SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA THOROUGHBRED RESCUE

Our most pressing need is for permanent, loving, adoptive homes for the thoroughbreds that we rescue. Please forward this website address to friends that might be interested in providing a home for a thoroughbred ex-racehorse. We can be contacted at sctbrescue@live.com or (661) 305-9021 by prospective adopters. All prospective adopters should be aware that providing a new home for one of our horses ideally involves a commitment to that horse for its lifetime. However, we will endeavor to provide the best possible advice and ongoing guidance concerning the retraining and care of your thoroughbred, put you in touch with experienced off track thoroughbred (re) trainers, and will stay in touch with you to ensure that all is going well for you and your new horse. In the event that your circumstances change, and you can no longer care for your horse, he or she can always be returned to us.   

Please see our "About Adopting" page to read our adoption application form, and a sample of our adoption contract. Many of the thorougbreds sold at livestock auctions or coming directly from the racetrack are young and, even if they have suffered minor injuries and wear and tear through their racing years, they have many possible future career trajectories. Many will make excellent pleasure and trail horses, and others are amateur sporthorse prospects for both Western and English riding disciplines. The thoroughbreds that we have rescued all have wonderful temperaments, and want to be "pets"; mainly they want to belong to a loving human being.  

If you are currently unable to provide a permanent home for an ex-racehorse, but would like to financially contribute to the rescue, care, and rehabilitation of SCTR horses, you may make a tax deductible donation to our organization through paypal here: 

Our horses need sponsors! If you are unable currently to adopt a horse, but would like to help a horse in our care by providing "virtual" sponsorship for he or she, please contact us at sctbrescue@live.com. We are happy to accept ongoing sponsorship amounts as small as $10 per month, or in any amount, up to a "full sponsorship" of $200 per month. Horses awaiting adoption, and horses in rehab, are in need of sponsorship. In return, if you are ever in the southern California area, we would love to have you visit your sponsored horse; we will send you regular updates and new photos of your horse; and of course your sponsorship is a fully tax deductible donation. If your sponsored horse is adopted, you will be notified immediately. For a list of horses requiring sponsors currently, please see our "Horses Needing Sponors" http://www.sctbrescue.org/horsesneedingsponsors.htm And here is a photograph of one of them: Rainbows at Aloha needs a sponsor - and how can you say no to this pretty girl?

If you are or have been a horse owner; have a stall, pen, corral, or pasture area that is currently unused; some experience with thoroughbreds; and you would like to support the rescue of a former racehorse, perhaps you could foster one of our horses? SCTR will supply, or fund the cost of, feed, farrier, veterinary and dental care while the horse is with you, and regularly visit the horse to monitor its successful rehabilitation. We do not, in general, pay "board" rates however unless a substantial discount for charitable purposes can be offered to us for the service. Any out of pocket expenses incurred by a foster home are reimbursed promptly. 

Fostering, which involves direct participation in the rehabilitation of a rescued thoroughbred, can be a very rewarding experience, while not involving a permanent or significant financial commitment to a horse. Every foster home must be visited in advance by one of our members, and each foster signs our "Foster Care Contract". Please contact us at sctbrescue@live.com if you are interested in fostering a rescued thoroughbred, such as the lovely young thoroughbred filly that we rescued at auction in this photograph.  

Note: as of April 2009, we are not currently in need of additional fosters.

Of particular importance for SCTR is to have a number of foster homes in which effective "quarantining" of the horses that we purchase, for a period of thirty days following their rescue, can be completed. What this involves is the physical isolation of the horse from other equines, at a minimum distance of thirty feet at all times, and the careful practice of biosecurity guidelines to prevent the spread of possible diseases carried by, or suffered by, the horse.

Typically, horses arriving at livestock auctions directly from the racetrack and breeding farm have been regularly vaccinated for most contagious and other diseases, just as you vaccinate your own horse. However, when horses are excessively stressed, as a result of the dramatic change in routine that they suffer while at auction or on dealer's lots, they become uniquely susceptible to illness, just as you or I would. Outbreaks of "strangles", an unpleasant but rarely fatal upper respiratory disease caused by streptococcus equi, at auction lots and feedlots are a common consequence of such stresses for horses.  

While SCTR has been fortunate in not yet having a horse become ill following its rescue, we would hate to risk the health and safety of anyone else's equine by failing to follow appropriate quarantine protocol.  You can read more about appropriate quarantine and biosecurity protocol, and about the upper respiratory disease "strangles", by clicking on the links below. If, after reading these materials, you are willing and able to offer us a quarantine area for a rescued thoroughbred, please contact us at sctbrescue@live.com.    

http://www.aaep.org/pdfs/control_guidelines/Biosecurity_instructions%201.pdf  

http://www.aaep.org/pdfs/control_guidelines/Streptococcus%20equi%20var.pdf

http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/livestock/horses/facts/prot_strangles.htm

http://www.acvim.org/uploadedFiles/Consensus_Statements/Strangles.pdf

http://www.thoroughbredtimes.com/horse-health/2005/April/16/Veterinary-Topics-Strangles-No-need-for-panic.aspx