Goldspirit Farm

10/28/2024

Mark your calendars....Come one, come all... join us at our open house! PLEASE SHARE.

10/22/2024

darn straight!

10/05/2024

Are you looking for barn cats? I foster for the lancaster and castaic shelters. We often get stray cats that do want to be house pets. We would love to find them SAFE homes at local barns. If you are interested or know someone who is, please share!
Right now in foster, we have speckles, a 3 year old LH spayed female and maxie a 6 month old neutered male tabby. the lancaster shelter has many cats that will be euthanized if they do not get homes. If we can get our fosters adopted, we can foster and save more lives!
you can reach me at 818-636-1522 or [email protected]

09/23/2024

So I had a crazy week....Wednesday, I had to go to the ER after I had a bad reaction to a new medication. Ends up I had a minor stroke. yikes! nothing keeps a horse girl (especially an eventer!) away from her horses....I competed in a schooling dressage show today, on not one, but TWO horses!. Crazy? hope not. Super fun to be back in the saddle. Thanks to a great barn family, competing was fun and easy. Thanks to Pacific Dressage and Claudia Roberts for a super fun show.

09/17/2024

please help us get this awesome dog a forever home! please SHARE or better yet...ADOPT!!!

08/26/2024

There is not one post on this nice dog who has had his 72 hour plea issued!!! Let's share him and get him out of the shelter!!!! Meet Wagz, a friendly and affectionate dog available for adoption who received a behavior medical score of 2 on intake, reflecting his amiable nature. Despite some health concerns, including cloudy lenses in his eyes, missing teeth, and stiffness in his back legs, Wagz remains upbeat and engaging. He has a clean, full coat but is dealing with alopecia and will need continued care for these issues. An eye lid mass removal is scheduled for August 9, 2024, but overall, Wagz's prognosis is good. He is eupneic, with no obvious signs of distress, and his mentation appears normal with no neurological deficits noted. Wagz’s friendly demeanor and resilience make him a wonderful companion who will benefit from a loving home where his ongoing health needs can be addressed. If you're looking for a warm-hearted dog with a positive outlook, Wagz might just be the perfect fit for you!

wagz A5643837 10 year neutered brown labrador Retriever Mix 64 lbs. stray on 8/04/24

07/13/2024

come join us Saturday July 13!

06/09/2024

To say I am frustrated is an understatement. We have amazing dogs available for adoption and no one calls, emails or comments on our posts at Golden Years Dog Sanctuary. We are full and can not take in another dog. We can't help until we can get some of our nice, NOT SENIOR, adoptable, friendly with people and dogs, loving dogs adopted or into foster. And yet, all I see on FB, besides nice horses that make me drool as I can't afford them..... are posts of kittens that need rescue and senior dogs at the shelter that are sad, scared and going to die. And yet, I can do nothing. We can't do adoption events because the everyday things we have to do to care for the dogs and cats and run a horse boarding and training facility take all my time. I ask for help and people say they want to, but don't show up.

If you want to help, we need volunteers, fosters and adopters. If that is too much of a commitment, here is a very simple thing you can do: SHARE this post AND go to my page and SHARE my posts for available dogs on your page, on groups, on nextdoor.

these are the dogs available for adoption or foster. Most are with us, a couple are in temporary foster.

You can reach me at 818-636-1522 or [email protected]. We make our adoption process easy. our application is on our website at www.goldenyearsdogsanctuary.com.

03/31/2024

adopt, don't shop! and please...keep your pet! hundreds of dogs are turned in to the shelter every day in LA county. 30% are KILLED. Be part of the solution! keep your dog! foster, adopt, and speak up to government for laws to change to help animals, protect renters, provide affordable S/N, and stop back yard breeding.

03/20/2024

little bragging never hurt anyone, right? https://voyagela.com/interview/hidden-gems-meet-susan-friend-letourneur-of-golden-years-dog-sanctuary/

03/04/2024

so excited for these shows!

We are gearing up for our first one day in April! So with just over a month to go, we thought we would share some fun facts about our one day shows last year!

Total shows in 2023: 5
Highest points earned: 100, by Erna Adelson

Year-end winner who attended the most shows: Roslyn Flanagan

Trainer who brought the most students over the year: Chloe Smyth

Best dressage score (by a professional): Lindsey Smith on L Fabulous J: 26.1 at our April show

Best dressage score (by an amateur): Amber Ryan on Starlightpistol: 28.2 at our April show

Dressage judges: Donna Weinberg and Terri Rocovich

Show with the highest attendance: October 2023

Prizes awarded for year-end winners: embroidered jacket, saddle pad carry bag, tote bag from Professionals Choice

What to look forward to for 2024:
All new cross-country courses!

3 events: April 21, July 7, and October 14. (Look B4 You Leap clinic the day before the one day show.)

Great prizes at the end of the year, courtesy of Professionals Choice

Year-end dinner in November to celebrate riders

We love seeing everyone out there and having fun! See you in April!

02/24/2024

ISO a new horse for myself. I am an eventing trainer, shown through 2** ( many moons ago). I have my own place in the LA area,. the horse would have a great life. I don't have a high budget so I am looking for someone who perhaps needs a horse trained or help with selling, or someone looking for a feed lease, or someone with a sense of humor that would sell a nice horse for under 15K. I just want to have fun and get a horse that can eventually go to prelim. My current mount is getting old and it is not fair to him to push him to so more than he can or wants to. You can check me out on my goldspirit farm or golden years dog sanctuary page. I am an ICP certified instructor and I am really good with horses. Photo for attention grabbing :)

01/22/2024

01/15/2024

And we're off and running into 2024! this weekend we went to ram tap to go cross country schooling for the weekend. what a blast! I schooled moose modified and preliminary, and Rebecca did beginner novice and the whole novice course! it was awesome. here are Rebecca's videos mine are coming shortly

12/13/2023

it's my birthday on wednesday, and I am not doing a fundraiser on facebook...I am doing a plea for adoptions....at Golden Years Dog Sanctuary. Come adopt one of our amazing kittens, cats or senior dogs. They need homes! PLEASE SHARE OR BETTER YET>>>>ADOPT NOW!!!!! We can save more animals from the shelters when these animals have homes!
we have 3 of the sweetest kittens, 2 who have been passed over for months. We need homes for Donny and Marie NOW. We also have Gizmo, who isn't quite ready, but could be adopted with donny or marie. Christopher robin (ginger) is an adult cat who was feral and is now a sweet heart! Rosemary ( calico) is one of our fosters form the shelter. we have had her for months and no one wants her. She is shy, but loves being with male cats. she needs a home!

We have two amazing dogs that must be only dogs and need homes now. It breaks my heart to see carnation separated from the other dogs. She deserves a home. She is a super sweet 12 yr siberian husky who LOVES people and seems to be ok with dogs off leash. However, she is very leash aggressive and we need a home for her as the only dog. ( she has surgery scheduled for 12-18 to remove her cherry eye!) For months she has lived separated and she cries to get out. of course we take her out every day and give her time to run in the yard and go on walks, but this can not be the rest of her life. Then there is crankshaft. he is the sweetest 10 year old staffie, but he doesn't like other boy dogs. So he too, has to live separated. it hasn't stopped him from being a love, but he deserves a home with freedom. So this is my wish for my birthday: ADOPT FROM Golden Years Dog Sanctuary. we have kittens, cats and dogs..... save a life, enrich yours! call me 818-636-1522 to meet them now!

09/05/2023

great explanation of the cost of a lesson horse, except that hay in california is $22-26/bale, grain is $40/bag and shavings are $12/bag!

"I didn't think riding lessons would cost that much..."
Well. We wish it didn't. But, if you don't own your own horse and you ride a school horse (horse owned by a riding barn), there is a harsh reality behind the expenses.

As the cost of living for everyone increases, our horses are no exception to that. The days of $5 60lb good quality hay bales is over. Grain is no longer $15 per 50lb bag. So how much does it actually cost today (in 2023, in North East America)?

Let's break it down...
Hay $12 per 40lb bale - 1 bale / day = $360 / month (no access to pasture + free choice hay)
Grain - $30 / bag - 1 bag / week = $120 / month
Bedding - $7 / bag - 3 bags / week = $84 / month

(For reference, these numbers used to be $5 / bale, $15 / bag, $5 / bag )

So far, for just basic supplies for your horse we are at $564 (in comparison to 5 years ago it being $270), excluding any labor costs or facility costs....let's keep going.

Your stall fee (mortgage/rental) will run $350 / month on the low end (with an indoor arena). I have seen dry stall fees cost as much as $500 as well.

The following fees would be divided amongst horses on the property...

Insurance $50 / month
Manure removal / arena/facility maintenance $50 / month on the low end
Utilities $75 / month

Without labor, we are at $1,089.00

Let's say your horse gets a total of thirty minutes of care each day (turn in, turn out, stall cleaning, water bucket refills/cleaning). That 30 minutes probably doesn't include blanket changes or any additional services aside from general care.

Good barn help will not get out of bed for anything less than $20 / hour, so totaling per month your horse would cost $300 per month, assuming your horse didn't recieve more than 30 minutes of care each day. If you run your facility plus teach, you can't be in 2 places at once, so some help is necessary, especially if you don't cut corners in your care.

We are now at $1389.00

We have not accounted for vetting, farrier, or supplements. Let's do that now.

Farrier - $250 every 5 weeks (low end) so let's call it $200 every month (my personal farrier charges $275-325 for 4 shoes, but to keep Facebook from resulting in uproar over expensive shoeing costs - I've estimated it low)
Vet - assuming your horse is healthy annually you would spend maybe $700 so let's say $60 per month if divided
Supplements - that tried and true schoolmaster you ride probably needs some joint support, so let's buy a lower end joint supplement at $50 / month

We added an additional $310.

Your school horse now costs $1,699.00 per month, and there are many more costs associated (like your tack, equipment, tractor, trucks, trailers, etc)

Okay. So how does this school horse pay for himself? Let's say the horse does two 1 hour lessons per day, 5 days a week. That means the horse can produce income 40 hours out of the month. To break EVEN (theoretically, because any horse owner knows the pricing listed above isn't even as comprehensive as it should be) you would need to make sure the horse worked twice a day, 5 days a week, and charge $42.50 per lesson.
Realistically, If you do not overwork your school horse, the horse is probably working 30 hours per month, which would bring us to having to charge $60 per one hour lesson to break even.
But wait....Our instructor hasn't even gotten paid yet! So let's give them $20 per hour, which of course is low. And for reference, that would mean your instructor makes $600 per month.
Now we're at $80 per lesson.

So when you call any facility, and their lesson price is $80 or less, think of this cost break down!
We don't do this for money. We do it because we love to share our passion with the next generation of riders. We wish this weren't the case financially, like the rest of America and how the economy is. We want so badly to have horses be affordable for everyone, but these are the real, true, uncensored costs of owning a horse today. If riding schools don't charge what they need to in order to stay afloat, I fear one day the horse industry will not have school horses, and the only people who will be able to ride are the ones that can afford horse ownership outright, and then pay for lessons on top of that.

*disclaimer* these prices are based on our experience of pricing in the industry. Pricing may vary based on care and diet provided to horse, area of the country, and specific horse requirements. This pricing is assuming the horse is receiving top level but basic care (free choice hay, quality grain, etc). There may be cheaper options available and there may be more expensive options available. I'm sure there will be many comments that say "those are low" or "those prices are high". We are happy to share receipts as these are the legitimate prices we pay!

05/08/2023

Had so much fun at the derby this past Sunday. So ready for Galway Downs this weekend! It is my first horse trials with moose in over 2.5 years!

03/12/2023

so proud of Mariah.....Rook took his first jumps in our last lesson! check it out!
https://youtu.be/l1rwSoveK6c