At the time of writing Crosskennan Lane Animal Sanctuary is providing care directly or financially to 63 horses, ponies and donkeys. 50 of whom are on site right now. Horses like Lucas the ex racer who was left to starve to death in the corner of a yard. Ponies like Niknak who was lifted along with several other badly neglected ponies, pregnant and terrified of people. Donkeys like Cyril, who was dumped on the mournes with feet so overgrown he has permanent muscle and tendon damage.

We are rest stop for some, but for many we are permanent home. But no matter how long these equines live with us here at the sanctuary we will do our best to provide the best for them each day.

To do that, to provide support to any animal, we need support from the public. Crosskennan is solely reliant on the kindess and generousity of the general public. There is no government or statutory body providing us with stipend to feed and care for these animals, or rescue them in the first place.

Right now when funds are so tight it is the smallest of things that we are struggling for; the simpliest. Our Bed and Breakfast is as simple as it sounds; every day we provide a clean bed for the horses, ponies and donkeys to sleep on. Every day they get their breakfast, lunch and dinner (some getting more hard feed some just hay, etc.).

We spend £345 approximately a week on food; broken down (on average) as;

Linseed Mash £3.88

Comprehensive Feed Balancer £12.50

Formula 4 Feet 20kg £47.81

Top Chop Grass £12.74

Aplha A Mollasses Free £24.00

Lo Cal Balancer £56.00

Senior Mix £31.25

Happy Hoof £58.13

High Fibre Cubes £97.18

We also spend £250 weekly on hay and haylage. (forage)

According to Horse and Hound - In addition to forage and bedding, most horses will need additional hard feed. On average this will cost £30-£40 a month dependent on the type, size, weight and exercise regime of the horse. This does not include additional specialist feeds or horse feed supplements that the horse may also require.

For the 50 in our direct care according to Horse and Hound we should be spending around £375 a week.

So that's the breakfast side of the appeal sorted; what about beds?

Well at the sanctuary we have 29 individual stables, some of which have double capacity. We also have 5 shelters and 4 covered paddocks. These all recieve shavings each week, although at different rates. Some horses are harder on bedding than others, some horses are extremely clean, others very messy.

The shelters and paddocks have a base layer of woodchip/bark/shavings but these do need to be topped up regularly, especially when dirty bedding is removed from them.

At present we are spending approximately £430 a week on shavings. We buy them in 15kg bales which are then manually manouvered around the sanctuary to wherever they are required.

On average each week to keep costs down as much as we can without compromising on care we provide each stable with one bale to top up and each paddock and shelter with approximately - 2 to 4 bales a week.

According to the British Horse Society a 12ft x 12ft stable requires approximately five bales of straw or eight bales of shavings to initially bed down, then three bales of straw a week or eight bales of shavings each week to top up.

They do add that with careful management that top ups could be reduced to 1-2 bales per week with careful management.

Why don't we use straw? Well the simple reason, it's harder for us to store and work with, it's not as absorbant either and is bulkier in the beds. Also with many of our equines on calculated diets, straw can be a tasty snack when no one is looking.

So for 1 days bed and breakfast at Crosskennan it costs £145 (approximately for 50 equines).

And that is all we are aiming to raise right now. One day.

If we can raise one day then we will hope to raise enough to cover two days, and maybe three, and so on...

It's covering the simple things, beyond the supplements and treats, and equipment, and staff, and rugs, and buckets... it's the daily external cost. It's the bills that are essential.

Every animal deserves to know that they will have a bed to sleep on and know their next meal isn't going to be late. Everyone deserves that!

So we are asking if you can help provide that; that simple thing of bed and breakfast (lunch and dinner).