For eight years, Polo was gone.
The rare horse disappeared from a farm in Scotland when he was still a foal, leaving his owner, Zoe Urquart, with little more than occasional reports from people who thought they might have seen him.
Then came a phone call she never expected.
Eight years after Polo was stolen, the horse was found hundreds of miles from home and reunited with Urquart, ending a search she had long ago stopped believing would have a happy ending.
“I’d given up on the idea that he would ever be located a number of years ago. So it was a massive shock,” Urquart told the BBC.
Polo, a rare cremello stallion, was taken during a break-in at a farm in Morayshire, Scotland, in 2018. He was eventually discovered in Shipley, Yorkshire, after West Yorkshire Police's Wildlife and Rural Crime Team received what authorities described as “community intelligence.” A check of his microchip confirmed that he was the horse reported stolen eight years earlier, police told the BBC.
For Urquart, the discovery brought an answer after years of uncertainty.
In the time Polo was missing, she occasionally received messages from people who believed they had spotted him. But none resulted in a confirmed sighting. As the years passed, hope slowly gave way to acceptance.
“I did get the odd message from people who have looked out for him and thought they'd seen him, but no confirmed sightings at all,” she told the BBC.
Then, one afternoon, everything changed.
“I got a phone call completely out of the blue at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, and I had to make an instant decision on what I was going to do,” Urquart said. “He was uplifted within three hours and en route.”
But Polo's return home was only the beginning of a new challenge.
Urquart told the BBC that he was in “really poor” condition after years of neglect. Polo had sore eyes and a large sarcoid, a type of tumor that would need to be removed.
“He has quite a large sarcoid, which is a form of tumour that will need to be removed by the bow,” she told the BBC.
His recovery is also expected to come at a significant cost.
“His veterinary and rehabilitation care will span into thousands of pounds, if they had several foals a year from him, they'd have made tens of hundreds of pounds, but neglected his health,” she said, according to the BBC.
Urquart believes Polo may have been targeted because of his unusual genetics.
“Genetically, he is quite a rare colour,” Urquart told the BBC. “Perlino cremello foals are not so unheard of now, but certainly going back in time they were really quite rare.”
Now, however, Polo is back at the Morayshire yard where he belongs.
After years away and a difficult journey home, he is beginning to settle back into life with the owner who never got an answer about what happened to him — until now.
Urquart knows his recovery will take time, and the road ahead will bring its own challenges. But after eight years of uncertainty, she finally has the chance to care for him again.
“He's going to get the best of care, and we'll get him back to the way he should be,” she told the BBC.
Police said Polo was seized after his identity was confirmed through his microchip, and inquiries into the original theft remain ongoing.
For Urquart, the reunion does not erase the years Polo spent missing or the care he now needs. But it has given the story an ending she had stopped expecting — and Polo the chance to begin again, back home.
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