Missy

Missy was a mustang captured by the BLM (Bureau of Land Management) in the Humboldt Mountains of Nevada near Winemeuca. She was 3 years old when I adopted her along with a stud colt yearling. They were both the same height. I figured her diminished size was due to lack of nutrition at an early age, a problem faced by all the horse on the wild ranges because of lack of forage and competition with grazing cattle. The cattle ranchers have little incentive to control their heard sizes. The grazing is free, or virtually, on government land, so the BLM reduces the impact on the land by removing the wild horses periodically.

The horses are considered feral since being released by Spanish conquistadores and those that followed in their footsteps. Though horses existed in North America before the new world conquest, they had gone extinct eons before. The released horses flourished in the area of the West where cattle were only beginning to be introduced, and where buffalo (bison, to correct the song) roamed, moving frequently en masse, leaving the prairies fertile even as they devoured its abundance.

Many feel the operations of the BLM rounding up wild horses and selling them to the public are inhumane. I think it balances out a bit. The methods used are not unlike other ranch operations although the use of helicopters to control the movement of the herd is a bit unique. Some adopted horses surely must go to unscrupulous individuals who find ways to exploit them in ways that I dare not imagine. But, for me it was a way to do something I was lacking in life, and desperately needed. At the time it seemed simple enough, but perhaps my not so youthful (38) ignorance betrayed me on that count.

The requirements for adoption were simple: pre-approval from a vet that would attest to the fact that the would be adopter had a facility capable of holding the horse, with shelter and 400 ft minimum area per horse Also a high enough fence to contain it while being gentled, 5 ft for yearlings and 1 year olds, 6 ft for older horses. Two horses were allowed to be adopted at one time. The fee was a flat $125. The selection is made by lottery. I ended up getting number 97, 97^th in line to select my horse(s).

My brother Bob, a seasoned carpenter helped me erect the barn the weekend before the vet was to show for the inspection and less that a week before I would travel to Bryan to participate in the adopting. A colleague of mine would participate as well with me supplying the truck and trailer to haul the horses and he would split the cost of gas and trailer rental. I ended up getting the short end of the deal, but what the hell.

If you have never been to one of these adoptions, and are interested in experiencing the adoption process by all means go. It is sad to see them, the bays , sorrels, buckskins, grullas, occasional paints corralled up but equally lifting to see the adopters eyeing them to determine which would be suitable for each of them. Some of the horses come to the corral edge and sniff others huddle with their mates, scratching each other with their teeth. The BLM provides plenty of water and alfalfa and keeps the site relatively clean for the 2 or 3 days the adoption occurs.

As time progressed the BLM found that people were more willing to adopt trained horses and they have instituted a regimen where the horses are handled to some extent beforehand, even as far as being saddled and ridden. To account for the difference in training, the BLM now has a bidding type auction, and prices can go to $1000 for the desirable ones (mostly based on color I dare say). And now there is the internet auction! Much fun to check out.

But, my adoption was years before all that. I perused the pens with a list of horses and pencil in hand marking characteristics that now seems as naive as I was. The stock dwindled as adopter after adopter picked one or two of the remaining ones. I got a yearling stud and Missy. I had to wait a day to load and go because all those ahead me were already packing up to leave. I took my colleagues horses to his ranch, half a days round trip from there, and returned to late to find I'd have to wait to get mine.

The next morning I was eager to get them loaded and going. Missy was up to load. They would run her down the chute and slip a halter on her head as she went. This would be the second time she was handled. The first was to get her freeze brand marking - codes of slanted and straight line segments marking where and when she was captured and her 4 digit number. That part may not have gone well because her freeze brand was uneven and very deep, so much so that a good bit of her hair never grew back. It is only suppose to destroy the pigment in the hair follicle. Loading in the trailer didn't go well either. It may have been that the more experienced handlers worked the day before when most of the horses were loaded, but it may have been Missy. She didn't fall for the “halter hanging down I'll just slip my head in” trick around three times. She never lost sight of her goal to be rid of the interlopers that were manipulating what she did. But, she loaded, and her soon to be buddy loaded easily, although in the confusion and angst I don't remember which went in first.

I paused for a bit on this and realized that excluding my non-objective impression would be in error since without my interaction this girl's life here would never have happened. And, remembering the advice of an old horseman, {my interpretation} a horse always has two choices, help him make the right one [make the right thing easy and the wrong thing hard] making him a binary animal I suppose. Another one was make every interaction purposeful – this extends in time to having light hands and confident seat. Oh, crap now I can't get off my stupid self. Coffee.

This brings us to coming home from Bryan, rainy mid-morning, knowing that if this extended to home there would be a terrible ¼ mile mud path to the barn, and there was. We got stuck midway. Bob arrived when I had just got the trailer unstuck. We got to the end of the road and backed the trailer up. We opened the trailer gate and funneled them into the corral. It almost feels that the story ends right here. The act of getting them was over. They were here. And I knew very little of what to do with them. And so my education began in earnest. Kidding. Actually I did what I could, fixed what I screwed up (or called the vet), attend all the clinics I could (I only ever took a horse to one training clinic), and got on with daily living.

I am only learning now how much time it actually takes to own horses. Having never been around horses, let alone mustangs, I had very little experience with them. The VHS video by Bryan Neubert “Wild Horse Handling” was my teething ring, remarkable!. Then came the more dubious training booklets, videos, and autobiographical tell alls. Later books by the greats which had very little substance until you actually knew what you were doing, then you got floored with it. One of my favorites though was the very readable Mark Rashid and his stories of getting in the know with the old man down the road.h

I couldn't do much with Missy over the years. When she first came she and Curio were lumped as one. I didn't know horses and certainly didn't know what to look for different in them. But, Curio was easier to get around, gregarious I used to say, and Missy, well, she wasn't up for that. Curio got more attention during training, he got to be saddled and eventually ridden. Missy got to where I could catch her when she was cornered in her stall. In the open she'd let me walk up to her and touch, pet, pick a foot or two, administer ointment where she'd rubbed her self raw. But, if I approached her with a halter even in the middle of the corral, no dice, she be off on a tear. This is in a tiny corral, 30'x30' square. And she would own every corner of it.

We put Missy down on April 25. She was 29 and a Mustang. People say we gave her a good life. I hope that is true. It is hard to evaluate objectively when you are so involved with something. She was a project horse until my skills were made obviously inferior to her needs. Then she got left alone. When my skills finally developed a bit, I tended to only work with one horse at a time. There were other horses already far enough along to ride, so after the initial failures at gentling her, she got left alone for the most part. When she got a tooth problem in March'15 we spent a bunch of dough to get a hole in her jaw/sinus plugged. But, it didn't work so well and she always had a stinky nasal drip after that. I learned the awful lesson from this that horses' health needs were critical. As the horses started dying; Curio '19, Lucky '20, and Missy '21 I knew that all the money and time I spent on them wasn't enough, but they got by on it anyway.