Category: Uncategorized

I would like to introduce you to Alice (in wonderland) and Annie (the sun will come out tomorrow). As you all know, we are committed to supporting the welfare of the Carneddau Mountain Ponies, who are all having a really good Winter so far, even with the snow challenges, but these 2 older ladies were spotted looking rather thin and weak, so their guardians made a plan, to get them off the mountain for us to collect and give them the extra care they need. Alice’s condition score is currently zero (minus her belly), but, as you can see from the photo, the cause is very evident, she has parrot mouth and with no equine dental technician’s in their wild home, her back teeth have grown in all sorts of directions until she can no longer chew. This is totally fixable, especially with our amazing Vet Luke, who is exceptional at dealing with these little Wildie’s, so she will be on the road to recovery very soon and Annie isn’t as poor, but as an older mare will likely need her teeth doing and a little MOT too.

Our beautiful, sweetheart, Mollie, suffered a heart attack, passing away instantly, having celebrated her 36th Birthday just a few days ago 

Not only are we devastated, but her husband, Nelson, is heart broken, licking her and nudging her for a while after  once he left her side we turned him out with one of their next door neighbours, where he settled, until the crematorium arrived and he has been shouting after her ever since, truly heart wrenching to see.

Mollie had a rough start in life and even 25 years in a good home before us had never completely healed her mental scars, but she had blossomed since arriving here and had a fabulous few months, we have loved every minute with her 

Big thank you to the team here at the time, also to our lovely vet, Luke, for being on the end of the phone and Whitley Brook Crematorium for their sympathetic treatment, as always xxx

NEW THIS CHRISTMASChristmas E-Vouchers, to purchase an item in someone’s name and we email you a voucher to print and pop in their Christmas card, to say a donation has been made in their name towards.

£5 hay donation £5 straw donation £8 shavings donation £10 food donation £15 food donation £20 farrier donation £30 straw donation £40 hay donation

The choice is yours Payment via PayPal, as friends and family, or ask for an alternative method. PayPal: horsesensewirral@yahoo.com Ref: E-Voucher (your chosen voucher)Please put your email address in notes, to receive your voucher to print, or recipients email address, if you want it sending direct.

VALE BALE – Who very kindly donated us 5 bales of their beautiful hay to try, via our supplier. Its come in very handy for a pony we have had to change management with, as his Equine Asthma is progressing, he also has a history of laminitis on haylage, but also of dropping weight if on soaked hay, these bales have been the perfect answer for us.

BRAVE PANTS – Who not only makes our beautiful rosettes at cost for our online shows, but are also donating the most beautiful trophies for our Christmas Bonanza Show.

IRBY PET SHOP – Who after being a victim of crime set up a Just Giving to raise money for our animals. Irby Pets are a small family run business, and been big supporters of ours for years. They don’t make huge profits, they just love animals and providing for the locals pets.

PETS AT HOME – Again, long standing supporters who donated a pallet of small animal suppliers to help us through the winter.

Due to limited hours in the office, I am getting a bit behind. Saffy and Royal both spent time in hospital and Cally was very poorly and treated at home in isolation, with 4/5 vet visits a day. Bumping our vet bills up considerably, we can’t thank Support Adoption for Pets enough for their support in giving us a £10,000 grant. This was to be split between vet and feed costs, and made a huge difference to us. However, we still have substantial bills for both with the 3 unexpected large bills for the poorly horses above.

This year is an ongoing struggle, with no events to fundraise. But we with our supporters help and thinking outside the box with online shows etc, have been able to give the same level of care to our animals. We are not known for taking the easy option or for turning our backs when needed. However, winter is here and lots of obstacles to overcome. There is a shortage of straw this year, and we are having to buy outside the area. This means we have to buy in bulk and with fund low, it is an ongoing battle. Everybody including our suppliers and their suppliers are battling to hang on to their businesses, putting in stricter terms and conditions which obviously has a knock on effect on us. Only 5% of our income is made up of monthly Standing Orders, which will give you some idea how hard our team works to bring in the rest of the 12k each month. We have outstanding support from our professionals (vets/farriers/dentist) etc, suppliers, our public followers, our volunteers and Trustees, who all donate on a regular basis to provide the love and care the animals deserve. If you would like to find ways to donate, please go to our “Donate” page. or we have a Just Giving button on the Home page. For regular updates we are on all the social media sites, but if you are not on them we have a monthly newsletter. This will help you stay up to date if I don’t get the time to do the website, just email HSWnewsletter@gmail.com to be added to the list. We are Wirral’s largest animal rescue, with every penny going to the welfare of the animals, no wages taken not even expenses. We want to survive this year, go forward and keep improving on what we do. We can only do this with your support and thank you all from the bottom of our hearts for helping us to help the animals. xx

November 1st we returned to the Carneddau Mountain ponies, for the gathering and health checks, all looking really good and ready for Winter accept 4 mares and some very young colts, who have come home with us. The mares were taken off due to poor condition, needing a bit more TLC. The colts too young to survive the harsh winter, and to prevent inter/over breeding. Due to Covid-19 the farmers were not allowed to have the usual numbers attend who would offer homes. A few of the colts have been adopted by the mares who had foals at foot. ANIMALS REALLY ARE AMAZING

Royal arrived with us 18th Sep 2020 after retiring from a successful racing career in the UK, Belgium and France aged 10yo.

Royal arrived as a stallion and was gelded a few days later. He has impeccable manners, a real gent. He will be given time to get over his op and settle before going out on loan, however he already has a waiting list to view him.

Raine arrived safely with us 4th Sept 2020, all the way from Kidderminster, thanks to Premier Equine Transport. Raine is only 6yo, but has a neurological issue that needs further investigation. Unfortunately her owner suffered a sad and sudden change in circumstances not long after purchasing her, leaving her with the worry of Raines future, given this unknown issue.After seeking advice from friends, it was ourselves who were recommended as the best place to cater for whatever life/treatment/management she requires, fortunately it is only a mild issue, so she can certainly live a very happy life as a companion, but if there is a solution to the problem, we certainly do whatever we can for her

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Roma, named by his rescuers, as he was found “roaming”, is a rising 3yo, colt.

Roma is underweight, matted and crawling with lice, but as you can see also arrived with a huge abcess on his shoulder.

Our amazing vet Helen arrived shortly after he did, to drain his abcess and I’m sure he is feeling much better to be rid of what had obviously been there for months and months.

Roma will now receive all the care he needs to put his weight on, have a good groom and de-louse and be gelded as soon as possible, but most of all he will be showered with love and affection, he is a really sweet little boy.

Huge thank you to his rescuers for keeping him safe, to Helen for being on hand so quickly and our amazing Joel as always.

Please consider a donation towards Roma’s care, even £1 all adds up. Bank and PayPal details are below, but if you prefer to donate another way, please just ask. As always you can contact our supplier Stuart Jones and order him some feed, he is having conditiong cubes, fibre beet and chaff, or you can make a payment direct to Leahurst Equine Practice of you prefer.

Height: 17hh, Age: 4yo, Colour: Bay, Breed: Thoroughbred

Macumba arrived July 20, when he didn’t make the grade as a racehorse. He already had a loaner waiting for him, who covered all his costs. The race yard who wishes they could keep all their horses, want to do right by them and secure their future. By them being rehomed by us, they will never be sold on or fall in to the wrong hands. Macumba has gone to an exceptional home, where is loaner will take the time with him and spoil him rotten. The

We collected mother and Daughter, aged a minimum of 35yo and 25yo, last night, (15th July 2020) following the sad death of their owner. Their owner had purchased Mollie from a local horse market 25 years ago and got a surprise when Tilly came along, they had never left his property since.

As you can imagine strangers turning up and taking them away in a trailer would be stressful for them, but as we did everything slowly and quietly, they took it all in their strides and have settled well.

They have been very well cared for and Tilly is in amazing condition, however, Mollie, whilst not intentionally neglected by any means, has been lacking specialised geriatric care, so has a nice round grass belly, but is very thin along her top line and bum, she is also very lethargic, so has been placed under intensive care with us and has Tilly right next door where they can still reach each other and interact.

Our lovely Luke from Leahurst Equine Practice will be visiting Mollie tomorrow morning, to give her an MOT and run some blood tests. Both girls also need micro chipping and pass porting, we would really appreciate any financial help towards the girls care, we expect this initial outlay to total around £300, plus feed products for Mollie totals around £80 per week.

Clues is a beautiful 12yo, ex-pointer, only recently ex. He was taken into The Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital on Monday for Colic surgery, but unfortunately due to personal circumstances his owner is no longer able to keep him post surgery and the sad decision was taken that he would need to be put to sleep, as no one would want to take on a horse immediately post colic surgery.

We received a call from Leahurst 2 days ago (11th Jun 2020) asking if we would be able to give this real gent of a horse a home, as we are experienced in post surgery care, this isn’t a put off to us and of course we were happy to help and agreed to take him on and following a couple more days in Hospital, we were able to bring him home this morning.

We will obviously be taking one day at a time, as he is still high risk of complications, but we hope that we will be able to get him thru his recovery and in a few months be able to start rehabilitating him to search for his forever home in his own time.

Chaos has arrived with us on 10th June 2020, we don’t know the full circumstances around him ending up without his mum, so won’t speculate, we just know he urgently needed somewhere safe to avoid the alternative. We estimate he is around 6 weeks old, so have started him on mares replacement milk, he is very, very nervous, but we will soon show him all the love in the world and gain his trust.

We want to say a huge thank you to those responsible for making him safe.

“Mitas” arrived at 4.30am this morning, after a very long trip from France. Mitas is an 11yo, former racehorse, very much loved by his whole family.

Sadly his family/trainers had a bad experience with rehoming, leaving them very worried about trying it again, but with out endless space or money, they cant possibly keep all of their retirees, although believe me, they would if they could, they spoil them rotten and really do love them like children.

So it was agreed that is was in Mitas’ best interest to come here for rehoming, where we can find the person who best suits him and protect him, with one of our permanent loan contracts, his trainers have made sure that they covered our initial lay out costs, by having him up to date with dentist, farrier, vaccinations etc.

He will be allowed ample time to settle in before the rehoming process starts, but we do have a long list of prospective loaners already, so wont be taking anymore enquiries at the moment, thank you ,

Little Missy arrived here today, after we responded to her owners call for help. Her owner had saved a group of ponies earlier this month, Little Missy included, the others weren’t too underweight and thrived under her care, however, Little Missy didn’t improve and this morning deteriorated and collapsed.

We attended expecting to find a pony who had given up and required euthanasia, however, she was bright, perky, eating and drinking, so we decided to bring her home and with the help of our very own Super Vet, Luke, get her on the road to recovery, with some careful nursing and fingers crossed she will pull thru with the love and attention of her new Horse Sense family. She is a cheeky little madam, who is full of attitude, which is really important to keep her going and she has had a 50 minute period of standing since arriving already.

Huge thank you to our amazing team for all coming to help lifting, unfortunately there was no socially distanced way to do this, but our team have been all taking extra precautions to stay safe, in order to be ready for emergencies like this and huge thank you to her owner for doing everything she could for her.

This is going to be a long road for her, with no expense spared on careful feeding and medical treatment and we need your help, to help her.

If you can donate towards her recovery costs, please give as much or as little as you can afford.

JUST GIVING – https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/hswlittlemissy

PAYPAL – horsesensewirral@yahoo.com

BANK – Sort – 161614 Account – 10375919

As you are all aware we closed to visitors some weeks ago, however, with the UK now in a Lockdown situation, we have had to implement further changes to how we operate, not only to fall in place with Government guidelines, but to keep our really amazing team of volunteers safe.

THE TEAM

Since the Prime Ministers public address last night, we have introduced our Lockdown contingency plan, to install a full time team of 8 people, caring for the residents, all of whom have been provided with documents explaining why their travel is necessary should they be stopped and checked. Each person has their own dedicated group of residents that only they will care for their daily needs, keeping well away from other team members at all times.

Shared surfaces and tools were already being disinfected between use, gloves, hand wash and hand gel already provided and being kept on top of.

LIVERIES

We have a small number of DIY grass liveries, to help us with funding. Some liveries have chosen to join the team caring for residents on a daily basis, others are staying away, while we will care for all horses on site, whether we own them or not, to keep everyone safe.

ROUND OF APPLAUSE

None of the volunteers have ever been full time here, 7 days a week and this is a huge undertaking for them, so we hope you will join us in acknowledging the effort and dedication shown by all of these unpaid heroes, for the benefit of the animals. Lots of people, understandably, want to avoid their paid jobs at the moment, never mind do it for free.

WELFARE CASES AND ADMISSIONS

At this time we will only be attending/admitting life threatened cases, in order to conform with necessary travel and also to not overload our awesome team, when making a report please be prepared to provide exact locations and photographic evidence, so we can correctly prioritise.

REHOMING OF ANIMALS

As we cannot perform home checks, no animals will be available for rehoming during this time, but interest may be registered for when we can get back to normal.

DONATIONS

Due to the travel ban, you are unable to drop off donations, or even cake for the team. However, now more than ever we need your support. Online deliveries are still taking place, if you would consider treating the small animals to treats and toys and the team to cakes and biscuits please.

Horsey supplies are a big concern, as our excellent supplier is already suffering shortages, we have several ponies who can’t eat hay/haylage/grass and therefore need their readi-grass, grass nuts, fibre beet and conditioning cubes. Shavings are also massively short in supply and we have several ponies who can only be stabled on shavings.

So we ask you please, to consider donating a bag of any of the above, by contacting our supplier Stuart Jones at Manor Farm Feed and Bedding in Greasby, directly to place and pay for an order and he will deliver directly to us, so we can make sure we have enough stock to get us through, should stocks completely run out.

FUNDRAISING

Due to the lockdown, we are unable to get out to events to fundraise for key funds, for rent, feed bills, vet bills, farrier etc etc. We haven’t cancelled our Open Day as of yet, but it will likely come, not only taking away a crucial fundraising opportunity, but meaning we have to refund stall holders.

We also have an Easter Bonus Ball going on with a £300 cash prize, that again, we will have to refund, if people don’t play on the rest of the numbers.

So please consider a monetary donation or play the Easter Bonus Ball to help keep us going, we really are the peoples charity here, we rely on you, to help us support you.

Bank sort: 161614 account: 10375919
PayPal: horsesensewirral@yahoo.com

ANNUAL ADOPTIONS

Due to our administrators working from home at the moment, we are not able to print Adoption Packs at this time.

COMMUNITY SUPPORT

As we will be very tied up here, we aren’t in a position to do as much in the community as we would like, however, we will endeavour to post lots of photos and videos on facebook for those of you locked indoors, to make your days a little brighter.

THANK YOU

Massive thank you to all of our supporters, team and experts, whilst this is a big transition, it is one we were well planned for and with your help, we can make it thru. Thank you xxx

It is with great sadness, that we bring the devastating news, of our final goodnight kiss with the beautiful Molly.

As you all know Molly has been poorly and receiving Veterinary care for months. As we thought we were finally getting somewhere, Molly deteriorated a week ago, but remained stable, until last night. When we went to give Molly her 11pm medication Saturday night, it was obvious she was struggling, so we called our lovely Helen of Leahurst Equine Practice out to her.

She had a high temperature, so was given medication to lower this and she almost instantly perked up, but as Sunday went on, it was obvious to us that she didn’t want to fight anymore and Sunday evening Helen was called back to end her suffering. Not before the volunteers queuing up for kisses, cuddles and to stuff her full of juicy apples, having been on a restricted diet for so long.

There really are no words big enough to describe what a beautiful soul Molly was, such a gentle being and a firm favourite amongst the team, she will be terribly missed by everyone.

I can’t stress enough how important it is to keep up with your equines dental care, everything Molly has been through stemmed from a simple fractured tooth, that was never tended to, left to rot and cause massive infection over a period of years, an infection that in the end, her body could no longer cope with.

Molly is not a pony who was purposefully neglected by her former owner, she was loved, but unfortunately the finances weren’t available for the care she so badly needed. At least one dental check up per year, 2-4 in geriatrics, needs to be part of all Equine owners budgeting.

Let’s not let Molly’s memory die, let’s keep Molly’s memory alive by sharing her story and encouraging all owners to make an annual appointment with a BAEDT registered, Equine Dental Technition. A £40-£50 visit per year, could save your horses life.

Find a qualified, insured and registered Equine Dental Technician here http://www.baedt.com/members_5357.html

To the Etihad Stadium, home of Manchester City Football Club, for kindly donating all of their veggies, that had been purchased for Match day before games were cancelled, the animals are loving their feast.

Molly was admitted to pony hospital on Monday night, ready for her next sinus related surgery on Tuesday. This all went well, however, when we went to collect her on Wednesday her laminitis had flared badly and she was pronounced unfit for travel, so she remains in the care of the hospital.

Her surgery costs already amounted to more than expected and then with the additional stay and medication, her bill will be almost double what we anticipated, so far and we really need your help to pay for Molly’s continued. treatment.

Please give what you can, even £1 all amounts up

Yesterday we had a super busy day, with both of our dentists Robin and Lee here for the day, to check everyone’s toothy pegs, Farrier Paul in the afternoon to give Coco a pedicure and Vets Luke and Jo here in the afternoon for Molly’s surgery and Carrots microchip.

Later this year the law is changing and ALL equines have to be microchipped, most already are, however, those with passports pre-microchips, are needing to be done, so we are doing one or two at each vet visit, so we are all done in plenty of time for the law changes.

Molly’s surgery didn’t go quite to plan, as the sinusitis wasn’t present where we expected, so Luke had to hunt around for it. Horses have several Sinus pockets and it’s possible that with Molly the problem is in one of the smaller, harder to access pockets, but Luke decided to stop where he was, rather than put her through anymore in one day and devised a tube system for me to flush thru each day, in hope that will flush everything out, if not, he will need to make another hole and try again. He will be seeing her again on Friday, so we will keep you posted.

Whilst this looks very daunting, Molly is really bright and happy today, there has also been a good improvement in her laminitis, so we feel that we are finally heading towards health with Molly, which she so deserves, it’s hard to put in to words quite what a pleasure Molly is, she is a real sweet old lady, loved by everyone who meets her.

Sorry, I am behind with the news. I am very busy at the moment in my full time work and with the charity. So a quick catch up for you as follows.

Nov 28

COPPER UPDATE

Copper is coming on amazingly and fancies himself as a jumping pony. He has been having a play in the school tonight with his best friend Bertie, a proper bromance has blossomed between these young boys and they love playtimes.

Also included an up to date photo of Coppers tail, so you can all see how amazing its healed

Nov 26

MOLLY

Molly spent the afternoon with her Uncle Luke at Leahurst Equine Practice, where he removed a broken tooth that had been giving her some trouble and obviously for some time, as it was that rotten and infected under the tooth that its left an opening, connecting right up to her sinus.

Luke also found further fractured teeth and problems, thanks to the camera being able to take a closer look, but decided it wasnt in her best interests to put her thru anymore today.

He has cleaned and packed the hole where her tooth was and hopes that it will heal over of it’s own accord, if not he will have to try and come up with another plan, he will be re-cleaning and packing the hole weekly for the foreseeable future and she is on pain relief and antibiotics.

Molly is a very stoic pony, who has obviously been in some considerable discomfort for sometime, but you wouldn’t know it, even tonight shes happy and well, you wouldn’t know she had a big hole in her mouth, shes such a real sweetheart

Nov 23

A HEART BREAKING DAY

This morning our beautiful Biscuit sadly had to be put to sleep, due to very sudden onset of colic. She was 35 years old, completely blind and bow legged too, but the toughest and sweetest pony you could meet. We were present when the colic started and our lovely vet Luke was present within minutes and on rectal examination could feel that something serious was wrong, either a twisted gut or displacement, so we very quickly ended her suffering.

Biscuit was very much a favourite amongst the team, so there has been much heart break and tears here today.

On a personal note, Biscuit was a pony Amy rode and loved as a child at Barnston Riding Centre nearly 30 years ago, her first riding instructor incidentally was her owner and a lovely bloke who, along with his family owned her right up until she came to us due to unfortunate circumstances and we have always kept in touch and been visited, so this has been a particularly hard loss for Amy and her mum to take, but she was well loved by many people and at least we could end her suffering very swiftly.

She will forever carry a special place in our hearts

Jan 18

JOLENE UPDATE

This week we finally decided that Jolene had made enough progress, learning to trust us human folk, to give it a go doing her teeth. We were quite surprised at what our lovely vet Helen found. Apart from huge ‘fang looking’ hooks and alot of cheek ulceration from sharp edges, for a mid-teen pony, who has never seen a dentist, her actual tooth quality is very good, no fractures, or infection.

In the wild, ponies eat a selection of grasses, shrubbery, wild flowers and even barks, which help maintain their teeth better than the average grass and hay diet supplied to domestic ponies and it really is a learning curve, when we get to see these things up close and personal.

The hooks are too large to file down in one go and will take several visits over 9-12 months to correct, but it’s another step on her road to recovery. We also performed another worm egg count, which has come back at 922, not as reduced as we would like, but less than half what it was and heading in the right direction. It’s quite common to take a while to reduce worm burdens in emaciated ponies, purely due to their overall health and ability to fight against pesky parasites, so we are happy with any reduction. She will be wormed and heavily monitored again this week.

Shes bright eyed and bushy tailed, even been out for walks and around the school, while Tinkerbell does what babies do best and run around silly in the school too

Jan 1

WIRRAL EQUINE STAR AWARDS 2019

Congratulations to all finalists.

There was only 4 points between the three vets, the closest we have ever had.

YOUR WINNERS ARE

As you can imagine Winter is a lot busier, with all horses in not only are we busier with feeds, mucking out etc we are busier fundraising for the extra expenses. Our team have also been busy training the youngsters. Amy our chair has been poorly and the team have really stepped up, so she has less to worry about letting her get the rest the doctor ordered.

We have also started organising the Open Day May 24th, so save the date. I hope to keep up with the news for you going forward, but please bare with me if I get a bit behind.

Huge thank you to everyone involved, from the farmers rounding up, to the volunteers holding the fort at home, Eileen, her baby Dewi, Jolene and her baby Tinkerbell are all settled and snuggled up for the night.

The decision was taken at last weeks annual round up, not to put these mares back on the Carneddau for Winter as Eileen is lame and Jolene is underweight, so their owner, the lovely Gareth Wyn Jones, kindly agreed we could offer them a new home with their babies.

They loaded easily, travelled very well and settled immediately, they are very special, beautiful ponies. We will allow them some adjustment time before we start looking into Eileen’s lameness and the cause of Jolene’s weight loss, the ponies up on the mountain are all in good condition with such great food sources available, so we suspect possible dental issues, that will be addressed, as soon as she trusts us enough to do so.

To donate towards their food, hay, bedding, vet care etc, please find our bank and paypal details below.

Thank you for your continued support.

Bank: sort: 161614 account: 10375919

PayPal: horsesensewirral@yahoo.com

On Thursday 15th August, we brought Little Bertie (40yo), Magic (18yo) and Molly (28yo) into the sanctuary, as their owner could no longer care for them. Due to their owner struggling to care for them, they have not received any Veterinary care for some time and although not in horrendous condition, having been on a nice grassy field, all 3 do required some TLC, passports and microchips.

Little Bertie is approximately 40 years old, under weight, very hairy suggesting cushings disease, covered in lice and looks to be carrying a worm burden, none of which is a surprise in an old boy, but does require treatment.

Magic is a cheeky little madam, is obese and been suffering with Laminitis, suggestive of her suffering from Equine Metabolic Syndrome, this requires blood tests to confirm and possibly a course of medication, normally given in diabetics, along with a strict diet in order to get her in to a more healthy state, to give her many more years, she also has lice.

Molly has the saddest eyes we have seen for a long time, at 28 years old, is maintaining her weight, but along with uneven fat distribution, a long coat and recurrent hoof abscesses, again she is ticking the boxes for also suffering with Equine PPID, more commonly referred to as Cushing’s disease, so again will need blood tests and then life long medication, to improve her quality of life. She also has lice and sweetitch.

Molly required Veterinary Treatment on scene, before we could even entertain moving her, as due to her latest hoof abscess causing excruciating pain, she could only stand on 3 legs, making it unsafe to travel her. The lovely Caroline from RD Owen Equine Vets attended, drained her abscess, poulticed her hoof and gave her a strong dose of pain relief to get her home, she is much more comfortable now. We will continue to poultice her hoof, provide pain relief and work with our farriers and vet until Molly is fully recovered.

Initial Veterinary costs as above, are expected to be in the region of £500 for all 3 ponies, however, with worm and louse treatments, dental treatment and careful feeding of Little Bertie, to get him looking and feeling as good as our other 40 year olds is expected to all together come to a minimum of £1000 in the first month.

Please give what you can to help us with their initial and ongoing expenses.

www.justgiving.com/littlebertie

It’s been brought to our attention that many 16 – 18 year olds and even those older, struggle with knowing what is expected of them at Vet School, or what experience is needed to gain a good solid portfolio before applying to Vet school and so we have put our heads together with the lovely Helen Braid MRCVS of Liverpool University, to come up with a solution.

It’s clear that university open evenings can be quite intimidating and so you may not ask questions you have, or just not think of them in such a formal environment, so on Friday 23rd August, 11am – 1pm we are having our own open event, for those wanting to become a vet, or are about to start any Vet School this term and want to ask questions, to prepare.

You won’t be sat down in a formal manner, you will just be able to come here for a couple of hours to mingle with us, Vets/Lecturers, current Vet Students and eat cake in a lovely relaxing, animal filled environment.

Amy(chair) has experience of building a portfolio and has helped many students build their portfolios and written recommendations, all of which are now currently Vet students or qualified vets, off saving the world, one animal at a time. Amy also suffers with depression and anxiety, so can empathise with those who do struggle in a formal environment, so helping YOU achieve YOUR goal is very important to her.

If you seriously want to be a vet please come along, to this one of a kind event, no pressure to do anything you dont want to and get yourself prepared.

Just 6 weeks on Mika is looking much better.

We have had a busy few days here:

Thursday – Farrier
Friday – Dentist
Saturday – Willy Washer
Sunday – Equine Car Boot
Monday – Vet & Farrier
Wednesday – Farrier 

We had an early start Saturday to make the 5 hour round trip, to collect baby Luke, who was abandoned in the Lancashire area. An abandonment notice was logged with the Police and posted where he had been abandoned, but no owner came forward and he is not microchipped. He is a bit on the thin side and crawling with lice, but a sweet natured yearling colt, he will be gelded along with Herbie this month.

We have named him Luke, in honour of one of our amazing vets, who has been looking after our residents for several years now, from the excellent Leahurst Equine Practice, we are huge fans of Luke Edward’s, so thought it was about time he had a pony named after him.

Rascal had a day out to Warrington with his Auntie Sam in the rain, and brought home a lovely first place rosette, how clever is he. Rascal has a lovely nature, and wants to be everyone’s friend. He has now gone to his fabulous new home, we will miss this bundle of mischief and wish him well in all his adventures.

The owner of the 9 mares and foals seized from Warrington on 30th April, has come forward and proved ownership, therefore the Police have taken the decision to return them in to his ownership. It turns out while he was away, someone had cut the fence of the field he rents, allowing the horses to escape, the people looking after them while he was away couldn’t do anything until he returned, not being the owners themselves.

He came with his family to start collecting them, they were all very lovely to us and the horses, he has taken Magic, Gypsy and Josephine and will return for the rest after Ferne and Crystal foal, he has however, taken the decision to relinquish ownership of Mika to us, so that she can receive the veterinary treatment she needs, so please keep sharing and donating for Mika, so she can receive the best care possible.

www.justgiving.com/mikaandfriends

 

To everyone who came to the first of our 2019 open days today, it was great to see you all and to all of our team, friends and family who have put many hours of effort in for weeks, to prepare for the day, we really are surrounded by amazing people.

Thank you all for giving so generously too.

Yesterday we assisted Cheshire Police, dealing with 9 abandoned ponies, 6 mares, 3 of which are heavily pregnant, the other 3 suspected to also be pregnant, just not as imminent, plus 3 foals at foot, who look to be late foals of last year, maybe very early this year.

Although they are all a good weight, they all need their feet doing and are all riddled with parasites and matted. One pony who was named Mika at the scene, after the Police officer in attendance ‘Michael’ is not as well as the rest, her chest is covered in nasty looking sarcoids (tumours), she isn’t carrying as much weight as the others and also has chronic diorreah. One of our lovely vets will be attending tomorrow morning to assess them all, after a bit of time to settle in, but obviously Mika will be priority.

We are very proud to have been nominated for a National Diversity Award, please take a moment to vote for us, in the Community Organisation section.

When shopping at Pets at Home you may already have a VIP card, if not, you can register for one on their website, it takes 60 seconds and you can select a charity to support when you are shopping!!

You can change this charity at any time, its costs you nothing, but as you shop it collects points for your chosen charity, then each quarter Pets at Home send a gift card to the charity, to the value of the points, that can be used against anything in store, from food and bedding, to medical supplies, for all small animals. A massive help to us, as our small animal side is always growing.

 

 

 

 

 

Babie Herbie is doing really well, although now he has some proper nutrition, he has become a typical Coltish monkey. His Uncle Luke from Leahurst has been to examine him, with view to castrating him, his testicles haven’t dropped yet, but are up there, so hopefully wont be waiting too long.

Picture 1 – with Uncle Luke
Picture 2 – morning wake up call, asleep with his gorilla

 

THE WORST START TO ANY DAY

We are so sad to announce that our amazing Bobbie Dazzler has trotted off over rainbow bridge this morning, he saw the lovely Ben from Leahurst last night, as he had a very mild episode of colic, but by 6am was very, very poorly, we suspect he had some sort of abdominal tumour, even with pain relief and sedation, he was still obviously in a lot of pain, so there was no other decision to be made, but to let him go to sleep for a final time.

Bobbie was 31 years old and everyone’s favourite pony, he was such a cool dude, he was one of the original ponies we founded the Sanctuary with, so this loss has hit the whole team very hard.

Most of you will know that Bobbie has a 40 year old wife, Mandy, who lay down with him while we were waiting for Ben to arrive this morning, a very touching moment, we will of course be keeping a close eye on her over the coming days. Sleep well our Bobbie Dazzler xxxx

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I arrived at Horse Sense Wirral April 1st 2019, they tell me I was going to Italy on something called live export, I don’t know what that is, but I’m glad I’ve come here instead, I’m only about 4 months old and shouldn’t be away from my mummy, mummy Amy has given me a big Gorilla teddy to cuddle up to and is making me some milkies, but I would have much preferred to have my real mummy with me. They tell me I’m safe now, but I need a name.

When I woke up the next day, mummy Amy tells me that a lady called Kathy suggested that I be named after the first rescue pony here, that started the charity. I think that sounds like a very good idea, as although Mummy Amy has been doing this for 12 years Horse Sense Wirral was officially formed In March 2009, so it’s their 10 year Anniversary too.

So I am now called HERBIE, apparently I look like him too, but Mummy Amy hope’s I wont be as grumpy as he was :0)

 

 

 

 

 

 

On February 5th we received over 200 messages about 2 ponies being threatened with abandonment. Our first thought was we are full, and the photos we received showed both in good condition. As always we don’t just leave it there, we contacted several people connected with the ponies to get the facts, and advise if we cant help. It soon came to light, the photos where old and both ponies in poor condition. Carrock is 30yrs old and Taffy 16 yrs old, both put on social media sites as “FREE TO GOOD HOME” . Naturally people where concerned for the ponies falling into  the wrong hands and not receiving the care they need. After getting more precise information we decided the best for the ponies welfare was to bring them in, as Emergency Admissions.

After a couple of days to settle in, they had pamper and deosect (lice treatment) administered , amazingly Carrock already looks to have gained some weight and Taffy who was very timid when collected was even brave enough to have a little rug on 

As it turns out, Carrock, starred in the ITV FILM, ‘Good Night Mister Tom’ back in 1998, as ‘Dobbs’, Toms horse, played by the late John Thaw. It’s amazing to think how her life has changed over the years, to end up being a late night, emergency admission to our Charity, some 21 years later.

Although we are chocka block, we have found space for tiny Rascal the stallion, as at just 3yo, he was due to be taken to the local hunt to be shot and fed to the dogs. He is very sweet and will NOT be a stallion for long. Sadly he was in this situation due to an un-registered pony sanctuary, please do research sanctuaries.

 

Yesterday we sadly had to say a final goodbye to the lovely Claudia, after she suffered a suspected heart attack or stroke, whilst happily grazing with her friends.

We would like to say a huge thank you to the lovely Helen from Leahurst Equine Practice and to our awesome volunteers for all of their help and support at such a sad time.

We can’t thank Elise Pilkington Trust enough, having supported our charity several times, with grants towards capital items. We have recently taken purchase of a lovely Horse Trailer and a tractor with a grant from them. Both massively important for the running of the charity, to which we are forever grateful. We run solely on donations with nobody taking a wage or expenses so that every penny goes to the welfare of the animals. Both these items have already made a big difference to us.

New Years day our Biggest resident, George was found lying unwell in the field, he got up briefly, but soon lay back down, he was brought down to the yard and the vet called out immediately. 

The lovely Ben from Leahurst attended him very quickly and initially treated him for Colic, Colic is a broad term for tummy pain, which can be caused by minor things, such as wind, but can also be caused by much more severe illness or disease. Unfortunately for George, it is the latter in his case.

He was admitted into the amazing Phillip Leverhulme Equine Hospital within an hour and following all diagnostic tests and scans, they are unsure what is making him so unwell, however, his kidneys aren’t working well, he is very dehydrated, has a low white cell count and protein levels, so all in all, a very poorly boy.

The initial problem to combat is the dehydration, so he has been hooked up to IV fluids and they will keep assessing his bloods over the next 24-48 hours, looking for any signs of improvement or deterioration, however, at this time it is 50/50 whether he will pull thru.

As always, we have told the hospital to do anything he needs, which comes at a price, just the first 24 hours alone, are estimated to cost £2000 – £3000. If you are able to donate even £1 each, towards George’s care we would be ever so grateful and providing he pulls thru, he will be more than happy to kiss and cuddle anyone who helps him, as he really is the loveliest boy, with a lot of love to give.

Please visit George’s Just Giving Page
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/biggeorgie
Or, you can also donate via our PayPal: horsesensewirral@yahoo.com and just pop in comments “For George” please

Please join us in wishing our 2 oldest residents, Mandy and Mrs Mac, a very HAPPY 40TH BIRTHDAY!!!!

To the amazing team at Support Adoption for Pets, Pets at Home, particularly our partner store, Wallasey and all of their supporters and customers, who all make it possible for Support Adoption for Pets, to help charities, like us, make a huge difference to the lives of unwanted, neglected or abandoned animals.

You, our supporters, will be well aware, that we have had huge struggles this year, from unexpected and significant vet bills, like when the awesome team at Leahurst saved Pollyanna’s life, against all odds. We have battled with food and bedding bills from the beginning of the year, being wetter than normal and then the Summer being dryer than normal, adding huge costs to our usual outgoings.

We would like to wish you all a very happy Christmas and all the best for 2019.

Also to say Thank you to all those that support us, be it in donations, grants, our fabulous volunteers or any other way you support us. Everyone is voluntary here with nobody taking a wage. We have jobs, families and our fair share of ups and downs but do this for the animals. We aim to be the best we can in all aspects of our charity, making sure the animals are in good health, our accounts are transparent and work closely with the professionals to keep within the law and the required guidelines. We tweak things and make improvements as we grow, and strive to do the best by the animals and charity at all times. You, our loyal supporters keep us going and we cant thank you enough.

We are hosting an Equine First Aid Course, Saturday 5th January, 2-5.30pm at Thronton Hough Village Hall, with the lovely Helen Braid of Leahurst Equine Practice, involving practical skills, as well as theory.

***NOMINATIONS ARE NOW OPEN***

This is our 3rd year, running this to show our appreciation to our professionals. This year we have 6 categories, as follows:

To the Jean Sainsbury Animal Welfare Trust for providing us with a very generous donation,  to help us with our winter food and bedding. We still have a long way to go to catch up with our bills after the most expensive summer ever, with no grass and massive quantities of forage needed. However, these very lovely people have made life a little easier for us, we can‘t thank them enough. 

To Sally Leadbetter at TackShop4U and all her lovely customers, who have been busy donating items at TackShop4U to be sold in their fabulous second-hand section, in order to raise much needed funds for our ponies. 

Coming in to Winter we are very short of Haynets, so Sally has very kindly turned those donations into Haynets for us and will continue to do so, until we have enough. Thank you all so much, Sally is always happy to take clean, usable items to sell on, to raise pennies for us, she stocks our calendars and also has our bonanza raffle tickets for sale, pop in there for all your horsey needs.

To Pets at Home and Support Adoption for Pets for including us in their damaged stock scheme. Last week we collected a huge pallets of damaged, but perfectly usable stock for our small animals. This lot should keep them all going for a while, thank you so much.

Pollyanna our miracle pony. Pollyanna had her whole colon removed 11 weeks ago, after a long surgery and blood transfusion the odds were slim. She can never eat hay again as she only has her small intestine. This meant Amy our founder had to feed her a sloppy feed every hour 24 hrs a day for weeks slowly increasing the amount then about 5 weeks ago it went to every 2hrs and a soaked chopped grass. Pollyanna has adapted well and doing fantastic, her face is wet due to the wet haynet but we are all so happy with her.

Hey, my name is Cerys, some of you may remember that I was very sick earlier this year with copper poisoning from my “sheep” food and the vets had little hope of me surviving, but thank’s to you lovely lot clubbing together to buy me some magic tablets and Mum spending many days and nights syringe feeding me liquid food, water and giving me jam butties I pulled thru. Mum says I ate my magic tablets like a really good girl, I don’t remember seeing them, the jam butties were good tho ;0)

My liver and kidneys were damaged pretty bad and the vet said it would take a long time for them to recover, in the mean time my poops were very liquid for months, so Mum still had to keep making sure I stayed hydrated, but my poops are normal now and my liver and kidneys are working propers again.

I love my Mum and always first to see her and follow her around looking for a jam butty, but she stopped giving me them when my magic pills ran out, for some reason, I miss my jam butties.

Recently, the vet that saw me the day I collapsed, was visiting one of this year’s lambs and she couldn’t believe her eyes when she saw me, she thought for sure that I couldn’t be made better, she said I’m the first she has seen survive being so sick, but I tried to tell her that my Mum wouldn’t give up!!!!

I am 18 months old now and my sister, Dolly and I are having great fun, watching this year’s little ones grow, the little boy, Arwel, can get a bit big for his boots sometimes, but Dolly soon tells him to behave, not many sheep’s get to live a safe life, like we do and we are grateful to all of you, who make it possible.

Mum is great, but she can’t do it with out all of my Aunties, Uncles and donations, donations are running very short at the moment and all of us here eat more food and use more bedding in the Winter months I’ve heard Mum panicking about a shortage of food too, this doesn’t sound too good, I have well over 100 brothers and sisters here and we needs our foods.

I think it would be a really good idea to buy loads of foods now, before it runs out, so it lasts us, but we don’t have enough donations, would you mind helping with donations please?? Anything you can afford would be a great help, it all adds up, we have a PayPal, which is: horsesensewirral@yahoo.com, but if you want to buy food and bring it to visit, that’s great too, just ask Mum what we needs, or you can buy foods from our Uncle Stuart Jones too, he takes BACS and PayPal payments, he knows what we all eats here and he brings foods to us every Wednesday and Saturday, he’s a pretty cool guy, although he did spoil my fun one day, when I was playing running offs, Mum was too slow, but he got me and carried me back to my paddock, I didn’t talk to him for a while, but then I remembered he brings the foods, so I join in giving him a shout when he arrives again now, our paddock is right next the gate on to the farm, so we get to greet all of the visitors, as long as it’s not raining, we don’t like to go outside in the rain, Mum says we are a bunch of spoilt princesses!!!!

Anyhow, it’s 2am and I really should be asleeps, I’m keeping the kids up, so I will have to logoffs for now, please see if you can spare us some pennies and ask your friends too, we really, really needs it please.

Much loves from

Cerys

Pollyanna was discharged from the amazing Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital on Monday 3rd and is back home with Finlay, we can’t thank everyone at Leahurst enough for EVERYTHING they did to save her and look after her, they were truly amazing and went the extra mile all the way, we are very lucky to have them so close.

Polly is still receiving intensive care at home, luckily our experience and living on site means we can do this safely, please keep sharing her Just Giving page found on face book, Herbert Pirie (Horse Sense Wirral) or there is a Donate button on our home page. Between Polly, Claudia, Mandy and George, we owe Leahurst £10k now and need to get it paid off ASAP.

Tuesday night our beautiful Pollyanna was taken ill suddenly with colic, following 2 vet visits, she was admitted to the Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital, shortly before 1am wednesday morning, along with her life long companion Finlay.

As with the previous 2 vet visits, she stabilised after medication was administered, however, when the medication wore off, she deteriorated again and we were called to say she was going into surgery, so we rushed to Leahurst to sit with Finlay, while she was operated on.

Tuesday 22nd

Up and walking, doing better than expected, but still very much critical, please keep praying for her. She was pleased to have her first nibble of grass last night too, so good to see, but we are being told it’s still very much 50/50, she’s needs all the help she can get.

Saturday 25th

POLLYANNA is still fighting and each day looking more comfortable, she is very much still critical, but with each day, we become more hopeful, tonight her temperature had risen to the higher end of normal, so the awesome team at The Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital are closely monitoring that, for any changes.

It is inevitable after the surgery she has had, that some sort of infection will occur, so she has been on 3 types of antibiotics all along, however, there is always the possibility of infection, even with the antibiotics, but she is in the best place to deal with that. For now she is happy, eating, drinking, walking, toileting and that’s the best we can hope for, so far.

Sunday 26th

Now off her IV fluids and looking happier again, just a little cold after being for a walk in the rain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monday 27th

She is bright as a button today and got her cheeky head back on, waiting at the door for her sloppy feeds and grabbing at Amy and Shaun’s legs for attention. Whilst it’s lovely to see everything looking positive, she still has a very long way to go. We have set up a donation page to help towards her vet fees, if you spare a few pounds we would really appreciate it, surgery alone was just under £5,000 and with after care we are expecting this to rise to over £8000  you can use the Donate button on our home page or find other ways on our Donate page. Thank you.

 

 

A great week for our ponies and their loaners. HSW Tilly spent the week at Equifest, with hundreds of horses, people, vehicles and lots of noise and strange surroundings. She did so well taking 8th in a very large class of 23, that took 2 hours to get through. And made it to the Rescue Pony Championship.

Following in her success:

 

HSW Marley of the Great Barrow horses, who where found with their deceased friend.

2yo, HSW Marley attended his first show, just 4 months after his very public rescue and came away with 3 x 2nd place, a 5th place and has qualified for TOYS 2019!!!

Our ponies and their super loaners are making us very proud of them all at the minute

Who remembers little Charlie? The very poorly, elderly pooch, rescued from one of the houses in the New Ferry blast. Charlie is totally blind and underwent two surgeries in one, to remove a very painfully infected eye and several very painfully infected teeth, just 2 days after the blast. He had all his matted fur clipped off, a good bath and spent a couple of weeks making several TV and Radio appearances, telling everyone his story.

Charlie was very lucky and found himself a fabulous bungalow with a garden to live out his days, he’s quite keen on the human residents that feed him too :0)

Here he is today, after his latest hair do.

Poor Bobbie has been taken ill today, with no obvious cause so far, our super vet, Luke, took fluid from his tummy and bloods to check for various causes, so far the tests on his tummy have come back clear and we are awaiting the blood results. As he has a high temperature and heart rate, he has been started on antibiotics and pain relief.

Bobbie is one of our long term residents, one of the original 6 we started with, so is very, very special to us and does have his own little fan club, so please, say a prayer and cross your fingers that, whatever it is, is treatable, at his age there are some things being tested for, that may not be treatable, which breaks our hearts :0(

Yesterday we had a little Hoglet brought in with a broken leg, we rushed him straight off to our fabulous vets, who will be amputating his leg in the morning, this is something that hedgehogs do cope well with, so won’t stop him being released back in to the wild, once he has fully recovered.

Huge thank you to his rescuers and to Birch Veterinary Centre, who have kindly agreed to do this surgery free of charge.

He’s a cheeky little fella and quite confident for a wild animal, maybe Just because he was so hungry, he ate like he hadn’t eaten for days, bless him.

Here at Horse Sense Wirral, we usually receive a handful of calls each month, for the concern of welfare of horses, however, this has increased to a call or 2 most days. 99% of what we are attending, is due to people not knowing to adjust their management according to the unusual weather we have been experiencing. Waters are running dry quicker than normal and paddocks are bare, due to lack of rain not helping the grass grow.

Another great open day. Lovely weather, good turnout, everyone had a good time. Thank you to those who came and massive thanks to those who helped make it a good day, volunteers, friends, stall holders. A few photos from the day 

 

 

 

 

Those of you who follow our Facebook page will have seen whats been going on in the last week, last Sunday 24th March 2018 a lovely lady brought to light, the plight of 4 abandoned horses in Great Barrow. Sadly, as can been seen in the photographs, one had already died thru lack of care and so it was paramount that we got the remaining 3 to safety.

They weren’t thin/sick enough to be seized on welfare grounds, so we liaised with Cheshire Police and the RSPCA to remove them on abandonment grounds. This means placing an abandonment notice at the scene for a minimum of 4 days, in order to give an owner chance to let us know they exist. During this time they have been in a neighbouring field with plenty of grass and water, so already doing much better than they were.

Saturday was the day their lives changed forever, we went with an amazing team of people, who gave up hours of their time, to corale the 3 unhandled, very scared horses into a horse box to bring them home.

They have really settled in well and we can’t thank everyone who helped us get them here enough. They will spend 2 weeks in quarantine, getting to know us humans and being fed correctly to regain their lost weight and condition. Once they are ready, they will see the vet, dentist and farrier.

If you would like to buy them some food, it would be very much appreciated, they will be eating Baileys No.4, Alfa A and Fibre beet, plus ad-lib Haylage. If you are a customer of Manor Farm Feed and Bedding Supplies in Frankby, Wirral, you can add a bag to your order and ask for it to be delivered here,  or contact Stu at Manor Farm and send payment direct to him. Alternatively, you can make a payment to use via several ways on our donate page.

Thank you so much to our team, supporters and everyone who helped as always. 

I will add a few Thank You’s here as our website is having work done, and it will be easier to transfer one page when ready.

Massive thank you’s to:

Sue Dunning and all the staff and customers at Debenham’s Chester, Cosmetic Department for raising £605.00 in store. All the staff and customers at City Aesthetics Chester who had a fab time and raised £170.00. We held a naming competition and raised £183.00 with a prize to the winners of a large Easter Egg donated from Tesco’s Bidston. With the colt (small coloured cob) being named Marley by his saviour, the two mare have been named Peggy (Coloured) and Lacey (Bay) so a big thank you to you all who entered the competition.

 

A big thank you to Colberry Saddlery and all their customers who held an Easter raffle and raised £75 for us. We really do appreciate all your support. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are based in a highly populated equine area, 5 minutes from Leahurst Veterinary Hospital. We are very fortunate to have a large numbers of specialists covering Wirral looking after our animals. Our chair Amy decided in 2016 to acknowledge their hard work and support by running a voting poll, and award them with an award.

The winners of 2017 vote are:

Farrier of the year – Tom Clothier, Dentist of the Year – Lee Shakeshaft, Vet of the year – Nadine Page, Physio of the year – Claire Sudbury and Instructor of the year – Helen Dutton. All receiving a HSW Star Award. Well done to all the specialist in their field, out there.

 

We would like to say a big thank you to 3rd Greasby Brownies and their leaders, who not only raised a great £127.90 by holding a cake sale in aid of our residents, but also came on Saturday in the awful weather and filled tonnes of haynets and scrubbed every bucket for us, thank you very much.

We would like to thank all the Co-Op customers who picked us as their chosen charity for the community fund. What a lovely surprise when we picked the cheque up. This will be used towards our winter feed and bedding, thank you.

Wow wow wow so Tilly’s loaner Sam took Tilly to Supreme Showdown at the weekend. Asking nothing of Tilly, Sam just wanted her to enjoy the experience. Sam has had Tilly just over a year and has been very patient with her and taken things very slowly building trust and confidence. Well Tilly paid Sam back by taking Champion Rescue Pony both on Saturday and again Sunday. We couldn’t be prouder of them, well done.

We would like to say a huge thank you to Fany Boutique in Oxton and all her customers. They held a cake sale and raffle on Sunday and raised a fantastic £205 for the horses.

Friday saw the arrival of ‘Mary’ from Burtonwood. Mary, although in good condition otherwise, has the worst case of feather mites we have seen, having gone untreated for so long, they now effect right up her legs, belly and chest, she has some really nasty sores from rubbing herself. 

Mary is only rising 4 years old and was due to be put to sleep, as her loaner was struggling to afford to keep her, never mind pay vet bills. Once aware of the situation her owner was agreeable to her coming here and paid for her to be transported here. The yard where Mary was also very kindly clubbed together lots of useful items which they sent along with her, which we are very grateful for.

Monday morning will see our vet Luke start her treatment, with the help of our lovely supporter Fran Randles clipping her, so we can get to her skin for more effect relief of the itching.

As always, any help towards Mary’s care is gratefully received, you can find out the many ways to donate on our donate page.

 

 

 

 

We have had quite a busy week, starting with the arrival of Beauty, a visit from the vet for her, to make her mouth more comfortable, as she couldn’t eat hay.

Our fab farrier Tom Clothier Farrier out doing a bit of remedial work on our gentle giant, George, these fully round shoes are called egg bars and are used to support horses with navicular. If your horse or pony needs remedial work, talk to Tom, he works well with our residents, alongside our vets, isn’t afraid of trying new things and doesn’t over charge.

Beauty arrived with us today, all the way from Morecambe. Her moving to us was arranged by another party, so we don’t have full details, but are told that she has spent over 3 years of her 4 year life locked in a stable and has scarring on her withers from an embedded rug. 

She is very sweet, but nervous, in poor body condition, although a lot of this is hidden under her thick coat. Due to having no muscle, fat or anything around her back end, her back legs don’t quite know what they are doing, but some love and food, this young lady will be a real cracking family pony in the future.

She will be wormed and see the vet, farrier and dentist over the next few days to give her the best chance of a healthy and full recovery, she will been seen by our wonderful physio in a few weeks too, when she has a bit more back end to work with, to build up her strength.

If you would like to help aid Beauty’s recovery you can do so in many ways:

Donate via PayPal, BACS, cash or cheque.
Ring Leahurst and ask to make a payment against our vet bill.
Buy her some food, she is having Baileys No.4, Alfa A and Fibre beet at the minute.

Thank you for your continued support 

Cally was returned from loan to us during summer, as her loaner was struggling to keep weight on her and keep her sound.

When she arrived back home she could hardly stand, so the vet was called immediately and it was found that she had a fracture to her hip, under a small open wound, she had a fall a few days previous, but as she was still happily running around her field, her loaner thought nothing of it.

2018 Calender’s are now ready, featuring some of our rescue ponies from the last 12 months. These make great gifts, for jotting down appointments on, for the office, for that someone who has everything or you simply struggle to think of what to buy them. A4 size good quality at £5 plus £1.30 UK postage. Local collection points are Horse Sense (Thornton Hough) Manor Farm (Frankby) Tack Shop 4 u (Neston). If you would like one posting, please email wendy@mechair.net with address details and to arrange payment.

Over last few days Sailors condition deteriorated and we could no longer manage his pain, this morning it was obvious that he didnt want to continue his fight any longer, so we took the heart breaking decision to have him put to sleep, he went very quickly and peacefully.

We cant thank Ben from Leahurst enough for arriving so quickly and his many cuddles and have to thank Luke too, who has tried everything over the last few months to try and give Sailor a comfortable retirement. R.I.P hansom boy. 

We would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who attended our open day on Bank Holiday Monday, to our fab stall holders, the awesome Pam’s Pony Parties, Mr Tee ice cream and a massive thank you to friends, family and volunteers, who helped on the day and to get us ready in the lead up to the day, we couldn’t do it without you. It was a great day and lovely weather, with only 5 weeks to organise the event, we are really please with how it went and will build on that for the next event.

Just a few photos taken at the beginning of the event, sorry it got too busy to take more. Permission was given from the parents of the children to show how lovely they looked. 

 

 

 

 

 

We are absolutely delighted to announce, we are one of Lush’s Charity Pots chosen charities to be featured on their lids. These will be on sale in all Lush shops throughout the UK and Ireland, featuring the beautiful Gracie.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Congratulations and well done to all 4 Hsw ponies and loaners who did fabulous at yesterdays Greasby show. Loaners are doing a fantastic job and all ponies are looking great. We at Hsw are very proud of you all and ponies.

Biscuit is doing great and looking wonderful just 4 weeks after arrival.

 

2 weeks ago, was a very sad day for a very well respected, loved, local horsey family, as they sadly found themselves parting with their 3 much loved equine family members, 2 of which had been part of the family for over 20/25 years. Both spent time, years apart at Barnston Riding Centre, under Brenda’s care.

Unfortunately life hasn’t been very kind and it became clear that all the love in the world and probably over 100 years collective experience, was no longerenough to meet the needs of ageing ponies.

One of our aims is to turn one of the barns in to an indoor arena, where we can rehabilitate the horses and hold classes and clinics. We can also hire the arena out, bringing in funds making us more self sufficient. Below is an example of why we need this facility. We work closely with our vets, dentist and farriers, BHS and other animal/equine officials. By having an indoor seated arena, we can open so much up to the public, by holding talks like below:-

DO YOU LOOK AT YOUR HORSES TEETH WHEN THE DENTIST IS STARTING AND FINISHING?

DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT THEY SHOULD LOOK LIKE?

HAVE YOU EVER CHECKED WHAT DENTISTRY QUALIFICATIONS YOUR VET/DENTIST HAS?

 

 

 

 

Whilst I have been away Sailor was admitted to intensive care at the Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital, it was unclear what was exactly wrong with him, we knew he was dehydrated, we knew he was slightly impacted due to the dehydration and we knew his kidney function tests weren’t right but not horrendous. He also had a swollen sheath and penis, he was well in himself, eating, drinking, pooing, he just couldn’t urinate for himself.

Sailor was rescued by one of our followers in a very poor way, she took advice from us how to start his rehabilitation and after having his feet and teeth done she tried her best to get weight on him. He really wasn’t good so she signed him over to us so he can have 24hr care he needs. His feet are in a bad way and he was in pain, we set too with everything to make him comfortable, and had a special pair of shoes put on him. He is a stunning boy with a lovely nature and deserves the best. Sadly too much had been taken off his teeth and he couldn’t chew his food causing the impact.

Whilst he was in the best place possible, we did have to pay a £750 deposit towards is care, estimated to cost around £1500 and that had completely emptied our bank account of all funds, if you can possibly spare a pound or two, it would be very much appreciated to help us replenish those funds for feed, hay, bedding, farrier etc etc.

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday we had to say goodbye to our sweet Fantasia due to Colic, sadly due to an old injury before she came to us Fantasia would struggle to recover from an anaesthetic and she was very, very poorly, so we had to take the kindest decision for her.

She will be very much missed, with her cheeky, if slightly grumpy character and her lovely wickers to everyone she saw, she was a favourite amongst the team.

This week has seen Faith, Gwen, Hercules and Toos go off to some amazing new homes and Sunday saw 2 of our ponies and their families, have a great day at our local horse show with Tilly grabbing a first and reserve Champion and Chance (Mr Chips) scooping a clear round and a 2nd in his first show jumping competition with Lucy, we are so proud of both ponies and Loaners ….. these ponies prove that rescue ponies shouldn’t be written off.

Sailor arrived with us on Friday 21st April, crippled with laminitis after years of his feet being neglected (not by the lady who brought him to us).  Following x-rays it has been found that the amount of sole between the floor and his pedal bone is minimal.  He is currently on pain relief and has thick pads on his feet.  His vet bill is already very high and to get him thru this, with his pain meds, constant replacement pads and if we can stabilise the pedal bones, specialist rubber shoes, its going to be very costly.  He is a very sweet natured, gentle boy and even if he doesn’t come right enough to ride, we just want him to be able to live a pain free life, with our other retirees.

27.04.17

One of his feet have deteriorated today so our fabulous vet Luke is making a last attempt to save him tomorrow, by cutting thru the deep flexor tendon on his bad leg, to release the strain and hopefully most of the pain, this isn’t cheap and the cost of regularly redressing will be a big cost too, he is totally worth it but we desperately need your help and support to get us thru this time, as we are still paying off the bill for Saffy and Mojos colic surgeries. If you can donate even a small amount, please go to our donate page where there are several options how to do this. Thank you

We would like to thank Selwyn Building Services for the kind donation of £36.51 raised from their cake sale.

We have been chosen as one of the local charities by CO-OP that you can support. 1{6a58d31d3c5a0a8c6a8185d433f901ea3d6300a08925ea4c531ce37ae37d0426} of what you spend will come to us if you select us as your chosen charity between April and October 2017. Also you get 5{6a58d31d3c5a0a8c6a8185d433f901ea3d6300a08925ea4c531ce37ae37d0426} reward back,  join up today or if already a member, make us your chosen charity.

 

We were very sorry to hear of the tragedy in New Ferry on Saturday 25th March, and hoped for everyone to get out safely. Whilst we knew it was mainly commercial properties effected, we knew some local residences would be effected by evacuations, while building safety was established. Therefore, we offered our services free of charge, to temporarily house any family pets effected, so those effected had one less thing to worry about.

Whilst Saffy has been recovering very well, her handsome husband Mojo, was very suddenly taken very poorly, with Colic last Monday.

We were so lucky that we noticed him sweating and pawing the ground as he started and the lovely Ben from leahurst not only got to him very quickly, by which point he was refusing to walk and just throwing himself around on the floor, but he also diagnosed him with a suspected strangulating lipoma very quickly, so he was on his way to theatre with the fabulous Prof Debbie Archer, within an hour of his first symptoms.

Saturday day we collected Toby from the Chester area, after he had spent several days roaming a locals land, he is only a baby at 2 years old, very nervous and full of lice and worms. He has a very sweet nature and once gelded, back to full health and more confident with people, he will be looking for his forever home.

 

 

 

 

Saffy was rushed into surgery on Tuesday for colic surgery as her large bowel has displaced itself, all her vital signs are good, but its a very serious operation, she has the best surgeon in the wonderful Debbie Archer at he Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital, so she has the best chance she can.

Wednesday:- Saffy is doing really well, after her emergency colic surgery last night, she is on IV fluids to keep her hydrated and has a mineral lick, she hasnt had any food yet, but has been to the toilet which is a good start, shes very bright and alert. She is still within the critical time frame but we are quietly optimistic.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A year ago Alex Duke started here as a volunteer, she spent her life looking at the floor and only really speaking to give one word answers, a quiet little mouse she was.

On 22nd March 2016 we seized Faith under UK Abandonment Legislation, totally emaciated, only 3 years old and full term ready to give birth to her baby boy, Morgan. This was the first welfare case that Alex attended with us and one she will never forget.

What I forgot to mention, is that when Alex joined us, she had never had anything to do with horses but, she learned very quickly and became an invaluable asset to the team, volunteering 7 days a week, with a very rare exception and she also found her voice and opinion and now we cant shut her up 🙂

From day one Faith was the sweetest mare and having a special place in Alex’s heart, their bond grew and grew, Alex now has Faith on full loan here and this week has backed her and we couldn’t be more proud of the progress they have both made together in the last year.

 

 

 

 

We would like to say a huge Thank You to everyone who nominated our volunteers for a Pet Plan team of the year Award and Alex Duke for Volunteer of the year award, our team work really hard looking after the animals and fundraising going above and beyond in emergencies. We wish them all good luck for the finals.

Yesterday a very special mare named Diamond by her saviours arrived, all the way from Yorkshire. Diamonds plight hit social media after a lady went to view her, to buy her for her husband and found her under weight, covered in rainscald and lice, a twisted hoof and abcess. She came over here from Ireland only about 8 weeks ago and is the grandaughter of King of Diamonds. A small group of horse lovers, from all over the country, very admirably made it their mission to get her into a safe home where she could get all the treatment she needed, they clubbed together to buy her and transport her here. She is a real gentle giant and has had her vet check where it was found that along with whats listed above she also has very sharp teeth, which will be taken care of ASAP. Thank you to everyone involved and of course our volunteers for making sure everything was ready for her.

We would like to say a big Thank You to K.G.A. Partnership Ltd for the donation of £500 towards our worming program. We have already started receiving the winter calls regarding abandoned horses, and small animals looking for homes. With 2 new ponies coming in today, this will be a massive help.

Baby Bertie 5 Wks old

Modelling one of his new rugs, kindly donated by Horseware Ireland

 

A huge thank you to Robinson Animal Health care for sending us some much needed supplies. We always need a supply of these in stock, and the costs all add up.

Last month we had the lovely Paddy Finnegan from Finnegan Equine visit Wirral. Here is a small piece about his work and a lovely Thank You to HSW. To learn move of the fantastic work Finnegan Equine do, take a look at their page www.finneganequine.com

We believe that education is the key to every animal and every person’s welfare right across the world. Education is also the  key to change for the better, the lives of working equines and their owners/keepers.
To contribute to education  to improve the lives of thousands of working horses, ponies, donkeys and mules in the developing world, we aim to have 1000 partners overseas by the end of 2021. With your help, we can reach this target.

How can you help?

Very simple, by joining our campaign called 1 for 1, this means that for every product sold in a developed country, Finnegan Equine will donate a sample welfare model on your behalf, for instance, if you buy a hoof stand, we will donate a sample welfare model of a hoof stand to be replicated; if you buy a hoof pick or a rasp, we will do the same. Even better if you buy a full kit, we will donate a full sample welfare model kit.

Many thanks to Horse Sense Wirral Rescue Centre

We are also ever so grateful to Alex for her helping hand at both of the practical trimming sessions at the Horse Sense Wirral Rescue Centre.  It was very kind of Amy and Shaun Pirie, directors of the rescue centre, to have hosted two trimming practical sessions on Saturday morning and afternoon.

Horse Sense Wirral founders Amy and Shaun Pirie facilitated the practical training sessions!

Furthermore, Amy and Shaun were very generous providing my accommodation all week at the Horse Sense Wirral Centre.  I cannot thank them enough and I have a lot of admiration for their compassion and the great work they carry out every day with so many unwanted horses.

This great team effort, by all concerned, has enabled us to make  huge progress in our educational goals, as all the new welfare models and our commercial models of our stands,knives, rasps and safety nippers were well tested by these enthusiastic students,  on a wide range of animals including donkeys, Shetland ponies, cobs and several of the fantastic very well looked after, senior residents at the centre, they all  look really  fantastically happy and well for many of them being over 30 years of age. 

I must point out that all the animals at Horse Sense Wirral, including the senior residents, had some of the best cared for feet, that I have had the pleasure to see in any rescue centre. They are certainly a credit to the very dedicated team at this rescue centre.

We hope that this winter our Education Trust will be formalised to allow us to offer similar training workshops next term to the other Equine Students Clubs in the rest of the Veterinary Colleges in the UK, as well as to any interested nearby equine rescue centres. If you would like  further information about our educational program or about our products please contact us on paddy@pfeni.com

 

 

 

 

 

Coco and Bertie are both doing well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are very please to say that Coco foaled at 12.10pm on 15th November, giving birth to a beautiful baby boy, we have named him Bertie, both mum and baby are doing very well.

24hrs old

 

 

 

 

 

Mum and baby are doing well, Coco is very protective and an excellent mummy.

 

 

Day 4

 

 

 

 

Bertie in his 1st ever rug.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is our granny herd, on the left is Red aged 33 yo, owned by our Rehabilitation Manager, Tamzin, in the centre is our oldest resident Mrs Mac aged 37 yo and to the right is Claudia aged 31 yo, both Red and Mac have lost their long term companions this year and as you will remember, Claudia started the year emaciated and with a serious case of lymphangitis.

I am sure you will all agree that they are looking amazing, poor Mac is under going treatment for gastric ulcers at a cost of £690 but is coming on great.

 

 

 

 

 

We are heart broken to announce that our lovely Dolly, aged 37yo, collapsed on 15th November and couldn’t get back up, as her back legs had completely given up on her, we sadly had to make the decision to put her to sleep. Dolly captured all our hearts here at the sanctuary, she was gaining weight and her character was coming out, she was a pleasure to have if only for a short time.

Our thoughts are with Dolly’s previous owner of 27 years

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday members Jacki and Graham Jones from The Wirral Copper Jar presented us with £110. We would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who donates to Wirral Copper Jar. This time of year is a real financial struggle with extra feed, bedding and veterinary costs so every penny and pound really does go a long way to lightening the burden.

Unfortunately we have been turned down for a grant we were really pinning our hopes on, to convert some of our barns into stables ready for winter, we only missed out due there only being 2 grants available and 11 of us applying for it and the others either own their premises or have very long leases on them.

What this means for us and our residents is that we don’t have enough housing for them over winter, as the fields get very wet here they do need to come in and sadly due to lots of new arrivals this year, as well as ponies being returned from their loan homes, we can’t fit everyone in, to add to the strain, with an £1800 vet bill this month and average £6000 a month running costs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gordale are holding a fabulous Charity event on Monday 14th November 6pm till 9pm, tickets are just £10 to admit 2 people, including drinks, nibbles and entertainment, £5 of every ticket sold will be donated to us if purchased through us and best of all, all attendees get a whopping 15{6a58d31d3c5a0a8c6a8185d433f901ea3d6300a08925ea4c531ce37ae37d0426} off everything on the night, you would be mad to miss it, please email wendy@mechair.net or ring 07799 005666 to purchase tickets.

 

 

 

 

Tilly’s new mummy has done a fabulous job with her, here she is at her first ever show. Tilly behaved impeccably and trusted mummy when she was unsure of the new things, coming away with 2nd in her class. Well done girls. 

Dolly gaining some weight, more alert and chatty. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rupert on arrival in June and now. This lovely boy was abandoned in a field on his own and torn away from his mummy. He has his forever home and is growing fast.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately due to change of circumstances with Ambers owner, she was at the her last resort of having her put to sleep, Ambers owner very kindly donated the money it would cost to have her put to sleep and cremated, in order to secure her a place here, understanding how financially stretched we are. Amber is an ex race horse, Eventer and has hunted, she has navicular and kissing spines after years of such a demanding job and has also suffered a broken leg in the past, she has raced still with all this and although she is going to be taking some time out now, depending on veterinary investigations she may be considered for rehabilitation in the future, she is 13yo and lovely natured

 

 

 

 

 

 

Having a leg stretch, already gained a fair bit of weight in just under 3 weeks.

Dolly is now on full rations of her new mash diet, costing £60 – £80 per week, if you would like to donate towards her ‘Dolly Dinners’ please donate via PayPal: horsesensewirral@yahoo.com or go to our donate page for other methods of donating. Thank you

We would like to thank Jean Sainsbury Animal Welfare Trust for the Grant towards our Vet bills. Back in the early days, we would hardly ever see a vet. However, with over 80 animals at the farm now we see them at least once a week. With so many poorly horses we are never free of a vet bill, and work really hard fundraising to keep up with demand. Thanks to this grant we can breath a little easier.

 

Huge thank you to Etching Designs for very kindly donating some beautiful items for our open day. Every child that comes to the Open Day on 20th August will  receive a HSW pencil.

Our biggest Open day yet, lets make it a good one. Please come along and have some fun.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Introducing Dolly (37yo), who came in with Mr Chips (3yo), Saffy (19yo) and Mimi (24yo) and have been signed over to us following a change in their owners circumstances.

 

 

 

 

Introducing Mr Chips (3yo), Saffy (19yo) and Mimi (24yo) who have been signed over to us along with Dolly following a change in their owners circumstances.They will all have their feet, teeth and worming done and then assessed for suitability for rehoming. 

 

 

This week has seen 6 new admissions, 4 ponies and 2 bunnies, we haven’t pictures of the bunnies yet as they only arrived tonight and look to be expecting baby bunnies, even tho mum is very underweight and dad too. We will seperate daddy and have girls and boys quarters ready for the babies being weaned.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is with great sadness that we bring the news of the loss of the lovely Bob Harwood, Husband of our Trustee and Trainer Sue Harwood and very proud Dad to Lucy Harwood, who he saw graduate earlier this month. As you can see from the photo, he really was proud as punch.

Since we moved here to Thornton Hough in January, Bob has really enjoyed coming here 2 or 3 times a week, passing his time filling haynets for us and enjoying a good chat with the volunteers about their holiday holiday plans, he very much enjoyed a trip to Gordale on his way home to collect plants for his gardens.

Bob was a genuine gentleman, with time for everyone and will be sadly missed, whilst he had ongoing medical problems, nothing that would suggest he would be taken so soon and having only been here on Sunday he passed unexpectedly, but peacefully in his sleep over Monday evening, it’s been a massive shock for us all, but none more so than for Sue and Lucy.

All our love and thoughts are with Sue, Lucy and the family at this very sad time.

Sleep well Bob, you really will will be missed xxxx

We are very proud and privileged to announce that the very inspiring Heather Moffett has very kindly agreed to be our Charity Patron, just like us Heather believes in putting the horses physical and mental wellbeing above all else and so is a perfect match with ourselves and our aims.

We are ecstatic to announce that this week we have been awarded a grant from the amazing people of Lush, towards replacing our barbed wire and electric fences we inherited, with lovely pony safe post and rail fences.

This will be an ongoing project until all paddocks are pony safe, and divided into smaller paddocks to ensure the ponies welfare is met. Our ponies have different health issues, the main concern is to prevent them getting laminitis. Laminitis can be brought on from too much rich grass, therefore ponies susceptible will be on a bare minimum grass paddock. But with our current electric fencing, they will walk through to get the longer grass. Post and rail fencing will ensure the ponies stay where they are supposed to be.  

Lush are real ambassadors of animals rights and welfare and on numerous occasions have assisted us by allowing us to fundraise in their Liverpool store, they have really come up trumps for us this time and we can’t wait to see the finished project.

We are very pleased to announce the appointment of Sue Harwood as a TRUSTEE and as our CHARITY SECRETARY.

Here’s what she has to say ……

 TAMZIN FURTADO

After seeing Tamzin in action with our ponies over the last few months, we decided she is the perfect person to take charge of our rehabilitation programme, from teaching nervous ponies to be caught or pick their feet up, to backing and breaking.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We would like to say a huge well done to our walkers. Kyle, Sam, Steph and 7 yr old Skye took on the Wirral Coastal Walk on Sunday to raise donations for our horses.

Dylan arrived Sunday 12th June 2016, sadly no longer wanted by his owner and couldn’t stay where he was, keep your eyes peeled for this boys progress as he has been there and done it, before some time off and at only 10 years old we are sure he will be snapped up.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Massively proud day today – for the first time Coco was OK with the farrier. Coco arrived at the sanctuary about two months ago, terrified, basically unhandlable and with flipper-feet. She was so scared of things that she even freaked out when I was carrying a large carrot. Having her legs touched was a particular phobia for her, to the extent that she was even dangerous under sedation. We’ve been using positive reinforcement and clicker training, and she is now headcollarable, groomable, and farrierable (well front feet at least). It’s completely amazing how forgiving and accepting horses can be, despite all the things that happen to them – I can’t believe how brave she’s been to come so far, so soon. It’s massively humbling seeing how much can be done by guys like Horse Sense Wirral (Herbert Pirie) who see something that needs changing, so they change it! (Written by Tamzin Furtado)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday morning 3rd June, we received a call from the lovely Cheshire Equine Clinic as they had been called out to tend to a stray foal, found in a farmers field near Tattenhall. As the field had been sprayed with pesticides a local yard had taken him in and called the vet out to check him over and advise them what to do next, at which point we were called in to collect him.

We have no idea where he has come from or where his mummy is, whilst he is old enough at 3 or 4 months old to survive without his mummy, it’s really heart braking to think he has just been snatched away from her, he keeps calling for her, bless him.

Hope For Horses has a Facebook page, Website and Twitter page and is ran by a group of people fighting to make a change for neglected horses in the UK. They are not a charity, they are a dedicated team working every hour to this cause.

Below you will see their links, you can read the history of how it all began. Most importantly is the link for their petition, please sign, even one signature is another step forward. Or get all your friends/family and colleagues to sign too.  Thank you

CAMPAIGNING FOR THE ENFORCEMENT OF EXISTING WELFARE LAWS FOR NEGLECTED HORSES IN THE UK

Or Paper Petitionhttp://fossehorses.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/petition.pdf

PETITION PACKS:http://hopeforhorses.co.uk/2014/07/26/petition-packs/

To see the history of this campaign which started in February 2014 please visithttp://hopeforhorses.co.uk/about-us/who-we-are/

The last little herd to go out. Poppy (first little grey) followed by Flossie then Carrots and Buddy following. Buddy and Poppy are prone to Laminitis and great hudini’s have to go on minimal grass with post and rail fencing, to prevent them escaping to the long grass. With so much grass at the farm we had to wait for the bigger ponies to eat it down, also Flossie has spent her life with Queenie and the big horses and for her health it was time to separate them. This had to be a steady progress so not to stress Flossie or Queenie. Flossie has integrated well as have them all in this herd and they are having a great time playing and bonding. Queenie being Mummy to all at HSW is in a prime location to be able to see everyone and loves keeping a close eye on baby Morgan. All our paddocks are separated to take in to account the horses needs, for example Shetlands in one paddock with minimal grass as prone to laminitis, re-homables, oldies etc.

 

Coco had been unable to be caught for several years before coming to us, hence the state of her feet, but having really taken to Tamzin Furtados clicker training we have been able to start putting her out with Faith, Morgan and Maisie during the day and she is perfect to be caught to come in first time every day, this is perfect so she is settled in the herd ready for when her baby is born.

With winter over its time to start doing jobs on the farm. We have fences to build/repair, and lots of fixing and sorting out to do. It is also time to start working on the horses in order to find them loving forever homes. Below are just a few photos of Blues having her saddle fitted and Banjo trying on his first harness. Tilly and Rosie doing box loading and scary objects training (not really scary, but the horses can be spooked at the silliest things) Tilly has had a bridle on and done lots of in hand work, and been an absolute star, taking it all in her stride.

 

 

 

Kev Baker completed his 5k swim and he did it in an amazing 1h 22m, huge thank you to Kev and Helen for their generosity, but also their friends and family for sponsoring him, he has raised a fantastic £571.15. Well done Kev, you are a super star, thank you.

We are having our first table top sale at the farm on Sunday 15th May 1pm-5pm. There will be Horsey and Household items for sale, and the Equisafety team will have an end of stock sale stall with all proceeds being donated to us. We will have a BBQ going with cakes and drinks for sale, so well worth dropping in for a bargain.

Hollie and Muffin went off to their new home together on 8th May, they are going to be spoiled rotten with the lovely Minchin family.

The lovely Jess Taylor popped in to do a Photo shoot of Morgan, here are just a few of her shots.

After the heartbreak of so many loses in such a short time Faith gave birth to a health little chap at 11pm 19th April 2016. Lots more photos will be added to the Gallery page as they come in.

And the dark cloud continues to hang over HSW. We are heartbroken to bring more sad news, that on 19th we sadly had to have our little gent Tonto put to sleep, after he was suddenly taken seriously ill with liver failure, of all our little shetland herd Tonto was the most placid and exceptionally mannered little fella and will be greatly missed by us all, horse and human alike, rest in peace little man.

 

 

 

 

 

It is with a heavy heart that we bring the sad news that during the early hours of the morning on 16th, Molly had severe complications foaling, Amy was actually with her when her waters broke and within minutes had the vet on route because the foal only presented as 1 leg and a head, due to the size of the foal neither us or 2 Leahurst hospital vets could get the foal out, so she was rushed up to the hospital for surgery but very sadly we lost both Molly and her baby (named Diamond as he/she had a diamond on his/her head and its a unisex name as we dont know if a colt or filly)

 

 

 

 

 

On 13th April we received a call to say that a mare and her 3yo colt were being euthanaised, in the minutes between an exchange of calls and texts, sadly her 3yo colt Polo was euthanaised, but the group of young ladies who had come across the situation, bravely, managed to stop Coco falling on the same fate so that we could go and collect her.

Coco is 18 years old and had very little handling, certainly her owner admitted, that due to health problems she and her baby had been neglected for at least the last year.

We are very sad to report, that the first of the 3 foals we have been expecting from our most recent rescues, was very sadly stillborn between midnight and 2am 10th April over night. Although a big foal, Maisie had no labour complications and is well in herself, the vet says the foal had died before labour had begun.

Maisie was fully examined early hours and we are thankful to have her come thru her ordeal as healthy as she could be, we can only cross our fingers that Molly and Faith have better luck

Carrots looking fabulous today, now fully recovered and pain free from having his eye removed. He gives lots of cuddles.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hope is doing great, gaining weight and settled well.

We would like to thank everyone who came to support our first ever Open Day. We had a fantastic turn out of approximately 500 people.

We had a few teething problems due to weather and time management but we will learn and improve for future events.

Our dedicated team and a few supporters arrived early to feed the 60 residents and clean out all their stables. They then set up stalls and manned them and the areas around the farm, a quick cuppa at the end then started the night feeds. We couldn’t do what we do without them or our public support and donations, so a massive thank you to you all.

Yesterday we seized 3 ponies from abandonment after we had placed an abandonment notice on their field and no owner responded, this followed on from a much larger Charity seizing 3 from the same field on welfare grounds.

They were seen by one of our fabulous vets Luke, when they arrived and all 3 found to be in foal and near enough full term, Faith and Maisie are healthy young ladies but poor Molly (Pictured) is tiny, in foal to a cob stallion, aged mid to late 20s and has symptoms and bloods consistent with a very serious condition called Hyperlipidemia.

We would like to say a huge thank you to Burtons, for their very generous donation to our Open day on Easter Sunday 27th March 2016.

Our lovely Fundraising Manager Sam Robinson, collecting a cheque for £381.00 from McColls in Irby. This donation was gratefully received from their carrier bag sales.

As you will remember Carrots arrived with us from Cumbria a few weeks ago with an almost completely blind eye, from a previous injury, on Sunday morning we found Carrots with his bad eye all pussy and inflamed, so called our vet Elliot straight out who admitted him to The Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital for further examinations.

By Monday morning one of the surgeons rang me to say, due to the old damage flaring up and being painful for him and it very likely to do this on a regular basis, the kindest thing to do for him was to remove his eye, this was done under general anesthetic yesterday afternoon. He is recovering well and should be able to come home later today but as always has been a big expense over £1000 that we just don’t have at the minute, if you can even donate £1 that would be a massive help to Carrots. Thank you very much for your continued support.

We would like to thank Tesco, Bidston, for their very generous donation of items for use for our Easter Open Day in raffles, tombola.

We have lots of stalls and plenty to suit all ages, so pop along and say hello.

All 3 have now been seen by the Vet, Farrier and Dentist, not all the vets results are in yet but Hopes blood results came back consistent with a pony with malnutrition and muscle wastage, poor little Spartacus has a massive worm burden for such a little man so will need steroids to get him through his first wormer.

Hope and Tilly had their feet trimmed by one of our fab farriers Tom Clothier, but as Spartacus had been poorly the previous night and his baby feet aren’t desperate we decided not to stress him and wait till next week.

For the donation of a pallet of food for our horses and ponies, these are slightly damaged bags that cannot be sold in store and are then very kindly donated to charities up and down the country making a huge difference to all animals in need, thank you so much.

I am sorry for the delay in keeping the site updated, due to the relocation and ill health.

I am afraid this wont be a great post as I am in agony sitting here, but it will bring you up to date.  I have just copied posts from our face book page, and will update other pages and our ponies details as soon as I can.

*******WE HAVE RELOCATED********

We at Horse Sense Wirral are extremely happy to tell you all that we have relocated to one site at Lodge Farm, Thornton Hough. Whilst the cost of renting the property is over double our previous rents, we had to make the move to give a better living environment to our current residents and also to allow us to keep up with the ever increasing demand on us, as our reputation grows and we are involved in more and more welfare cases up and down the country.

We are, as always totally financially drained but to the benefit of our ponies, who want for nothing so we would appreciate any donations large or small to help us along our way to creating the Wirrals very own Equine Super Centre in Welfare and Education.

Funding permitted we plan to convert the old barns into stabling and an indoor arena, as well as having a class room and veterinary examination area on site, to run many courses to aid horse owners to care for their equines to the best of their abilities. We will also have regular remedial farriery, dental clinic and massage therapy days on site.

We hope you will all enjoy watching our progress xx

20.01.16

Sorry its been so long, but we have been up the wall moving all our residents to our new site, good news though, as Bubbles didn’t have to have his eye removed, although the treatment has worked out more expensive, so we really do need all the financial help we can get please.

It’s well worth it to keep his eye, as it is progressing well and we hope to see it healed in 4 to 6 weeks, although until then the vets can’t guarantee that it is definitely saved as such a delicate area.

21.01.16

MOVING IN PHOTOS

 

Huge thank to everyone who has helped, too many to name thank you all so much. 

 

 

INTRODUCING “CARROTS”

 

On arrival he was seen by one of our fabulous vets Elliot and given a clean bill of health whilst a sample has been sent away to check his worm burden and one of our super farriers Tom Clothier attended to his feet.

He has had little handing so is rather nervous and has never been with another horse so was delighted to meet his neighbours Mojo and Indie, he has settled well in his large barn area and will be seen by one of our lovely Equine Dentists Lee-Shakeshaft Edt next week, we do aim to rehabilitate Carrots to rehome him in the future, so keep an eye out for this super cute little man’s progress 

29.01.16

Little Carrots has had his teeth done and vaccinations today and he was a very good boy for his Uncles Elliot and Lee-Shakeshaft Edt, we will be holding our first Dental Clinic here at Lodge Farm, Thornton Hough, all day on Wednesday 27th April with Lee and Robin Harding @ £40 per routine rasp, please inbox to book your place 

 MEET MUFFIN

We were contacted yesterday by a lady struggling to care for Muffin in her small yard area at home and so we went and collected him, he has not been living with other ponies so was excited to meet his next door neighbour, little Hercules and after having his vaccinations and teeth done today he is settling in very well 

 

04.02.16

SQUEAK IS BACK IN PONY HOSPITAL

Poor Squeak has had to under go more surgery to empty another part of her sinus of nasty infection, after having had 99{6a58d31d3c5a0a8c6a8185d433f901ea3d6300a08925ea4c531ce37ae37d0426} of it removed when she arrived 18 months ago, sadly vets have now found a fistula (a tract) running from her sinus into her nose which means that she will be likely to need some sort of surgery at least once a year, this is her 4th in 18 months, which is alot for a little pony but, I have to say she doesn’t stress and takes it all in her stride.

If her previous owner had of gotten the vet to her years ago when the infection started, rather than assuming she had a dust allergy, poor Squeak wouldn’t be having to go thru all of this, but she is a happy girl with a great quality of life so we will always do what’s needed to keep her like that.

Huge thank you to our super Veterinary regulars Elliot and Luke of Leahurst Equine Practice for looking after her so well, hopefully she will be home late on Friday.

After our move, finances are very tight so we would really appreciate any help, whether it be £5 towards Squeaks bill or a bag of food or bedding, as in my previous posts. Thank you ever so much for your continued support as always 

09.02.16

NEW ARRIVALS

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today we admitted 3 ponies from a field of ongoing concern to us and the general public, unfortunately not all of the residents were able to be saved, but these 3 will be given everything they could possibly need to get back on their feet, Tilly is a Chestnut, Section C, rising 4yo and although she is not malnourished, she has been lame since October and her owner has been unable to get veterinary treatment to her for various reasons.

Hope is a grey, cob, mare (age to be confirmed) with her foal Spartacus, at foot, whilst Spartacus is underweight, poor Hope is malnourished, full of worms and has severe rain scald, oozing puss, meaning she finds it really painful for us to touch her in these areas, both Hope and Tilly have very long feet and obvious dental problems, not even able to eat beet, so as per usual they will all be seen by our lovely Vet Elliot tomorrow morning, our Farrier Tom will see them Thursday and Dentist Lee will be here to make eating a pleasure for them on Friday.

I can’t stress enough how financially strained we already are, so these extra veterinary bills are really going to stretch us, so as always if you can help even a little please check out our donate page for ways to help.

 

11.02.16

POORLY SPARTACUS

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday morning our super vet Elliot spent 3 hours here and saw 7 ponies.

• Buddy had x-rays of his sore feet and a blood glucose test to see if he is insulin resistant,
• Hercules was examined for any sign of his testicles appearing,
• Bubbles had his eye checked, which for the last week had had no ulceration, just scaring starting to settle down,
• Squeak has another infection so had that all flushed thru and started on some really strong antibiotics,
• New arrival Tilly was examined and found to now be sound, but she has rain scald, long feet and nasty teeth causing her pain and worm count samples, routine bloods and a pregnancy test were taken,
• New arrival mummy Hope was examined and is by far in the worst state of the lot, with infected rain scald, very long feet and sharp teeth, lice, malnourished, she is very lethargic so Elliot took the usual manure for worm counting, pregnancy test and bloods but will run full blood works on her rather than just the routines and finally
• new arrival baby Spartacus was examined in the morning and found to be malnourished and have rain scald but come tea time he was lying down and wouldn’t get up, so Elliot had to come back, while he was passing faeces, he was really struggling to do so, basically his little body isn’t used to food, particularly forage, so Elliot gave him some pain killers, tummy relaxers and tubed fluids directly into his tummy to soften everything up for him and help it pass through his tummy, both mum and son will have a long and bumpy road to recovery we just need to make sure we spot the bumps and either change what we are doing or get the vet straight out for the big bumps.

I will be back A.S.A.P to tidy and update this page and the website.

 

Bubbles is home and being treated every two hours, we are still trying to save his eye.

Blues and Toos are back due to no fault of their own, they are looking great and hopefully will find a forever home soon.

We are moving location. The move will take weeks so bear with us. The new premises offer lots of potential to take the charity forward. Its extremely hard work at the moment with Amy and Shaun working till early hours of the morning each day. Once all the horses and everything has been moved from the old sites, Amy and Shaun will be moving in to the cottage on the farm. They will pay the cottage bills, rent, rates and all household bills themselves, this will not come out of Charity funds.  Being on site will be much better for the animals and we are hoping better for Amy and Shauns health.

Its a huge step for the charity, we have lots of plans to make the charity self sufficient in the future. Until then we will still be relying on public support and donations. If you can help no matter how small please go to our donations page to make your pledge.

We wish to thank everyone who came and helped with bag packing New Years Eve, and all the staff and customers of Sainsbury’s, Upton, we raised a whopping £908.76 which will go straight off the outstanding vet bill, so thank you all very, very much.

 

 

 

 

 

December 27th we had to rush poor Bubbles into pony hospital at The Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital as he injured his eye. It seemed to be a minor injury at first so we started treatment with antibiotic eye cream, as we do as standard with any eye complaint, but as the day progressed it became clear that this was in fact a rather serious eye injury, so after a quick chat with the on call vet, we decided it was best to get him straight into the hospital for treatment.

Very proud of one of our younger volunteers today, who after much hard work, has been accepted into Vet school at The University of Liverpool, the home of our very own Vets Leahurst, Congratulations Ece we are all very proud of you.

 

 

We would like to wish you all a very happy Christmas, and all the best for 2016. From all the horses and staff at HSW.

 

Friday we took ownership of a new Shetland pony called Cookie as his owners circumstances had changed, luckily he had already been offered a lovely life long loan home so he went straight to his new home for lots of love and cuddles.

Keep you pets calm during the fireworks. Today the wonderful people at Vets4Pets Wallasey will be giving away one free dose of Nutracalm, to help your doggies and kitties get through the bonfire night fireworks, per purchase of one of our wrist bands for just £1. Thank you so much Vets4Pets.

We would like to say a humongously massive thank you to Support Adoption For Pets for awarding us another very generous grant of £6225 to pay off the bulk of our Veterinary bills and also to install water at our Shetland Centre in Wallasey, which will make a massive difference to our ponies and also to our volunteers who break their backs day in and day out lugging water around, also thank you to Leahurst Equine Practice and Tom Clothier for providing references for us, aiding us to be awarded this grant, we are exceptionally happy to have this weight lifted off our shoulders.

Betsy found her forever home with a lovely lady, Paula Greenfield. Call it fate, love at first sight, whatever, but these two are a perfect match.

Paula suffers from PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) . The following words are from a post Paula put on Face book.

Paula’s permission has been given to share with you, to show our ponies who are often broken by human hands can give love and still trust that we will keep them safe, and in return they will give unconditional love back.

 

(written by Paula)

I’ve got so much love for my little princess Betsy Boo! I went through stages were I used to stay in bed for days on end and hide away from reality, She gave me the strength I needed to get out of bed everyday and face the world, the fact that she needs me to feed her, groom her and change her bedding and teach her how to trust meant that I couldn’t let her down and I had to put her feelings and care before my own feelings! She was a tough little pony to start but I wouldn’t change her for the world 😘 I’m ever so proud of her for the little lady she is today.

We spent yesterday with a film crew at our Shetland Centre in Wallasey, filming for Support Adoption for Pets to give advice about taking on a rescued pony, to promote adoption over purchasing and hopefully a bit towards their give a pet a Christmas dinner appeal this year too, all in aid of their 10th birthday helping animals in need.

We are pleased to announce we are now partnered with Pets at Home Wallasey. This means 

1. We can Increase our local awareness and raise funds. Perhaps most important, we can join the Pets at Home team for a “Meet and Greet” event in store. This is a unique way of introducing our work to the public and is guaranteed to be a great awareness and funds booster.
2. We will be eligible to receive food and/or accessories donated by customers via the Support Adoption For Pets donation bins located within Pets at Home stores.
3. We will be eligible to receive a nomination for a donation from Support Adoption for Pets following the
   annual Support Adoption For Pets Fundraising drives (currently held three times a year)**
4. We will be eligible to advertise ponies that need a new home on display boards in store (where available)
5. We will receive 10{6a58d31d3c5a0a8c6a8185d433f901ea3d6300a08925ea4c531ce37ae37d0426} Pets at Home vouchers (subject to availability) for us to include in your pet adoption packs for new loners.
6. Take advantage of joint PR and knowledge of the charity team, charity ambassadors in store and their Trustees.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After a year of work on our dedicated Shetland Centre in Wallasey we finally put our sign up today. We have lots of people to thank for their hard work there including Adam Grogan and the Probation Service who did the bulk of the work and also a big thank you to Support Adoption for Pets and local supporter Joanne Bird who between them put forward all the funding required for the work.

Up until Joanne’s support 18 months ago we were trundling along with little funding and unable to expand as we wanted, she has done all sorts for us, not just financially but collecting items and sending emails, she truly thinks about the ponies day in and day out and takes every opportunity to help and encourage others to do the same, so it’s only fitting that we mark Joanne’s big heart by dedicating our Shetland Centre to her name, thank you for everything Joanne and everyone who has been involved in the work in one way or another.

We are so proud of our team braving abseiling down Leasowe lighthouse to raise much needed funds for our ponies on Sunday. Just a few photos of the team.

 

 

 

 

Last week Tonto started with really watery diarrhea and recognising he has had this before, due to the sand in the ground, we upped the sand medication that he has each month and treated him with Epson salts to counteract the dehydration.

Saturday he was no longer passing anything but pure water so we called out the lovely Elliot from Leahurst who started tubing him twice daily, with the sand shifter and Epson salts directly into his stomach, to try and shift the sand out but to no avail.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday 28th Aug, our Trustee Margi travelled all the way to Manchester to collect Jinny as her owner can no longer care for her, due to health challenges. Jinny is a sweet natured 14.2hh solid lady and it looks like she already has a forever home to go to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We were contacted just over 3 weeks ago as Hercules’ mum was very poorly and Vets advised that if she continued to feed the little fella she wouldn’t survive longer than 2 weeks and his breeder was unable to hand rear him.

Our Saughall Massie Yard Manager has been taking fabulous care of him at home up until today in order to be able to give him his night milk without us all travelling back an forth to the yard, he is now 12 weeks old and today was transfered to our main yard in Saughall Massie where we will continue with his hand rearing but aided by Gracey who we have introduced him to as his Nanny mare and he is also with Fantasia so will be able to play with our new foal soon too.

Friday we collected mother and daughter Beatrice and Bella after their owner could no longer keep them due to a change in circumstances, both girls have had little handling in the last 2 years but both very friendly in the field. They are registered section Bs and both move like they are floating on air, definitely future showing prospects when they are lucky enough to find their new homes.

We would like to thank McEwan Wallace Chartered Accountants for their support, in featuring us on their website.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We would like to say a Huge thank you to Jones & Chapman, for supporting us and our Annual Summer Party. Jones & Chapman have very kindly had 10,000 leaflets printed and will be posting to homes in Wirral next week.

We will be at The Ridger in Newton, Wirral, on 22nd August 2pm – 5pm

Featuring live music, D.J, Bouncy Castle, Face Painting, Glitter tattoos, BBQ and lots more. Something for all the family, so pop along and come say hello.

We are very proud of our handsome Merlin and his loaner Louise. Merlin was orginally wild off the Welsh mountains and doesn’t quite tick like a normal pony but with Lou’s hard work, dedication and masses of love, they stepped out in their first in hand show yesterday, and stole first place. Pictured, Louise with Merlin calling out to his friends and collecting 1st prize, well done both of you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are expecting our first foals at the sanctuary any time soon. The lovely Fantasia and Holly came to us recently already in foal. The team are all doing their bit to ensure these lovelies get everything they need.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bonnie has settled well in her forever home, she’s making new friends and getting spoilt rotten from her new family. Bonnie is a very gentle lady but whatever has happened to her in the past has made her very nervy. We couldn’t have found a better home for her than with the Robinson family. With gentle steps she is learning to trust again, and we wish them years of fun together. 

Chalkie and Betsy (Brother and Sister) had to be separated when they arrived. Chalkie was attire and needed gelding, and Betsy was still feeding from Gracie. With Chalkie’s operation going well, we were able to rehome him pretty quickly after his op. With Betsy, we left her with Gracie for a few weeks for them to settle in before separating them. At first Betsy called out to her mum, who was stabled behind her but she settled well and got lots of attention. Betsy loves kisses and responded well to human contact, so we decided because Chalkies new loner wanted to take Betsy too, it was best for her to let her go so they could play together. Chalkie and Betsy love each other, so it was hard to separate them at first, but for their own good it had to be done.  The photos are of them reunited in their forever home, giving lots of kisses. I’m sure these two are going to have lots of fun together.

Today was our annual MOT day for our older residents. The lovely Becky of Leahurst equine practice has been out and taken annual blood tests from our old dears to check for cushings or to check that the treatment they are already on for cushings is still effective and she was made up how well everyone is.

She also checked how Lady’s foot was progressing and was very happy with it, she gave Gracey a once over to check her milk is drying up nicely and after Fantasias false start over the weekend she gave her a good looking over and is hopeful that we have another week or 2 before her baba will show it self, so all looking good at Saughall Massie at the minute.

Last year we applied for a grant from the Elise Pilkington Charitable Trust, and yesterday 2 of their lovely Trustees came all the way from London to meet our team and lovely horses and ponies. Just before leaving they surprised us and handed us a whopping cheque of £5000 for capital purchases. This means we can’t pay bills with it but they have outlined what the money is to be spent on, to include a quad bike, big tipping muck trailer and other large purchases to enable to run our sanctuary more efficiently, we really can’t thank them enough for their generosity and time coming all this way.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Staff at One Stop Shop in Brimstage, held a fundraising week for us. With a raffle, cake selling days and even a hunt the pony for the children to get involved. They raised a whopping £119.83, thank you so much.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our lovely Fundraising manager and the staff at the Rose and Crown pub in Bebington, did a car wash for us and raised a fantastic £115.00. Thank you to everyone who gave their time and support.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Who could resist this stunning boy. It was love at first sight for Merlin’s new loner. Now in his forever home and being spoilt, Merlin is coming on leaps and bounds and I am sure will soon be attending local shows in Wirral.

All too often, ourselves, along with other welfare organisations hear the excuse “he/she is just OLD”, OLD is not longer a valid excuse for a thin/poor horse.

With good dentistry and nutrition your OLD horse can look this good, we do have to review her feeds more often than any other horse and she has more regular dental appointments along with regular cushings tests and Prascend dose adjustments when necessary and she looks this good all year round!!!

Look at Ruby now just four month of TLC. Ruby has such a sweet nature and loving her new friends.

 

 

 

 

As you all know Blues and Toos had an offer of a life long home pretty well since the second they arrived and Sunday they set off to start their new lives in Parkgate, destined to be driving ponies in adulthood, we wish the whole Russell family a long and happy life with these 2 very special girls.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We had a great time at Heswall Summer Fare on Saturday. We met some lovely people and even the Mayor had his photo taken with Herbie.

 

 

 

 

Last week Banjo was re-admitted to Leahurst following his castration in March not going to plan, in order to locate a missing testicle. Banjo’s surgery didn’t go so well,  after 5 different incisions no testicle was found and he was in allot of pain, what this means is that once he is recovered he will need a more invasive operation to locate the testicle now presumed to be around his kidney rather than in his abdomen.

After a minor heart murmur Banjo was kept in for an extra two days. He has already lost so much condition being stabled so long so we really don’t want him to wait any longer than he has too but with our vet bill in the region of £3000 currently and Chalky also needing rig surgery we are really struggling, please consider what you can do to help.

 

 

 

 

Our local Veterinary Students have actually finished their exams, congratulations everyone. Therefore, they are spending a few weeks taking a keen interest in areas of particular interest to them, including spending time with the lovely Neil Townsend and our ponies, doing a bit/ a lot of dentistry, spending 2/3 days a week with us until term end.

Saturday we arrived to find that Queenie had either been leaning over the fence (removed for rescue) for a bit of tasty grass or itching her bum on the fence and it had snapped causing her to fall into a 4 foot deep ditch, with her back legs trapped under her she couldn’t get out. We had to call upon Merseyside Fire and Rescue services along with our local heroes Stuart Jones and Charlie Parsons and a duo of vets from the amazing Leahurst Equine Practice.

Whilst waiting for the vet, the team managed to get Queenie to her feet but still trapped between the ditch walls and she was tiring, once sedated the Fire and Rescue service slid padded straps under her front and back of her belly and attached them to the forks of the tractor for Stu to lift her out for us. Considering Queens is normally a nervy mare she took it all in her stride and thanks to the quick and quiet efforts of the whole team she was up, out and eating, just a bit stiff and shaken.

A massive thank you to all involved, everyone worked calmly and professionally as to keep Queenie calm and safe. 

We travelled to Warrington to collect our new arrivals, as the ponies haven’t been handled it was a difficult task to say the least but they are all settled in well. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The girls looking fab today, they will soon be off to their forever home. They now have life in their eyes that was not there when they arrived, and canter round the field full of life, such a joy to see the girls living how they should.

 

 

 

 

Yesterday we collected the first of 2 new admissions that we have been planning for a couple of weeks now.

Lady was admitted to the Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital several weeks ago for surgery to remove a keratoma (tumour) from her hoof, sadly her owner never returned to collect her so following reasonable notice being given to her owner, she has been signed over to us here at Horse Sense where we can take care of her post op treatment. We have followed up with a letter to her owner giving her a further 60 days in which to reclaim ownership of Lady providing all costs are covered. Following the 60 days and her hoof recovering Lady will be available to a suitable loan home.

Lady is 13 years old and believed to be an ex race horse and apart from the odd snarl she is actually a lovely and very beautiful lady.

As most of you will remember our little Jules had surgery June last year to remove a large Keratoma (Tumor) from her hoof leaving a large opening in the front wall of her hoof. She had a sepcialist rubber shoe and metal plate fitted to be changed every 8 weeks or so and it was estimated to take 18 months before her foot would be completely grown back however, it was growing very slowly.

2/3 months ago Leahurst launched the all new “Specialist Equine Hoof Supplement” and we decided to give it ago. Over the years we have tried every hoof supplement under the sun on our ponies and with no success so we were sceptical but, earlier this week Jules went to have her shoe replaced and what we found left us and our Remedial Farrier Tom Clothier gob smacked. Compared to her last shoe change Jules had double, yes double the horn growth to the previous shoe change and therefore has grown right down and no longer needs a shoe. Thats 18 months of growth in just 10 months, the majority in the last 2 months and its good solid horn too. This has saved us a fortune in Remedial Farriery and we are only half way through our first tub.

While Pollyanna was in Leahurst with colic, the veterinary team took a closer look at the abscess on her cheek. She had received creams and antibiotics prior but the abscess kept coming back. The vets discovered that one of her back teeth was rather large, although she has regular checkups with the dentist and was eating normally, it was decided to remove the tooth to prevent re-occurring abscesses. And, wow what a tooth for a 23inch high pony.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pollyanna suffers with Equine Dwarfism and stands at just 23 inches high. She has recently been very poorly with colic and after a stay in the Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital her vet bill is expected to be between £2000 and £5000. Local 10 year old Olivia Cole (pictured) sponsors Pollyanna and was devastated to hear she was poorly, so set about a plan to raise as much funds as possible to help pay for Pollyannas treatment, as a result Larton Riding School agreed to let Olivia and all the other weekend riders, ride in their onsies and be sponsored for the event to raise money for Polly. These amazing young ladies raised a fantastic £316.49. A huge thank you from all of us at HSW especially Pollyanna.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What a lovely site. Blues and Toos out in the sun. Toos is doing great, however, Blues still has a way to go. The fresh air and grass will do them both good.

We would like to thank SGS (UK) Limited and staff, for their very kind donation. We really appreciate you thinking of us and our horses. The money will be put towards our current huge vet bill.

 

 

 

Our new stables are up at Wallasey Site for the Shetlands. Built and installed by the lovely Adam Grogan of Wirral Shelters. Adam worked tirelessly through the bad weather to get the stables up and running. We are absolutely thrilled with the results.

 

 

 

 

Also a massive thank you to these lads for clearing all the old stable wood from site for us, all the way from Widnes and only charged what it costs them to dispose of it and gave up their own time for free, great lads and did a great job even in the mud.

Its been busy this week so will give a brief update.

Blues and Toos: 

Toos is doing well and gaining weight, Blues however will take a lot longer to get her to good health. Blues coat is falling out due to her immune system being very low, having anaemia and recovery from lice. She is looking brighter and eating well but this poor girl gave so much to save her baby, it will take some time before she is the pony she should be.

Ruby

Ruby is bright and very chatty, she has had a vet check, her feet and teeth done, been wormed and had a lovely massage. Ruby loves kisses and cuddles, shes eating well and doing just great.

Banjo

Banjo was castrated last week, with one testicle being abnormal, it was taken to the labs for testing. Result was it was just flesh, meaning he has one retained testicle in his abdomen needing invasive surgery to remove it.

Pollyanna

Pollyanna had a bout of colic Monday morning, the vets came out and treated her and all seemed well. Unfortunately Tuesday morning she didn’t seem herself and was taken into Leahurst Equine Hospital. As always we wont separate Pollyanna and Finlay, so Fin went with her. Polly was tubed and scanned but the vets are at a loss at the moment with her immune system low, the vets are running every test possible to get Polly onto the right treatment and well again.

Squeak

Squeak still has a drainage tube from her nose, and is still on antibiotics. The tube is doing it’s job and draining her infection.

With so many poorly ponies our bank account is empty, as always we would appreciate any donations big or small to help us give the ponies the best of care.

To finish on a good note, Amy our chair has been nominated for Pet Plans Animal Charity Volunteer of the Year Award.

Amy was diagnosed with a rear illness a few months ago, meaning she has been off work on sick leave. Although she struggles most days she has still been at the helm. What Amy does is just normal to her and she recognises the support from the volunteers and public as the true heros, because without them she just couldn’t do what she does.

I will finish with a few photos of our babies. Pollyanna having her scan, Ruby all settled in, and Finlay saying hello to Ruby with kisses.

 

 

 

 

We received a call on Saturday from a very distressed mother, as their new shetland pony had taken to kicking her young daughter which had become intolerable, and a massive risk to the little girl. So she needed to be moved before it happened again. We are aware that this pony has been passed around a fair bit recently and had a couple of names so our vollies have decided a fresh start requires a fresh name, so we would like to introduce ‘Holly’

Ex Race horse “Hand Care” Ruby was sold at the last Beeston sale in very poor condition, causing lots of upset. After much tracing the lovely Karen Owen purchased her and brought her to us. She arrived Saturday night, and she will receive the care needed to live a long and happy retirement. Since being at Beeston Ruby has already gained a little weight although her fluffy coat covers her petruding bones we expect her to make a full recovery back to perfect health.

 

 

 

 

Ruby, Sunday morning. So happy and settled, she’s a real chatty one, she talked to us all morning while we were mucking out and pottering around the yard. Her head was over the stable door watching everything we were doing. Which of cause meant she got lots of fusses and kisses every time we went past her. Not sure if she is nosey or clever 🙂

Ruby will be seen this week by the vet, farrier and dentist, we have also booked her a massage and reiki in.

 

 

 

 

Thursday morning Blues was showing signs of colic, the vet from Leahurst was out within 20mins. She had a relaxant and painkillers while bloods were rushed to the lab.

Blue’s gave everything she had to keep her baby Too’s alive, therefore we knew she would take longer to recover her ordeal. We got the test results back which have shown that even after all the worming, poor blues is still riddled with worms and now has aneamia too, so they are back in hospital for further more invasive worming and also Blues will be treated with steroids to support her getting through all this.

Last night when we arrived at Leahurst to visit Squeak we knew straight away that something wasn’t right as she wasn’t shouting at us and also was lying down covered in shavings as we approached and didn’t get up and in fact when Shaun jumped over the door she just lay flat and breathing hard.

 

 

 

 

We have just left little Squeak at the Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital, she settled in after making sure the whole Campus knew that Squeak was in the house. The lovely Neil Townsend will perform a fairly minor surgery under General Aesthetic later today to create her a new drainage system for her eye following her previous surgery and flush it all out, this is a new procedure so there is no evidence to say how long it works for so it may need doing again at some point in the future or maybe another option taken, but Neil feels its worth doing as its allot less invasion than the old way of doing things and she has already been through enough after the major facial surgery she had last year.

We will visit her tonight to see hows she is after her surgery and keep you posted.

Squeaks Surgery went very well however, same as last time she has gotten herself in a bit of a state when coming round and so is on colic watch as very sweaty and tucked up, but no one has any major concerns it is just a precaution and hopefully she will be home Friday.

We were aloud to give her a 5 minute in hand walk on the grass to try and calm her down a bit and give her a good brush and scratch and she was more settled when we left her.

 

A busy valentine’s weekend. Friday night we received an emergency call out to a Shetland pony cast in a field suspected to be colicing, on arrival the caller had managed to get him up and he seemed fine in himself but with us unable to locate an owner we called in the RSPCA for assistance, between us we decided after several hours that he was fine but the RSPCA would leave a note for the owner to contact them and they would also come change of shift at 7am to check he was still doing okay, which he was.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nearly at her expected weight just 5 weeks on ….. look at that nice round little bum and cheeky face. 

Everything about her is 100{6a58d31d3c5a0a8c6a8185d433f901ea3d6300a08925ea4c531ce37ae37d0426} better now bless her, just still fighting a bit of a battle with mummy Blues but she is getting there, she was allot worse off than baby Toos to start with.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You may remember squeak had a nasal operation last year, shortly after coming to us.

Squeak was seen yesterday by the lovely Neil Townsend at the Philip Leverhulme Equine Hospital as we feared her infection was back.The good news is that the previous nasty sinus infection she had isn’t back. However, she does have a secondary infection in her tear duct more than likely as a result of scar tissue from her previous surgery not allowing normal drainage processes so, Squeak does require further surgery under general anaesthetic, a new procedure that will be performed next Wednesday.

This procedure is nowhere near as invasive as her previous surgery and will involve her having a catheter through her tear duct for 2/3 weeks post op to keep it all nice and open. She is one lucky girly.

 

Busy day on Friday for the girls, with a visit in hospital from the lovely Sophie Harrison of Zebra Products Ltd, the UK’s distributor of Bucas products who have donated 2 full wardrobes of superior quality rugs for both girls, as worn by the amazing Valegro, Thank you very very much, they look very smart.

After a very sad farewell to the girls amazing Vet Andrea Kashani who is sadly moving to another Equine Hospital and will be so so missed, the girls were allowed to come home and it was nice to see them recognise it as home with a chorus of whinnies as they pulled up out side. They will have another worming treatment at home next week but are well over the worst.

Day 1. Both girls have been impeccably behaved all day and settled well into their lovely huge stable at Leahurst Equine Practice as you can see here they are slowly gaining weight but hopefully following this week of worm treatment we should start seeing an even more dramatic weight gain in the following weeks once the nasty parasites are all gone.

Day 2. The girls have settled very well in their holiday home at Leahurst Equine Practice and have now been taken off Antibiotics and pain relief, in fact their lovely Vet Andrea has decided they are doing so well that they should be okay without the steroids that were a provisional plan, they are however, passing huge amounts of worms so she, along with the excellent team up there will be keeping a good close eye on the girls but so far Andrea is very happy with their progress.

Day 3. Today the girls have had their dose of tape wormer, when tested they showed high levels of tape worm so we anticipated if they were going to have problems it would be today/tomorrow. 

When we visited them earlier they were both seeming a bit ‘down in the dumps’ Toos more so and when their Vet Andrea did her last check before going home she also felt they weren’t their usual selves, so she stayed late and along with the evening staff popped the girls into the hospital for a good check over which revealed that Toos’ heart rate is rather on the high side, this can be an early indication of colic so the staff are now keeping an extra close eye on her and both girls have been given steroids to support them through this latest battle. 

It could just be that its an extra hard struggle for such a poor young lady to clear all these worms and on the positive side she did get a little excited when crossing the yard to the hospital but just in case Andrea and I have had the conversation as to what action to take if Toos does colic and we have consented to any intervention required which could be anything from an ultrasound to see what the pesky worms are doing to full colic surgery to remove the worms, we hope it wont get to that stage but having a plan of action in place will save time if the worst should happen.

This is exactly why the decision was taken for the girls to go up to Leahurst for their worming treatment as we know everything they could possibly want and need is right on hand and they are in the very best place possible, if you are so inclined please say a little prayer for Toos that she is just having a little struggle and will feel much better by morning.

You will also all be delighted to know that Blues 2 part pregnancy test has come back negative so she can concentrate on just getting better herself .

Day 4. The girls are doing great and eating well. Providing everything is ok tomorrow the girls will come home. Now they have been wormed the weight should go on and we will see a huge difference over the coming weeks.

We would like to thank everyone who has made a donation towards Blues and Toos vet bills, they have come in from all over the world.

Were we cant name everyone individually, we do like to name the trusts that do a fantastic job in raising much needed funds to help all animals and charities like ourselves.

Therefore, we say a huge thank you to Animal Clinical Trust based in Wirral for their kind donation of £500. This along with all donations will all go on getting the girls fit and well.

Our vet bills are our biggest outlay, so with your generous donations towards this, we can concentrate on nursing the horses so they can be in good shape when ready for their forever homes. Thank you

We would like to thank Sainsbury’s staff once again for their hospitality New Years Eve. And a huge thank you to everyone for donating also a massive thanks to those who helped bag pack. A real team effort and we raised a fantastic £1,004.13. At this point that cleared out vet bill and paid for hay for two weeks.

My apologies for the late post, however with Blues and Toos coming in, their care took priority.

As many of you know I regularly assess and treat Horse Sense Wirral’s rescue ponies when needed!

On Sunday Amy asked me to pop along and see Blues (mummy) as she was concerned about her stifle locking, she was also struggling eating her dinner/hay from the floor!

These poor girls are so poor and malnourished that there is very very little muscle tone to work with which could cause the rotation of the patella resulting in the locking! – this is something that is difficult to treat at present due to their general health and ability to exercise without becoming fatigued!

What we did work on is some soft tissue release around her poll causing her restriction in range of movement at her neck, we have also started some forelimb and hind limb rhythmic stabilisations to activate her deep stabilisation muscles.

Then to try to improve her core Amy and her volunteers will be working on some baited stretches with Blues within her comfort zone!

Both girls are lovely and Blues was a pleasure to treat! I will be seeing Blues again in a couple of weeks and I’m sure I will see a big difference!

BLUESTOOS

 

 

 

Shortly after 7pm New Years Day we received a call from Cheshire Police requesting assistance with 2 seemingly abandoned ponies in the Ellesmere Port area, we were shocked when we arrived at how emaciated and lethargic the 2 young fillies are and as the Police had looked into where they may have belonged and unable to trace an owner the Police and ourselves decided the best thing for these lovely girls was to remove them and place them in our care at the sanctuary, of course any owner has 7 days in which to claim their ponies back subject to an emergency livery fee and veterinary costs, providing adequate proof of ownership and on agreement from the Police Welfare officers who would have to address why these ponies are so emaciated, other wise aptly named by the Police Officers ‘Blues’ and ‘Toos’ was seen by the vet first thing the next morning and are now being nursed back to health until such time they are fit and well enough to find lovely life long homes.

2nd January 2015

We would like to say a huge thank you to Asda Birkenhead, for allowing us a 3hr bag pack on Saturday 22nd December. Thanks to the generosity of their customers, we raised a fantastic £678.53.

 

 

Saturday 22nd saw the start of the old stables coming down on our Wallasey site, and the ground prepared for the new stables.

 

We are proud to announce, Amy, founder of Horse Sense has been nominated for the Daily Mirror’s Animal Hero Awards.

Amy was surprised to receive a telephone call last week, informing her she was a finalist in her category. Amy and husband Shaun will travel down to London next week, to a red carpet awards presentation.

If that wasn’t surreal enough, she finds her picture in the Daily Mirror yesterday.

Amy has been helping animals and humans since she was 6 years old, and its all in a days work to her.

Though she doesn’t recognise what she does as something special. What Amy does recognise is, the continued support from HSW followers. She would like to say thank you to all those that have supported her in her venture to help horses and ponies, and to everyone who nominated her for this award. But above all, a huge thank you to our volunteers for their continuous support and hard work. 

Finlay gives volunteer Rachel kisses goodbye.  Rachel helps out at our Saughall site, when she visits from South Africa. We all wish her a safe journey home, and look forward to her permanent return in the new year.

We would like to thank Jean Sainsbury Animal Welfare Trust, for their very kind donation of £1,000 towards our winter running costs. Winter is a very expensive time for us and the donation will be put to good use.

We had a lovely visit yesterday from Montse, her family and co-workers. It was lovely to see them again and for them to spent some time with us and the ponies.

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Little Katy arrived with us 14th October 2014, after her owner purchased her as a companion for her other pony who had other ideas and badly beat her up, her owner had no choice but to stable little Katy to keep her safe but Katy quickly became depressed and so she started the search for a new home for her, unfortunately she couldn’t find her a home and as lost the use of the stable for her so called on us as a last resort to help her and add her to our growing group of shetlands, Katy has settled straight away and is a sweet little lady.

Its is with a heavy heart that I sadly bring the news that our beautiful Fifi lost her fight against Tetanus on Wednesday.

Fifi was signed over to the sanctuary on Thursday 2nd October 2014.

Fifi was in a terrible state with sarcoids, over grown feet and was unable to lift her tail resulting in a mass of infected sores all around her back end. As we were passing Leahurst Equine Hospital to take her to the sanctuary, it was decided to ring ahead and get her straight in for veterinary attention.

The vets cleaned her up gave her antibiotics and made her as comfortable as possible. Fifi had been grazing in a cow field with very rich grass, so in order to prevent loose motions she was put on a hay only diet, and medication.

Everyone at the sanctuary fell in love with her immediately, she was so trusting despite what she has been through and the obvious pain she was living through.

On Sunday we were concerned she had a mild colic, presumed to be related to her medication for her injuries, so kept a close eye on her. Monday brought another story.

Weekend of 20th September 2014

Wellllll, what a weekend. In no particular order with the Thank You’s as they are all greatly appreciated.

Saturday & Sunday our local supporter Wirral Muddy Rugs, had a sale on and dedicated a rail of rugs in the sizes we need to us, so people could buy us a rug at a reduced price, or donate towards a rug. Also a local supporter Kathleen Webb dropped off a donation at our Saughall site. And, locals John Gilbert and Anthony Patterson who set up Parkgate Riding Club, held their first dressage competition donating £1 from every entry to us.

Sunday was a huge day for us, as we knew we were having a couple of very important visitors. But we never expected the day to turn out the way it did, with overwhelming support.

We had a couple of visits from some of our supporters dropping off sacks of food and rugs and saying a quick hello to the horses. Then it was time for our V.I.P’s. Support Adoption for Pets kindly presented us with our first grant cheque for £6850.00 so we can build a much needed new stable block. We are so grateful to all at SAFP and their supporters, the sables will ensure our horses are warm and dry this winter.

We also had a visit from a few trustees of the Rafa Benitez Foundation. Who came to see what we do and meet the horses.

Everyone at Horse Sense Wirral would like to say a HUGE thank you to each and every one of you. Not only have you helped the horses with you kindness, your support helps the whole team to keep going and move forward. WOW an overwhelming weekend.

 

Saturday 30th August

We would like to thank all the staff at Lush Spa in Liverpool, for once again letting us raise some pennies and awareness for our horses. Always a pleasure to do this venue, the staff are so helpful and friendly and make us very welcome.

 

We had a lovely day at Hoylake R.N.L.I. Fun day, and met lots of lovely people and raised awareness for Horse Sense.

We are holding our annual Summer Party this Saturday 23rd August 2014 at the Cherry Orchard, Arrowe Park, Wirral. There will be lots for everyone, Live music, Games, Bouncy Castle, Face Painting, Dance Group, Stalls and lots more. We will be there 1pm till 5pm so pop along say hello and have some fun.

 

We would like to thank Sainsburys Upton for their kind hospitality, and all their customers who kindly donated on our bag packing day. We raised a fantastic £770.98, which will help towards our Vet bill.

 

Jules is happy to be home with all her friends, she is not allowed to play with them yet but she shouts to them from her stable and they call back, and she can see new boy buddy and all the horses that come on to the yard for grooming, so she is happy for the fuss.

 

 Lulu

 Lulu is happy to be home from Leahurst after having a sarcoid removed from her eye, and with her friend Bonnie.

 

Jules foot

10 days after her operation and Jules has her glue on shoes.  She is still in Leahurst however we hope to have her home in the next few days.  Once the vets are happy with a lower dose of painkillers, she can come home to her friends, although a full recovery will take up to 12 months.

 

Today Jules was admitted into Leahurst Equine hospital under the care of lovely vet Ellen to have the very painful keratoma removed from her foot. Jules arrived with her friends Squeak, Bubbles and Beau and was obviously in pain. After being seen by the vet, it was decided to let our farrier treat her and give her antibiotics to dispel the abscess she had. This worked to a degree but we were not happy so the decision was  made to have X-Rays on her hoof. Which revealed the tumour, recovery will be a long process but will give Jules a pain free life so she can run around with her friends.

25th May 2014

 

 

 

 

 

 

We held a fundraising car wash, to help raise some much needed funds for one of our new rescue ponies Squeak, to have a life saving operation.  We would like to thank everyone who came to support us.  With donations made before hand, we raised a fantastic £866 followed by a donation of £34 to take us to our target of £900 needed to cover veterinary costs. Above photo of Squeak just arrived at Leahurst Equine Hospital.

We would like to say a huge thank you to local supporter Helen, for her  very generous donation, enabling us to make two valuable purchases. A lovely trailer for our horses and rescue work, and a trailer for the car which will help for transporting water to our Leasowe site, and items to our fundraising days and so much more. We cant thank you enough.

Marjorie Williams

We would like to say a special thank you to the friends of Marjorie Williams who very kindly offered donations towards the care of our ponies in place of flowers at her recent funeral, Marjorie was a local animal lover who sadly passed away at the fantastic age of 95, our thoughts are with her loved ones at this sad time who managed to collect together £135 towards our recent vet bill for Chico and Tonto, we cant thank you enough for your support especially Joanne as always.

 

3rd March 2014

 

 

 

Chico and Tonto Came home today after 4 days at Leahurst Equine Hospital.  Chico was taken ill with colic and admitted to intensive care, where things were touch and go. The decision was made to take 15 year olds Chico and Tonto together having spent all their lives together , we didn’t want to risk Tonto getting colic with stress from the separation. Tests started on arrival and it wasn’t looking good for Chico, chair Amy Pirie made the call for a scan to be done, knowing this would be costly with possibly the same outcome of calling it a day for the little chap.  It proved to be a good call with a slim chance of hope. The boys are on our Leasowe site, were they had been all their lives prior to us taking them on after their owner became too ill to look after them. The site is very dry considering the amount of rain we have had, and its not too far from the coast. On doing a scan it was discoverer Chico’s gut was full of sand, with all the rain the sand had come to the surface. Samples were taken from Tonto and he too was showing sand in his stomach. Treatment was started immediately however Chico was critical, and chances of pulling through were low.  After 3 days there was marginal improvement in him, but he wasn’t out of the woods yet. Day 4 things were looking good, and the cheeky chap was starting to whinny as other horses passed by. By the end of the day all results were normal, he was starting to eat and was on the mend.

 

We have never been on sandy land before and had never heard of this potential killer.  Although this has cost Amy a lot of money it is a small price to pay for the return of the boys, and the knowledge we have learnt and can now forward on to others. There is treatment you can give horses to prevent this, and tests you can do yourself to check for sand in your horse.  Both boys are home and on box rest for a month or so, and we are keeping a close eye on them.