There are words to be said here, partly of a deep anger at the staff and management of MSLAR for all the death and destruction they caused, for the lies told to those who sent their loved animals to live their final days in peace, only to have their days end in the cold and misery from starvation while the caretakers stayed warm inside their luxury home with an indoor swimming pool.
Fourteen hours after leaving Missoula, Montana, my plane landed in Houston’s Hobby Airport. None of the locals thought the 50 degree weather they were experiencing was warm, but I stood happily outside in shirt sleeves waiting for the shuttle. I doubt that I will ever complain about the cold weather of South Texas again, even on the rare day that it reaches freezing. Walking through frozen pastures at -10 is enough to convince me that the South is a place to call home.
Back home in South Texas, when the thermometer reaches fifty degrees, the ice, if there ever was any ice, disappears off the roads. Back home at fifty degrees, folks are wearing heavy coats and gloves, shivering before they walk into the mall. Western Montana is different. For two days now, with close to fifty degrees by mid-afternoon, the roads up in the mountains have turned into thick slush ice, the pastures are the same, and every step of man and beast is threatened with the possibility of a major fall, but the people are showing up without coats and in a few cases, in shorts. Things are different up here.
Hot Springs MT (SFTHH) – Eighty horses are receiving much needed veterinary care at a foster location while volunteers continue to move 650 llamas, two camels, several pot bellied pigs, donkeys, bison, cattle, goats, and sheep to safe locations for veterinary evaluation and future adoption campaigns.
High winds and drifting snow, laid over the top of pure ice. That’s Western Montana in the winter. The mountains, the trees – it all looks so wonderful from the inside of a warm car. The beauty fades away quickly when the car door opens and the first steps are taken, but those first steps are necessary to get the job done. It’s being pretty self centered when those steps aren’t taken and the beings that are living outside don’t have a way to feel warmth or enjoy life.
To look at the website – http://www.mtanimalsanctuary.com you’d almost think that these animals found a little piece of heaven, and I’m sure those who sent their animals here believed it also. Beautiful mountains, a flowing river, forever views and it what now seems like a far too typical caretaker – employees that flat out don’t give a damn about animals in pain.
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