Photo credit Samantha Raffensberger
Before he was RPM (Rescued Performance Machine), he was on his way to an abattoir.
“He was an eight-year-old unbroke stud horse standing in a kill pen in Shippensburg,” Kelly Smith explains. Smith, who is Director of Omega Horse Rescue, says that RPM was clearly special. “Well, he is quite spectacular to meet in person, even though he is this rank breeding stud, you could just tell he was an extra special individual.”
Smith could not take her eyes off this beautiful dark bay horse. “Not only is he stunning to look at, but he has a big heart,” she says. Omega Horse Rescue (www.omegahorserescue.com) has been working on behalf of abandoned, abattoir-bound equines for more than 40 years. “We look for horses we think we can rehabilitate. When I saw him, I got to thinking about the Rescued to Stardom competition and the kill buyer actually donated this horse to us.”
The Rescued to Stardom competition was introduced in 2018 at Horse World Expo. The objective is to show the amazing versatility and talent of horses that are too often overlooked. The competition selects 10 equine rescues operating in the mid-Atlantic region, and each rescue selects a trainer. Jeff Michael from Hagerstown, MD was the trainer selected to get RPM ready for his close-up. The trainers have 90 days to train unbroke rescued horses to any discipline. Horses in the competition must be available for adoption at the event.
From Rescue to a New Life
And that is both the beginning and the end and the beginning of this story. Smith says that the job is not complete until the rescued horses are in homes where they’ll be safe, loved and protected.
RPM had lots of miles to travel before he was ready to train for his moment in the spotlight. “We got him in April and he had to go through a month of quarantine,” Smith explains. “Then we had to send him to a week of ground training so we could get him gelded.” She says that RPM finally went to New Bolton Center for gelding and freeze-branding. “Then he came home and spent the rest of the year standing in the field waiting for his hormones to leave. He still thought he was quite the boy.”
That investment in a horse that seemed to have no future paid off. “Jeff did a spectacular job with him,” Smith says. RPM won the competition at Horse World Expo in March, but his charisma was evident before he got to the big show.
“The lady who adopted RPM loved him right from the start,” Smith says. Dondi Dahlgaard, an emergency care veterinarian in Washington, D.C., also happens to work in equine rescue. She fell for RPM, and just knew he would be a perfect addition to her family. “I have some other horses that I rescued, and through the Santana Center (in Rhode Island) I had bailed three other horses—two of which were not broke to ride,” she says. “My horses were in training with Jeff; that’s how I met RPM and fell in love with him.”
Dahlgaard said that she observed something rare and profound as she watched Michael work with RPM. “The interesting part is what goes into the minds of these beautiful horses,” she says. “They’re so powerful and so capable of not doing what we want them to do.” But Michael established a level of trust, and a connection with RPM. They became a team.
“I just saw this beautiful black horse when I got to Michael’s farm, and fell in love with this horse that turned out to be a silly goof ball, which is right up my alley,” she says. “There are so many horses that go to slaughter,” she says, “and as a veterinarian I know there is no way to humanely slaughter a horse without drugs. It’s a horrible end for them.”
The Perfect Match
Smith is passionate about ensuring that the people who adopt horses from Omega are carefully matched with the skills and potentials of the horses. Mary Ann Messmer of Montgomery County, PA has adopted three horses from Omega: an 11 year-old Quarter Horse named Ally; a 12-hand pony named Lacey; and a mini-Shetland named Cindy Lou Who. “They really do try to give the adopters a good idea of what kind of things the horses would be good at,” Messmer says. “I can’t imagine anybody doing a better job of screening them and making sure you get the horse you can handle. I don’t know if she looks at their eye or their soul, but she knows.” She says that the horses need patience and training. “They need time. You never know what they’ve been through.” But she and her husband Tom are willing to invest the time and patience because the payoff is so great.
Messmer says she bought Lacey for her grandson, but she knows that kids can be fickle. So, she made sure that she got a horse that she could drive, in case the grandson’s interest drifted away from horses. She and her husband have been working with trainer Kail Palmer Miller of Elverson, PA and Lacey seems to have found her niche as a carriage pony.
A National Tragedy
The Humane Society of the United States estimates that more than 100,000 horses in America are sent to Canada or Mexico for slaughter every year. Smith (of Omega Horse Rescue) says that there are some horses that just cannot be adopted or retrained. But loading them onto trucks and sending them to foreign abattoirs is both cruel and unnecessary. “We have a humane euthanasia program,” she says, but that is only part of her group’s mission. “On average we adopt out about 40 horses a year, and we help the local animal control with SPCA cases and we occasionally take in surrenders.”
Omega’s mission has not changed in the 40 years they’ve been working on behalf of horses: educating horse owners on the full spectrum of responsibilities of horse care; promoting laws that ensure the humane treatment of horses; finding appropriate homes for unwanted, abused or neglected horses.
Smith says that horses like RPM rarely make it out of the slaughter pipeline. “At the kill pen the least likely horses to get help are studs.” They usually have never been handled, so they have significant behavior issues to overcome.
The dedication and effort it took to get RPM from rescue to stardom, though, prove that a second chance is always worth taking. “I got to know him during his 90 days of training and knew I would love him whether he won the show or not,” Dahlgaard says.