Horse With No Name No More

Among the many things The HSUS does to advance its mission, one of the most important is our direct response to animals in distress. A few weeks ago I told you about our Emergency Services deployment to rural Nebraska to help in the rescue of more than 200 starving mustangs. Just a few days ago, 84 of these horses arrived at our Cleveland Amory Black Beauty Ranch in central Texas—the nation’s most diverse animal sanctuary and the signature holding in our network of direct-care facilities at The HSUS and our sister organization, The Fund for Animals.

© Mary Pierce/AP
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Following two weeks of intense emergency care in Nebraska, this Saturday we transported the horses and they all arrived safely at Black Beauty Ranch. After enduring months of neglect and starvation, I imagine they hardly knew that their fortunes had changed so dramatically, trotting out of the trailer to Texas sunshine, rich grasslands, and paddocks filled with fresh hay and clean water.

We’ve just posted photos of each of the horses online and I hope you’ll take a few minutes to browse them. And if you can, please make a special donation to help us rehabilitate these horses. As a way of recognizing your financial support, we’re even offering a unique opportunity for you to name the horses.

Rescue operations like this carry a surprisingly large price tag—with major labor costs for The HSUS and with these formerly neglected horses requiring much-needed treatments and special diets and supplements, the estimated cost of care is $20 per horse per day, or exceeding $300,000 over just six months.

Once the horses are fit and their health restored, they’ll be released to stretch their legs on the more than 1,200 acres that Cleveland Amory designed for just this purpose—to provide a safe home for homeless and abused creatures. Some of the horses will be placed in new homes, while others will spend their remaining years at the sanctuary.

Just last week we announced our plans to develop the Doris Day Horse Rescue and Adoption Center on the grounds of Black Beauty Ranch, a state-of-the-art operation that will be dedicated to caring for and re-homing horses in need. Perhaps some of these very mustangs will be the first to find new homes as we work to implement even more programs to help homeless, abused and neglected horses.

It’s just another tangible example of what your support allows us to do for animals.