Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
There’s only one place where Jessie Reeves has heard a child say her first words, seen young people lifted from wheelchairs to run around on four powerful legs, and witnessed military veterans heal from combat-related traumas: Worthy Stables Therapeutic Horsemanship.
The non-profit riding organization was started by Reeves in 2017 and was fueled by Reeves’s desire to share the joys and benefits of horsemanship with the surrounding Mississippi community.
Today, Worthy Stables provides programs to a broad range of individuals, with personalized curriculum designed to help them reach their goals, improve their situations, and become the best versions of the themselves.
“Our broadest reaching program is Exceptional Equestrians, serving individuals with special needs such as Autism Spectrum Disorder, Downs Syndrome, Traumatic Brain Injury, Cerebral Palsy, and many others,” explained Reeves. “We also serve our military families with programs for veterans who have experienced trauma. Our military veterans program has three levels beginning with Boots on the Ground, an unmounted program in which the participants learn to work with untrained horses on the ground and progress into riding as they develop their skillset, confidence, and passion.”
Worthy Stables also serves children who have experienced foster care or developmental trauma and women who have survived assault, as well as offering camps and classes for children who homeschool.
“The heart of Worthy Stables is inclusivity,” said Reeves. “It is unique among equestrian centers because qualifying participants are not turned away if they cannot afford our services. We are donation funded, volunteer staffed, and our horses are donated, rescued, or on loan from friends of the organization.”
Presently, Worthy Stables is home to seven full-time therapy horses, two horses in training, and two therapeutic donkeys.
When doing an online search for software to help keep the horses’ information organized, Reeves and the Worthy Stables team discovered BarnManager.
“For the first time since opening Worthy Stables, I recently had to travel for over a week,” said Reeves. “Being able to share horse care information so easily was a lifesaver and provided much needed peace of mind that my horses would be well cared for and my volunteers would feel confident in caring for them.”
BarnManager is designed to be a part of your team, with the compatibility and credentials necessary to improve communication, simplify the management of horses, and get you out of the office, off the phone calls, and into the barn with the horses you care about! Click here to get a free demo and find out more!
Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
Miranda Swilley was rehabilitating a rescued hound dog named Sadie when she came to the realization that there was no hound-specific rescue in her home state of Mississippi. Recognizing this, Swilley began advocating for and taking in abandoned or neglected hounds.
Three years later, Swilley encountered a similar scenario – this time with horses.
In 2015, Swilley took in two horses from a 17-horse neglect case being handled by another rescue. It was at the seizure of those horses that Swilley also met the now-vice president of Homeward Horse & Hound, Angel Weldy.
“We kept in contact, and as time went on our concerns grew that there would be a need for another rescue able to take horses in our area,” said Swilley, who soon founded Homeward Horse & Hound. “We established our 501(c)(3) in 2015, and in 2016 the other rescue dissolved. The calls have been coming in ever since.”
“We knew when we started that we wanted to help our local law enforcement,” continued Swilley. “Mississippi has pretty poor animal laws, so our hope was that if we were there to give law enforcement an assist, fewer neglect cases would fall through the cracks.”
The majority of the horses rescued by Homeward Horse & Hound come from law enforcement calls, with a few also coming because of owner surrenders due to mental illness, age, or other circumstances.
Off-the-track Thoroughbred “Major Bingo,” was rescued by Homeward Horse & Hound and was adopted and renamed “Jackpot” by one happy young girl! We think he definitely hit the “Jackpot!” Photos courtesy of Homeward Horse & Hound
“It’s made adoptions a little more challenging since we never know what we will get or when, only that they will be in bad shape,” explained Swilley. “We also get the occasional goat from the city or an abandoned pot belly pig, even chickens and ducks sometimes! We still rescue hounds, but there has been such a need for the horses, that has become our primary focus.”
With horses as the organization’s focus, the team was looking for an app or software that would help them to stay organized and share information with others within the group, which is when Swilley came across BarnManager.
“The ability to access and input records without having to hand each other paperwork physically has been a blessing,” said Swilley of BarnManager. “I am horrible at forgetting things. Recently a horse of ours, Pedro, was adopted, and the trainer needed a copy of his Coggins paperwork. I had forgotten to take it to my partner’s house the night before, but she was able to access it through BarnManager.”
“Sometimes we lack the pizazz and following you see on bigger rescue pages, but one of the things I love about us being small is that you can really follow along with the horses in our care from the point of intake to adoption,” concluded Swilley. “For us, their stories are what’s important!”
BarnManager is designed to be a part of your team, with the compatibility and credentials necessary to improve communication, simplify the management of horses, and get you out of the office, off the phone calls, and into the barn with the horses you care about! Click here to get a free demo and find out more!
Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
New Hampshire native Emily Aho had just purchased her third pony when she received a call from a woman in Michigan.
“She said, ‘Do you know what you have?’ I said, ‘Yeah, they’re Newfoundland Ponies!’” said Aho, who had acquired her first pony, a Newfoundland cross, strictly as a pasture companion for her Clydesdale cross, not knowing much about the Newfoundland breed. “She said, ‘They’re extremely rare, and you need to breed them!’ I thought, ‘What!? Breed? Me?!’”
Aho knew her ponies were special; that’s why she ended up with three ponies from the same family after only intending to purchase one! However, what she didn’t know at the time was that the Newfoundland Ponies are what are considered an original “landrace breed” – and that there are less than 40 Newfoundland Ponies in the United States and a global population of well under 1,000 ponies.
The Newfoundland Pony breed is one made hardy thanks to the pony’s native environment in northeastern Canada.
Upon learning this, Aho knew she had to do something, and in January of 2013, the Newfoundland Pony Conservancy Center (formerly Villi Poni Farm) was born.
“[My first] little pony stole my heart,” said Aho. “She was just amazing. The connection between her and anyone, actually, was just different than I’d experienced before. It’s very hard to describe.
“We decided that the best way to save this breed was to bring awareness about them and let people meet them,” continued Aho. “I could tell you about them all day long, but until you actually experience what they’re like, you won’t get it. People say, ‘I had a (certain breed) horse that was wonderful and good with kids.’ But when 99 percent of a breed are that way, like the Newfoundland Pony is, it’s mind-boggling. So, we formed the sanctuary. It’s grown and grown.”
Today, Aho and the Newfoundland Pony Conservancy Center act as stewards of the endangered breed through selective breeding and educational efforts.
Part of the Newfoundland Pony Conservancy Center’s mission is educating others about the breed.
“Almost all breeds, including types of plants, are traced back to landraces that we’ve taken and adapted for our purposes,” explained Aho of how she immersed herself in learning more about the Newfoundland Ponies. “Nature makes their genetics hardy and able to withstand environmental and biological change, and they’re healthy. We as people; we can’t do that. We can’t say, ‘Okay, this one is going to survive this disease or this type of weather change.’ We look at what’s measurable. What’s measurable is their appearance, their usage, their size and ability, for instance. We can’t see the inside of what we’ve created; we don’t create them with the sole purpose being survival like nature does. So over time as we select out genetics/certain traits, we ultimately weaken species. Never having been “‘improved” or having their breeding altered for one purpose or another, the Newfoundland Pony doesn’t have a single genetic problem.”
With that in mind, the Newfoundland Pony Conservancy Center carefully breeds Newfoundland Pony to Newfoundland Pony, allowing the breed to continue. However, it’s not solely Aho who is doing the breeding – and it’s not the multi-faceted non-profit’s only focus.
“We don’t want to keep all of these ponies here,” said Aho. “Some of them are permanent residents, but others, we take them into our network. They go to breeding conservation homes that we have mentored and taught about the breed. The concept is that they breed registered ponies to registered ponies only, no irresponsible breeding. If that happens, we pull the animal, and that’s in our contract. We’re very serious about that.”
Presently, there are nine ponies living onsite at the 501(c)(3) rescue’s base in Jaffrey, NH, while there are 22 total ponies under the Conservancy’s program. The additional ponies all reside in adoptive homes within a two-hour radius of Jaffrey, NH, and with approved owners that have received mentorship and education on the ponies, their heritage, their care, and the best conservation breeding practices. Once they’ve undergone mentorship, new adoptive owners are considered “Breed Stewards,” continuing the work of the Newfoundland Pony Conservancy Center and becoming a part of the organization’s network of conservation breeders who help one another.
With less than 40 Newfoundland Ponies currently in the U.S., the Newfoundland Pony Conservancy Center is committed to continuing to grow the endangered breed through careful breeding.
“We’re all volunteers,” said Aho, a nurse by trade who serves as the non-profit’s executive director alongside five total board members. “All of our foster homes – everybody’s involved. We all stay connected together. We have quite a little network going and some really impressive people involved. We have loads of volunteers. It’s wonderful; they’re great people. We take people as volunteers that don’t know anything about horses, and we teach them. They’re a good pony to learn on!”
The Newfoundland Pony Conservancy Center also offers educational tours to the public to further spread knowledge about the ponies and equine welfare in general, as well as providing Equine-Assisted Learning (EAL) programs.
With so much going on, Aho was thankful to have found BarnManager!
“It’s incredible. I’ve never been so excited about a program in my life!” said Aho of BarnManager. “Just recently, it helped me in the greatest way!”
Due to a scheduling error, a veterinarian arrived somewhat unexpectedly to look at a filly while Aho was at work. The horse needed a health certificate in order to travel across state borders, but Aho had not planned on the vet visiting and did not have any of the horse’s necessary coggins and paperwork records prepared at the barn.
“I went into my phone at work, and there [the coggins] was!” said Aho. “I had downloaded everything in BarnManager, so I messaged it to him right then and there. It was amazing!
“It has helped immensely,” continued Aho. “It’s so great that I know who and when they had their hooves trimmed, or dewormed, etc – otherwise it’s hard to keep track of, especially when you’re the chief cook and bottle washer here!”
Aho is not the only one using BarnManager though, she’s now invited the adoptive and foster families to utilize it as well.
“It’s a super way for me to keep track of their records,” said Aho. “They can just put it in there, and we’ve got that for the future. They scan in their vet records, all of that. I know that they’re being taken care of, and I know if there’s a problem without them having to hunt me down.”
BarnManager is designed to be a part of your team, with the compatibility and credentials necessary to improve communication, simplify the management of horses, and get you out of the office, off the phone calls, and into the barn with the horses you care about! Click here to get a free demo and find out more!
Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
In 2016, Michele Hughes spent nearly a month in the intensive care unit with a blood clot and pulmonary embolism. When she got out of the hospital, her husband bought her several chicks and brought the young chickens next to her bed.
It was a simple gesture, but for the life-long animal loving Hughes, it was enough to spark an idea. Hughes began raising chickens and taking in animals of all types at what became known as Sunny Side Up Farm in Lecanto, FL. Before long, Hughes’ reputation for helping animals had spread, and she and her husband began receiving calls asking if they could take in animals that were unwanted because of unfortunate situations or moves.
In April 2018, following the continued growth of Hughes’ rescue efforts, and with the help of her husband, mother, and daughter-in-law, Saint Francis’s Sunny Side Up Farm Animal Rescue was officially launched as a 501(c)(3) non-profit rescue organization.
“Our goal is to positively change the relationship between people and animals, and one of our main focuses is on teaching children how to care for and have compassion for animals,” explained Hughes, who runs the rescue with the help of three part-time volunteers.
Presently, Saint Francis’s Sunny Side Up Farm Animal Rescue is home to three goats, seven pigs, five rabbits, numerous chickens, turkeys, geese, ducks, and cats, and 20 horses – enough that Hughes new she needed to find a solution for managing all of the information and medical records that went along with each horse.
“I was looking for something to help me organize all of the horses; it’s so hard to keep everything written on paper,” explained Hughes, who began looking in the iPhone App Store before coming across BarnManager.
Now, Hughes is able to use the software to manage the horses available for rescue, as well as her own gaited horses that are the backbone of Saint Francis’s Sunny Side Up Farm Animal Rescue’s fundraising efforts.
“We rely on donations, and for fundraising, we have been offering trail rides out in the Withlacoochee Forest,” explained Hughes, who helps oversee up to six riders at a time on the daily trail rides through the beautiful forested landscape surrounding the rescue.
All of the funds raised through the trail rides go directly to helping the horses and the other animals being rehabilitated or available for rescue at Sunny Side Up Farm.
To learn more about supporting Saint Francis’s Sunny Side Up Farm Animal Rescue through trail rides in Lecanto, FL, visit their Facebook page here.
BarnManager is designed to be a part of your team, with the compatibility and credentials necessary to improve communication, simplify the management of horses, and get you out of the office, off the phone calls, and into the barn with the horses you care about! Click here to get a free demo and find out more!
Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
Ten years ago, the communities surrounding Driggs, Idaho, experienced the height of an economic downturn.
Suddenly, many local, rural horse owners found themselves unable to care for their animals, and horses began to be left behind or neglected as their owners lost their incomes and often even their housing.
That’s when horsewomen Jen Carter, Debbie Falber, Gena Howald, Julie Martin, Kim Mills, and Greta Procious decided to together step into action, and HAPI Trails Horse Adoption Program, Inc. was born.
HAPI Trails’ mission became providing a happy, healthy, and nurturing environment for the abused, abandoned, and neglected horses of the area – initially with the idea of simply seeing the horses through the tough time in the economy. However, while the women expected the demand for the organization’s services to decline as the economy improved, it remained the same. Year after year, at least 10 to 12 horses were discovered to be in need of HAPI Trail’s help, and for the greater part of the past decade, HAPI Trails has maintained an “at full capacity” status.
“This is our first winter since 2009 to NOT be a capacity,” said Martin, the executive director of HAPI Trails. “It’s a good feeling, especially since we had our biggest adoption year in 2018. We were able to find new wonderful homes for nine of the horses in our program. We currently have 10 horses in our program, with another six potentially needing our services, and we cannot take care of more than 25 horses at one time due due to space and funding limitations. We are very responsible when it comes to the care of our horses and unfortunately will not take more than our resources allow.
“We work regularly with local law enforcement to collect rogue horses and provide care and housing for impounded, lost, or unclaimed horses,” continued Martin. “We maintain two emergency spaces within our system for these agencies. We have on average, five horses in foster care in our network of volunteers at any given time.”
Today, the Driggs, Idaho, based rescue continues to be run 100 percent by volunteers who spend more than 7,500 cumulative hours each year volunteering their time, money, heart, and soul caring for the horses.
“We have nine board members that are 100 percent hands on, and who I’d consider to be our top volunteers,” explained Martin, who is also certified by the Equine Assisted Growth and Learning Association (EAGALA) and is helping to facilitate the equine-assisted psychotherapy program for HAPI Trails. “We also have, on average, 35 other volunteers who help regularly with the care of horses, property maintenance, and fundraising.”
All of the volunteers are dedicated to rehabilitating and rehoming the horses that come to HAPI Trails into a loving, compassionate, lifelong home.
“We advocate for responsible horse ownership and are members of the Unwanted Horse Coalition, working with owners who are capable of keeping their horses, but have deemed their horses ‘unwanted,’” said Martin. “By assessing each horse and matching that animal to an appropriate owner, we can help provide good homes for these wonderful animals. We prefer to place horses in permanent homes; therefore, no HAPI Trails horse may be sold or given away and is always welcome back into the program. HAPI Trails performs follow-up visits and provides continued support for all of our animals and owners.”
With so many horses to keep track of, Kristie Eggebroten, HAPI Trails’ development director, knew that the organization needed a better way to manage all of the horse’s data and information, which led her to finding BarnManager and the free-for-501(c)(3) program.
“BarnManager is helping us organize and connect our horses and our volunteers to what our horses need,” said Martin. “We all have full-time jobs, so making it easier to keep up is always a plus.”
By simplifying their organization and cutting down on the time needed to stay organized, Martin and all of the volunteers are able to spend more time focused on what they love most about HAPI Trails: the horses!
“We love what we do!” concluded Martin. “We give hope for horses and connect horses to good people.”
BarnManager is designed to be a part of your team, with the compatibility and credentials necessary to improve communication, simplify the management of horses, and get you out of the office, off the phone calls, and into the barn with the horses you care about! Click here to get a free demo and find out more!
Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
Wisconsin native Cindy Prince was attending law school and preparing for her First-Year Law Students Exam (commonly called the “Baby Bar Exam”) with her sights firmly set on a successful career as an attorney, until suddenly fate and a half-blind horse intervened.
In September 2013, Prince got word of a one-eyed Arabian being given away for free from a rescue that was closing its doors for the winter.
“Who, I asked myself, is going to take in a two-year-old, one-eyed Arabian? Well, the obvious answer was me!” said Prince, who was 40 at the time. “The entire series of events that this decision kicked off was not at all what anyone saw coming.”
Prince contacted the rescue on a Friday, and by Saturday, she was approved to adopt, with plans made to pick up the gelding Sunday morning after Prince attended a wedding on Saturday evening. That Saturday night however, while dancing at the wedding reception, Prince dislocated her knee cap.
“It was excruciating, and I ended up in the emergency room, not getting back home until close to 3 in the morning when we were to be on the road by 8 a.m.,” said Prince. “Plus, I was now in a leg immobilizer and on crutches. Regardless, we hopped in a borrowed truck pulling a borrowed trailer, and off we went to pick him up!”
The Arabian, now named Kirby, came home with Prince and in the months that followed Prince recovered from her injury – and from a blood clot that developed in her calf immediately following– she passed the Baby Bar Exam, and the idea of starting a horse rescue began to be lightly tossed around between her and her close friends.
“A couple of friends and I declared Thursdays to be horse night; they would come over, and we would spend time with the horses and each other,” explained Prince. “Everything was going so well. We talked of wanting to start our own rescues, but also about how hard that would be as there is no money to be made in rescue. How could I go from planning a future career as an attorney to running a non-profit that provides no income?”
For Prince, fate already had that one figured out. Two days before the start of 2014, Prince learned that she had stage two breast cancer, and everything came crashing down around her.
“My body did not tolerate the treatment well at all,” said Prince. “It was 10 months of hell, to say the least. I could barely get out of bed most of the time, much less care for the horses. I was often too drugged to even think straight, but when I could, all I could think about was Kirby. This horse I took in to care for and now I was unable too.”
Throughout treatment, Prince spent much of her time thinking, dreaming, crying, and misplacing her anger on those caring for her, until suddenly everything made sense.Something or someone was telling her that she was on the wrong path. Her heart had always been with horses, and suddenly she knew what she was meant to do.
“I began researching other horse rescues and talking with my husband. I no longer had any interest in law school. There was only one thing I wanted to do when my treatment was over – help more horses in need like Kirby,” said Prince.
By August 2014, before Prince was even completely done with treatment, Pony Tales Refuge & Rehab, Inc. was born with the mission of rescuing equines from abandonment, abuse, neglect, and slaughter.
Prince and Pony Tales took in their first two “official” rescue horses in October 2014, and since then, the refuge and rehab has rescued more than 150 equines and, to date, has found homes for 96 of them.
Presently, the Colfax, WI-based rescue is home to 40 equines and specializes in unhandled, feral equines and nurse mare orphan foals, while continuing to take in equines from all walks of life – and while running a special program, known as the Trainer’s Challenge.
Started five years ago, shortly after Pony Tales initial creation, the Trainer’s Challenge welcomes trainers and riders of all ages and training experience to apply to be partnered with one of the rescue horses. If accepted, the trainer is able to pick up their designated rescue horse in February, working with the horse until June when the horse and trainer together show off their hard work and vie for prizes in the Trainer’s Challenge, before the horse is returned to the rescue and ultimately rehomed.
“The past Challenges have made it possible for more than 30 equines to get the training they needed to be able to find homes,” explained Prince. “This year, if each of the 27 available horses get paired with a suitable trainer, we will almost double that number!”
With so many horses at Pony Tales, some of them leaving the property to be involved in the Trainer’s Challenge, and some finding new homes, organization is vital. That’s where BarnManager comes in.
“We heard about Barn Manager in 2017 when we became verified by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries (GFAS),” said Prince. “They asked us to find an electronic storage system for our data in case of a fire or other disaster that could destroy our paper files. We began researching programs and initially wanted to try BarnManager.
“We thought it was out of our budget at the time and tried other programs over the next year and a half. None of them were quite what we were looking for though. When we learned a few months ago that BarnManager offered free services to 501(c)(3) non-profits, we signed up right away!
“BarnManager not only helps us keep our ‘verified’ status with the GFAS, but it is so user-friendly. I personally struggle with technology at times, and it’s so easy to use that my mom – who is very tech-challenged – is even able to work with it,” continued Prince. “I also very much love being able to scan in our documents, and I greatly enjoy throwing away the ones we don’t need to keep as the documents are stored safely in the program and accessible from any device. We had stacks and stacks of papers, records, and binders everywhere, and we were beginning to run out of room to keep them all! It became quite a task to just track down the location of a certain document.”
Whether its importing information into BarnManager and handling organization, updating the Pony Tales’ website, or caring for the horses themselves, volunteers, including a team of board members and four additional reliable and trustworthy volunteers, do the majority of the work at Pony Tales. Prince says she would be lost without them.
“Every day is a learning experience,” said Prince. “We do not have any full-time volunteers. Our website has been a thorn in my side since day one, but we now have two wonderful volunteers working on getting it in shape and maintaining it. We do our best and our first priority every day, all day, is the horses. The horse always comes first.”
To learn more about Pony Tales and how you can support the 501(c)(3), visit www.ponytaleswi.org.
BarnManager is designed to be a part of your team, with the compatibility and credentials necessary to improve communication, simplify the management of horses, and get you out of the office, off the phone calls, and into the barn with the horses you care about! Click here to get a free demo and find out more!
Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
Dr. Susan Spivey had just graduated from the London School of Economics when she received a call from a friend, congratulating her on completing her dissertation and asking her a question – a question that would ultimately end up changing the course of Spivey’s life over the last two years.
“She said, ‘Have you ever heard of these things called kill pens?’” explained Spivey, who, in addition to her degree from the London School of Economics, has a master’s degree in Pharmacoeconomics from the University of Florida. “I said, ‘No I have not.’ She said, ‘You just need to go on this website and look. Just be prepared because your heart will break.’”
By that very same evening in September 2016, Spivey had rescued her first two horses, and that week, Brego and Arwen arrived at Spivey and her husband, Pat O’Neal’s Southern Redhead Farms in Bronson, FL.
“We had bought a farm, literally only about nine months previous,” explained Spivey, who grew up on a cattle ranch and whose goal had been to raise a few cows on the property. “I’d said, ‘I’d love to have cows and chickens.’ There has been a little bit of a digression from that as you can see.”
While her dad had had a few horses on their family ranch, Spivey had never intended to have a horse of her own, let alone two horses – which would soon turn into three horses, and then five horses…
“We had Brego and Arwen, and then this little colt popped up on my Facebook feed; he looked absolutely just terrified,” said Spivey, who next rescued that colt, Phoenix, and then George and Gracie, a wagon-pulling team destined to be killed as George had broken his leg.
As Spivey realized the ongoing need for rescue of these horses, the Southern Redhead Farms Rescue was officially born, with the name sharing that of Spivey’s farm and honoring Spivey’s mother, a redhead from South Carolina who lost her battle with cancer.
“We just started growing from there,” said Spivey. “The sheriff’s office started calling, so I’ve partnered with the local livestock deputies and have helped in a couple of horse seizures – or rather I call it rescuing horses who had fallen on hard times, of no fault of their own.”
Since its inception two years ago, Southern Redhead Farms Rescue’s mission has remained saving abused, abandoned, and neglected horses, rehabbing them, and then finding them new, safe forever homes. Today, it’s grown exponentially and is currently home to 37 equines, ranging from Quarter Horses and Thoroughbreds to miniature horses and donkeys.
With so many horses to love, care for, rehabilitate, and adopt out, Spivey has turned to BarnManager as a resource to keep track of all the horses’ paperwork and records.
“We would leave notes for each other; if somebody was on antibiotics or we were going to increase the feed for somebody, we’d put that in the notebook, and we’d date it,” explained Spivey, who also continues to work full-time as an associate director of medical sciences for a biotechnological and pharmaceutical company.
“Now BarnManager helps us with that. It’s a place for me to stockpile those notes on each particular horse,” continued Spivey. “It also helps in our adoption process, because now I’ve got all of those records together for the horse. So when they’re adopted out, I can say, ‘This is the last farrier appointment. This is the last time they received their shots. There’s the date of the coggins.’
“All of that information is together, instead of me having to run around and find loose pieces of paper. Now they can get a continuous record of what’s happened to that horse from the day they step foot on this rescue until the day they were adopted out to go to their new home. Then I can keep a copy of that record as well, along with a picture.”
In addition to the benefit of BarnManager for streamlined organization and paperwork, the rescue has significantly benefited from the support of a knowledgeable and well-rounded board of directors.
“I’ve got a board of directors that is just awesome,” said Spivey. “One woman, Karen Putnam, just came to our board, and she has really helped me immensely. I didn’t have a lot of contacts within the horse industry, and she does have that. So, it’s been a Godsend since the day that she showed up here at this rescue to look at a mini!
“Some of the people that have been on our board are much better at marketing than I am, so I allow them to kind of run with that area,” continued Spivey. “I have somebody on the board who works at the University of Florida as a grant writer, so she helps us facilitate grants. I’ve surrounded myself with people who have a love of horses and also help us keep this rescue afloat.”
Through the efforts and the effort of her husband, the board of directors, and the staff that helps care for the horses, Spivey hopes to place more horses into loving, adoptive families and garner additional support to cover the expenses of rehabilitating and caring for the animals during their time at the rescue.
“I do work full-time and part of that is to be able to put feed in these horses’ mouths,” said Spivey. “I’ll be honest and say that I probably fund 60 to 70 percent of the day-to-day expenses of running this rescue. I would like to eventually flip that and say that I’m only funding about 30 percent of the rescue, and 70 percent we have coming from donations and fundraising. Eventually!
“This was not a path that I sought out, and it’s not a path that I ever really thought that I would be on,” concluded Spivey. “But I don’t regret that I’m on it. There are moments where you’re like ‘This is too much!’ Then I can go out and look at some of these faces. My husband usually says, ‘If you hadn’t done this, these horses would be dead.’ Then it kind of puts my perspective back where it needs to be. When you see start to see those horses trust people again, it is just an awesome feeling.”
BarnManager is designed to be a part of your team, with the compatibility and credentials necessary to improve communication, simplify the management of horses, and get you out of the office, off the phone calls, and into the barn with the horses you care about! Click here to get a free demo and find out more!
Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
In 1980, the Fairfax 4-H Therapeutic Riding Program was launched with one borrowed horse and a handful of riders.
Today, 38 years later, that program has evolved into the Northern Virginia Therapeutic Riding Program (NVTRP), with a herd of 15 horses, four full-time and eight part-time staff, and a team of up to 250 weekly volunteers that serve approximately 115 riders each week.
With an ever-growing team, the need for organization is paramount—that’s why NVTRP Equine & Facilities Manager Christina Duffy found herself searching online for a horse management tool. In her Googling, she came across BarnManager.
“BarnManager seemed to best fit our program needs and was the most user-friendly option,” explained Duffy. “BarnManager has helped to keep all of our files in one place and helped keep track of any events or illnesses that arise with a specific horse; it is much easier to remember to type something up then write it down! It has also made information about our horses more accessible to instructors and staff.”
This streamlined organization makes it easier for NVTRP to continue to focus on fulfilling its mission of providing equine-assisted therapeutic services to children and adults with disabilities, youth-at-risk, military service personnel, and their families in an inclusive, community-based setting.
NVTRP’s number one goal is to use equestrian-based services to provide a range of physical, social, and emotional benefits, and to help riders attain the healthiest, most independent lives possible.
Today, in order to meet the growing demand for NVTRP’s services, the organization has begun construction and a capital improvement project. Part of the project includes a new, larger, lighted outdoor riding ring, an accessible playground, and improved parking and access. To learn more about NVTRP and to get involved in the capital campaign, visit http://nvtrp.org/capital-campaign.
BarnManager is designed to be a part of your team, with the compatibility and credentials necessary to improve communication, simplify the management of horses, and get you out of the office, off the phone calls, and into the barn with the horses you care about! Click here to get a free demo and find out more!
Through our ‘Free for 501(c)3’ program, our team at BarnManager has had the opportunity to learn more about incredible equestrian non-profit organizations from across the country. Each month, we’ll be featuring one such organization here on our blog!
In the mid-1980s, one Alabama girl, Marianna Greene Henry, begged her parents to start a therapeutic riding program on their farm near the Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind (AIDB) in Talladega, AL.
Henry had been volunteering with a therapeutic riding program in Birmingham, AL, and she was amazed at the positive impact that the horses had on the children with disabilities. Knowing that just down the road from her family’s farm, the AIDB was helping so many similar children, Henry thought it would be the perfect fit and could make an incredible difference for those children.
Sadly, in 1989, Henry was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy – a heart disease that only a heart transplant could cure – and she died that March as surgeons tried to implant an artificial heart and before her therapeutic riding program dream could come to fruition.
Soon after their daughter’s death, Pat and Marilyn Greene founded the Marianna Greene Henry Special Equestrians program (MGH) as part of The Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind in memory of their daughter.
“We just looked at each other,” recalls Marilyn Greene, “and said, ‘She really wanted this.’”
The Greenes started modestly with a few horses and a ring in their side yard. However, within months the program had blossomed into something greater than they ever imagined.
Today, the program at their farm is housed inside a 39,000-square foot arena and serves 350 to 400 children per year, making it the largest program in the country serving deaf, blind, and multi-disabled riders.
MGH’s mission is to maximize the potential and well-being for the students by providing equine-facilitated activities in the areas of therapy, sport, and recreation to enhance physical and mental skills, aid in mobilization, and promote socialization and communication. To fulfill that mission, MGH offers therapeutic riding, hippotherapy (physical, occupational, or speech therapy treatment strategy that utilizes equine movement), equine-facilitated mental health, equine-facilitated psychotherapy, equine-facilitated learning, and a work experience program.
In the last fiscal year alone, MGH provided more than 3,000 rides to students at AIDB.
With so many rides and generally around a dozen horses in the barn, MGH now utilizes BarnManager to stay organized.
“It’s an awesome program,” said MGH barn manager, Callie Smelley. “It makes filing paperwork quick and easy. It allows you to have all your information in one place, and it’s easily accessible by all MGH employees. Personal profiles for each horse allow you to pinpoint what each horse requires, and we can also share with veterinarians and farriers to keep up with equine maintenance.”
Keeping the horses well cared-for allows for the magic that exists between a horse and rider with sensory or physical disabilities that transcends all language and physical barriers – something that is so evident at MGH.
Presently, Marianna Greene’s younger brother, Tim Greene, serves as the program administrator and Pat Greene sits as the president of the MGH Foundation. Marilyn and Pat Greene continue to volunteer at MGH every Tuesday, where they’ve seen first-hand the miraculous transformation of many of the students and the joy and self-esteem that the riders gain.
“It wasn’t until I started working with these children that I saw what Marianna saw,” said Marilyn Greene. “It saved our lives.”
The non-profit riding organization was started by Reeves in 2017 and was fueled by Reeves’s desire to share the joys and benefits of horsemanship with the surrounding Mississippi community.
Miranda Swilley was rehabilitating a rescued hound dog named Sadie when she came to the realization that there was no hound-specific rescue in her home state of Mississippi. Recognizing this, Swilley began advocating for and taking in abandoned or neglected hounds.
