A pony named Stuart and a miniature horse named Bubbi at The Devoted Barn rescue on North Dixie Highway in Frenchtown Township were the unfortunate victims of haircuts sometime during the nights of April 9 and 10. An unidentified person entered the barn and cut off all the hair from their tails. Bubbi’s formerly lush mane and forelock were also severely trimmed.
“It’s going to be years for them to grow back,” said Melissa Borden, 41, who runs the barn. “They both had long tails that [dragged] on the ground. They were thick and beautiful.”
The Monroe County Sheriff’s Department’s road division is investigating the incident. The thief entered through a broken door. Beyond the hair removal, neither animal was injured, and nothing else was taken or damaged.
Sgt. Greg Berman of Monroe County Animal Control said the case is the first of its kind in his more than 20 years with the department, 10 of those as animal-control supervisor.
“I have not ever heard of it before,” he said. “I may not have heard about it or it may not have been reported.”
Ms. Borden said she’s known of a few cases in recent years, but she never imagined someone would target the rescue barn.
The hair could have been stolen to be used for tail extensions for show horses or to make jewelry, Sergeant Berman said.
Ms. Borden suspects someone wanted the hair for extensions, which she said are expensive with show season about to start. Of the 13 equines on the property, the thief specifically targeted the animals with white hair, which she said is more valuable.
The rescue’s only other white equine, a mare named Seven, was found loose in the barn. She had presumably been selected for a haircut too, but her tail is intact.
“She’s not very friendly,” Ms. Borden said, adding that the horse is mostly blind. “She definitely would have kicked if they tried to get behind her.”
Stuart and Bubbi will need help to combat painful fly bites as the weather warms.
“They need their tails to swish the flies away,” Ms. Borden said.
The thief didn’t leave enough hair to attach extensions to help them swat flies, so Ms. Borden said they will get fly sheets.
Just a week before the incident, the rescue installed a few security cameras because of intense public interest in one of the feral dogs that Ms. Borden specializes in rehabilitating. Shaggy is a brown Newfoundland mix from Grand Rapids, Mich., whom no one could catch for months.
The person must have known about the cameras and was able to avoid them, Ms. Borden said. The recording system also appears to have been tampered with because one part of the video shows Seven suddenly appearing in the barn.
The whole incident has Ms. Borden a bit on edge, she said. She doesn’t want to believe one of the rescue’s many volunteers could be responsible but can’t rule it out either.
“It’s frustrating because I don’t know,” she said. “It’s not a good feeling.”
The door has been fixed, and the rescue will spend $500 for more security equipment, including a keypad entry. The labor to install it and the monthly monitoring fee have been donated.
“In the summer, I like to leave the big barn doors open at night, but we can’t do that any more,” Ms. Borden said.
Anyone who may have information about the incident is asked to call the sheriff’s department at 734-240-7753. Donations to The Devoted Barn may be made online at thedevotedbarn.org/give. Checks made out to the rescue may be mailed to 6227 N. Dixie Hwy., Newport, MI 48166.
(Toledo Blade - April 20, 2015)
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