Amy Reilly, owner of Reilly’s Ranch Horse Rescue in Abernathy got a message about three horses living in what she called a junk yard between Shallowater and New Deal in between NCR 2100 and University Ave. She’s been rescuing horses for fifteen years, so she went over to speak with the owners of those horses.
“I found one horse in a very poor condition as well as two other horses,” Reilly explained. “It was basically a junkyard, it had junked cars and boats and trailers all over the place, wire everywhere, a lot of things horses could get hurt on.”
She said the horses were roaming all around the junked cars.
Reilly said she couldn’t believe how bad the conditions were. She said the owners wouldn’t give up the two mares living there, but they offered to sell her the one in the worst shape for $350.
Within less than a day, she had fund raised enough money through social media outreach to rescue that horse, which she renamed “Lena.”
“I put up a post on Facebook the amazing people came through, we were able to get her out that situation,” Reilly said.
“I felt really bad that I couldn’t get the other two horses, but I’m not any type of law enforcement, I can’t make people give me their horses,” Reilly said. “But I’m really glad they were willing to give her up so that she could start a new life.”
“[Lena] definitely needs to put on some weight, she has bot eggs, so she needs to be de-wormed, and honestly she’s just depressed. She’s extremely depressed, apparently she’d had a baby and it was several months old when it died in the blizzard, so I’m sure it has a lot to do with it,” Reilly explained.
She hopes love and nursing Lena back to health will improve her demeanor.
Lena is certainly not the only horse Reilly has worked with, she has rescued over 200 horses in the last 8 years through her non-profit. She also has an agreement to help the Hale County Sheriff’s Office to help take in abandoned horses.
She believes that horses like Lena can be helped by giving more owners education in horse care.
“I truly believe it’s an education problem, not that they hate the horse, not that they don’t want to take care of the horse, but that they don’t know how to take care of the horse,” she said.
She encourages people who have horses but aren’t able to take care of them for whatever reason to seek out help from a local rescue.
“We are a non-profit and it is sometimes really hard to raise funds, so if anybody wants to donate at all, any amount goes a long way to helping these guys rehab, we can’t do this by ourselves,” Reilly added.
If you want to help with Lena’s rehabilitation, Reilly welcome’s donations which can be made through HF&C Feeds in Lubbock, call and say you want to donate to Reilly’s horse rescue they have an account set up.
