Nov. 20 (UPI) -- An elderly horse was hoisted out of a watery ditch in Florida after being discovered by an off-duty animal control officers.
Edgar Santiago, an animal control officer in Homestead, said he was python hunting while off duty Sunday when he came across an elderly and emaciated horse trapped in a ditch in southwest Miami-Dade County.
Santiago contacted authorities and a team from the South Florida SPCA Horse Rescue responded to the scene.
A video posted to Facebook by the rescue group shows a slideshow of the horse's hoisting rescue from the ditch.
"With one shot, they were able to have the horse lean on this, like, big plastic, so it wouldn't scuff up or hurt itself, and slide her out of the water," Santiago told WSVN-TV. "They got her -- after like, 10, 15 minutes -- got her to stand up and moved her out of the water."
The slide show contains bonus shots of a pig found wandering at a gas station and a goat discovered loose near a church.
The SPCA Horse Rescue said the mare was found to be malnourished but otherwise uninjured. The horse is recovering at the group's ranch.
The rescuers said they do not know where the horse came from, but suspect it was abandoned by its owner.
