Tierra Madre Horse & Human Sanctuary

Tierra Madre Horse & Human Sanctuary Healing horses to heal humans
http://ranchotierramadre.org http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c152_tFRW4I&feature=related

OUR FACILITIES
We’re located in an unincorporated part of Maricopa County, Arizona, situated between Phoenix and Cave Creek .

Monday evening…….I know I post a lot of pics of my bunny buddies but I love all the little guys.
08/05/2025

Monday evening…….

I know I post a lot of pics of my bunny buddies but I love all the little guys.

Sunday evening moon…….
08/04/2025

Sunday evening moon…….

Looks like somebody’s waiting for a ride……
08/04/2025

Looks like somebody’s waiting for a ride……

Sunday, 5:30PM……..“Z-z-z-z-z…..” ~ Mystery
08/04/2025

Sunday, 5:30PM……..

“Z-z-z-z-z…..” ~ Mystery

Truth cannot be vanquished. As the sun rises & sets, as storms bring wind & rain, as the birds sing from the trees & wol...
08/03/2025

Truth cannot be vanquished. As the sun rises & sets, as storms bring wind & rain, as the birds sing from the trees & wolves howl in the nighttime distance so, too, must we stand straight & tall & speak the truth. Truth cannot be hidden nor muddied by fabrications, no matter how loudly they are spoken, for those falsehoods will one day crumble into dust & be swept away by the freshening gusts of time. And truth will still stand strong.

To follow blindly is to surrender one’s spirit. Each of us is endowed with a single wondrous spirit that can only be des...
08/02/2025

To follow blindly is to surrender one’s spirit. Each of us is endowed with a single wondrous spirit that can only be described as a miracle. Given that we only walk upon this path once, to allow one’s spirit to be conscripted by others is nothing short of an insult to the Great Power that brought us to this land that we call earth.

Friday…….We had such a FUN THING happen this morning!Just as I drove in from a trip to the hardware, Mindy came up to me...
08/01/2025

Friday…….

We had such a FUN THING happen this morning!

Just as I drove in from a trip to the hardware, Mindy came up to me & told me that all eight of the fans along the shed row, as well as Guess’ AC unit & the light in the feed room had stopped working & the ground fault current interrupter that they were all attached to had tripped off. I disconnected the electric cord that ran all that stuff & reset the GFI. The light in the feed room now worked.

Uh-oh – a short.

Somewhere. Somewhere between the Iron Man’s house & Hollywood’s – the entire length of the shed row

Me: “We’ll have to check all the fans & Guess’ AC thing to see where the short is.” A big-ass time-consuming & energy-expending job.

Mindy: “Okay, where should we start?”

Because I’ve had so many evaporative coolers, aka swamp coolers, aka ‘AC units’, I figured that was the place we should start. I had Mindy mind the electrical plug in the breezeway. I turned off the AC – all three controls – the pump, the fan & the little thing that swings the air flow from side to side. “Okay – plug it in”, I shouted. She plugged it in. All the fans worked.

I turned on the pump. It worked & all the fans were still working & it didn’t blow the GFI. Wasn’t the pump, then. Next, I turned on the unit’s fan. Everything went off – the whole shootin’ match. Aha! That’s it! The AC unit’s fan shorted out. “Okay”, I yelled again. “Plug it back in.” She did & all the fans, etc. worked again.

The good news: We’d found the short.

The bad news: We’d need a new AC unit because I don’t know enough about that s**t to be able to screw around, taking everything apart, trying to find the short & putting everything back together again. And then, after all that, hoping the goddam thing would work. A new unit was the only answer.

I jumped into the truck & headed for the Home Depot – about a 15-minute trip if I cruised at 60 instead of the speed limit of 45. Which I did.

Yeah – they had one. I did the financial thing & hoisted the unit into the truck. Another 15-minute trip home again.

Fortunately, Iron John was here & he & Mindy & I emptied the old one, wrestled it out of the way, got the new one out of the box & placed on the pallet where it belonged, gingerly hooked the water hose to it, allowed the little reservoir holding the pump to fill &, then, the time of reckoning was upon us.

I climbed up Guess’ fence, plugged it into the socket up under the roof, looked down at John & said, “Okay – turn it on.”

And it worked! All three switches worked!

It worked & the GFI didn’t blow!

We were back in business!

I gotta say, the three of us got the whole damned thing changed out & working in nothing short of record time. We worked like a finely-tuned orchestra.

Fortunately, while we were doing that, Susan & the other volunteers not only got all the regular chores done, but did a bang-up job renovating & revitalizing the flooring in Tally’s large house. It needed it something fierce.

So, as you can see by the photo I just took, Guess is now partaking of her lunch in air-cooled splendor.

Oh, yeah – the other bad news……

The new unit set me back $652.42, which I needed like a head in my hole. That, added on to Guess’ dental work bill, this week, is enough to choke a…….well, I don’t even wanna say it.

Are we having fun yet?

Thursday, 8PM -Under western skies…….
08/01/2025

Thursday, 8PM -

Under western skies…….

Thursday, July 31 -ANOTHER GUESS UPDATE (SORT OF)……..Well, as you can see in the photos, our girl is back to loving her ...
07/31/2025

Thursday, July 31 -

ANOTHER GUESS UPDATE (SORT OF)……..

Well, as you can see in the photos, our girl is back to loving her food. Note: I just took those pics of her chowing down on her lunch.

And, although she never displayed any sense of pain before those teeth were extracted, I’ll just bet that her mouth did hurt. Had to, right? You saw the size of those bulbous growths on the roots of her teeth in the earlier photos. Jee-zus. But, being the tough-assed girl that she is, she never let on to us. Amazing.

Okay.

Remember a couple of weeks ago when we asked for donations to help offset Jazzbo’s bills for his laminitis treatment & his final costs? And that y’all had come through so well that we actually hit our goal? And I posted that & asked everybody to stop sending money because we’d undoubtedly need it in the near future.

Well, I think that ‘near future’ is now.

See, Guess’ invoice came today &, natch, I paid it right away. The total? $1617.11. I’ve posted the invoice so you can see exactly how the amount was arrived at.

So I’m asking you, that if you feel you can, you can help us to offset some or all of our girl’s bill.

Remember, you can go to our website – ranchotierramadre.org – click on the ‘Donate’ button & that’ll take you to PayPal. Or, Venmo works, too. We’re tierramadre2006. Checks will always be more than welcome.

I know that it’s only been a couple of weeks & many of you are tapped dry after making such a tremendous difference in the Jazzbo affair. But you may have hit the lottery or something & have a few spare bucks lying around. If you do – well, you know.

Thanks for following along on Guess’ journey to a pain-free mouth. She sends her thanks & her love. I do, too.

Friday morning GUESS Update……As you may have seen, Dr. K was out yesterday to extract a few of Guess’ diseased teeth. Th...
07/31/2025

Friday morning GUESS Update……

As you may have seen, Dr. K was out yesterday to extract a few of Guess’ diseased teeth. The disease: Equine Odontoclastic Tooth Resorption & Hypercementosis (EOTRH). I explained the disease in yesterday’s post.

At first, Guess was going to lose six incisors – two on the top & four on the bottom.

In the attached radiographs, you can see how bulbous her teeth’s roots had become. The top rad is of her upper jaw & the bottom two pics are of her lower.

This bears a little explanation.

The middle pic is of Guess’ lower mandible prior to Doc removing two teeth (there are 6 teeth in all). The bottom shot is of the same lower mandible after two teeth were removed. At that point, Doc & I conferred. Although the two teeth on the right of the pic are somewhat diseased, the question was - did they get pulled then or do we wait? As you can see, they don’t appear to be too bad at this point. Either choice was acceptable.

I opted to wait - & Doc didn’t disagree. For one thing, it could be a long, long time before they get too bad. For another, those teeth’s disease appears to be in the early stages & wouldn’t be causing Guess any pain. So we wait – months? years? Thrown into all this is the fact that my angel is in her late 20s & who knows? You know what I mean?

Guess got back into her stall around one o’clock. Around two – after she’d woken up from the sedation – I tossed her a little food. No go. Alright, it’s early. Four o’clock: still not interested. Six o’clock: still not interested. I called Doc who told me not to worry – some horses don’t eat for quite a while after extractions. But, natch, I was worried.

While I was doing my evening rounds – around 6:30 – I was down by the Iron Man & Slayer & called Abel to tell him that, in the morning, Guess might still have a lot of hay in her feeder. If that was the case, don’t give her any more for breakfast. I was still pretty concerned.

As I was pushing the cart back from that area, I looked in Guess’ direction.

She had her head in the feeder! She was chowing down!

I walked over to her. Guess “Hey, Jimmy – you got any treats?” Me: “Hell, yes, I do, Angel – here!” She took a couple & went right back to eating. When I finished the chores around 7, her head was still buried in her feeder. And, this morning, all her hay was gone & she was trying to yank her breakfast flake out of Abel’s hands while he was feeding her. YAY!

We have to give her Equissul (an antibiotic) twice a day for a week &, today, some bute (for discomfort) a couple of times.

You know that I love each & every horse on this ranch dearly, but Guess? I’ve known & loved her ever since before there even was a Tierra Madre. So I’m thrilled that things are working out. And I’m thrilled that any discomfort those diseased teeth may have given her is now a thing of the past.

ROCK ON, ANGEL!

Anyway, that’s my story & I’m stickin’ to it.

Thanks for reading.

Friday, 5AM -Still Life: ‘Panther In Window’
07/31/2025

Friday, 5AM -

Still Life: ‘Panther In Window’

A hummingbird, watching the action as Guess gets some of her teeth extracted today…..
07/30/2025

A hummingbird, watching the action as Guess gets some of her teeth extracted today…..

Address

27115 N 45th Street
Cave Creek, AZ
85331

Opening Hours

Monday 7:30am - 11am
Tuesday 7:30am - 11am
Wednesday 7:30am - 11am
Thursday 7:30am - 11am
Friday 7:30am - 11am
Saturday 7:30am - 11am
Sunday 7:30am - 11am

Telephone

+14807471070

Website

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Our Story

Founded by Jim Gath in 2005, Tierra Madre Horse & Human Sanctuary, 501 (c)(3) provides a compassionate facility for the full circle of healing between horses and humans. The magnificent herd of horses who have graced our presence, many coming from lives of abuse and misfortune, are honored, cared for and brought back to health and happiness they may have never known. The horses in return are the primary healers and facilitators for providing a non-judgmental space for children and adults to realize more productive and fulfilled lives. Through our specialized programs, we empower individuals to gain a sense of accomplishment and achievement by working with the horses in a variety of non-mounted activities. The support from our wide-ranging community and dedicated sponsors allows us to help various groups of differently abled, including autism spectrum individuals, to realize the life changing gifts we all receive through working with our equine partners.

Our mission is to provide a safe haven for the horses and people who enter the gates of Tierra Madre Horse & Human Sanctuary. Through the support of our community and generous donations from our sponsors, we can offer positive, life changing programs for children and adults including those with developmental challenges including autism spectrum. We are committed to supporting the full circle of healing from horses to humans.

Healing ~ Hope ~ Happiness