Two Hartford women are barely meeting guidelines for the care of their horses.
By Gail Geraghty
Staff Writer

HARTFORD – To some Hartford horse lovers, the scene was heartbreaking.

Six horses, each standing in a 10-foot-by-12-foot box stall, a loose tarp their only shelter. With barely enough room to move.

Complaints of animal abuse began within days of when a mother and daughter brought their horses to Hartford Aug. 1 and began renting a home on a scenic hillside on Gurney Hill Road.

But Bentley Rathbun, state animal control officer, doesn’t see any abuse. The horses are well fed with grain and hay and given plenty of water, he said Friday. And, he added, the owners are building a barn.

If the barn isn’t up by the time winter hits, he said he may be forced to seize the horses.

“I’m giving them time to construct a barn,” Rathbun said. “I don’t like the conditions these horses are in,” but the women are just barely meeting the guidelines, he said.

They “are just on the edge of the law as far as those portable box stalls are concerned.” The law requires horse owners to provide, at a minimum, a three-sided shelter with a floor and roof to protect them from the elements.

Rathbun said the women are trying to start over after leaving a difficult situation where they used to live. They have a signed contractor for the barn, he said, but the work has been delayed by recent rains.

Town Clerk Monica Mailly, who owns a stable and boards horses, helped the women move into the home owned by John Charette. Charette is acquainted with the mother, a retired horsewoman who asked that her name not be used.

On Monday, the woman declined comment other than to say she hopes to have enough money to live on after paying to construct a barn on land she doesn’t own.

“I love horses,” she said.

Lianne Bedard, Hartford’s deputy town clerk and local animal control officer, turned the case over to Rathbun shortly after the women moved in. Bedard said the women were under the impression the landlord would build a shelter. They held out until it became clear the shelter was their responsibility, she said.

“This is not a case of deliberate abuse,” she said. Several of the horses are elderly, in their 30s or so, but “they’re well fed. They’re not starving.”

Some local horse owners have pointed out that, until recently, there was one horse near the road standing with nothing covering him, “standing in feces a foot high, in a holding pen the size of a box stall.”

At least six residents have been making regular calls to Rathbun to complain about the situation. Some have criticized the state for not taking action sooner.

Rathbun said Bim’s construction lent a helping hand by delivering sand and back fill last week. And the women have a signed contract to build the barn.

“Some people have been helping to work with them to get them through this situation,” he said.

Rathbun said he wished that more people would lend a helping hand instead of complaining.

ggeraghty@sunjournal.com

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