When Kelsey Merrow rescued her first horse, she was astounded by the immediate warmth of the relationship she developed with the blind pony she called Potato. Why did the name the rescue horse Potato? “Because like a potato, he has eyes but can’t see.”
“I’d been around horses all my life, and I’d only seen them well-treated,” Merrow said. “But when you rescue a horse that’s been abused or neglected, you see them find joy again. A 30-year-old overworked cart pony starts acting like a foal, playing tag with a dog. It’s too beautiful a thing not to share.”
After careful rehabilitation and training, Merrow found a home for Potato. Soon she rescued a second pony, and in early 2023, she founded the Pony Up Rescue Collective on a private farm in Tivoli. To date, she has saved a dozen ponies and horses, re-homed five of them, soon to be six, and is still caring for seven, with the help of a few dozen enthusiastic volunteers.
Like two other rescue groups in Dutchess County, 13 Hands in Clinton Corners and Lucky Orphans Horse Rescue in Dover Plains, Pony Up Rescue Collective offers people the chance for hands-on involvement with gentle horses.
The collective emphasizes collaborative action and equitable access to the far-reaching benefits of horses. The group is driven by the idea that rescuing horses does good. Rescuing horses that engage with underserved communities and at-risk youth does a great deal more good.
“With only donations and volunteers, we’ve already saved a dozen horses, built programming for underserved special-needs groups, partnered with the Ulster County 4-H, and built a wonderful network of local volunteers of all ages,” Merrow said. “Imagine what we could do with funding.”
On a Monday afternoon, five adults and three children gather at the barn for a weekly “Meet the Rescues” session, when the public is invited to the property. Advance registration is required.
Merrow led the visitors to a stall and introduced Tamarind, a small dark-brown mare who had arrived several months earlier gaunt and frail, with infected eyes and intestinal worms. “She wanted to be hugged more than she wanted to eat,” said Merrow, scratching the mare behind the ears. “She would put the weight of her head in my arms and just exhale.” Despite having lost the use of one eye, Tamarind gained weight and is now healthy and cheerful.
Merrow finds horses at auctions, bailouts, and kill pens all over the country. There’s an industry of horse-dealing for discarded equines. Often passed from auction to auction in worsening condition, the remaining horses that aren’t rescued head to the slaughterhouses of Mexico and Canada. Currently, around 20,000 horses a year are slaughtered, down from 100,000 a decade ago.
For those that are saved by rescue organizations, life can be sweet.
“The gratitude you get from them is huge,” said Hurley resident Melanie Chletcos, a retired makeup artist who has been volunteering at the collective, feeding, grooming, and handling the horses to help them get used to friendly human contact. A group of people with special needs visits twice a week to groom the horses, and some of them have helped teach the newer volunteers.
Bruce Gluck is learning to care for the horses, which he finds relaxing, a balm for stress and anxiety. He brings skills from a career of setting up museum installations. He is working on facility repairs and improvements.
A group of volunteers recently cleaned out the long-disused hayloft, now a usable community space “closer to a Brooklyn loft than to a hayloft,” said Merrow. She plans to use the space to set up a lending library of horse books, show videos on working with horses, and conduct classes. All the programming is free, with donations suggested.
“Everyone has been coming with ideas: a summer program, an art program with an artist who specializes in drawing horses,” Merrow said. In the works are a public equine education series and a workshop for kids on how to take care of horses. “We might use the United States Pony Club curriculum, which explains how to do the basics: how to lead, how to blanket, how to look for problems in the field.”
Merrow’s cell phone rang. It was a call from her mother, Elise “Easy” Kelsey, who was visiting from Greenwich, Connecticut. Kelsey runs a stable where Merrow spent much of her youth learning to ride and train horses for wealthy clients. Kelsey was outside with Merrow’s twelve-year-old daughter at a paddock, a large grassy enclosure for two of the the group’s ponies.
“My mom says the mustang is walking funny,” Merrow told the group of guests. “Let’s go and take a look.”
The visitors and volunteers followed her out to the paddock, where Merrow ducked through a fence to greet the collective’s latest arrival. The five-year-old wild mustang had been captured in a Nevada roundup by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management but had failed to find a home at three consecutive adoption events. He was deemed unadoptable and passed from sale to auction until ending up lice-ridden in the hands of a kill buyer.
When the mustang had arrived nine days earlier, he was shaking with fear. Merrow started working with him at least twice a day in his quarantine pasture. “Now he’s eager to engage,” she said, buckling a halter on his head. She circled him on a lead rope as she studied the movement of his legs. An odd little misstep confirmed that they would need to investigate further.
In the next paddock, the group visited Levon, the only horse-sized equine currently in residence, a former cart horse that had suffered an injury to his haunch. “We think he was impaled in a carriage accident,” said Merrow. “I’ve been retraining him as a riding horse. I just think it’s amazing that, although we’re predators, horses allow us on their backs and are so interested in learning. They are prey animals, but they’re open and willing to trust.”
Merrow’s daughter haltered Sparrow, a brown-and-white Paint mare from Texas, and led her to the fence for the three little girls to greet. Sparrow sniffed their hands calmly. Back in the barn, the girls learned how to brush the pony’s flanks and neck.
In addition to volunteers, Merrow is looking for donors and sponsors to help support the expense of caring for the horses, which comes to approximately $400 per month for each horse. To learn more and arrange a visit to Pony Up Rescue Collective, or to send donations, see https://ponyuprescuecollective.com.
Other Dutchess County rescue outfits
13 Hands Equine Rescue in Clinton Corners, has about 150 horses, ponies, donkeys, and mules — and three zebras. The organization, founded in 2015, offers therapeutic programs for veterans and their families, mindfulness retreats, family retreats, Warriors Weekend, and corporate outings, as well as a volunteer program for people who want to get to know horses and help care for them. Founder and president Marylou Tortorello explained that horses are keenly aware of emotional energies and can sense what people are feeling, helping us be present in the moment and reminding us how to relax. https://13handsequine.org
Lucky Orphans Horse Rescue is a sanctuary in Dover Plains, established in 2008 by Deanna Mancuso, now executive director. Unlike other rescues, they do not offer their 47 horses for adoption. Mancuso said, “We are highly accredited by both horse and human organizations,” with certification to employ horses in therapeutic programs for people with disabilities, mental-health issues, and other challenges. They also welcome volunteers, many of whom find comfort in a relationship with horses after the loss of a husband or child, the breakup of a marriage, or the onset of an empty nest. All volunteers are screened and trained, to protect their safety and the well-being of the horses. https://www.luckyorphans.org
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