KUNA, Idaho (CBS2 News) — There are approximately 200,000 unwanted horses annually in the United States, according to the National Library of Medicine. It can be challenging to rehome and rescue so many horses, but Stardust Rescue in Kuna is trying to make as much of an impact as possible.
"I feel like any horses that come through here, I was meant to be in their life," said Founder of Stardust Rescue,Lucinda Angle. "I will either find them the best home or they will be with me the rest of their life. The universe brought us all together for a reason."
Angle started Stardust Rescue by herself and dedicates most of her time to helping horses in need. Much of what she does is paid out of pocket, otherwise she relies on the community for help.
"My daughter works several jobs just to help fund what we need to get done," said Stardust Rescue volunteer, Anna Barnes. "She is a single mom with two wonderful kids. She works seven days a week, sometimes I don't see her for days. She makes sure that every single one of these horses are well taken care of, even if she has to give up buying herself shoes to make sure that they have what they need."
Those needs look different for every horse. For example, one rescue horse named Aries was attacked by a cougar, lost his family to the horse meat industry and was later rescued from a hoarding situation.
"He is actually covered in scars from that cougar attack. He even has puncture scars on the side of his neck from the bite," said Angle. "He kind of had a rough go, his mom hit a meat truck. We did manage to network out 150 horses off of that lot to get them homed."
While slaughterhouses are illegal in the United States, auction houses are not and do exist in Idaho. Lucinda says people known as 'kill buyers' will attend those auctions and then ship the horses off to other countries where it is legal to butcher them for meat.
"It doesn't matter if they're severely emaciated or if they're pregnant because when it comes down to it, by the time they ship them off to Mexico or Canada, it's priced per pound," said Lucinda. "When they're at auction houses, sometimes they don't give them adequate water. A lot of the horses will wind up trampled, they get injured and sometimes they die. It's really unfortunate and it breaks my heart to know that this happens. I've actually rescued quite a few horses from kill pens myself."
Lucinda says that the uncomfortable reality of auction houses is becoming more known, but that poor regulation keeps many of the perpetrators from being charged.
"Some of them are like, 'Well, it was unbeknownst to me, we're just selling these horses' and others, they're like 'Oh, yeah, we have contracts where they tell us how many horses they need for a meat truck and this is what we're contracted to ship out with them,'" said Lucinda. "It's disastrous, they deserve to be treated better."
Lucinda has dedicated her life to saving as many horses as she can. Although, she says, it's the horses that have saved her.
"I was going through a lot of family issues, it was a really dark place. I took that spiral where some people are just like, 'I can't do this anymore, I'd be better off not here,'" said Lucinda. "I think she (the horse) knew that I needed her just as much as she needed me. She didn't want to be in the situation she was in and I needed something to break me out of my funk, and that's why the rescue was named after her because she saved me as much as I saved her. I wanted to pass it along and save other animals who also need that help."
Lucinda says help goes a long way for each horse in need.
"I've seen a huge change in their personalities, and being able to be turned out every day and be a horse is not only fantastic for their mental health but also for their physical condition," said Lucinda. "They're getting to eat all day which is how horses are supposed to be and socialize and be happy."
Lucinda believes every horse deserves to be happy, regardless of their medical condition, which is why she serves as Idaho's state ambassador for blind horses.
"The injections for (this horse's) eyes are about $1,250 and then his medications kind of vary," said Lucinda. "We pay mostly through donations, if we do manage to get donations, otherwise I've been paying everything out of pocket."
If you'd like to donate to Stardust Rescue, click here.
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