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Wednesday, August 19, 2020 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Fire breaks
out on
Green
Ridge
Horse finds solace at refuge
By Jodi Schneider
Correspondent
When Sisters resident
Mona Delfino, animal com-
municator and energy healer,
found out there was a horse
at 3 Sisters Equine Refuge
in Bend who was recently
rescued from near death,
she seized the opportunity to
help.
Like Robert Redford
in the film <The Horse
Whisperer,= Delfino was
born with a remarkable gift
to communicate with animals
and help them heal.
Delfino said she became
aware of her special abilities
at the age of five when she
knew what her dog Shadow
was thinking and feeling,
which saved him from being
euthanized.
This awareness sent
Delfino on a spiritual journey
toward recognizing her intui-
tive abilities. Delfino prac-
tices a form of healing based
in reading the energy of a
person9s or animal9s body, or
<Spiritual Immune System.=
She has a background in
nursing, and neurology.
The horse, now named
Sammy, was picked up a
few weeks ago in an open
rocky area in Lane County
by Cyndi Davis, board chair
and one of the founders of 3
Sisters Equine Refuge.
The refuge offers a tempo-
rary haven to horses at-risk of
slaughter, abuse, and neglect.
Davis, her husband, and vol-
unteers rehabilitate, retrain
and re-home the horses.
<We received a text on
Sunday evening June 28 from
one of our volunteers with
photos of a horse that some-
one found while out hiking,=
Davis said. <We knew then
that this was an emergency
situation.
<The following day Kira
(the woman who found him)
drove as we followed with a
horse trailer. We had to hike
up a steep area where she had
seen the horse the day before.
He was nowhere to be seen.
Then, Michele, our board
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vice president, spotted a tiny
brown dot to the north. Kira
and Michele headed towards
the brown dot.
<As they moved towards
the horse in the distance, the
horse moved toward them.
The horse amazingly fol-
lowed them, no halter, noth-
ing. He seemed to know to do
that.=
Davis said, <I9ve wel-
comed two other starvation
cases into the rescue, but
neither were as emaciated
as Sammy. He literally had
days left but was remarkably
strong!
<Your instincts are to
throw food at a horse that
looks like Sammy, but that is
the worst thing you can do.
It can cause 8refeeding syn-
drome,9 and kill the horse in
that condition. You start slow
and give him small amounts
of food (alfalfa hay) every
few hours around the clock to
re-start their gut.=
Davis also found out
through the veterinarian that
Sammy is 70 percent blind
and has no teeth, indicating
he is likely a senior, and he
has a heart murmur, possibly
from the starvation.
Davis said, <We are
always curious about what
our rescued animals are
thinking and or needing to
say. It helps us as we treat
them. Mona has been out
before, so when we heard she
was on her way, we were all
in!=
Delfino knew Davis for a
year before Sammy came to
the refuge.
Delfino said, <I met Cyndi
and her husband through my
friend Lori Drew, who volun-
teers at the 3 Sisters Equine
Refuge. We became good
friends and they knew I am a
healer. Whenever they have
issues with a horse, they call
and ask me to do some heal-
ing work. I read the energy of
the horse and I get the infor-
mation of the emotion that9s
occurring within the horse.=
Delfino told The
Nugget that animals
have always gravi-
tated toward her.
<My family
owned a buckskin
when I was in grade
school and I9ve had
Firefighters around
a love for horses
Central Oregon spent a busy
and riding since
afternoon and night respond-
then,= she said.
ing to 39 reports of new fires
When Delfino
Sunday after a lightning
went out to their
PHOTO BY JODI SCHNEIDER
storm moved through the
refuge to meet him,
Mona Delfino is helping a rescued horse heal.
area. While seven of these
Davis and her hus-
being one of those important
turned out to be false alarms,
band were out for a while.
28 were quickly caught and
<It was just me and things. Of course, in small
contained.
Sammy, the perfect time to amounts and we did steam
Four fires developed into
work with him,= Delfino and shred them for him. She
incidents.
said. <They had only had also helped him release any
Incident #684, the Green
him a week when I got there. anger he had from being left
Ridge Fire, is burning
The work that I did was to to die a slow painful death.=
She said, <Sammy is one
approximately two miles
read the energy of his mus-
northeast of Camp Sherman.
cle memory. This horse did of the most trusting, loving
The fire was estimated late on
not want to remember what creatures I have ever met and
Monday morning at 20 acres
happened to him in his past. honestly it9s shocking that
and was showing some active
He put up a resistance. And he9s still here.=
Delfino offers individual
fire behavior. Additional
that9s how he stayed alive in
20-person hand crews, heli-
the desert. I ran the energy healing sessions that are
copters and water tenders
through his pressure points done over Skype, phone, and
were ordered Monday to help
to see what else was going sometimes in person. She
contain the incident.
on with him. As I was work- also holds spiritual retreats.
Updates on the Green
ing on him, his stomach was For more information visit
Ridge Fire may be found at
very hard. I kept coming back www.sacredreconnections.
www.nuggetnews.com.
to that area, that9s where he com.
needed some help. This horse
could not decipher if he was
in pain or hungry. He didn9t
know the difference. So, the
third time I went down by his
stomach within 45 minutes it
was finally soft. He told me
he missed carrots. He can9t
chew with his teeth because
his teeth went bad because of
starving, so I asked Cyndi to
steam the carrots for him.
<I found that Sammy is
very special with a wise soul.
Horses are intuitive about
things, and he knew Cyndi
was coming to rescue him. He
was left in the desert all alone,
but it was his spirit that kept
him alive 4 he had hope.=
Davis explained that
Mona9s ability to commu-
nicate with the horse helped
the refuge to know what he
needed.
HOURS: WED.-SAT., 10 A.M.- 4 P.M.
Davis added, <Carrots
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