In the midst of this country's economic downturn, it has been our pleasure and privilege to receive animals from caring people who reach out because they can no longer afford their care. Farms are in foreclosure; people are losing their rural rental property...or simply can't afford the price of hay.

This situation---today's situation--is different.

I was called by another rescue about a woman who "needed help." She had three animals--a mare and two older stallions, all thoroughbreds--and could not afford them. "They might be in bad shape," she said.

I called her. She talked about how she'd lost her job, how she could barely afford to put gas in her car, how the horses were 40 minutes from her home and she had to haul hay and water in a broken down vehicle that might just die on any of these trips, and how no one wanted the animals...especially not two older stallions. Who in their right mind would take them?

(We would. Despite all the issues--needing to house them far away from any mares, not being able to turn them out with any other horses, the expense of gelding, the risks associated with gelding older horses--one is 14, the other 21--we would take them. I'm proud of that. We take the tough cases.)

I told the owner that we needed to see the boys before they came to Catskill Animal Sanctuary. Were they strong enough to withstand immediate surgery? If they were thin and debilitated, we'd first need to put weight on them--and that would mean more time juggling the issues inherent with stallions.

Allen Landes, who works as a hospital biologist at Albany Medical Center during the week but is a godsend at CAS on weekends (and whenever else he can squeeze in a day off), lives just 3 miles from the horses' home and agreed to take a look at them. I relayed directions from the owner; Allen went right after work.

He used his cell to call from a long-abandoned derelict camp of some sort. "This can't be the place," Allen said.

"It's the place," I assured him, having gotten a clear description from the horse owner.

Allen walked a place that looked like it had not seen life in decades. "No horses in here," he'd say as he traipsed through one ramshackle shack after another. "Nobody here," he'd say, as he moved through the derelict remains of another.

He was about to give up when he spotted a forlorn-looking barn at the base of a hill at the back of the property. "Ugh," I hope they're not in here."

They were "in here."

For many years, Allen served as a board member for an Albany-based rescue, and assisted with seizures when owners were arrested for cruelty. The first words out of his mouth were, "God...this is the worst situation I've ever seen."

Three horses. Bone thin. Living in darkness in tiny, rat-infested stalls that have never been cleaned. Caked with manure. Water buckets bone dry. One stallion was shivering violently, and spent most of Allen's half-hour or so there lying down.

It turns out that this woman was arrested for animal cruelty eight years ago. It turns out that one horse, a thoroughbred stallion, had to be euthanized--he was simply too far gone. And IF we can get these horses out, that might be the only humane option.

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