“I have nothing to fear, and here my story ends. My troubles are all over, and I am at home.”

For all who have read the classic children’s book, Black Beauty, this quote from the final lines of the book may sound familiar. We believe it’s also close to what Bentley, a 4-year-old Thoroughbred gelding, must have felt when he first arrived at Red Bucket in Chino Hills. Parked at the entrance to the ranch, barely holding himself up inside the filthy trailer he was delivered in, Bentley must have sensed the peace and hope the ranch exudes as he summoned the unbelievable strength and courage to stagger out of the trailer and give himself one more chance at living.

You see, to this day Bentley has been one of the worst cases of neglect and starvation in a horse many of us have ever witnessed. With a body score of 1, he was basically a skeleton, and the fact that he was still standing was mind-boggling. In fact, our veterinarian was in disbelief when Susan Peirce asked her to come out to evaluate a new horse with a body score of 1. She gently pointed out that a horse in that condition would not be able to stand. When she arrived at the ranch a little while later for the examination, she took one look at Bentley and welled up with tears. The only explanation she had for this horse standing upright was that he likely knew that lying down was not an option because he simply wouldn’t be able to get back up. So who knows how many months this poor creature had spent without ever resting his legs or getting a good night’s sleep.

It all started when a horse trainer familiar with Red Bucket called Susan Peirce, shortly after we had moved from Huntington Beach to Chino Hills, alerting her to four severely neglected and starving Thoroughbreds in dire need of rescue. Due to limited available stalls, Red Bucket found placement for three horses and took the most critical, whom we later named Bentley. After intake, we devised a treatment and feeding plan for him consisting of 9 small feedings at regular intervals throughout the day and night. Caring for any severely starved horse is very tricky. After four days on this regimen, we began to see a glimmer of light return to his eyes. Then, with tears in our eyes, we observed how Bentley, during a turnout in the big arena, finally gingerly bent his knees and let himself drop to the ground for a good roll in the sand. He shakily got back up afterward and shook off the dust, and that was the day Bentley reclaimed his life.

Around the time Bentley came to live with us, Jennifer Bailey was a fairly new volunteer at Red Bucket. An animal lover and rescuer her whole life, Jennifer wanted to help out animals in need, but she was certainly not in the market for a new horse of her own. In fact, at that time she had her own senior horse to love and care for. She was still learning her way around the ranch when she followed another volunteer groomer into Bentley’s stall one day. While the groomer was tending to Bentley, Jennifer just stood and started caressing his head. She recalls standing there for a full 15 minutes, simply petting and talking to him as he just melted into her hands. “Despite everything he had gone through, this horse seemed to have zero baggage and was just so grateful for someone taking the time to show him love and affection,” she says. “I fell in love with him right then and there!” Turns out that Bentley was in fact the biggest (literally) love bug she’d ever met, and as time went on, Jennifer couldn’t get him out of her head. She found herself spending slightly more time with him than any of the other horses and sneaking him a few extra treats every chance she had. Although it was still not certain if he would ever fully recover physically from the trauma and neglect in his past, Jennifer started entertaining the idea of maybe adding him to her family. She says, “Even if I could never ride him, I just wanted to be able to make him feel loved and safe and taken care of for the rest of his life.” It didn’t hurt that by then Bentley was quite smitten with Jennifer too! So, she and Susan got the ball rolling on the adoption process, and by December 2013 they had made it official: Bentley was well and going to his forever home in time for Christmas! About a month later Jennifer’s other horse crossed over the Rainbow Bridge (at the proud age of 39!). She was missing his presence terribly and looking to her new horse to help fill the void. In hindsight, it seems that somebody may have had a bigger plan for her and Bentley all along.

While he may be a cuddle bug and not your typical high-strung racehorse, Bentley is definitely a well-bred athlete in the prime of his life with a lot of energy to burn. Eventually Jennifer would like to focus on dressage with him, but for the time being, they log a lot of hours on basic training in the arena and exploring the trails around Chino Hills. Jennifer is truly impressed with his demeanor on the trails. “He’s very level-headed, relaxed and reliable,” she states. As for her experience with Red Bucket and the whole adoption process, Jennifer can’t gush enough. “It’s such a well-run organization, and I firmly believe in their mission! Because the goal is to find forever homes, they truly put so much effort into matching the horse with the adopter!” In fact, the first adoption worked out so well for Jennifer that she recently added another Red Bucket horse by the name of Maestro to her family, much to Bentley’s delight. (Watch for Maestro’s adoption story in a future newsletter.)

Bentley’s troubles really are all over, and he is at home. But we actually think that his and Jennifer’s story is only just beginning…