Safe Harbor Sanctuary

02/01/2026

Why choose a Standardbred?

A Standardbred comes off the track with valuable training applicable to riding or pleasure driving, including:
- Quietly leading from Point A to Point B
- How to stand tied / cross-tied
- Hoof handling/shoeing/farrier work
- Vet work
- Grooming and bathing
- Loading, hauling, and unloading from a trailer
- Wearing a bit, bridle and girth (harness)
- Equipment touching many parts of the body (harness and sulky)
- Noise around and behind
- Turning left and right
- Light traffic: the starting gate is driven with a car or truck; the track is worked by tractors; the backside of the track is busy with golf cards, side-by-sides, empty sulkies, outrider horses, and lots of foot traffic
- Track activity also includes loudspeakers and humans in the grandstands
- In general, they are very straightforward to transition to under saddle and pleasure driving
- A gaiting Standardbred can be the perfect smooth trail, endurance or western dressage mount
- Standardbreds are successfully showing in almost every discipline including hunter under saddle, hunter/jumper, eventing, dressage, western pleasure, cattle classes, endurance, trail challenges, hunter paces, and pleasure driving -- not to mention every day pleasure, trail, and family horses.
- Numerous opportunities to earn year end points and awards if that's your thing - just look online
- And they love having a job to do with their human!

Consider a Standardbred!

01/01/2026

🎉 Happy New Year - and 🥳 Happy Birthday to our retired racehorses.

Standardbreds and thoroughbreds celebrate their “official” birthday on January 1!

01/01/2026

🥳 New Year's resolutions? 🥳

Resolve to add your animals to your estate planning.
Resolve to panel test your breeding stock.
Resolve to TRAIN your broodmares.
Resolve to attend that clinic or lesson.
Resolve to ask for help when you need it.
Resolve to be kind.
Resolve to love your neighbor.

31/12/2025

Who are we and what do we do?

🐴 We are 100% volunteer, primarily funded by private donors;

🐴 foster farm network: We do not have a central location nor own real estate;

🐴 located in Middle Tennessee and south central Kentucky (in short, from the Alabama line to Bowling Green north to south, west to Ashland City/Clarksville and east to Lebanon/Watertown);

🐴 We prioritize intakes as follows:
- Off the track Standardbreds retiring from the track, post-track, or Amish
- Law enforcement seizures/assistance with neglect/legal cases
- Referral/partnerships

🐴 Our After the Track program has placed almost forty Standardbreds into loving 'forever-after' homes.

🐴 Our Sanctuary program provides educational opportunities, owner assistance via Charlie's Fund, and (currently) five 'lifetime' sanctuary foster homes for horses with complex long-term care needs.

🐴 Learn more: safeharborhorses.org

31/12/2025

*Reminder*

If your horses are scared of fireworks: Keep hay in front of them, play the radio on low, make sure stalls/gates are secure, and if you are going to be the one setting off fireworks - please be courteous to your neighbors with animals -- and neighbors who are veterans -- and at least let them know so that they can prepare.

New Years Eve can be scary for pets. Animal shelters see a big surge in lost pets. Sometimes they escape while you're busy with friends and family. Sometimes they jump a fence because the sound of fireworks or gun shots scare them. Don't take the risk! Keep your pets secure tonight. Make sure they are wearing ID! No tags? Use a piece of masking tape, write your info and loop it around the collar, just in case.

31/12/2025

Continuing our blog flashback: We will never 'shame' an owner for the hard, responsible decisions

https://www.safeharborsanctuary.org/from-the-horses-mouth/can-we-please-stop-shaming-owners-for-making-difficult-decisions

31/12/2025

Continuing our blog flashbacks: In a price-per-pound industry, those Facebook horse traders are laughing all the way to the bank.

Call it what it is and start acting accordingly - for everyone’s sake, but most of all, for the horses.

30/12/2025

🦄 Friends and followers, we interrupt our regularly scheduled end-of-year postings to bring you a personal note/guarantee:

1) We will NEVER, EVER lie to you, exaggerate the truth, or stretch the facts to make a rescue situation more dramatic or dire or cruel or sad than it is (in reality, there is no need to do this....each situation is sad enough in its own right, but we see it on the daily)...We take our mission to educate very seriously and when we talk about a horse's history, origins, diagnosis, or etc., it is "from the horse's mouth" not from the drama queen's imagination. 🤭

and

2) We will NEVER use AI to talk with you, share information with you, or communicate in any form. Our posts are real talk from our volunteers and our photos are real, actual horses in our care (or adopted), not altered in any way. After all, we want you to see what's really there, not some false sense of what 'could' be. 🐴

📸 reflections with Ben

30/12/2025

Common issue: Poor quality tack resulting in behavior problems

You'd be surprised how often that well-behaved, beginner safe, easygoing horse you took home turns into a biting, bucking, protesting creature due to a low quality saddle that does not fit.

Think about it: Would you want to work in a piece of equipment that pinches? Something that leaves you sore in wide areas of your body every single day?

You'd say no, right?

So why should we expect our horses to just suck it up and deal with it?

There are two related sides to this issue.

#1: Low quality, low price saddles that 'look nice'

How do you spot these?

Well, they almost always look flashy.

But on close inspection, you'll note that the fenders and skirts already have a curl to them, which gives away the low quality leather construction. They'll almost always have visible screws on the underside. Often, the tree will already be warped, so the saddle itself will look not quite straight front-to-back.

And, when someone is selling a used one, it's almost always because "it didn't fit my horse." Newsflash: They don't fit ANYone's horse.

Bottom line here is, you are not saving anything to buy a 'brand new' $350 junk saddle that is going to sore your horse and cause pain and potentially lead to long term behavior problems - especially if you don't identify the saddle as the cause of the problems when they start. It's better to buy a good quality saddle used, and even work with a saddle fitter, to make sure your saddle fits your horse.

Related: If someone is selling a $200 'roping saddle' - it's not. What it is, is a good way to make your horse sore when you break the tree. Roping saddles are expensive and heavy because they are built to do a specific job.

#2 is, a saddle that fits the rider. These days, we see many, many riders in a saddle that is too big. Needless to say, this leads to issues when the rider simply can't maintain position and therefore sends confusing, conflicting signals to their horse.

If you're a beginner rider, this is why instruction from a knowledgeable professional is so important. Once you know what fits YOU, you can solve this potential issue on your own, every time.

29/12/2025

Flashback from the blog: The 'free' horse and personal responsibility

https://www.safeharborsanctuary.org/from-the-horses-mouth/believe-it-or-not-no-one-wants

28/12/2025

Flashback from the blog: What to do if you think it's neglect

https://www.safeharborsanctuary.org/from-the-horses-mouth/when-you-think-you-see-neglect

23/12/2025

Reminder! Register by New Year's Eve to save $$!