Pardon the shameless plug - Here is a very cool calendar featuring artwork of Thoroughbred racehorses - sales from the calendar benefit The Exceller Fund - I am a volunteer and past President of the organization which works to find new homes for racehorses when their racing careers are over.

http://stores.prime-equine.com/Detail.bok?no=473

You can read more about The Exceller Fund at www.excellerfund.org

Thanks for looking!

Here's another cool calendar if you like fast animals! Greyhounds are cuter than race horses! (Just kidding Princess, I love them both).

I'll buy yours if you buy mine
Greyhound Desk or Wall Calendar

BF - I love the ears on the second calendar. I've already bought a greyhound calendar <and basenji & sheltie> for the year. Had to get all of them - couldn't show favoritism.

Done! I ordered the Desk Calendar. If you know anyone who would like to adopt a Racehorse - let me know!

If you're not far from Oklahoma and would like a grand-daughter of Seattle Slew - this gal is available:
http://www.excellerfund.org/horses/mystic-illahee-942.html

If you prefer geldings, this guy is a little too much horse for beginners, and would make a good "project" horse for retraining:
http://www.excellerfund.org/horses/dah-waterboy-361.html

I've already bought my calendars for the year, but will look at the Cafe Press store when I get home. A girl can never have too many horsey t-shirts or coffee mugs!

Romeo, I wish I had a place to have a horse, and someone to teach me how to care for them!

Mr. Prospector babies usually make fantastic event horses. Hopefully a good home will find him soon!

BF - Looks like you're a couple of hours away from Indianapolis. That's where Friends of Ferdinand are located - they are a group that The Exceller Fund works with. They are looking for volunteers to take photos of horses that are ready to leave the racetrack. The group advertises those horses to people looking for training or riding prospects. It might be a good way to visit with horses, see them up close, and learn a bit about their care.


http://www.friendsofferdinand.org/new/in...5&Itemid=74

If you know anyone interested, they are welcome to visit him!

I don't know anyone out that way. My friend in TX is happy with the OTTB he has now that they've finally gotten him over his recurrent pneumonia.

They used to make fantastic racehorses too.

Romeo, thank you so much for telling me about this. It just so happens that I love photography! With the current weather, it is not a good time for me to be travelling, but I'll try to remember to look them up in the spring.

PR - do y'all handle any of the FL horses? Or are you primarily NE and upper midwest?

We network with all sorts of folks - right now most of our horses are located in Kentucky and Oklahoma but we have taken them in from almost all over the country. If there is a specific track, I can put you in touch with people that are assisting trainers in Florida that need to find new jobs for their horses.

Just general curiosity at this point. When I was looking for horses a couple years ago, none of the bigger orgs seemed to be operating on a significant scale in FL. I was surprised at the time, and wondering if that had changed.

Last I heard from my racing connection was that if you wanted a free OTTB, all you had to do was go park an emtpy trailer behind the track barns and walk away. By the end of the day, at least one horse would be tied to it.

I recently heard of another report of a small group just being turned loose. They were obviously pets at some point, they turned up at a friend of a friends place. He's working with the department of land management to try and keep one of them.

Florida's been a tough nut to crack and I really cannot pinpoint any particular reason. Recently, CANTER has made some inroads in the Gulf states:

http://canterusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2309&Itemid=374

Currently they don't have any horses listed for Florida tracks. A large part of the issue is finding dedicated volunteers who will go to the track every week and talk to the trainers, take photos, get updated information, etc. The volunteers have to know what questions to ask, and they have to be careful not to come across as judgmental - no matter what they might think about a particular trainer.

It's not an easy job to make a connection with a particular horse, and you see that horse each week until one day you go, and the horse is gone and no one is saying anything. At that point, you pretty much know what has happened.

The Ocala area has always (to my knowledge) had a fairly easy exit route for the toss-offs through the numerous sport barns around there, but I've wondered what the economy has done to those. I know that around here, child-safe horses with proven show records are going for $5000 and under, when those same horses 5 years ago would have been $20,000+. You literally cannot give perfectly good horses away right now....I have friends who've tried.

I know - I heard a story that a couple loaded their horses into their two horse trailer and drove to a spot near a nice trail head. They went for a 2 or 3 hour trail ride, and when they got back to their trailer, they found two horses tied to it with a note saying the owner couldn't afford to keep them and to please find them a nice home.

Genius - how is someone supposed to haul FOUR horses in a two-horse trailer?

After a number of cell phones to other friends, they managed to get another trailer up there, and I think both of the "new" horses were decent horses but I don't recall the specific outcome if they wound up keeping the horses or found new homes for them.

then there's this article :-(

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/18/sports/18horses.html?_r=1&pagewanted=2

Yes - the TRF is the organization that got the lion's share of donations from the industry. The Exceller Fund would get a few crumbs here and there, but our regular support comes from the racing fans with their $15 to $25 at a time donations.

Here is a link to the 2010 Year-end Financials for The Exceller Fund:
http://www.excellerfund.org/financials.html

The admin costs and fundraising expenses were covered by donations from our board members. The other largest expense was the PayPal fee and credit card processing fee in order to accept PayPal and credit card donations.

However, small, all-volunteer groups like us are routinely ignored by the media and the majority of the industry.

The Cumming, GA Horse Rescue is like your Exceller Fund - does a huge amount of work for a lot of horses and dogs with a lot of heart-filled human involvement.

We also visited the horse rescue in Aiken, SC - similar story. Can't say enough good about these places....I think there's a national trail riding association that tries to put together mildly competitive rides to raise funds for some of these organizations -

We try to do networking for GERL (GA Equine Rescue League). Our vet has partnered with them for a VERY successful low cost shots/coggins day, and I understand that you can apply through them for low cost gelding. As far as I know, they are the only group with representation in our area.