – part of it just separates from itself. Bad injury. He was only three years old. He was here the next day. It was either come here or get loaded onto a truck to the slaughterhouse in Texas. The universe brought him here. Lucky for all of us. The doctor said at the time that three things could happen: it would heal well enough for him to be ridden easily at a walk or slow trot some day; it would heal enough for him to have a comfortable life in the pasture; or it wouldn’t heal and he’d lose his life. It’s healed remarkably well and the doc said he has 90 percent flexibility in the knee. Yay! When he first got here, M’Stor didn’t know how to behave around humans. He’d try to bite all the time and didn’t want to be touched at all. He’d probably gone from being a young, young horse directly into the rather impersonal (for the horses) and very demanding world of horse racing. But, like his broken knee, that behavior is all in his past. He’s now the most loving guy – I often stand with him, our faces pressed together, my arms around his neck, the two of us silently sharing our secrets. Wherever we’ve been, whatever we’ve both been through, passing between our spirits. And, for that moment, it’s just the two of us in the world. |
|
MOOSE MOOSE is the Chairman-Emeritus of the place. He lives in the field with nine other horses and is the senior member of the herd. Moose is a National Showhorse (isn’t that the most presumptive breed name you’ve ever heard?!?), which is really a cross between a Saddlebred and an Arabian. Moose used to be a show horse – until his previous owner was no longer able to devote the time, attention or financial resources to him that he deserved (she was a 2nd year law student at USC at the time). By the way, she has been active in animal rescue for a number of years and the decision to turn Moose over to us was not one made lightly. We still keep in touch and it’s nice that that thread of love runs through Moose’s life. Moose has good medicine. Although Johnny B. Goode is the day-to-day leader of the herd, he spends most afternoons following Moose around, his nose just off Moose’s rear flank. This is John’s way of showing Moose’s exalted place in the herd, albeit a psychic and spiritual place, not an overtly physical one. Oh, when Moose wants to go somewhere or wants a particular flake of hay, all he has to do is lower his head and pin back his ears a little. Moose is teaching John that it’s all in the attitude. Moose has Cushing’s disease, which is being well treated with proper medication. Doesn’t seem to slow him down when he wants to move. Not long ago, Solo and he were chasing around the field and Moose was rapidly closing in on the two-foot tall, four-foot long 100-gallon water tank at a dead run. He simply jumped it longways and kept going. Moose rules. |
|
 |
MR. BERNIE RIVERS MR. BERNIE RIVERS’ given name is Benson River, but that name just sort of morphed into Mr. Bernie Rivers, in honor of the gentleman who runs the Galeville Grocery in Liverpool, NY. Nice man. Nice horse. Mr. Bernie Rivers is one of the most beautiful young Thoroughbreds you’ll ever see, standing over 17 hands tall, deep chestnut with a huge white blaze on his kisser & two knee-high white socks on his hind legs. A couple (very strange people) lived near us & said they were moving & had to find a home for Ol’ Bernie. We said, fine, but the only place we have for him right now is in the herd – would that pose a problem? No, said they, he lives in a pasture with other horses now. He had a bowed tendon but it was now healed. He came in about 200 pounds underweight. That should’ve tipped us off. Within 30 minutes of him being in with the herd, he couldn’t put his left foreleg to the ground. We got him out of there & had the vet out. Dr. Rollins said, “This wasn’t a bowed tendon. This is far, far worse than that. He must have suffered a grievous injury on the racetrack.” He has arthritis in his pastern, his cannon bone, his coffin bone & his sesamoid. He’s now by himself in a large pen & we keep him in a nice tight standing wrap most of the time, but we’re steadily weaning him off that as his leg slowly heals. The best we can hope for is for all that arthritis to grow together, thereby giving him a form of internal cast. It’s another case of humans not being honest & forthright in telling us Mr. Bernie Rivers’ situation. We’d have taken him in no matter what, but a little honesty surely would have saved him an awful lot of pain. Despite all of his trials & tribulations, there isn’t a sweeter or gentler horse at the Sanctuary than Mr. Bernie Rivers. And, needless to say, he eats like a horse & has put that 200 pounds back on. |
 |
SOLO SOLO, a Saddlebred, purports to be #2 in the herd hierarchy. I say “purports” because although his leadership may come in time, he has a lot to learn. He still thinks leadership is all about physical presence & intimidation. He’s learning from John & Moose but, truth be told, the others think of him a bit as a wiseass & kind of a bully. He has fun, though. We have one of those big blue plastic barrels & Solo often rolls it around the field, pushing it with his nose. He can get the thing going pretty fast & trots behind it sending all over the place. Everybody else scatters when Solo is on the loose with his barrel. He loves to play with the water tanks & can spend endless minutes kicking them with his front hoof, watching the water slosh around. His sense of timing is remarkable & it usually sounds like somebody beating a big bass drum to a perfect rhythm. Under saddle, there is nobody better. Solo has a a slow, smooth, steady trot that can last for days & his canter is equally as smooth & reliable. Once he & the rider properly connect (& he doesn’t suffer fools gladly), he’s magical. One of his front teeth has a big chip broken off & I sometimes accuse him from coming from a trailer park. |
 |
SUZIE Q SUZIE Q is a big, beautiful dark bay Thoroughbred, just under 17 hands tall. We rescued her from a woman who was desperate to get a horse for the show ring. Not to show off the horse, mind you, but to show off herself. A really nasty piece of work. Shortly after this woman got her, Suze developed a hairline fracture of the right front sesamoid bone. “What?!?”, the woman shrieked. “I don’t want a horse with a broken foot!” I did and said so and Suze was ours on the spot. Suzie loves to be loved. She can’t get enough rubbing and scratching and just buries her nose in the crook of your arm. She also loves water. She always “helps” with the water tanks and is personally responsible for the irretrievable loss of thousands of gallons (she always pulls the hose out when you’re not looking). And when it’s hot and we spray them down, Suze thinks it’s her personal shower time. If she’s not getting sprayed directly, she conveniently steps on the hose and nobody gets wet ‘til she’s good and wet again. When she first was introduced into the field, Dawnie couldn’t stand her. They’d be maybe 100 feet apart and all of a sudden, Dawn would get a notion in her pretty little head and charge clear across the field just to bite Suze in the butt. It was funny to everybody but Suzie. Now, they get along pretty well and hang out together often though Dawn, about two-thirds the size of Suze, is still the boss-lady. Suze doesn’t mind. |
 |
SWEET BOY SWEET BOY must have been really badly abused somewhere along the line. Oh, he’s happy now and a lot more trusting than he was when he first got here, but he must have one nasty story to tell. First of all, he must have had a human that was brutal when saddling him – kicked him in the belly, yanked hard and fast on the cinch – something like that. Because whenever you put a saddle on him he whipped that ol’ head around pretty violently. He’s getting a lot better because we are always as gentle as possible but it’s pretty obvious that old scars run deep. He was very headshy and didn’t want anybody to touch him. He was downright nippy and obstreperous on a simple lead rope. A real loner. A sadness in his eyes. And he has the most unique eyes – they’re light brown so you can read almost his every emotion. Realizing he had a lot of adjusting to do, we decided to just let him be a horse for a year or so with no other pressures. It seems to be working because the nippiness is gone and he leads quite nicely. It’s about time to get a saddle on him again because once you get past all the problems of tacking him, he’s a terrific horse – walks, trots and canters virtually on command and does each with grace. Oh, that sadness in his eyes? It’s been replaced by mischievouness. And that’s so nice to see. The story of Sweet Boy raises the ever-present question: Why do so many two-leggeds have to be so mean to horses when all they really want to do is please them? |
 |
TARZAN TARZAN is an enigma. I wish I knew his whole story, but it must not be a pretty one. Tarzan is a big, robust Quarter horse and he’s blind in his left eye. The woman who dropped him off said he’d been a champion rodeo horse – a hazer for a calf-roping team. And she said he’d gotten blinded in a trailer accident seven years earlier. Tarzan tells quite a different story. First, when Tarzan got here, he continually craned his neck so he could see everything with his one good eye. Horses, like people, learn to adjust. Two-and-a-half years after Tarzan arrived, he’s begun to adjust pretty well. But he hadn’t been blind for seven years, like the woman said. Nor had he been injured in a trailer accident. If that had been the case, Tarzan would never go near a trailer again. We’ve had him in a trailer twice and each time he’s walked straight in, pretty as you please. But you can’t get anywhere near him with a rake. Nope, Tarzan tells us the woman lied. Tarzan had been blinded in that eye just prior to his being dropped off – and he’d been nailed by a rake or something like it. Horses don’t lie. Tarzan still doesn’t want virtually anything to do with humans. I can sidle up to him and pet his right side now and then and he’ll take carrots and treats pretty well, but that’s after two-plus years of daily close proximity to him. Tarzan must have spent years being brutalized by a human or humans in one way or another. He’s contented now, though. And you can tell he’d like to trust somebody. It’ll happen on his time, though, and not a minute beforehand. |
 |
VENTURE AND JERICHO We put VENTURE and JERICHO together because these two guys are virtually inseparable. They live in the field and are sort of in the middle of the herd hierarchy and neither one of them wants it any differently. They play for hours with orange cones (one of the greatest horse toys ever invented by a human) or parts thereof. In the middle of a hot Arizona afternoon, when everybody else is dozing, these guys are chasing around with a cone between them. At three in the morning, under a blanket of stars and the moon for illumination, there they are – fooling around with a cone. They are the playingest guys I’ve ever known, at least on four legs. Venture’s a Polish Arabian, meaning he’s large-boned and without the real obvious Arabian face. He has a wonderful personality and, over the years, has come to enjoy, no – demand a good, proper scratching. He undoutedly learned it from Jericho. Venture’s a great riding horse and gets all proud whenever he’s taken out and ridden, either bareback or under saddle. “Hey, y’all get a load of me!” His major aspiration: fun. Jericho is also an Arabian and, like, Dawn, is almost white, or flea-bitten grey. A great riding horse, he can do flying lead changes at a whim. When he arrived here from a trail riding stable in Los Angeles, he was little more than skin and bones and seemed very sad. Two-and-a-half years and a couple of hundred pounds later, he’s a real happy camper. Oh, that and the fact that he finally met Venture. |
Copyright 2008 Tierra Madre Horse Sanctuary, a 501(c)(3) Charitable Organization.
Website Design & Photography by Mary Gulino.