by Maureen Harmonay – Equine Advocacy Examiner

Humane Observer gives a Voice to those who cannot Speak for Themselves

(Maureen wrote this excellent article on the day of the March for Mustangs and due to travel and the Rally activities we did not post it.  But here it is, a few days late but the message is the same.  Many of you who attended the Rally met and heard Elyse speak.  She and Craig Downer are our eyes and ears at Fallon.  Thanks to Maureen for highlighting this very special lady – R.T.)

Wild Horse advocates R.T. Fitch, Elyse Gardener and Ginger Kathrens at Pryor Mt. Round-up

Even as throngs of equine advocates gather for today’s international March for Mustangs in Washington, DC, London, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas, the plight of the captive Calico Mountain wild horses continues to haunt us.

Thanks to Humane Observer Elyse Gardner, who attended the BLM’s recent “Media Day” at the Broken Arrow holding facility near Fallon, Nevada, we now have an up-close-and-personal snapshot at how individual horses are faring.  It’s not a pretty picture.

Writing in The Stablewoman Gazette, Ms. Gardner highlights the discrepancies in the number of horses who are actually in BLM custody.  At the end of the roundup, the BLM had reported that 1922 horses had been caught.  We know that at least 77 horses have died or been euthanized, not including the dozens of in-utero foals that were miscarried or who perished when their pregnant dams died.  “The numbers don’t jive at this point,” says Ms. Gardner:  some reports say that there are 1854 horses, others claim 1731.  The agency has made no effort to publicly document the number of newly arrived foals, who, according to Ms. Gardner, “are being born daily now.”

But Ms. Gardner’s primary focus is on the emotional and physical trauma that the “processing” inflicts on the wild horses.   Her photos eerily capture the abject terror in their eyes, but cannot depict the uncharacteristic “grunting sounds” they emit, in response to being pushed and prodded through the “squeeze chute” for worming, blood testing, vaccinating, and freeze-branding.  The experience paralyzes and shocks them beyond anything we can truly comprehend:

Captured Calico Mare and surviving newborn Foal at Fallon - photo by Elyse Gardner

“Each horse comes out looking disoriented.  To me it looks like they are surprised they are still alive.  Some run out; most kind of walk-trot, looking nervously around, shaking their heads.”

It’s while the horses are in “little cages,” waiting to be forced into the squeeze chute, that most of the serious injuries are occurring.  On March 12th, for example, the BLM’s “Gather Daily Updates” chronicled one of the tragic fatalities:  “A yearling filly died when she suffered a spinal neck fracture.  She was standing unattended in a chute waiting to be moved forward for adoption preparation when she jumped forward, injuring herself.”

“It all seems so pointless,” Ms. Gardner concludes, and most of us would agree.  You may read her fact-filled articles and blogposts and weep.  But then, do more than that.  As Ms. Gardner implores:

“Come on, America; we can–and we must–do so much better than this with our American mustangs, the ancestors of whom we owe so much.  And these present animals in their own right are gifts to us and to the land.  Their free spirits and resilient constitutions are made for freedom; to freedom they belong.  We must not continue to defile the gift that is the wild horse.”