Off Track Thoroughbreds

Kathy Barraclough of Saratoga Glen Farm, an exercise rider at Saratoga Race Course, was happy to take back Heartfelt Jazz.

When Heartfelt Jazz was vanned off Finger Lakes racetrack this past spring, the lightly raced filly soon found helping hands and a welcome home with the breeder who brought her into this world.

Dan and Kathy Barraclough of Saratoga Glen Farm say they did not hesitate to take back their filly when they were contacted by Second Chance Thoroughbreds, Inc., of New York, notifying them that the pretty bay with a heart-shape marking over her shoulder had been injured, and that they had saved her and two other horses from the possibility of winding up in the slaughter pipeline.

Dan Barraclough says he and his wife were happy to take her back.

Heartfelt Jazz
Sire: Grand Slam
Dam: Val’s Jazz
Foal date: May 7, 2011“We’ve been blessed to be able to make a living doing what we love. The horses have been good to us, to allow us this lifestyle, so we owe it to them to take care of them” in their time of need, says Dan Barraclough.

So committed is the 15-year-old breeding farm to looking out for their own, that Kathy Barraclough notes they are now putting notes on Jockey Club papers welcoming future owners to contact Saratoga Glen Farm if they need to return a horse. “Our horses are out there trying to do a job, and they’re helping owners and breeders make money. If someone can’t give them a good home, we want to be the next option in line, so they can come back to us, and still have a career when their race days end,” she says.

Heartfelt Jazz relaxes at Second Chance Thoroughbreds in New York before moving on to live with her breeder. Photo courtesy Second Chance Thoroughbreds, Inc.

The Barracloughs each have deep ties with horses. She is a native Australian who rode three-day events before moving to the US and working as an exercise rider at Saratoga. He rode hunter/jumpers prior to opening their business down the road from The Spa and breeding to NY, Kentucky, Florida and Pennsylvania stallions.

“Our philosophy is that we try to help every horse we can. Sometimes my wife is asked by a trainer to help a horse she gallops at the track; there’s a bunch of exercise riders who help (re-home horses) who you never hear about,” he says. “We’ve taken in a lot of broodmares who are lame when they get here, and who are perfectly sound two years later.”

He adds, “For us, it’s the ones who have a strike against them who we tend to gravitate toward, because we know their future isn’t as bright if we don’t take them ourselves.”

So when they got a call from Second Chance Thoroughbreds, Inc., a NY based horse charity that took in Heartfelt Jazz after she injured herself in an April 29th race, they readily agreed to take her back.

“We bred and sold her. We still own her mare,” Dan Barraclough says. “My wife’s name was on her papers, so they called her, and she arrived about two weeks ago.”

Heartfelt Jazz was assessed, and quickly buddied up with a pasture pal, he says, noting that in no time she seemed to get the hang of farm life, galloping over her grassy field.

Described as having a great attitude, any soreness she felt after her last race seems to be easing by the day, he adds.

Heartfelt Jazz, on right, gallops in her field at Saratoga Glen Farm. She was returned to her breeder after she was injured at Finger Lakes.

His wife says that the plan now is to let Heartfelt Jazz take it easy this fall and winter, put on some weight, and in the spring they’ll reassess her. “She might just stay here and be a buddy for weanlings. She might make a great elder horse to watch over them, and to train beside them when we teach them to load and unload,” Kathy Barraclough says.

Although Second Chance Thoroughbreds, Inc., made a point to thank her and her husband for taking back their filly, crediting them as a “responsible breeder,” the Barracloughs say no thanks needed.

“I do think we should all take responsibility,” Kathy Barraclough says. “If all true horse people and horse lovers did the right thing, we wouldn’t have to worry about it so much. I would hope that everyone would take a normal amount of responsibility to help their horses.”

Jeanne Mirabito of Our Mims rescued this Thoroughbred, ID’d as Jo Jo’s Gypsy, from a herd of horses deemed to be abandoned by the County Attorney of Bourbon County. Jo Jo was identified by Dr. Walker Logan and the Jockey Club.

The 16-hand “walking skeleton” abandoned in the Kentucky woods with dozens of other Thoroughbreds before authorities intervened in early August was in a condition so alarming that Jeanne Mirabito knew if she left her, she would be “signing her death warrant.”

“I knew that she was so close to death that she would lie down and die in that field,” says Mirabito, president of Our Mims Retirement Haven, a Kentucky facility serving older broodmares. “So I said I want that horse. If I couldn’t save her, at least she was going to leave this earth being cared for and loved, and her last days on earth were not going to be alone.”

So on Aug. 22, Mirabito agreed to find a stall in quarantine for the ex-racehorse identified as Jo Jo’s Gypsy via her tattoo and photographs, and shoulder the cost of care for one of 42 horses discovered in a wooded area on the Bourbon County line in early August.

Jo Jo’s Gypsy
Sire: Johannesburg
Dam: Camptown Gypsy
Foal date: April 25, 2005The mare was trying to survive with approximately 35 other horses, mostly Thoroughbreds, on a 100-acre lot with a mud bog as a water source and little forage, according to Dr. Walker Logan, a veterinarian contacted by Animal Control. She and her husband, fellow veterinarian Dr. Zachary Logan, were on scene to evaluate the animals.

“On the 6th of August we went to assess the situation and found horrible conditions. There were several mares who were heavy in foal … and one mare was trying to care for her newborn foal on the side of the road,” Walker Logan adds.

Bourbon County Attorney G. Davis Wilson, in a telephone interview, says the animals were declared legally “abandoned,” and on Aug. 7, the veterinarians, various rescue groups, and volunteers removed some 32 horses. Two more trips to the location netted an additional six horses, and two foals, who died.

Jo Jo is in quarantine, receiving special feed and supplements. She is also hand grazed for a few minutes.

In the ensuing days, as individuals and rescue groups across the country stepped up to offer homes to the horses —horses were shipped to Michigan, New York, Virginia, North Carolina and the Kentucky Equine Humane Center, which took five mares, one with a mare by her side— Mirabito decided that although she is prohibited by the charter of her nonprofit to accept a horse as young as Jo Jo’s Gypsy into her charity, the Kentucky bred deserved the dignity of dying close to home.

“Because she’s only 9, I couldn’t take her in as part of Our Mims. It would be against our mission statement,” Mirabito explains. “But I couldn’t leave a horse like that, so I took a grand leap of faith that my buddies would help me, and I took her as my own personal horse.”

Last Friday Mirabito led the spindly, sickly mare into a 16 by 20 quarantine stall, and gave her everything she could. With her volunteers by her side, Mirabito washed the horse gently in iodine to remove the traces of her chronic diarrhea, and she fed her good quality hay; as much as the poor animal could eat.

“In her first 24 hours with us, she drank 20 gallons of water and ate an entire bale of hay. On her second day, she drank 25 gallons of water and ate a bale-and-a-half. Then she started to taper off … I think she understands that she’s full, and there’s another meal coming,” Mirabito says. “My vet says we can’t ask for better than that. She is doing her part to stay alive.”

Jeanne Mirabito says Jo Jo looks better in photos. Though her survival is not a certainty, the mare is being made to feel loved.

It will be touch and go for a while. Jo Jo is not even close to being out of the woods. But on Monday, the consistency of her poop was normal, and Mirabito and her volunteers screamed and did a “happy dance” in the barn aisle.

“I’ve never seen a horse with this strong of a will to live,” she says. “By all rights, she should have lied down and died already.”

Mirabito notes that even as Jo Jo came from the such dire circumstances, the beauty of the episode has been the incredible kindness and assistance of the rescue community. Charity organization One Horse at a Time voted immediately to grant Mirabito $1,000 in emergency funds, and is actively raising money to help Mirabito’s new horse.

Meantime, there are six horses still available for adoption, says Walker. “Five of them are perfectly sound and ready to be rehabbed for a new career,” she says. Those interested in adopting may email her at walkerjlogan@gmail.com, or contact her through her Facebook page.