Rehorse Rescue of Jamestown, Calif., is dedicated to rescuing horses, which are increasingly being abandoned and victimized due to the poor economy and owners who don't properly care for their animals. Photo courtesy of Raquelle Van Vleck.

Last year two Lake County residents were rescued from a very dangerous situation. They resided in a location where they should have been safe and protected but were instead found unclean, malnourished and injured.

Those two residents were a 4-year-old pinto stallion named TJ and a 14-year-old pinto mare named Breezy, owned at the time by former Animal Control Officer Terrie Flynn.

Thanks to rescue and rehabilitation efforts from the Rehorse Rescue Ranch in Tuolumne County the two horses have come full circle, both making exceptional recoveries.

Breezy was adopted, according to Rehorse Rescue director Raquelle Van Vleck.

TJ also is in the process of being adopted by a volunteer, she said.

“We wait for them to find their human,” she said. “They'll stay as long as they need to.”

Each of the horses was underweight and suffered from rain rot, a condition in which bacterium creates lesions on the horse’s body and is usually caused from insect bites and unclean stable conditions.

Breezy’s hooves were severely overgrown and TJ suffered from a serious injury to his penis, possibly caused from a barbed wire fence. They conducted a reconstructive surgery to remove the scar tissue and avoid amputation.

Breezy, a mare surrendered in 2010 by a Lake County Animal Care & Control officer, has been adopted after being rescued and rehabilitated by Rehorse Rescue of Jamestown, Calif. Photo courtesy of Raquelle Van Vleck.

“He's just as happy as he can be,” Van Vleck.

Situations such as the ones with Breezy and TJ have become all too common throughout the state and nation, and are currently on the rise, according to Van Vleck and animal rights groups that monitor the treatment of horses.

With the number of calls more than tripling since the rescue of Breezy and TJ the Rehorse Rescue Ranch has seen a significant increase in the number of mistreated horses in need of help.

TJ, a stallion surrendered to Rehorse Rescue of Jamestown, Calif., in 2010 by a Lake County Animal Care & Control officer, is in the process of being adopted. Photo courtesy of Raquelle Van Vleck.

“Last year at this time we had 17 horses and now we’re up to 45, if that is any indication of the increase there has been as far as the number of horses in crisis,” Van Vleck said.

The startup of the Rehorse Rescue Ranch came as a bit of a surprise, even to Van Vleck.

She began to notice the amount of horses that were suffering a little over three years ago and started taking the animals in.

“We didn’t even know we were doing rescue when we were doing rescue,” she said.

Once the need for a large animal equine rescue in the area was identified she decided to start the Rehorse Rescue Ranch. It officially incorporated in February of 2009 and received nonprofit status in June of 2010.

Although there have been numerous success stories at Rehorse Rescue, including the adoptions of 24 horses and the relocation of 53, the increase in horse abuse provides Van Vleck with many challenges.

“We’re getting calls from Las Vegas and Southern California and emails from all over the country,” she said in an exhausted tone. “It’s been tough. We want to help as many horses as we can, but because our community and surrounding counties are in crisis we have to put them first and foremost.”

In one particularly serious case earlier this year Van Vleck, along with animal control, rescued 10 Morgan horses from a property in Calaveras County.

The horses were kept in the backyard of a house, fenced by barbed wire, in conditions so unclean they “almost had to swim through feces and urine” in order to access their water trough, she said.

One stallion also was housed in a 10-by-10-foot chain link dog kennel with a roof on top inhibiting him from lifting his head.

Rehorse Rescue works in collaboration with county officials; however, due to increases in budget cuts many animal control offices do not have the funds to hold horses until they can be placed and have turned to Van Vleck in order to save horses from facing euthanasia.

They have currently taken horses from five different animal control offices including Calaveras, Tuolumne, Stanislaus, San Joaquin and Lake counties.

A growing crisis

The effects of the recession are felt in nearly all aspects of equine rescue.

Many of the rescue and rehabilitation facilities rely on fundraisers, adoption fees, donations and sponsorship for funding and due to the economic downturn have experienced decreases in cash flow.

According to Jacque Schultz, senior director of community outreach for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the organization awarded more than $1 million in grant funding to equine efforts in 2010, nearly doubling the amount given the year prior.

“California was yet again the No. 1 state,” Schultz said “They’ve been No. 1 in the number of grants applied for and received since I’ve been in charge of the program for four years.”

Van Vleck says that they’ve applied for some grants but with the stiff competition it’s hard to rely on the funding. She usually tries to find money elsewhere.

“We're beyond struggling,” she said, adding she takes it “one day at a time.”

The challenges are exacerbated by the current cost of hay, at $13 a bale, and expected to go as high as $20 by the summer. Van Vleck said she feeds 12 bales of hay each day.

She worries what those climbing hay prices will do for horse owners barely making it right now.

Because of the hefty expenses involved with caring for a horse, the troubled economy also is considered to be a contributing factor in the rising numbers of horse abandonment cases around the nation.

However, Van Vleck believes that this is a much bigger problem than can just be pinned on the recession.

“It’s not just the economy,” she said. “I think the recession has a lot to do with it, but the reality is that there are still people out there that need to take care of their horses.”

Often times, she said, the source of the problem is new owners who aren’t educated on how to properly care for a horse or people who wait until the situation has escalated to dangerous levels to ask for help.

With an increased number of horses at the facility and an extremely tight budget it is much easier for the Rehorse Rescue Ranch to maintain and relocate a horse than it is to rehabilitate one, she said.

Van Vleck believes commitment and responsibility will help decrease the number of mistreated horses.

“Horses depend on us for everything, every bit of care,” she said. “We have domesticated them and we are therefore responsible for them.”

How you can help: Visit Rehorse Rescue online at www.rehorserescue.org, make a donation or adopt a horse into a loving forever home. The group also can be reached at telephone 209-337-5886; e-mail, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.; or at P.O. Box 494, Jamestown, CA 95327.

Follow Lake County News on Twitter at http://twitter.com/LakeCoNews, on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lake-County-News/143156775604?ref=mf and on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/LakeCoNews.