Episode 311 Lucy Butler Pt 3: Building Strong Safety Nets Under Horses

This is Part 3 of our conversation with Lucy Butler. With her fiancee Lucy founded the River Haven Sanctuary in Rhode Island. The sanctuary is home to about fifty animals - pigs, geese, ducks, chickens, goats, donkeys, and three horses. The Sanctuary gives forever homes to animals that were in crisis. Lucy and her fiancee Jeff have plans for developing the sanctuary into an educational center,.

In Part 1 Lucy introduced us to the sanctuaries three horses, Pearl, River, and Nieve. Initially, clicker training was used to help the horses settle and to fill in the huge gaps in their basic education. It’s been a healing process for them physically as well as emotionally.

In Part 2 we talked about the effect that lateral work is having on the horses. We began with Nieve and the remarkable changes lateral work is making in her emotional stability. Nieve is confirming that in horses physical balance is very much related to emotional well-being.

In Part 3 we continue on with the changes that Lucy is seeing in River, a standardbred who was raced for five years and was then a harness horse for the Amish, and in Pearl, a mini who came to River Haven Sanctuary via another horse rescue.

These “throw-away” horses show us how important training is to their overall well-being. Lucy is learning how to weave strong safety nets under her three very different horses.