Article from The Observer.

Horses get a second chance
by Vanessa Moss

If Elsa Harper has one passion, it’s for rescuing horses from unfortunate circumstances. It’s a goal that drives the Wellesley woman, who is eager to share her experiences helping animals that would have otherwise met a different fate. To that end, she and partner Rob Munday last weekend opened the doors to the public at their Second Chance farm.“We are hoping to find families for some of the horses we have up for adoption, and [to help people] understand … why we do what we do, why horses are sent for slaughter, and how to humanely euthanize a horse,” said Harper.The couple has been rescuing, rehabilitating and finding homes for horses for the past four years, but in the last year, they have been working hard to expand their farm in Wellesley.“Rob and I have done so much work, with a lot of volunteers and a lot of helpers … and gotten to where we are now and we’re still working.”Although their efforts can be tiresome, Harper said the rewards make it all worthwhile.“When you take a horse and work with it, through love and respect, and you teach that horse, it’s amazing what that horse will give back to you.”Second Chance takes in horses from a variety of backgrounds, including those that have been treated badly and others whose owners can no longer care for them.“People sometimes have no other option than to call up the auction, [so] instead, they can call me,” Harper said.The auction she referred to is the Ontario Livestock Exchange that holds a horse auction every Tuesday in St. Jacobs.Harper said that among the horse buyers, there are “meat men,” who purchase the animals for slaughter.“That’s what people don’t understand – they’re slaughtered for human consumption.”Harper’s first experience with the horsemeat market is actually what prompted her to start saving horses.She found a black stallion she liked at the auction, learned that he was going to be shipped for meat, and immediately had to have him. She bought him and named him Spirit.Since then, Harper has been dedicating her life to saving others like Spirit. Currently, her farm is full, but don’t ask Harper how many horses she has.“I don’t count them. They’re just my kids. I call them my children.”One of these special “kids” is Cherries “Brandy” Jubilee, Elsa’s second rescue.His adopted owner, Kym Witkowski, can’t say enough about Harper and what she does for the horses.“Elsa just loves the horses. You can see it: just how she interacts with them [and] how they interact with her – she can go up to any of these horses and all of them just love her.”Of course, this trust between Harper and horse takes time and effort.When Brandy first came to the farm, he kicked her so hard he broke her ribs and then proceeded to buck Munday out of the saddle.Over time, however, and with natural horsemanship, Brandy became the docile horse he is now, and Witkowski couldn’t bear to let him go.“I adopted him because I was afraid somebody else would take him,” she said.Seeing Brandy and Witkowski together in the field, it is clear that he is comfortable with his new owner.“I like the fact that they rescue a horse and spend time rehabilitating [and] getting the horse to trust people and then adopting them,” said Witkowski. “It’s not about money here. It’s about the care and the love of the horse.”These success stories are what Harper wanted to share with the open house visitors at the farm.“People misconstrue ‘rescue farm,’” she said. They often think that these horses will be aggressive, but they’re not.Harper explained that her horses come to the farm “frightened of the world,” so it takes time to get them to trust her, but once they do, they become extremely affectionate.“You go into any pasture and they’ll all come over to greet you.”Witkowski praised Harper for staying in touch with the horses that are adopted out to new homes.“The horse is never gone from the farm,” she said. “They may be [physically] gone from the farm, but they’re not gone from Elsa.”