Wonderful News!

We have our first horse. Well, not yet, but we were approved for it. His name is Touch Diamond, and he is a 6-year old dark bay registered Thoroughbred. He has been in a rescue facility, after having been in an abusive situation, rescued, and moved to a facility to take care of him properly.

I don't have permission to post the pictures here yet, I hope to have that by next weekend. It would be great to be able to document the whole transformation including the hard work the rescue facility did.

Until I get that permission, I will use the notes posted on the site where his listing is. When he was deposited at the rescue facility on 3/24/10 by the young couple who had rescued him he was severely underweight, covered in rain rot on his body, ringworm all over his face and neck, and bot-fly eggs all over his legs. His coat was terribly shabby and long. The lady that runs the rescue said even though he was in such a bad shape his eyes still sparkled and he was just looking for someone to help him - and help he received.

They immediately got to bathing him and treating the rain rot and ringworm. They gave him internal antibiotics to fight the infection from within. They began feeding him appropriately, and they gave him a safe proper place to recover.

After a month or so on 4/22/10 on the update online, his hair had just about been replaced and the ringworm and rain rot was almost gone. He had gained quite a bit of weight and was looking like a real horse again.

About a week and a half after the updated pictures, there was an update that they had tried him with wearing a saddle (no rider yet), and tried to lunge him but he didn't seem to know what either was. It seems he is starting over from scratch. Luckily he didn't react poorly to the saddle or the stirrups, so that is a good sign for us in the near future.

A week or two later he was announced as ready to go to a good home.

Enter Lucy Roberts and Stonehaven Stables.

I was looking for a horse to become the flagship of Stonehaven Stables. To represent exactly what Stonehaven Stables was all about - recovery, rebuilding, and reinvention.

I was trolling around the internet as I had been for the last 5-6 months looking for an equestrian project, and I accidentally fell into the rescue center's website. I looked at the horses they had and instantly felt drawn to Bravo. I put out feelers on other horses at other places, and even another horse at this location, but in my heart, I wanted Bravo. Well, pieces started falling into place, and I was approved to take on Bravo.

I am arranging the transport from the rescue center to the boarding facility, but next weekend I am going to go and take some pictures of him to document his progression from the beginning of when I get him if not the beginning of when the rescue center got him.

I will also be documenting the conditioning and training program as well. I will be taking video of the training/conditioning sessions and posting them online. My hope is that all of this will be helpful to someone else in the future. I also hope that people will get to see how much

He still needs work. He is under muscled, and still needs to gain some weight. That and I have work to do with me. I have a bit of physical rehab that is going to be going on as I am conditioning him and training him.

I am very excited about him.

Well that's all the update I have right now. I am going to go to the boarding facility tomorrow, and make sure everything is up to par and that there is a spot for him, and then to go see him the first time next weekend.

Update coming soon, until then -
Happy Tails!
Lucy Roberts

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