06/12/2024
On today’s meet the rescue, it’s one that didn’t end with a happy ending. We post both the happy rescues along with the sad ones to make sure we are 100% open with our supporters along with showing what really comes with rescue, from happiness, pain, true cost, and just heartache when we can’t save them all.
We would like everyone to meet Dancer, she was our very first kill pen rescue to come to our farm who was kindly sponsored by a very nice lady who is local to our rescue who paid for her full bail when we were down to the last 8 hours before she loaded on the slaughter truck.
Dancer was a brood mare for the racing industry, a registered Jockey horse who never raced but produced babies for them until she couldn’t anymore.
At the young age of 15 she was sent to auction where a kill buyer bought her. He gave her less than a week to find a home or he was selling her to slaughter.
Picking up our first kill pen rescue was a mild disaster because our quarantine spot at a neighbor’s cow farm fell through as we were pulling into their driveway. So we had to race to Tractor Supply to get fencing items needed to make her a pen all while she was still in the trailer. We are thankful for the caring staff at our Soddy Daisy, TN Tractor Supply who helped us gather items before they closed since we pulled in as they were closing. They understood our need and seen her sad eyes and wanted to help us with our mission to save her.
We then drove her to our farm where one of our volunteers held her on lead rope while the rest of us put up a quick temporary quarantine lot away from the herd.
Seeing her on what appeared to be her first time ever being turned out on grass was priceless! But this is also where her story takes a down hill path.
Our vet came out and she appeared healthy minus needing her teeth floated, she wasn’t even too under weight, only needed 20-50 pounds on her. She did however have lice. Not too bad, we treated it, and cut parts of her mane off that were too infested to treat. But not all illnesses can be seen right away nor found on bloodwork.
Within a week or so of her being released from quarantine we noticed some swelling in her chest that eventually got where she couldn’t walk. Please note from the minute it was noticed we were already working with our vet on treating it.
When she couldn’t walk we had to call our vet out after hours on Father’s Day weekend. He came right away to our farm even though he was heading out the door for dinner. After quick assessment it was determined she had Pigeon Fever which is not only contagious but also can be deadly if left untreated. It is also not known to our area but is known from the area she came from.
Her chest was drained and a tube put in to allow drainage over the next week along with a IV in her neck for IV antibiotics. Did I mention we had to put the quarantine lot back up to keep her away from the herd? We didn’t have a barn then to stall her.
During her treatment she did get the cap off her IV which ended with a bloody mess for our volunteers to wake up to one morning. They called the vet out to recheck her and fix her IV port immediately. They also had to clean up the paddock of all the blood including Dancer to prevent coyotes from smelling it and coming. This IV was in her artery so it was a lot of blood.
Thankfully she healed from the pigeon fever but unfortunately a month later her health went downhill again. She had swelling in her shoulder and after X-rays was determined to possibly have a fracture. She was placed in a small paddock to limit her movement so she could heal, something that is typically an easy healing process for how mild hers was.
One morning we went out for morning check to find she went through 3 fences and was no where in sight. We sent out the alarming text to our volunteers, family and neighbors.
A quick search of our property we found her by our pond in bad shape. We called our vet immediately, started putting pressure on her injuries and while we waited for the vet to arrive, several of us helped hold her on her feet as she couldn’t not hold herself up. Right before the vet arrived she started having mild seizures. After a quick assessment from the vet it was determined that her quality of life wasn’t good and the humane thing to do was to let her go peacefully.
We did not have a necropsy performed on her as it was determined prior to euthanizing her that she had neurological damage possibly from a blood clot traveling to the brain. After a lot of research we found that is a high probability with fractures in their legs, even mild ones. We also question if it could have come from her IV issue a month prior but only God truly knows what caused it. We were heartbroken losing her and swore we were done rescuing.
Dancer didn’t get the fairy tale ending we hope all our rescues get, but we are glad her last three months here she knew she was loved and that we would do anything in our power to treat her if it was possible. Unfortunately life had other plans for our sweet girl and now she is running on Heavens fields.
Rest in Heave Dancer, we miss you ole girl!
We also knew that not continuing our mission to save those without a voice was not how we wanted to remember or honor Dancer. So every rescue is in her memory, because even though she didn’t get to live to old age, she didn’t have to go through the cruel slaughter process and felt what love was in her short time we had her. She never went without love, food, water, or vet care.
