Marley’s Miracle
Critically injured and abandoned, the small sorrel mare had little hope of surviving
the winter. Thanks to her rescuers, she not only survived but
is thriving.
On September 15, 2018, we received a call about a horse that had been abandoned on thousands of acres of arid scrubland in New Mexico. The reporting party had been observing the sorrel mare for several months and it was becoming clear that she was doing poorly.
After seeing the pictures the reporting party texted us, we knew we had to find the horse as quickly as possible. With her xylophone ribs and jutting hipbones, the situation had escalated to an emergency. We had a lot of country to cover, so it took us a few nerve-wracking days to find the mare. We didn’t know if she’d survive that long.
We found her running with a small band of horses and she looked even worse than in the photos. She was skin and bones. Starving. Interestingly, the five other horses in the herd looked healthy enough. What could account for such a difference in their conditions? We got out of our truck and walked toward the group. Though the other horses scattered, the little mare simply waited for us. It was as if she knew we were there to help.
As we checked her over, she basked in the attention. She had no visible injuries, but when we examined her teeth, we instantly solved the mystery of why she was so skinny while the other horses were in good weight.
It looked as though she had been kicked in the mouth several months before. Her front grazing teeth were nothing more than jagged ridges reminiscent of a Halloween jack-o-lantern. With her teeth in that condition, there
was no way for the mare to functionally graze. She wasn’t getting enough calories or nutrition to fuel her body, and there was no way she would survive the winter months ahead without intervention. If we didn’t take her in, she would surely die.
I hated leaving her there, but I couldn’t legally remove her from the property without doing some research. Luckily, I was quickly able to locate the man who owned the land and found out she was not a regular member of the herd we had found her with. It appeared as though she had been abandoned on the property.
With the landowner’s help, we legally obtained ownership of the mare. When we picked her up a few days later, we were thrilled to see she was still on her feet and moving. She seemed happy to see us, almost as if she knew we had come to rescue her. She came right to us, let us halter her, looked at us as if to say, “What are you waiting for? Let’s get this show on the road!” and loaded up onto the trailer.
We got her to our facility on October 4, 2018. Because of her dreadlocked tail, we named her Marley, for Bob Marley. Over the next several months, with the help of Purina Equine Senior® and carefully tailored supplements, we watched Marley bloom into the horse she was meant to be.
These days, Marley is doing incredibly well, thriving as a trail horse. We believe she was a ranch horse at one point because as soon as she sees a cow, she is on a mission! She has come a long way in the past year; although her mental strengths were always evident, now she’s physically strong as well. The starving little mare we rescued has turned into a stout and sturdy horse, ready to take on anything.