H.O.R.S.E. Rescue and Sanctuary

We have water!

You're probably saying to yourself "So what?" Everybody has water. For the past eight years, the only way to get water out to all the horses was to drag a 200 foot hose to the pastures. It didn't matter whether it was summer, fall, winter or spring. This ritual was replayed on a daily basis and most times it was twice a day. During the cold winter months, the hose would freeze many times meaning that water had to be transported in five gallon buckets on plastic sleds. The effort expended to keep the horses with fresh water was monumental and extremely tiring, especially since Chris and I are in our sixties. During the school year, we had the help of college student volunteers but when school was out for the summer, Christmas vacation, Thanksgiving or spring break, it meant that the task of watering the horses fell on our shoulders.

During the winter of 2006-2007 we were contacted by the parents of two young ladies who also happened to be Girl Scouts and were looking for a project whereby they could win their Silver Award. We responded that the one thing in the world that we desperately needed were frost free hydrants so we could water the horses year round. This simple request began an epic saga for these two young ladies. They began by calling plumbing suppliers hoping to get the equipment and supplies donated that would make our dream come true. The hydrants were to be installed in May but delay after delay kept happening but finally in September the work was scheduled to be completed. On Saturday September 9, 2007, Ed, Morgan and Laura Kiefhaber and Valerie Spaeth arrived and brought with them all the supplies they were able to get donated or purchased to complete this mammoth project. At approximately 2:30 PM the excavator was delivered and work began in earnest. Ed Kiefhaber, Laura's dad ran the excavator and four foot deep ditches were dug starting at the house. Of course, it started to rain so everything became thick gooey wet clay. We originally wanted to run the first hydrant between the existing barage(a one car garage being utilized as our barn)but with the rain we kept having cave-ins and it was determined to be too dangerous a location. We feared the barage might collapse as dirt supporting the building kept sliding into the trench. We decided to relocate the first hydrant 25-30 feet further west. Once Ed reached this location with the excavator, a hole was drilled through the house foundation which is two feet thick and one inch PVC water line was run to the existing water pressure tank which is fed by a drilled well. It took three days to dig and lay the water line and install six hydrants. I don't know the total length that was finally trenched but I would estimate close to 400 feet total. Monday afternoon, the last hydrant was installed and the water line was connected to the existing house water system and the last hydrant was pressurized and we had cold clear water after all these years.

We would like to thank these two young ladies, Laura Kiefhaber and Valerie Spaeth from Cadette Girl Scout Troop 2009, their parents and all of the companies who so graciously donated materials and the excavator to get us water. It was a big project and the girls worked tirelessly for months to get it accomplished. They are the only two girls in the troop that are true horse people and we congratulate them on getting this project accomplished.

Bobcat of Buffalo-use of the excavator(John Freundschuh)

Delta Sonic-$1000 donation to purchase supplies

Lowes of Orchard Park-Supplies

Tractor Supply of Springville-Hydrants

Below, we have included pictures of this wonderful project.