The dust has long settled on the Horse Fair that GERL and the GHC hosted in April. It was so well attended that it surprised us all. Many people have let us know how much they enjoyed it and hope that there will be a repeat. As a result of the great turnout, the Georgia Horse Council will be able to write a check to the Georgia Equine Rescue League for $10,000 from the proceeds taken in at the horse fair. That is a very nice shot in the arm for GERL and will allow us to extend more help through our many existing programs.
After over a year and a half of meetings and planning for the event, we have shifted to a low gear. It has been very nice not to have a calendar full of fundraising to contend with. That being said, we do have a lot of work to do in the world of horses and Veterans.
After six months of waiting, the papers have finally been signed off on the portion of property that will become the future home of the H. Reyno Petree Veterans Ranch, located in Bethlehem. A workday at the ranch will be underway soon. There will be a lot of manual labor involved with tearing down an old chicken house and turning another into a barn. We have discussed waiting until it cools down some, so September would most likely be a suitable time to pull everything together. Keep a watch out for the communications that will be coming out in the month of August announcing details about the workday and be sure to tell your friends, too!
On another good note, GERL has been very busy adopting out horses in our foster program. It has been amazing how just the perfect person for each horse has appeared and fell in love. Many of these horses have been in our program, or the previous Georgia Dept. of Agriculture (GDA) equine program, for as long as 2 years. At least three of the horses were previously adopted out and were returned for one reason or another. In this newsletter alone, there are five success stories of horses that have recently been adopted, and we currently have one pending that will be delivered at the end of the week. And, let me say this about that…that is what this is all about – rehoming horses.
We still have four of the original Six Amigos in our program. They have been around for 2 years now. Braveheart has had 120 days with a trainer and was the winner of the 2021 Rescue Challenge. He is a beautiful horse. We cannot understand why no one seems to be interested in adopting him. We recently sent two of the Amigos to trainers in hopes that they can get started under saddle soon. And, we still have Jazzy Cat in our program. She won second place in this year’s Rescue Challenge, but we have received no calls about her, either. In the 13 years that I have been doing this, I cannot remember having so few horses in our program.
Our horse supply may be low right now, but we will work with what we have to find them the perfect homes, regardless of how long it takes. We know from experience that there IS someone out there looking for just the right horse!