Working Together to Rescue a Baby Donkey, Ends Happily!

We were contacted this week to help rescue a baby donkey who was in dire need. He was one of 55 donkeys that were rounded up in Texas and sent to the Kaufman McBarron Slaughter Holding Station…and scheduled to ship to Mexico. He was actually pulled from the truck on the way to the slaughterhouse!

The little donkey was sent to quarantine where he was vetted, wormed and was otherwise healthy. He was scheduled to go to Washington, but he did very poorly during transport, and the rescue decided to pull him from the transport in California. This was when Hanaeleh was contacted.

The rescue was concerned that a longer transport trip would be too stressful, so they were looking for a local place to take this guy. We reached out to our rescue contacts and luckily Mustang-Spirit Rescue was able to take him. It took multiple rescues to make this happen, but by everyone working together, we were able to help save this little guy.

Here’s Mustang-Spirit’s update:

Thank you so much for sharing his story with us. We just couldn’t say no to him. He arrived at Mustang-Spirit this afternoon (Sunday) about 4 pm.  He was laying down and the hauler had to pick him up and steady him before she could off load. He is VERY weak!  It was originally thought he was a 10-
yr old adult; we have since found out he is maybe 4 months old.  Just a little baby, who has already done a 30 day quarantine….which makes him about 3 months old when he was pulled from the feed lot… no wonder he has had such a hard time with this separation.

He’s not out of the woods but 3 hours after he arrived he let out a few very loud and strong brays when he saw us, so I think his will to live is returning already.

Because he is so little and delicate right now we have him in a large stall and our donkey is in the stall directly next to him. Our mule is loose in the pasture which the stall opens up to (if the gate is opened).
They are both very attentive to him and he has enjoyed nuzzling them both.

We have changed his name to Norman, it just fit 🙂  Lora the original rescuer is being kept updated on how he is doing and if he makes it plans to come visit him later this year.