As many of you already know, we were delighted to welcome Kachina, a Wild Mustang Mare, to the sanctuary on May 10, which just happened to be Mother’s Day. What a gift!
She was born on the Pryor Mountains of Montana to two of the most famous and beloved wild horses in that herd, Baja and Washakie, who Ginger Kathrens, Executive Director of The Cloud Foundation describes as “Pryor Mountain royalty.” We posted this bio about Kachina on our website.
Baby Kachina on the Pryor Mountains. Photo by Ginger Kathrens of The Cloud Foundation
Ginger is also an award-winning film maker and when she offered to produce a short video about Kachina’s life, rescue and arrival to Equine Advocates, we were excited and extremely moved. The most amazing part of the video is the footage Ginger found in her archives that she had shot of Kachina on the Pryor Mountains when she was a newborn foal in 2010 and as a yearling in 2011. Sadly, the following year when she was two, she was rounded-up and captured by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), after which time she was shuffled from home to home until her rescue by The Cloud Foundation in the fall of 2019. It was determined that Kachina would do best spending her life in a sanctuary. We were happy to offer her a forever home when we heard her story.
This is not the first time we admitted a wild horse from the Pryor Mountains into the sanctuary. In 2013, we welcomed Hayden who had also been captured by the BLM and then over time, like Kachina, also needed to be rescued. Ginger, who appears in and narrates the video, was instrumental in Hayden’s arrival here as well.
We are currently in the process of introducing Kachina to Hayden which could either be quick, or take some time. That entirely depends on them!
Thank you, Ginger!
Photo of Kachina at Equine Advocates by Melissa Murray
I know she will have a wonderful forever-home at Equine Advocates.
The sad part of the story is learning that after being shuffled from place to place that she was then found in a hoarding situation. This is more common than any of us want to think about for our wild ones removed from their legal native lands.
God bless all who have helped this mare. As I write this from Australia we have choppers and shooter in our National Parks shooting to kill all our Brumbies … Yes pregnant mares, mares with foals at foot and colts and stallions. Why for? So the stinking graziers can use the land for sheep and cattle, that the offspring will more than likely end up on death ships to the middle east somewhere. The perpetrators are not allowing rescuers to even save any of the pregnant mares or those with foals at foot. Just being shot and left to rot on the ground. Welcome to Australia…Shameful!
Rosslyn, that is absolutely awful to hear!! Why aren’t they allowing any of the horses, even foals, to be rescued? Such an awful thing to hear this goes on in Australia also, all for the flipping livestock industry.
WH&B : Mae Lee Sun & Craig Downer on the culling of Australia’s brumbie
Hosted by Debbie Coffey There have been many horrific aerial cullings of brumbies (wild horses) in Australia, where shooters in helicopters have shot and left many brumbies suffering before death. The New South Wales government plans to wipe out 90% of the Snowy Mountains brumby population over the next two decades.
MAE LEE SUN, co-author of the 2013 release, “Brumby: A celebration of Australia’s wild horses” by Exisle Publications. She is a freelance journalist/photographer, editor, writer and animal welfare advocate and her articles and essays have appeared in numerous newspapers and literary journals. Mae Lee has worked in the United States and abroad since 1995 and is currently in Australia. Mae Lee’s blog is the Wild Horse Journal.
CRAIG DOWNER is a wildlife ecologist and the author of the book “The Wild Horse Conspiracy” Website: http://thewildhorseconspiracy.org/.
R.T. Fitch, author of "Straight from the Horse's Heart" and President/Co-Founder of 'Wild Horse Freedom Federation' ~ putting People between Wild Equines and Extinction
I know she will have a wonderful forever-home at Equine Advocates.
The sad part of the story is learning that after being shuffled from place to place that she was then found in a hoarding situation. This is more common than any of us want to think about for our wild ones removed from their legal native lands.
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Heartfelt thanks. A Happy Life, is ahead.
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God bless all who have helped this mare. As I write this from Australia we have choppers and shooter in our National Parks shooting to kill all our Brumbies … Yes pregnant mares, mares with foals at foot and colts and stallions. Why for? So the stinking graziers can use the land for sheep and cattle, that the offspring will more than likely end up on death ships to the middle east somewhere. The perpetrators are not allowing rescuers to even save any of the pregnant mares or those with foals at foot. Just being shot and left to rot on the ground. Welcome to Australia…Shameful!
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Rosslyn, that is absolutely awful to hear!! Why aren’t they allowing any of the horses, even foals, to be rescued? Such an awful thing to hear this goes on in Australia also, all for the flipping livestock industry.
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Rosslyn, I thought the Brumbies had finally been given protection.
Do you have this article? It was published in Horsetalk
Brumbies can fill a useful role in Australian ecosystems, says ecologist
June 4, 2018 Craig C. Downer
https://www.horsetalk.co.nz/2018/06/04/brumbies-useful-australian-ecosystem/
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This is an archived radio show
WH&B : Mae Lee Sun & Craig Downer on the culling of Australia’s brumbie
Hosted by Debbie Coffey There have been many horrific aerial cullings of brumbies (wild horses) in Australia, where shooters in helicopters have shot and left many brumbies suffering before death. The New South Wales government plans to wipe out 90% of the Snowy Mountains brumby population over the next two decades.
MAE LEE SUN, co-author of the 2013 release, “Brumby: A celebration of Australia’s wild horses” by Exisle Publications. She is a freelance journalist/photographer, editor, writer and animal welfare advocate and her articles and essays have appeared in numerous newspapers and literary journals. Mae Lee has worked in the United States and abroad since 1995 and is currently in Australia. Mae Lee’s blog is the Wild Horse Journal.
CRAIG DOWNER is a wildlife ecologist and the author of the book “The Wild Horse Conspiracy” Website: http://thewildhorseconspiracy.org/.
https://www.blogtalkradio.com/marti-oakley/2016/09/22/whb-mae-lee-sun-amp-craig-downer-on-the-culling-of-australias-brumbies
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That is amazing but also sad in a way. But she is a beautiful horse.
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