He is young, about the same age as Saleem, he has changed hands a lot, and since she got him she got sick and had to lend him out for a time. While he was with the people who borrowed him, he was ridden and competed in show jumping and did well. My friend then decided to let them buy him, which sounded reasonable, since it seemed that things were well with him and his new home.

Then the potential buyers backed out, not only from buying the horse, but from loaning it as well. Now, I don’t know why, I don’t know what happened, but it always rings an alarm in my head when people turn like that. Why were they happy to borrow the horse one second and busy handing it back to my friend the next?

Then my friend tried to sell the horse, but discovered that she does not have the proper paperwork on him, so technically, according to Danish law, he is not her horse to sell. It’s very simple. In Denmark we have an “owners certificate,” on every horse, and if you do not own that piece of paper, it is not your horse no matter how much money you paid for it or how many contracts you have proving that you bought the horse. If you do not have the owners certificate, signed by the original owner, you cannot register the horse in your name and it remains- not your horse. Cases like that have been taken to court more than once and the owner of the certificate always wins out. The horse belongs to whoever has his or her name on the paper.

So she couldn’t sell it, because the new owner could not register the horse in her name, because that piece of paper is missing. She asked me if I wanted him.

This was right after I had brought Tardis home, and I had to say no, for more than one reason. One, I do not want a horse I cannot register either. It is illegal and I would forever live in fear of the owner showing up one day, claiming his horse, and I know I would be utterly unable to prevent him from taking the horse from me if that should happen, and I would even have to count myself lucky if he did not press charges against me for technically having stolen his horse. No, no way I was touching that.

Secondly, I am dead broke, after Apollon died, costing me a fortune in vet bills. I simply could not afford to bring home another horse.

Then, recently I have been told that the horse is now all of a sudden shy, aggressive and downright dangerous and he is to be slaughtered. Here is where everything snaps for me. What?

I have never met the horse, but I have seen pictures of him and my friend’s children, grooming him on their own. This was ever a nice and gentle horse. Why has he changed like that?

I have worked with problem horses all of my life and I have yet to come across one that suddenly changed from Bambi to dragon over night, and didn’t have a simple reason for it. Pain. Horses respond violently when they are in pain. Of course, some horses “disappear” instead, if they are hurting, and become phlegmatic and nonresponsive, but most horses, especially young horses, become aggressive if something is bothering them.

My friend states that he is not in pain though, but simply too dangerous to handle. Everything inside me screams to hear that. I just want to shake her and beg her to have a good vet look over that poor horse, before his life is taken away from him. And if the vet comes up short, a chiropractor. Chances are that the horse, having been ridden and jumped at a young age, has a spine or front leg issue, that may or may not be easily fixed. But at least give him the chance, clearly he is trying to tell her something and she is not hearing him. What is he to do?

And slaughtered. Everything inside me turns at the thought of someone claiming to love their animal, wanting to load it into a trailer, drive it off and have it unloaded in a place that reeks of death and blood. In my opinion, it should be illegal to slaughter any horse, simply because – they know!

Horses are keenly sensitive to the smell of blood and death. Saleem, Apollon, Poseidon, Amalia, all of my horses really, have been very tough in heavy traffic. Busses, tractors, huge gas trucks, you name it and it can drive by them and they don’t flinch. (Mail boxes and trashcans are of course a whole different matter.) But come across the DAKA truck, and they turn and run. DAKA is the truck that picks up euthanized animals. Horses can smell it a long time before humans can. DAKA looks no different than most other trucks, but the horses, they know.

Blood smells. I actually had a problem with one of my old stables once, after Saleem had been castrated and had bleed all over the floor. We washed the blood away, none of the horses ever saw the blood, (Saleem was sedated and didn’t notice either, until he woke up,) but the smell must have lingered, because the horses spooked there ever after, until we repainted the place with some strong smelling tree-oil. That drowned out the blood.

So no, I do not see how you can ever subject your horse to being slaughtered, but maybe I am overly sensitive. I don’t eat meat, simply because I strongly believe that all life is sacred and my life is not worth sustaining if I do it at the cost of another living creature. It might sound cheesy, but who am I to decide if some poor chicken should die, just so I could eat, when I just as well could eat something that did not try to justify a murder?

But I am getting off topic here. Don’t get me started on how cows and pigs and chickens and other farm animals are treated… All of it should be outlawed if you ask me… One can only hope that future generations will be born with a tiny bit of empathy because that sure is something the human race seem to be lacking in general.

And no, I do not consider myself better, or purer, or in any way superior, and I have no religious reasons for not eating meat, I simply consider myself overly sensitive and able to empathize with any animal at all times. I guess that is an occupational hazard when you work with problem horses.

But back to the horse. I wish I could stop this. I wish I could bring him home and have my vets do x-rays of his spine and legs, I wish I could have my chiropractor and my Ferrier fix him up and I wish I could give him a chance. I feel like I am betraying everything I am by not fighting for this horse, but I just can’t.

First off, for the reasons stated above, I would not be able to own him, and secure him a safe and lasting home, and I would not be able to afford it. But I must add, that I swore when Legacy died, that he was the last chance I would ever take.

I cannot bring home another horse like that, and spend years fighting to fix it, hoping, believing, wishing that he could live a happy and pain free life, only to have him die on me in the end. Losing Legacy nearly destroyed me. I cannot take a chance like that again, and this horse is sounding very much like it is a chance to take. It may not be fixable after all. It may have to be put down after all.

And already, my crazy little head is screaming at me, then take it home and have it euthanized so it won’t have to be slaughtered, just as my rational side is telling me to let it go, to never publish this post, to forget about it, since it is not my horse and not my problem and I am in no place to try and save the world.

It’s just not in me to be that person. I must at least, feel horrible about it as I do nothing. Simply because this is who I am, who I became after 15 years of living with “the horse that doesn’t like humans,” as my vets and everybody else, not so lovingly, named Poseidon. I worry, I try to figure out why things happen, and to come up with solutions when I should be quiet.

It is killing me to walk away from a young horse like this, one I might be able to save, after having just lost four of my own to things I could not fight, like heart failure, broken bones, arthritis, and immune system defects causing ruptured arteries. This horse, I could fight for, maybe even save. The world is just so unfair. I would give anything to have any of the sicknesses that killed my horses exchanged for aggressive behavior and a fresh chance to make them live.

Because let’s face it. Behavior can be trained, once you know the cause. It cannot, should not ever, be reason enough to end a life. I simply can’t wrap my mind around it. After 15 years of avoiding just that with Poseidon, this feels so surreal. People really do consider putting down what they believe to be a healthy and sound horse, because they cannot handle them? My head feels like it is imploding. I will never understand that.

And you, my friend, once you read this, I hope you know, I am sorry for you and your horse- more sorry than I ever think you will know- and this is not an attack on you or your decision. This is just me, fighting me, trying to make sense of a world that Poseidon and I clearly never belonged in. I hope you will forgive me for this post, this is really, my heart bleeding for your horse. I know it shouldn’t, I know that I should be a good friend and support you and in time, I hope I will… it is just going to cost me a great deal of violating everything I am to get there. So, I am sorry, I am not there yet.

“Lucky,” with his slaughter number attached to his left shoulder.

Lucky was named Lucky because he was dumped in the desert on the Mexican border seven months ago with about 40 other half-dead horses. How this could possibly be “lucky” sounds like a mystery, I know, but had his trailer-load of horses bound for slaughter in Mexico crossed that border, what little meat there was left on Lucky’s emaciated body would now most likely be digesting in the gut of some person in France… or flowing along the rivers of waste below the city of Paris. A noble equine life wasted.

The horses were dumped because several had a disease known as strangles, which can be a death sentence for horses, is highly contagious, and is certainly not acceptable for animals intended for human consumption. It was no doubt far cheaper for the hauler to release them into the desert than to try to sell them or park them somewhere.

We don’t know the whole story, and surely many of these horses perished, but Lucky was picked out of the herd in a holding pen by a teenage girl as a “gift” from a benefactor who often rescued some of these poor critters.

This girl herself had a rare gift with horses, and she must have seen some spark in the eye of this little horse the day she chose him, even though that “eye” reflected such poor health and resignation.
Supposedly Lucky was only six, so that was in his favor. And he didn’t have strangles, so that was a double-plus. So off he went for rescue and rehab at the girl’s family’s stables, where they regularly took in as many of his kind as possible, brought them back to life, and placed them in good homes.

Fast forward to July of 2012 when Lucky arrived in Nambe, New Mexico, just north of Santa Fe, and was picked up by his new owner, my dear friend Cindy. Cindy had been looking for an appropriate companion for her only-horse, Nova, and, once again, there was just something about Lucky’s pictures that made her staunchly committed to giving him a permanent, forever home. He had been through months of rehab with his rescuers, Cindy’s friends, and had even recently survived a life-threatening round of severe colic. But Cindy never waivered. She was absolutely, positively sure that he was the one for her and her four-year-old mare, Nova.

Cindy began researching the little guy, posted pictures of the strange markings on his left side, and thereby learned much about his probable heritage. She found out that these marks are known as “blotch brands” and are Navajo in origin. (Cindy says they should be called botched brands because they are so messed up–no doubt due to improperly restraining the horse during branding.) The hip brand traditionally has three overlaid images which reflect the tribe, the land, and the family of the horse, so it’s easy to see how that brand alone could easily be “smeared” and hard to read. There are also often many other smaller markings/blotch-brands on a Navajo pony, of which Lucky has at least two, one of which looks like a face.

One Navajo horse trainer offered further description:  “If you can ride him bareback with a halter, and he can’t back up, then he’s off the Navajo Reservation.” Later, responding to Cindy’s horrified message that this horse had been sold for slaughter, probably for $100 or less, he said, “You haven’t seen poor until you’ve been on the rez.”

Due to the drought, hay prices, and the economy, horses are being given away, sold for slaughter, or just turned loose these days by folks who are far more prosperous than those on the rez, so no, it is no wonder that Lucky ended up on that truck bound for Mexico. Still, I like to imagine little children on him, riding bareback with just a halter, and that his family was bereft to give him up. But that $100 sale price to them probably meant at least a few months of staples for their larder. It’s hard for any of us reading this to relate to that, but it certainly is a fact of life for many, and definitely for many of those among the Native American population of our country.

So Lucky lucked out and finally made it “home,” just one week ago. He was shaking all over as we started to unload him, but when he stepped out of the trailer, all of that went away and one could feel a total sea change in his being:  he KNEW. We humans have epiphanous moments, why shouldn’t the animals? We could feel Lucky registering that this was his home, forever. It felt familiar being back in the high desert of New Mexico, and he immediately went into a place of total trust, relaxation and appreciation for the patient woman who stood murmuring quietly by his side.

In the last seven days, Lucky has flourished. He is on ten acres with one to two hours of at-liberty time each day to move freely, test the legs he hasn’t had a chance to use in a long, long time, and to graze on familiar stubbly, native desert grasses. But he also has his own pen with plenty of hay and feed. He is so thankful for this bounty that he went back into his pen, unprompted, all by himself, the first day he was turned out, after only an hour and a half. And he glues himself to Cindy whenever she is with him, following her from chore to chore, muck to muck. He knows. He had an epiphany. He understands and is grateful.

Other things Cindy has learned: Many of the rez horses date back to the original Arabian breed of ancient lore—the type that slept in tents with the Bedouins. A rare type these days because they are so calm and devoted, not as “hot” as many of their modern-day counterparts. Considering Lucky’s head, conformation, size and disposition, he certainly fits this mold. According to her vet, he is 11 years old, not six, which is just fine with her and will only help stabilize her four-year-old filly’s adolescent ways. And he has a spirit that can survive things most of us don’t even want to think about.

Lucky has been renamed “Sharif” (pronounced “Shar-EEF”) honoring all the traits he bears from his long-distant ancestry: nobility, honor, gentleness. He still needs to gain more weight and rebuild muscle, but no doubt one day soon Cindy will be able to find out if he can be ridden “bareback, with just a halter” (though by then she will have taught him to back up!).

Sharif is one of the lucky ones. So many horses, dogs and cats are being discarded these days due to lack of resources to take care of them. I hope Sharif’s story will inspire others like Cindy to step up and rescue or sponsor just one animal who would otherwise be lost. In this case, I don’t know who lucked out the most: Sharif or Cindy. She agrees.

Sharif, on his 6th day at “home,” clearly at peace after his long and difficult journey.

First, below is a history of the mustangs provided by (and all photos courtesy of):  National Wild Horse Adoption Day

America’s mustangs are the descendants of wild horses brought to the New World by Spanish explorers and missionaries in the 16th century. Others come from stock that were released or escaped from miners, ranchers, homesteaders and others who settled the West. Although horses evolved in North America there are many different opinions as to why no horses or burros existed on this continent at the time of European exploration. Spanish explorers reintroduced horses to North America beginning in the late fifteenth century and Native Americans helped spread horses throughout the Great Plains and the West. Until as recently as the mid-twentieth century, horses continued to be released onto public lands by the U.S. cavalry, farmers, ranchers, and miners.

The “Pencil War”

By the mid-20th century, domestic markets for pet and chicken feed and European markets for horse meat emerged, further reducing the number of wild horses and burros remaining in the West. Public concern escalated in response to the brutal methods used by mustangers to capture and transport wild horses for sale to rendering plants. Horrified by the gruesome practices, Velma Johnston spearheaded a “Pencil War”, a letter writing campaign that generated more letters to Congress than any single issue besides the Vietnam War! Thousands of letters were written by school children concerned for the horses’ welfare.

Congress passes “the Act”

As populations on western rangelands declined to fewer than 20,000 animals, the Congress of the United States deliberated over the animals’ future and passed the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burro Act in 1971 (Act). The Act placed America’s mustangs and burros under federal jurisdiction, and charged the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service (USFS) with preserving and protecting wild horses and burros as “living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West.”

Once again, here’s your chance to change the world and make it a more humane place for America’s wild mustangs and burros. Public outcry saved them in 1971 through The Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act; I know, by joining together, we can do it again.

It’s a sad thought to imagine losing the wild mustangs and burros to extinction, let alone other outcomes such as slaughter, abuse and neglect, injury, and the terror inflicted during and after BLM round-ups. Just as sad is the thought of the world’s children and future children never having the chance to witness the grace and beauty of these animals – running free as they’re meant to be, on the land America promised them, across this great country born from their backs.

On so many levels, America wouldn’t be America without the horses and burros. The least we can do is protect instead of inflict, respect instead of betray, stand up for instead of turning away, and offer our outrage instead of our apathy. Their lives and well-being depend upon it.

Their continuing presence on this earth depends upon it. 

Below is an Action Alert from the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign. Please do your part, and thank you for helping save the horses.

- Mustangs on the Hill

Tomorrow, Tuesday, September 29, is ‘Mustangs on the Hill’ Day: Wild horse advocates will be lobbying their Senators for the passage of S.1579, the Restore Our American Mustangs (ROAM) Act.

This critical bill, which passed before the House of Representatives last July, amends the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act by adding important new protections and provisions, such as the banning of helicopter roundups and the reclaiming of land lost by America’s wild horses over the past 30 years.

A press conference will be held from 9:30 a.m. to 11 a.m. in Room 1334 of the Longworth House Office Building in Washington, DC. If you are unable to attend the day’s events, please call your two U.S. Senators, urging them to support the ROAM Act (S.1579). More generally, please urge your Senators to address the mismanagement of our wild horse herds on public lands:

1) Denounce the aggressive wild horse removal campaign currently under way at the behest of special interest groups and at the cost of millions of our tax-dollars.

2) Tell them that our tax-dollars would be better spent on an in-the-wild management program not based on removals.

3) Call for a moratorium on roundups until actual numbers of wild horses on public lands have been independently assessed.

To locate your Senators, please visit www.senate.gov. Please also call the Senate Committee on Natural Resources at 202.224.4971 to express your support for wild horses and the ROAM Act.

- Last of the Mojave Burros

The last remaining wild burro heritage herds in California’s Mojave Desert are threatened with removal this week. Please take advantage of this lobbying day to also call Senator Feinstein’s office at 202.224.3841 and ask her to intercede with BLM officials and put a stop to these roundups.

On behalf of America’s wild horses and burros, thank you for your support!

The AWHPC Team
American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign
www.wildhorsepreservation.org

All photos courtesy of:  National Wild Horse Adoption Day

Riding Cloudy.

From last week:

I’m not just a writer, today, but a very worried Mommy. My twenty-something year old Arabian horse, White Cloud, has been colicky since yesterday afternoon.

Us horse owners shudder at the spectre of colic. Statistically known to kill one out of every four horses, this sneaky malady is infamous as the leading cause of death in equines.

It was colic that took my twenty-one year old Arabian horse, Takoda, in the summer of 2007.

Often, colic can strike out of nowhere; even something as innocuous as a change in the weather can cause the symptoms of colic — pawing, nipping at the stomach or sides, restlessness and sweating, constipation, diarrhea, refusal of food and drink, rolling, or rolling violently, in the worst cases — according to wise, leathery cowboys and scientific studies, even. Outside the window, I watch the new winds blow madly. (I’d rate them a ten on the obnoxious meter. If only there were a remote for that.)

Since Cloud is fed only the best hay and is floated and wormed like clockwork, I’m left even more concerned by his gastrointestinal distress.

I await a return call from our vet. As I wait, my mind and heart race. Forget the scary query in-box — I can’t help but remember Takoda’s last night on earth, my beautiful old Arab lying on the ground with his head in my lap, his usually fresh, green breath turned dark and forboding.

There was nothing the vet could do for him except end his misery.     

UPDATE:

I stayed up with Cloudy two nights straight. It was like a throwback to the night he arrived here at Morning Star Ranch, colicky then, too, and overloaded with worms from the feedlot, where he waited to be shipped to slaughter.

The morning I first saw colic symptoms in Cloud, I’d separated him from the herd and immediately called the vet. Settled in his own corral, I could more accurately monitor his water intake and manure, which happened to be explosive diarrhea. Like a horsier version of Nancy Drew, I gathered clues to clue in the vet, who made an emergency visit to the ranch after hearing the symptoms over the phone.

(This is why, if you own horses, it’s vital to have a medical emergency fund.)  

After the vet checked his vitals, Cloud was sedated; a long, clear tube was threaded down one nostril to his stomach, delivering water, psyllium and some red stuff straight into his gut. A few hours later, we administered two tubes of Biosponge (like a miracle for equine digestive issues). We also had blood drawn; it’s something I like to do yearly, especially with elderly horses.

Tonight, (or today, since it’s after 4 in the morning), Cloud is doing much better. The diarrhea is gone; the green mounds of manure he’s yielding are actually beautiful, indicative of the normal functioning of a healthy body. I hold myself back from getting my camera.

As a horse owner, I read manure like tea leaves. 

Last night, I even bargained with the Universe, Kubler-Ross style. I said, Universe, you can take away all the agent requests I’ve received, and if Destiny has scheduled me to win the lottery, you can have that, too — as long as you pull White Cloud through this ordeal. 

There’s nothing worse than when one of your babies is sick or hurting.

Today:

There’s an old saying. “If there’s trouble, a horse will find it.”

Cloud is doing GREAT. Since his colicky bout, our draft horse, Mr. Bean, came down with a more mild case of colic. Cloudy’s tests came back showing the presence of creosote, a compound found in our Mesquite trees.

I’ve had the poisonous plants handbook for this area ever since we put up the horse facilities, and we’re diligent about keeping the desert trimmed back from the fenceline. The only scenarios I can think of for the poisoning are:

A) Mesquite tree branches blown into the corral due to the crazy winds, which the two horses chewed.

B) Neighborhood kids feeding the horses clippings or twigs without us knowing it.    

Such are the times I wish I could shrink the horses into Breyer models and set my horsey gentlemen on the knick-knack shelf overnight, while I’m sleeping.  

When all is said and done, I do try to remain realistic. I have a soft spot for the older geldings headed to slaughter, and often, due to a history of neglect, or the neglect horses experience on the feedlot, (horses destined for human consumption can’t be wormed or treated, as the chemicals taint the meat), they’re also not the most likely candidates to live to be thirty years or older (a horse’s general lifespan).

I remind myself that when it’s Cloudy’s turn to gallop across the Rainbow Bridge, he’ll do so as a valued, cherished being. Many of his kind aren’t as fortunate.

Of course, the time is never right to say goodbye to the animals we love. Or at least, I haven’t come close to mastering this ability. It’s quite a dichotomy —  everything contains its opposite, and for life, that’s death. We can’t have the love and joy we receive from our four-legged family members without one day facing that dreaded goodbye.

As a writer and in a spiritual sense, you might say I’m fascinated with death. All writers, including the greats, have a handful of themes that run through their work. Mine is death. It’s another dichotomy when you consider the fact that:

A) I’m the opposite of dark.

B) Having fun with or exploring the death theme in my writing is night-and-day different from facing it in real life. 

Every evening, after I bleach-mop the sanctuary room before bringing the dogs in for the night, I put down layers of newspaper in the corner in case anyone can’t hold it. And in the Universe’s strange way, often I end up stopping in my tracks because the sheet in front of me happens to be the Obituaries. I’m jolted by the faces of children and teenagers, regularly present, but even more so, I’m jolted by the view of life’s great fragility. 

There’s some luck in it: those newspaper pages make it impossible to forget how lucky I am for another day, another sun, even another fake-out air-nip from a grumpy old horse. I’ve been thrilled this week to have Cloudy pin his ears at me and snake his neck per usual; good old Mr. Grumpy-Pants, back to his old, ornery self.

There’s also a gift: appreciate what you have right now — it’s all you have for certain, if even that.

But, enough lessons already.

Life’s a-waiting.

Cloud and Peanut, saved from slaughter.

(P.S.  Thank you, Universe! I did mean what I said last week, and Cloud is still doing great. But, if you could see it clear, can I keep the agents, too? I’d be much obliged.)

Wearing: NaNoWriMo 2008 WINNER t shirt

Listening to: Praise You, by Fatboy Slim

Mood: Happy, pure and simple.

Photos by Emily Murdoch (except for the one I’m in, of course).

Shooting Star, a wild Nevada Mustang foaled in a killbuyer’s feedlot, on arrival.

With much excitement for America’s horses, both domesticated and wild, there is a new bill being presented to Congress in the people’s ongoing attempts to end the slaughter of America’s horses for human consumption.

Called the Conyers-Burton Prevention of Equine Cruelty Act of 2008 (H.R. 6598), this legislation will prohibit the sale and transport of horses for the purpose of human consumption, effectively ending the agony of horses being transported/exported long distances to Mexico and Canada for slaughter, sometimes on double-decker trailers intended for cows, and without food or water.

This new legislation differs from the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act (H.R. 503/S.311) because its focus is the inherent cruelty of horse slaughter. Because of this, it has been referred to the Judiciary Committee for consideration. The Committee Chairman, Representative John Conyers, is the lead sponsor of the bill. It is very possible that this bill has a greater chance of being enacted than the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act, which has been stalled (most likely deliberately) in Committee since April 2007.

The Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing in regard to this bill on Thursday, July 31st, 2008, and the Humane Society of the United States President Wayne Pacelle will testify in support of the legislation. Testimony is presently being collected from Americans who do horse rescue, and who man the front lines of this awful, heartbreaking situation.

This is exactly what America’s horses need — protection and championing.

Let me shout it from the rooftops — Americans do not eat their pets! Pets are family, not food! Horses are considered pets and companion animals, not livestock or meat!

Why are we exporting our family members onto foreign dinner plates? Money, greed, and because the people who do so are counting on Americans to either not know, or not care.

We care! We care about the horses!

Shooting Star today.

All three horses in this photo were saved from slaughter.

(photos by Emily Murdoch)

Want to help? Please write, call or email your Representatives today, and urge them to support the Conyers-Burton Prevention of Equine Cruelty Act of 2008. Your voice is God’s, for these horses.

Want the low down on horse slaughter, and a timeline for anti-slaughter legislation? 

Shooting Star, my own wild mustang saved from slaughter.

 Photo by Emily Murdoch

 The point of this post is a passionate attempt to bring awareness to the plight of America’s wild mustangs and burros. At the moment, 30,000 plus wild mustangs in Bureau of Land Management (BLM) holding facilities are facing euthanasia. As if taking their freedom and stealing their lands isn’t enough, now their very lives hang in the balance.

Sadly, if you are reading this post, you have joined a new club – you, too, are bearing witness to the wild mustang extinction underway in the United States.

When you click on the link below,

http://www.care2.com/c2c/share/detail/804214

it will take you to a wonderful article in support of a famous group of mustangs, Cloud and his herd, along with additional information on wild mustangs. I also added this link to the original post from a few days ago.

Even if you’ve never owned a horse, or don’t care to, these horses are your horses, too, and your children’s and grandchildren’s. A symbol of freedom and majesty in America, they are America’s horses, and they are counting on you.

You may not know it, but tourists from all over the world come to America to see our wild mustangs.

There’d be no America without the horse. The least we can do is protect our wild ones, and in thanks, let them run free.

Singer Sheryl Crow has also joined the fight:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080702/ap_on_en_tv/people_sheryl_crow

If you (like me) would be interested in watching the documentary hosted by Sheryl Crow, Viggo Mortensen and Peter Coyote, or to make a donation to help the cause, please follow this link:

http://www.theamericanwildhorse.com/

From theamericanwildhorse.com:

“This critical documentary film explores BLM’s past management history within the Wild Horse and Burro Program. The film exposes the current massive Western land grab by oil, gas and mining corporations exploiting over 30 million acres of natural Western lands in the areas of New Mexico, Nevada, Colorado and others.

The current excessive land exploitation is affecting all wild life species including the American Wild Horse. To the extent that there are now more wild horses housed in BLM holding facilities than remain on the open range.”

Two million or more wild mustangs used to roam the west. Now, less than approximately 25,000 wild horses remain. 30,000 have already been rounded up into BLM holding pens, where 26 million in tax dollars is spent on their care. These BLM horses face slaughter and euthanasia, and the BLM plans to round up another 4000 or more horses by the fall of 2008.

These horses deserve to run free on the millions of acres of public land designated for America’s wild horses under United States law, as spoken by the people. Those horses presently in holding pens should be set free. 

It seems so simple: stop rounding up our wild horses. Set the wild horses free. Stop using our tax dollars to strip away the freedom and dignity of OUR wild horses, some of which end up at slaughterhouses suffering a horrific end. 

Most importantly, reinstate full protection for OUR wild horses and burros under The Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971.

How many times must we fight this same battle? 

And that’s where we come in, as individuals. Our voices count, and we are all the wild mustangs have to count upon. They need you to use your voice to do what’s right for the horses, when our own government can’t or won’t.

H.R. 249:  To restore the prohibition on the commercial sale and slaughter of wild free-roaming horses and burros.

–Introduced on January 5th, 2007.

–Sponsored by Rep. Nick Rahall [D-WV]

–Status: Passed the House — 89% Democrats supporting, 58% Republicans opposing.

–Last Action:  April 26th, 2007 — Received in the Senate, read twice, and referred to the Committee on Energy and National Resources.