The year-end multicultural celebrations of thanksgiving, hope, and renewal mark the time when Americans consider which charities they will support with their annual gift giving. This issue of the NeighSaver celebrates the accomplishments your support of Equamore Foundation made possible in 2013. It also makes a case for your continued support in 2014 and the coming years.

Dapples:
Queen of the pony field

Some think that providing sanctuary to aged, infirm, or damaged horses is less worthy of charity than helping people. To them, saving a horse is a lost cause. To us, a saved horse is a found treasure. Take Dapples, the party pony, for instance. Surely her youthful years entertaining children earned a better reward than to be left so long without hoof care that she could not walk without intense pain. And think of Red Cloud, the spectacularly painted quarter horse. Surely thirty-two years of hard service deserved more than a trip to the auction block. And consider Snoopy, the Arab show horse. Surely his many blue ribbons deserved better than a death sentence when a pasture accident marred his perfect conformation.

Dapples, Red Cloud, and Snoopy epitomize the many “lost causes” Equamore’s donors, volunteers, and employees fight for. At right, the aged but now sure-footed Dapples reigns as queen of the new Pony Field funded by a grant from the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries (GFAS), which lists Equamore as one of its verified partners. With Ranger, Poquito, Sampson, and Jasmine, Dapples is protected by another found treasure, General U. C. Davis, whose congenital blindness was reversed through the efforts of Equamore’s first Horse Rescue Team in 1999. Red Cloud lived at the Sanctuary until his death at 43 years of age. He was a patient mentor to horses and humans alike, especially to Happy, the blind pony whom he faithfully tended and led to water and food with the sound of a bell tied to his mane. And the hard-working Snoopy spent many productive years teaching youngsters (and a few old folks) to ride. After 20 plus years as a lesson horse, Snoopy has earned a quiet retirement in the gelding field supported now by his former students.

They, and all horses needing rescue, are causes worth fighting for!