updated 9:55 p.m. ET Dec. 22, 2006

KENNETT SQUARE, Pa. - They’ve written Christmas carols for him. They’ve sent him a wreath made of baby organic carrots and a Christmas tree of green apples. Someone even gave him a Christmas stocking.

The devoted fans of Barbaro see the colt’s recovery as a wonder that trumps even the “Miracle on 34th Street,” and this holiday season they want to celebrate — no matter how much the colt’s surgeon insists the recovery is all about science.

The fence that surrounds the sprawling New Bolton Center where the Kentucky Derby winner has been recovering since May from his breakdown at the Preakness has turned lately into a big Christmas shrine. Its theme: the miracle of Barbaro

“The Miracle is Barbaro’s Spirit,” reads one.

“May the angels of healing continue to wrap their wings of healing around you,” says another.

Some of the signs of devotion are just plain goofy, like the Christmas carol to be sung to the tune of “Let it Snow”:

“Oh, the weather outside is frightful / But my stall is still delightful/ And since I’ve got places to go / Let it grow, let it grow, let it grow!”

What has fans so overjoyed is the possibility that Barbaro could leave his ICU stall by the end of January, and make on his way to a Kentucky farm to continue recuperation from laminitis in his left hind leg.

“No one would wish on him this would happen and we’d rather have seen him race and live a normal life, but you have to agree it’s been such a positive feeling for people,” said co-owner Gretchen Jackson. “I wonder if people have discovered it’s great to be positive than negative.”

Dean Richardson of the University of Pennsylvania’s New Bolton Center also is positive about the colt’s recovery. The chief surgeon just doesn’t see it as anything more than good medicine.

“It’s not a miracle. It’s anything but that,” he said, sitting next to a Christmas tree topped with a stuffed Barbaro.

“Some of the Barbaro fans aren’t going to like that, perhaps. I’m a scientist, I’m a doctor. I’m not a faith healer or a religious person. I believe in the application in science and I think nothing that’s happened to him is particularly miraculous.”

The doctor might want to keep that to himself around horse racing fans.

To celebrate Barbaro’s Christmas, they’ve sent the colt a custom-made halter, an embroidered blanket, a Santa’s hat, and even his own stocking that will surely be stuffed with peppermints, sugar cubes and hay.

While the get-well cards and banners will eventually fade or be trashed, the biggest gift has been the $1.2 million raised since early June for the Barbaro Fund. The money is put toward needed equipment like an operating room table, and a raft and sling for the same pool recovery Barbaro used after his surgeries.

That’s not exactly the kind of merchandise found at Home Depot.

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“We are a teaching hospital that year in and year out always operates at a deficit,” Richardson said. “Help like that is immensely valuable to us.”

With two fused joints, Barbaro will never have a normal gait, but the right leg is now solid enough to bear his weight. The colt had all bandages taken off his injured right hind leg and goes outside once daily for 30 minutes to 40 minutes of exercise.

Richardson said Barbaro could leave “soon” but offered no timetable.

“He’s to the point where we feel that he’s well enough that he’s likely able to be managed in a non-hospital facility,” Richardson said.

Jackson hoped Barbaro could be on that Kentucky farm by the end of January.

“Hopefully, he can be a stallion,” she said. “That would be a joy for us to see his offspring and hopefully a joy for others.”

Miracle or not, it would be the perfect ending.

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