Whisper's Ranch

Besides simply making charitable donations you can now buy t-shirts from this website through Cafe press. 10% goes to them and the rest goes towards the ranch. Take a look and if any catch your eye scoop them up. Also, if you have any design ideas I'd love to hear them. Just leave a comment and I'll see what I can do.

Well everyone, I can officially accept donations towards the application fees for becoming a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation. Unfortunately 100% of the donations don't go to me, about 4-5% go to processing fee's.  This is still a great way to help out though. I'm aiming for $1000 but after the first $40 I'll be able to begin the application process. Please visit this link: www.gofundme.com/whispersrescue to donate, and share it with everyone you can think of.

Thank you in advance,

-Amanda Copus

It's hard to not be a little disappointed in the progress so far. I had a vision in my mind of waking up to find 20 or so people following the site. In reality there was just one. A friend from California has "liked" my link on Facebook and recommended that others do the same as well as shoot me an e-mail. 

Tad, thank you so much.

But on a happier note, there have been about ten hits, including one from Germany. Now that's kind of cool. I look forward to hearing from everyone who takes a look at this site and encourage you all to sign the guest book.

Please, please, please post a link to this website where ever you can and spread the word that a new kind of rescue is being born.

-Amanda Copus

P.S. Once again, if you have any experience with non-profit businesses or equine rescues I would LOVE to hear from you.

I've become conflicted as to whether this is a positive or a negative for horses. While it does mean that they hopefully won't rot in a pasture with no food or water for months, I still question if it is really the best we can do for them? Is there really not enough money to house and feed the horses of the united states? A study done in 2009 by the Unwanted Horse Correlation stated that with $50 form every horse owner $163 million would be raised. Is that enough? 

I don't have the answers,and right now it's hard to fathom the great extent of this issue. But if I narrow my view to just Montana alone, which is where the program would have to begin, I can start looking at some real numbers. There are 974,989 adults in Montana according to the census. If each donated $50 there would be $48,749,450 raised. I pay $3000 per year to house and feed my horse, including stall cleaning and facility use. Using these figures we could house and feed nearly 16250 horses. How many unwanted horses are there in Montana? Could there be more than 16 thousand unwanted horses in a state that still believes in the "cowboy lifestyle"?

I'm tempted to say no, after all the Montana Horse Sanctuary only lists five horses available for adoption, and there are no other listed equine rescues in the state. There are also no more than 900 "for sale" ads listed online for the state of Montana. So does that Make Montana the perfect place to start a large scale rescue? I believe so. It is a state with the land and hay resources necessary to feed large numbers of horses, and it is full of people who understand the joy a horse brings to a persons life.

It is my hope that people will read this, and that someone will decide they can help. If not, I will continue to do all I can until I’ve drawn enough attention that it will become impossible to ignore my pleas for assistance. 

-Amanda Copus