Twilight meets Bella in saga of sadness and hope
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The saddest of scenarios became one of hope and happiness for the owner of Blue Ridge Farms Monique Richter, when she was left searching for a mother for her new foal after the filly’s surrogate mare tragically colicked post foaling.
Pre-arranged plans to take the mare to the Palm Beach Equine Clinic [PBEC] in Wellington, Florida for the birth were thwarted. The foal, whose mother is Monique’s top dressage horse Blue Ridge A Acapella – ridden by Sven Steffens-Smienk – decided to come 10 days early. Twilight Dream – as the newborn was named – was delivered healthy at Monique’s farm in Jupiter, Florida. “She stood up within less than five minutes. She was very tall, like a giraffe, and very strong,” said Monique. “Tara [the mare] was doing good.”
Six days later events took a tragic turn. Tara was showing signs of colic and the new mother was shipped to PBEC. “They acted right away,” said Monique, who had become closely attached to the surrogate mare. “I was going to do colic surgery – I was going to do anything it took to save her life.”
The prognosis sadly proved hopeless. “Ultrasound of the abdomen and an abdominocentesis (belly tap) confirmed my suspicions and the worst,” said reproduction specialist Dr Justin McNaughten, once Tara had been examined upon arrival at PBEC. “The mare had ruptured her large colon on farm or in transit which carries a grave prognosis despite heroic efforts; the bacteria and ingesta that contaminated her abdomen would lead to peritonitis.”
Twilight with Tara before tragedy struck the mother and foal.
After consultation with Monique and the mare’s owners Peterson Smith Equine Hospital, the decision was made to humanely euthanize the mare.”
“She was such a wonderful, stoic mother—Tara was the best surrogate I could have asked for. There were no signs she was sick until it was too late. It was scary for a six-day-old foal, but we let Tara go peacefully,” Monique said. “It was heartbreaking. That was the only time I ever heard the baby cry out for her mom—and Tara called back. It was a gut-wrenching moment. I stayed by her side and promised her I would take care of her baby.”
At that point, the search began for another surrogate mother. Social media was engaged and offers came from as far as North Carolina. But Monique was not about to put Twilight through the trauma of travel. “There was no way I was going to send her that far away after all the trauma of losing Tara, the surrogate I had brought down from Peterson Smith eight months earlier,” Monique said. “I had grown very attached to Tara and even wanted to adopt her, but the clinic wasn’t open to that.”
With her mother gone, Twilight went into a decline and was reluctant to feed. “We tried everything to comfort Twilight,” Monique said. “We gave her stuffed animals and even rubbed a towel with Tara’s scent on it, tying it around a teddy bear. She would nuzzle it and drink her milk.” Slowly the foal began to pick up and several days later – a new mother arrived.
The stuffed toys, with her surrogate mother’s scent, that still give comfort to Twilight.
Fate had stepped in when a foster mare was found at Rood and Riddle Equine Clinic in Wellington. The mare had a dystocia – a difficult labor – resulting in the foal, a colt this time, but also an embryo transfer, being unable to survive in spite of three days of intensive care. “The mare had some post complications requiring a lot of intensive care to get her better and into a position where she would be able to be healthy enough to take the foal,” said Dr McNaughten. “And all of that was Dr Stephanie Walbornn’s work, she did a fantastic job. The mare was then released from their care. She came to us, and then we did the grafting.”
Monique was surprised to discover that Gigi St John and Jennifer Papiernik – from the Hunter world – were the owners of the lost foal. “Gigi had boarded at my farm while building her own and was there with Jennifer, a well-known trainer and the person behind Bella’s care,” said Monique. The mare had been frantic after losing her foal and in spite of words of caution from onlookers, Gigi and Jennifer knew Bella had the right temperament to take on another foal and they quickly took her to PBEC.
Dr McNaughten’s team performed an emergency evaluation on the mare and later that day introduced her to Twilight, where the vet’s expertise came into play.
“I try to introduce them without any drugs to get an idea of what the mare is going to think about the foal,” he said. “Does she show any interest in the foal or is she pinning her ears and thinking about biting. And then once I’ve done that I have found that using some hormone manipulation has worked really well.”
Dr McNaughten uses Lutalyse, the same drug used to bring mares back into season. “We are unsure of the exact mechanism, but we think we are stimulating the oxytocin receptors in the brain – as it’s commonly known as the hormone for love.” Sweating is a side effect of the drug and once the mare started to do so, Dr McNaughten brought the foal back into the mare’s stall.
At three weeks old, Twilight with her new mother, was doing great
“We are very gentle about it,” he said. “And we kind of let them explore one another. It really is helpful when you have a foal that knows how to nurse and a mare that’s already lactating because then they don’t get frustrated at each other.”
With Bella and Twilight the bonding process took some 40-45 minutes before Dr McNaughten felt they were ready to be left in the stall together. The release of oxytocin helps to make the mare fall in love with the foal. “I tell a lot of people because it is sad,” he said. “But moms really love their babies, and the babies just love the mammary gland.”
Twilight Dreams, an Oldenburg filly bred for dressage, was named after her father Dynamic Dream and with Bella as her new mother it gave a literary nod to The Twilight Saga, a fictional body of work in which Bella dies during childbirth but is brought back to life.
Now Bella and Twilight are thriving. Twilight gained nine pounds with her new menu, which consisted of Bella’s milk and a formula supplement. “She figured out she could have both,” said Monique. “So eventually we had to pull back the milk replacer.” As well as a healthy appetite, the filly also revealed a curious nature. She quickly learned how to open gates—at just three weeks old, she escaped the paddock but didn’t wander far. Bella was naturally panicked but quickly settled when Twilight returned. “She’s something special—strong, independent, and spirited,” said Monique.
The new mare and foal bond is strong but a link remains between Twilight and Tara. “Twilight still has the teddy bear with Tara’s scent, and she grooms it like it’s a companion,” said Monique. “It’s both heartbreaking and beautiful.”
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