“Oh boy, I’ll take this any day,’’ he says, smiling broadly at the Plymouth County Sheriff’s Farm where prisoners from the Plymouth County Correctional Facility care for retired Suffolk Downs thoroughbreds.

“I’ll shovel against the tide seven days a week. It sure beats being in jail.’’

He’s part of an aptly named program called “Second Chances’’ that is sponsored by the Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, the Fields Family Foundation, and Suffolk Downs. It’s a win-win situation. Inmates get out of jail during the day to care for the horses and learn a vocation. The horses get pampered in retirement on a 90-acre farm. The program started last November when four retired Suffolk racehorses were brought into an old barn renovated by inmates.

Butler, serving a one-year sentence for writing bad checks, volunteered and helped build the new stalls, but he knew nothing about horses.

“I never ride,’’ he says. “Never been on a horse in my life.’’

The Suffolk Downs racehorses gave him a run for his money, too.

“One of the horses was very aggressive,’’ recalls Dan Callahan, captain of the Sheriff’s unit that oversees farm operations. “He bit a couple of people, nothing serious. But that horse is so much more calm now. Tim has learned their personalities and how to work around them.’’

Butler, 49, strokes his white goatee and says things were scary in the beginning.

“They were off the wall when they came here,’’ he says. “Oh, I’ve gotten kicked, I’ve gotten pushed. One of ’em came forward once, knocked me into a wall. I had the white one [Red Miall] rear up on me, front hooves out and everything. I used to think they could only kick to the back. They can kick to the side, too. I was like, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me! I’m going to be doing this every day?’ ’’

Slowly, he started making horse sense.

“Your movements have to be really slow and deliberate ’cause they are really jumpy.’’

He also tried a little tenderness with his new equine friends.

“These guys all have injuries from racing, like bone spurs and tendinitis. They love peppermint lifesavers. I got them some spiced apple treats. These guys get nothing but the best.’’

The five former Suffolk horses currently housed here have won more than $1 million in purses.

“Sing Me Back Home. He’s got a nervous condition,’’ says Butler. “When he gets really nervous he gets these bumps — hives — all over him. Oh, yeah, he hates to be in his stall. At the racetrack they put blinders on him in the stall. He won a lot of money [$619,541] in his day.’’

Butler volunteered to work seven days a week because horses need daily care. He does not get paid but receives time off his sentence, five days for each month he spends on the farm, according to prison authorities.

Structure is part of their day, Butler says.

“They have an order. They all come out in the same order and come back in the same order. If you screw with it, they get mad. They’ll flip their bowl of food over.’’

Workers learn new skills in the hopes that they can land a job when they get out.

A study by the US Bureau of Prisons revealed that only 6.6 percent of federal inmates who worked while in prison violated their parole or were arrested again within a year vs. 20 percent for unemployed prisoners.

“What we are trying to teach here is a work ethic,’’ says Plymouth County Sheriff Joseph D. McDonald Jr. “There is an alternative to a life of crime. Inmates are given a chance at a life other than crime.’’

Prisoners here are deemed not a risk to the general population. Butler, who is eligible for parole, says he’s not tempted to giddyup and ride into the sunset.

“No way,’’ he insists. “I’ve got a baby boy, 8 1/2 months old. He visited me last week. It’s killing me that I’m away from him.’’

The farm also houses six retired horses from the Boston Police Department Mounted Unit. There is a horticultural center open to the public next month, which includes a petting zoo and plant sale.

For Butler, the farm is heaven on earth compared with his prison dormitory. He gets better food and brews his own fresh coffee.

“It’s two different worlds getting out of there, then coming here,’’ he says. “You just kick back. It’s hard work, but it’s decent.’’

Two of the horses are in the process of being adopted. So Butler likes to make sure the horses are used to tractors so they can move seamlessly to homes on farms. Other retired thoroughbreds will take their place.

One of the benefits of the program is that tough-guy prisoners inevitably bond with the fragile horses.

Butler acknowledges he plays favorites,

“Charlie [Business] is the cool one,’’ he says. “Him and me kind of hit it off right off. He’s the leader of all these guys. I pretty much can take him out right now and he just walks with me. I don’t have to hold him. We chit-chat. I talk to myself while I’m out here, sorting things out and they listen. I think they can tell if I’m kind of down. He’ll brush up against you. Oh yeah, it’s very cool. Once you get to know them and you’re around them they’re like a big giant dog.’’

He brings them back in by 2:30 p.m.

“I feed ’em again and make sure they are set for the night. I can’t believe how much these guys eat.’’

Last week he learned how to trim their hooves and check their teeth.

“Tim’s really shown an interest,’’ says captain Callahan. “He’s done an excellent job, the horses are in great condition. He’s been very responsible while he’s been with us.’’

Suffolk Downs, the first racetrack to ban killer buyers who truck horses to slaughterhouses in Mexico and Canada, is taking an active role to make sure its equine athletes are not abandoned. Now the track seems willing to offer a second chance to Butler when he gets out of prison.

“We’re very interested,’’ says Chip Tuttle, chief operating officer of Suffolk Downs. “There’s no prohibition for convicted felons to work. We look forward to talking with Tim and Sheriff McDonald when he is available.’’

Butler says that when he gets out he wants to get a job, gain custody of his son, and never go back to prison.

“I’m going to be like one of those horses with the blinders on and run a straight and narrow path,’’ he says.

Stan Grossfeld can be reached at grossfeld@globe.com.