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OUR YEAR END GIFT APPEAL LETTER!
YOUR YEAR END GIFT TODAY! THANK YOU!!
Contained in this letter is the scope of what we do and much too much to have to read in one sitting! However we want you to know that your support has helped create the amazing mission this has become!
This year end we have one goal and that is to raise funds that we can to put towards the purchase of a farm that will change the lives of the horses that we care for.
By giving them a farm of their own, designed for and with their help we share our respect and gratitude and at Blue Star we say it is time for that!
#loveyourequinefriends
Dear Friends,
This past month has been a record breaker for fundraising at Blue Star. At the beginning of the month we reached out for support to fund the purchase of a forever farm, a home for the horses that live at Blue Star. We searched and searched and searched some more and finally found what we feel is truly a perfect home for the horses we care for.
The price of this special New England Heritage Farm is $370,000 and we have successfully secured half of that with some large and all sized donations from loving supporters who also want to see the horses on a farm they can live out their lives on, heal on and grow up on, in order to carry forward an important connection we have with our working horse culture, locally, nationally and globally.
We have proven that this kind of sanctuary is wanted and needed to help with the unwanted horse population here in New England and America. We provide sensible retirement and sanctuary for those that need it. Taking good care of the working horse breeds while speaking honestly about their well being.
The horses that come to Blue Star have retired from stables or homes where they cannot be kept in retirement or those that have special needs or need specialized care of their own.
It is helpful for any community to have the horses cared for properly on a farm designed for their needs.
Carriage horses, lesson horses, therapeutic horses and police horse barns and many more run into not having proper facility for those that need specialized or extra required care when they are disabled or elderly or hard to place.
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We like to call Blue Star, Bud's Dream
as we created the farm for him in his need first. After being diagnosed with idiopathic epilepsy he lived out his life with us until he crossed over loved and respected by all that knew him and there were thousands! |
At
Blue Star we seek to create solutions by working
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Blind Retired Adrionack Pack Horse,
Sarge!
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We know there is a universal interest in making better choices for our horses in need and it starts like this, by working together. We enjoy many partnerships with other groups that also are doing their part to soften our impact on our Mother Earth and ease the tension we experience in our overly mechanized culture WITH the help of a rhythmic and living reminder of an empowered past with our noble equine partners that helped build the communities we have today.
We are there for the many farmers who are losing their farms, elder teamsters who have not given up their horse powered way of life but are now too old to carry it on. We are here for their horses and their piece of mind that they old friends will be loved and cared for.
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Kelly and Daisy helping bring beloved local horseman Percy Fuller to his final resting place in 2011. Percy's Morgan mares Izora and Katie retired at Blue Star after his death for nearly 4yrs before passing over, both girls passed in their 30's, loved and respected up until the very end.
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We are here for the poor horses who through no fault of their own lose everything they know, including friends and siblings or mothers and find themselves at auctions being sold for the value of their meat.
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(they all share the same father) were all bred to be meat for a Japanese Co. with a contract for Clydesdale weanlings. Blue has better things to do besides be meat for a dinner.
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Any suffering is too much suffering and we want to be a part of lessening that burden whenever possible. With great love and respect we created this mission and today it stands strong and ready to take the next step towards security and organizational and foundational support that will guarantee its availability for future generations to come. We cannot acquire or seek significant grants without owning land or having a perpetual lease that guarantees money donated won't be wasted if things don't work out.
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Tommy and
Piper sharing the road at Silver Bell Farm during the holidays!
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*** In the nearly nine yrs of operating with the collective help of countless individuals we have acquired harness and equipment for our working horses, these are all valuable assets to our work on and off the farm.
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Big Ben, 18hh, 7yr Shire growing up and working in a community that loves him.
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***W
e designed a pasture/compost management system
with the help of the MDAR, MEPA and Dr. Hashemi of the University of Massachusetts. Atakan Kadi, Adobe engineer and long time volunteer at Blue Star along with the late Paul Moshimer developed aerated composting systems for processing our manure on a large scale.
*** We have won at horse shows as well as participated in countless parades, ceremonies, wagon rides, carriage rides, historical re-enactments and even a couple of movie sets. We have been featured in Yankee Magazine
and our
Mario
made the cover of
Modern Farmer
, several other horses at Blue Star were featured in that article too!
*** We have taught at the University of Massachusetts Stockbridge Ag School for nearly 7yrs. Our class is beginner level driving for farming and commercial work these classes are offered through the Equine Science Dept at UMass and the Stockbridge School of Agriculture.
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| Stockbridge Alum Mithra Kulatunga and our farrier Tony Diemand taking care of Mario! |
*** We have graduated over a hundred young beginner level drivers and many have carried on driving horses on farms or in their own enterprises that they have created with their horses. There are many working and living with adopted Blue Star horses taking good care of the land they care for skills they began learning here with us.
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We have provided internships for tending the farm garden we managed here for all 8+ years and also internships in equine husbandry and care. The experience one can get here on the farm in the day to day is very valuable to those learning about the health and well being of working horses with diet, proper fitting harness and equipment, basic health care and handling. With horses like Tex and his lymphedema and little NYC carriage horse Finbar who has never been sick in all his 35yrs and everything in between you are going to get a lot of good experience in what it means to delve into what the working horse world really takes for commitment!
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Emma taking care of Neno and Shift on first meeting.
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*** Not many horse farms open their doors and so generously share everything they can to help you achieve your dream of learning and living with working horses like Blue Star does and we want to carry on doing it in a way that continues to support the farm and the students (of all ages and walks of life) that come to learn.
We have these opportunities offered recently too:
*** Partnerships with Sci-Tech Vocational School students in Springfield with Coach Stefan Davis, founder of ifoundlight.com
a program that encourages and supports inner city, at risk children to rise up and create the lives they deserve to live. We know the horses can help with that and we plan on introducing a modified curriculum in the coming spring semester.
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| Stefan Davis meeting the boys and vice versa, he told them right then that he would be coming back for their help and that he would not forget them! He didn't and now the boys have helped Stefan multiple times and will continue to do so! |
*** Continued work with the Veteran Soldiers Home and Hospitals in Holyoke and Florence and with the group Honor and Remember friends and their Board Members along with Brian Miller and Kenny Melanson who are always searching for opportunities that never leave our Veterans or the Horses behind!
*** Partnership with local Silver Bell Farm. Owner Mike Ward is looking to offer our working horses opportunities for more full time work on his tree farm with carriage and wagon, sleigh and private party rides. This kind of work helps farms and the working horses by reenlivening our community with natural and wholesome choices for fun and connecting with old New England farmland!
*** Continuing on our successful internship programs with the five college area students interested in learning what a farm like ours can offer.
There is much more too but none of it is possible without a farm of our own, allowing us to qualify for endowments and grants that better suit the full potential of our mission.
Please consider supporting this important work by making a donation towards our purchase of the farm, in the next two days we can hope that more will join us that haven't done so already!
We need more people talking honestly about the risks to a horses well being when they lose their homes or their jobs. We need to share ways of how we might honor and respect horses in such a way as to honor and respect our own kind and our shared history and ancestors into the future. We can only do that by participating in actually caring for them.
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| 148 West St New Salem, Ma. Our hope is to buy this property soon! Working on the extension for that this coming week! |
From all
of us at Blue Star!
We are committed to keeping alive a dream inspired by a working horse in need! Blue Star is ready to take it's place among the many other efforts going on everywhere to be the difference we want to see for the horses we love so much, America's working horses and our own communities and families who want to connect with them....again!
BEFORE YOU GO! NOW IS THE TIME TO MAKE IT COUNT THE MOST FOR OUR YEAR END AND YOURS TOO!
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