We get asked by people new to the horse world if we will adopt horses to new horse owners or let them foster. Many rescues don’t allow you to adopt if you haven’t owned a horse before, but I think that eliminates a lot of great potential adopters. Plus, we all started somewhere and if you start by adopting from us, we’ll be here to provide you with support for the rest of your adopted horse’s life – you rarely get that when you buy a horse! The same goes for fostering: not all horses will be good for first time horse people, but we welcome people with all levels of experience.
Hero’s a great example of the fantastic things that can happen when you welcome new horse people to the rescue. He came to Bluebonnet last year from a neglect case. Julie picked him, Bonham, and Maisy up and dropped him and Maisy off with me.
He was a little thin and very, very standoffish. I really liked him, though, because I could see he WANTED to be good and be friends. He was just nervous.
After a couple months with me, he went to a brand new foster home who was new to horses. I warned them that he might be standoffish for a bit, and I was a little worried about him with such novices. But I had plans to put him into the Challenge and thought he could hang out there for a bit. Plus, the foster home was nearby so I could help out if they had problems.
However, Hero had his own plans – he made his family fall in love, and they adopted him for their first horse!
From his adopters: Hero has been our buddy since day one. He is the first to come up to us whenever we go out to the barn or into the pasture. He greets everyone that comes to the house including the FedEx and Amazon delivery drivers. His hobbies include herding the cattle, playing chase with the dogs through the fence, joining us on walks with the dogs, trying to love on our foster cats, sneaking snacks from the garden, getting dirty (and staying dirty), following the tractor around, attempting to swing in our rope swing, and carrying around inanimate objects. He certainly keeps us entertained.
We are working on getting set up with Three Wishes Horsemanship to start formally training him. We are so excited to start working with him. Our plans are to use him for pleasure riding and potentially some light cattle work.
We are looking forward to fostering more horses, it has been an incredibly rewarding experience so far!