Partnership | Spring Creek Basin Mustangs

4CBCH annual wild horse count

30 05 2014

On May 17, members of the Four Corners Back Country Horsemen came to Spring Creek Basin for their annual wild horse count. This was their 14th year!

This is an important, ongoing partnership between 4CBCH and BLM. In addition to counting mustangs in Spring Creek Basin and getting an idea of the makeup of bands, members traditionally complete a work project during the weekend. Previous projects have included fence maintenance, packing out old wire and weed surveys. The last couple of years, the Forest Service has sent a weed-spraying crew to the basin to spray some of the locations we’ve surveyed.

In years past, horseless members of the group would drive to the base of Round Top and hike to the summit, then use binoculars and spotting scopes to search for mustangs. Radio communication between horseback groups and the hikers would help with locations and identifications. Now, we have horseback folks and folks who take “horseless carriages” around the loop road in the basin to look for horses, completing projects on the way.

Again this year, we surveyed ponds for the presence of knapweed and musk thistle. Fortunately, we found little of either type of weed at all the locations we checked.

Between the riders and the drivers, we saw almost all the horses! And a few of the bands put on a show by being in close proximity to each other, which was great for everyone to see so many of our mustangs!

Pat (president of 4CBCH) and Frank Amthor were the weekend’s leaders, as usual, and as always, they hosted a wonderful event full of horses, stories of past mustang sightings and terrific food. A highlight this year was meeting a Spring Creek Basin mustang, Tipi (spelling?), adopted in 2005. He reminded me completely of Bruiser – minus the spots!

Lisa and her son, Travis, lead the way into the basin from the campsite off the Disappointment Road. Travis has attended most counts since he was 6 years old!

Eva and her Spring Creek Basin mustang, Tipi. (Yes, the gnats are out!)

Eva’s husband, Adrian, also rode a mustang, Reno. They recently adopted a third mustang. These are true mustang supporters!

Cathy is 4CBCH’s vice president; this was her first count. Her lovely mom, Millie, came from California and joined us to see mustangs from the vehicles.

This also was the first count for Cindy and her daughter.

Daughter Mikayla (sp?) and her little mare Sapphira made a great pair.

Lisa is a past 4CBCH president, and she has attended numerous counts – and has lots of great stories about the mustangs they’ve encountered!

As noted, Travis has been coming to Spring Creek Basin since he was 6. He’s now 20!

Bob is another past 4CBCH president who has ridden in the basin several times. He also has packed old wire out using his horses.

Kat is one of our NMA/CO board members, and this was her first count. It probably won’t be her last!

Thank you to all involved for your camaraderie and super enthusiasm for our Spring Creek Basin mustangs! We’ll see you next spring!

Comments : 7 Comments »

Categories : Advocacy, Disappointment Valley, Disappointment Wild Bunch Partners, Four Corners Back Country Horsemen, National Mustang Association/CO, Partnership, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Work projects

Alternative spring break – day 2

27 03 2014

Not only are these University of Missouri students good workers, they’re good luck!

They arrived with smiles and good cheer and high energy, and we know why.

Chalen was the group leader for the second year this year. Last year, rumor had it that Chalen was up at 4 at least one morning (!) to cook breakfast for his crew. Kyla confirmed that while most UM alternative spring break groups are eating Cheerios and granola for breakfast and scrounging dinner on their own, Chalen is making sure his charges not only eat, they eat well! Kathe Hayes, with San Juan Mountains Association, sets up a couple of dinners for the students during the week each year, but I have it on good authority that the kids dined on steaks last night, courtesy of Chef Chalen. Niiiiice! (They deserve it!)

Wednesday’s stretch of fence work was fairly short, especially compared with Tuesday’s stretch. The goal was to finish relatively early, then take the students to the interior of Spring Creek Basin to see the reason for the work: the mustangs!

Tuesday’s work ended at a little arroyo that flows (when it rains) under the fence. The approach is fairly flat, but the north side is steep – and shaley (read: slippery). Tuesday, students built an H-brace on the flat side.

Wednesday, students ran wire up the steep slope to a newly-built H-brace (pictured is the brace built Tuesday). Students set up an impromptu relay system while carrying staves up the hill. Jake to Kyla in front, Sam to Dustin below, Casey and Chase bringing up the rear. It worked!

Forest Service firefighters Kevin and Chris helped with the work Wednesday. Kyla photobombed. Again. 🙂

From there, students removed wire and ran new wire to the next stop – a big juniper that students padded with 2-by-4s (to protect it from wire). This photo actually shows the female fence leadership in place Wednesday: Tif, Kathe and MK. They tied off the second strand of wire (you can see the first, bottom strand already in place and tight). Go, girls!

Removed wire: Check.

Ran new wire, four strands: Check. MK and Tom, both with San Juan Mountains Association, ran the last strand of wire from the padded tree to the H-brace while Grace, back right, helps channel the wire.

Dug post holes and built another H-brace: Check (oh yeah, and they carried these two thick, treated posts from the road just for this brace, at the top of the steep arroyo hill, to anchor the rest of the fence). Check, check! Here’s Chalen tightening the cross wires to strengthen the brace and Chris pounding in a spike (in a hole drilled earlier by Kevin) to secure the post to the cross piece.

Ran wire up the steep arroyo hill to then tighten and attach to T-posts: Check and check. Kevin carries the wire up the hill while Tif, Chris and Kyla tie it off at the H-brace below.

One more to show the steepness of the hill. Thank goodness it was just a short stretch!

Installed staves: Check. Mark, Sophia and Kyla made quick work of it.

Stopped for lunch: Check! 🙂

Here’s a shot of MK standing right in the bottom of the little arroyo while she attaches a stave to the wires. Tom and Chase are just up the slope. It’s just a narrow little thing, as you can see from the edge of the H-brace at the right edge of the photo.

And one more project to finish off the whole deal: Dustin, Chase and Tom installed a “dead person.” Back story: Most fence-building crews call these a “dead man” – “dead men”? But being the modern folks we are, and not to exclude an entire gender, in the last couple of years, with fence-building guru Tom Kelly – recently retired from the Forest Service – we started calling them “dead persons.” We’re innovative like that. This old tree trunk fit the bill perfectly; it will block the gap below the wire, and it will swing with any seasonal flows that wash through the arroyo.

Fairly early in the work, we had a couple of visitors:

Kevin Heiner with Southwest Conservation Corps brought his daughter, Mariah, to check a potential work project for one of his crews next year in Spring Creek Basin. Kathe Hayes with San Juan Mountains Association is trying to raise funds to bring a crew here to tackle a VERY steep – and long – hill coming up on the fence line. The hope is that the SCC crew might work at the same time as next year’s alternative spring break crew from Mizzou in order to add another dimension to the partnership.

While they were here, Kevin and his “executive director” also talked to students (Casey, Sophia, Mark, Chase and Grace pictured) about internship opportunities. Baby Mariah looks like a future outdoorswoman who will complete numerous projects on our public lands, doesn’t she?

Grand finale: Tif and Kathe follow the students to the vehicles after two days of work well done. How awesome is that fence??

Wednesday’s weather was quite a bit different than Tuesday’s: Somewhat cloudy, windy, cooler. Grey skies greeted us as we drove east with the idea to drive into the basin to look for mustangs to show the students. We saw Ty’s band at a distance from the road. By the time we got to Road K20E, we decided that the grey we were seeing was dust, not rain, so in we went. Chrome’s band delighted us by being a little closer to view!

And here’s where the good luck comes in. While it cut short our potential viewing of wild horses, the wind that stirred the dust also brought rain. Just a little. Enough to make the road the tiniest bit tacky. That’s more than we’ve had for weeks. Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiice!

So, dear students, thank you, thank you again, from all of us, on behalf of our mustangs – which belong to all of you, too! Please enjoy the rest of your stay – Sand Canyon today? Travel safely back to Missouri. Come back and see us! We so appreciate all your hard work!

Back row from left: Mark, Kathe, Chalen, Chase, Casey, Dustin and Sam. Front row from left: Damon, Grace, Sophia, Tif, Jake and Kyla.

Thanks. 🙂 You all rock!

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Categories : Advocacy, alternative spring break, Director's Challenge, Disappointment Valley, Education, Fence work, McKenna Peak Wilderness Study Area, Partnership, San Juan Mountains Association, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Work projects

Alternative spring break – 2014

26 03 2014

We had sunshine. We had short sleeves. We had the flush of sunburn on winter-white arms and faces. We had, uh, shale?

No beaches, but we had hard workers and fantastic attitudes. As usual, Mizzou sent some – 10 – excellent students to continue the fence-rebuilding project on Spring Creek Basin’s southeastern fence line as part of alternative spring break. Leader Chalen said the number of groups working this spring break is 52 – up from 38 last year. If all you’ve heard about the next generation is a not-so-hearty endorsement, these students made myth of such statements.

They ranged from freshmen to seniors, from undecided majors to finance, to animal science/pre-vet to fisheries and wildlife, to journalism.

Every year, we’re grateful and excited to welcome them, and every year, a new group of students humbles us with their willingness to work on public lands very far from their Missouri campus.

The sweatshirts didn’t last long. It was a gorgeous day in Disappointment Valley, and we were down to T-shirts in no time at all. Right to left: Grace, Sam, Chase, Sophia, Casey and Kyla.

BLM range specialist and former herd manager Mike Jensen helps Mizzou student Jake set a cross piece into an H-brace at the start of the project.

Students Chase, left, and Mark attach boards to a tree to protect it from wire fence strands biting into it. This is just up the line from the H-brace Mike and Jake are working on in the previous pic.

Student leader Chalen – who also was last year’s group leader – drew the short straw in digging this post hole with Sam. See all that rock? See the tamp bar? The only other tool they used was a post-hole digger.

Same post hole – post in! Sam, right, tamps it in while Chalen and fellow student Sophia admire the work.

MK Thompson with San Juan Mountains Association carries out old wire strands that the students removed and rolled. A local Girl Scouts troop will pick up the old wire to recycle and earn some money! How about that for both recycling and partnership among local groups?

Herd manager Damon Corley pounded his fair share of T-posts. Part of the fence line was relocated to a straighter route, so posts were lifted out and reused or replaced. The lower wire strand was left in place temporarily to help align the new posts.

Sorry, Dustin! While he was hard at work with a shorty tamp bar, Kyla bombed his photo – but gave his hard work an enthusiastic thumbs-up! They and Casey (whose foot appears at bottom left) – and Sophia helped, too – dug two holes for an H-brace at the bottom of this steep little arroyo toward the end of the day’s work project.

Sophia, right, and Kyla set the cross piece into the notches of the posts they dug holes to place. Kathe Hayes, mastermind of the alternative spring break week for many, many years (did I hear 17 years, Kathe??), supervises.

The Forest Service’s Tom Rice helps Dustin drill a hole for a spike to secure the soon-to-be-upright juniper post to the cross piece, as seen in the previous pic. Remember, in McKenna Peak Wilderness Study Area, no mechanized tools are allowed.

On this end of the brace, Dustin hammers home the spike while Casey steadies the cross piece.

NMA/CO executive director and volunteer Tif attaches a clip to a T-post to secure a wire strand. Only the top strand to go! The top and bottom strands are smooth twisted wire, and the the middle strands are barbed.

We’re using wildlife-friendly wire spacing on this entire line (I think that’s usual now for Forest Service and BLM fences). Jake holds one of the measuring sticks used by students to attach the wires at the right spacing while Casey attaches a strand to the T-post with a metal clip.

The students were so “on the ball” that hardly had a wire strand been tightened and tied off at the H-brace than they were attaching the strands to posts and staves to wire. Wow, they were fast! Some of the students have fence-building experience, but most don’t. Quick learners, these college students!

This shot is a little out of order, but it’s a good contrast to the previous pic, which shows the nearly-finished fence. In this pic, taken from about halfway up the steep bank of the arroyo at the end of the day’s work section, you can see Kyla and Tom drilling a hole in one of the juniper H-brace posts while Dustin, Kathe, Casey and Sophia have set their post and are getting ready to tamp dirt in around it. When the H-brace is completed, wire will be strung – from the bottom wire up – clips will be placed, staves will be set, and we’ll call it a day well spent!

One of the last things to do was to dig a hole and place this tall, stout juniper post (cut Saturday during work prep) about midway up that steep arroyo bank. Sophia, Grace and Damon carried it to its place, and they and other students dug the hole and placed it and tamped it steady before we hit the trail for the trucks …

… where we took the obligatory group shot. Back row from left: Damon, Mike, Kyla, Sophia, Dustin, Casey, Chase, Grace, Chalen, Sam, Mark and Jake. Front row from left: Tom, Connie, Kathe, Tif and MK.

We really can’t say “thank you” too many times. Mike, Tom and Connie won’t be joining us for the second day of work, but the students, Kathe, Tif and MK will return along with a couple of wildland firefighters Kathe ~~conned~~ encouraged to come.

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Categories : Advocacy, alternative spring break, Disappointment Valley, Education, Fence work, McKenna Peak Wilderness Study Area, National Mustang Association/CO, Partnership, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, unnamed promontory, Work projects

Work prep

24 03 2014

It’s that time of year again: spring. And March in Spring Creek Basin means a couple of things: We’re already bemoaning the dry forecast, and we’re looking forward to the arrival of University of Missouri students who come for alternative spring break. “Alternative” because these kids don’t ditch the books for sun, sand and booze. Instead, they raise money to send themselves from Columbia, Missouri, to Southwest Colorado, here to complete work projects on public lands. And they go home with terrific memories – as opposed to (possibly?) no memory at all.

Alternative spring break is next week – Tuesday and Wednesday in Spring Creek Basin; Monday and Thursday on other public lands, including Sand Canyon, in Canyons of the Ancients National Monument. For more than a decade, Kathe Hayes with San Juan Mountains Association has coordinated projects for the students. Much work goes into the actual work, and this weekend was no exception. She put together a volunteer crew, which included nearly every member of a local family, and they did a little prep work for the continuing project to rebuild the basin’s southeastern boundary fence.

The day started with a pickup bed full of these: wooden fence staves. This is the third year we’ve worked on this stretch of fence line, and the starting point gets farther and farther away from the road. Our task was to carry these staves to this year’s starting point. The students will have plenty of materials and tools to haul in next week.

Volunteers Chris and Keith also carried in more wire.

Photobombers and excellent workers Madison and Allison are cousins. They’re 12 and 11 years old, respectively, and we couldn’t have completed the project without them! They made numerous trips up and down “the hill” carrying staves – a distance of at least half a mile. These future alternative spring breakers come from a family of volunteers. We’re so proud of them!

Long-time mustang advocate and volunteer Tif carries a double load of staves.

Kathe Hayes, volunteer coordinator for SJMA, is our fearless leader. She shepherds the students while they’re here and makes everything run smoothly long before they ever arrive.

Curly and Keith use a two-person saw to cut a small juniper to use as a post or brace while Chris pushes to reduce drag on the saw. This part of Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area also is McKenna Peak Wilderness Study Area – no motorized vehicles allowed. No chainsaws, either.

Lyn does everything with a smile! Like she said, no other group may laugh as much as this one. All work should be this fun!

Wife and husband Heather and Chris worked with Keith to cut the top off a future post.

Top row, left to right: Chris, Heather, Lyn, Madison and Curly. Bottom, left to right: Allison, Tif, Kathe and Keith. It’s worth noting that both Tif and Keith are adopters of Spring Creek Basin mustangs. All of them make up a great group of folks working for the benefit of our wild horses. 🙂 Thanks so much!

Comments : 4 Comments »

Categories : alternative spring break, Fence work, McKenna Peak Wilderness Study Area, Partnership, San Juan Mountains Association, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Work projects

Water for mustangs

30 06 2013

Not elephants. Although, as this drought continues, it’s beginning to look a lot like the sere plains of Africa out here.

I call this photo “La Sals, Imagination”:

Whaddya mean you can’t see the mountains … through the smoke? Use your imagination. 🙂 Although Grey/Traveler’s band seems to also be looking for the mountains, they were watching Chrome’s band walking toward them on their way to the water catchment.

Smoke from this fire – way, way, way east of here – apparently has drifted into New Mexico then blown back north and west into Colorado. But it’s not the only fire burning in the region.

Earlier, Grey/Traveler’s band had been drinking at the water catchment’s trough:

Maia, clearly at her leisure, worried me; I thought the worst, that the storage tank had drained and the trough was empty, and she was waiting for someone to come fill it, darnit!

Not to fear.

The trough was full of water. Whew. (The big green tank is the storage tank that holds water from either rain or snow or direct-fill.)

Because of the drought, BLM has been checking to ensure that the horses have enough water sources, and we – National Mustang Association/Colorado – recently got the green light to deliver a load of water – 4,000 gallons – to the catchment tank. Donors and silent-auction-item buyers at the Pati Temple Memorial Benefit Bash, this is the first use of the money you helped us raise! Interestingly, the area of the catchment is used primarily by Chrome’s band and rarely by other bands. But some other bands have started to find the water – and the good forage in this area. Water is a good way to disperse the horses’ grazing and get them to use under-used areas.

Chrome’s band at the catchment trough, drinking clean water. This is an important water source because it’s the only clean source of water in the basin. The others are high in alkalinity and salt because of the basin’s soils. The dusky, hazy color cast is because of the smoke.

The temperature hit 110 degrees Friday. On Thursday, the high was 108. Smoke, wind, heat, zero moisture = ugh.

Cecil Foster, owner of Foster’s Water, to the rescue.

The storage tank is about 15 feet tall, so Cecil brings his ladder to access the hatch at the top. At right is the hose from his water truck.

Seen here are his water truck, the hose to the tank and the water trough in the background at right.

Thanks, Cecil! He also donated a load of water for the benefit’s silent auction. Cecil is a super nice man, and a friend of the mustangs of Spring Creek Basin.

Thank you, NMA/CO, for the delivery of water to the mustangs!

Comments : 10 Comments »

Categories : Advocacy, Alegre, Chrome, Corona, Disappointment Valley, Grey, Houdini, Kwana, La Sal Mountains, Maia, Mustangs, National Mustang Association/CO, Partnership, Pati Temple, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Terra, Water, Water catchment, Wildfire

National Academy of Sciences report on BLM’s management of wild horses and burros

7 06 2013

It’s out. The National Academy of Sciences has completed its report about wild horses and burros, and BLM’s management of them.

Some links to reports about the study:

“New report offers science-based strategies for management of Western free-ranging horses and burros; ‘business-as-usual’ practices will be increasingly expensive and unproductive for BLM”: http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=13511

Th National Academy of Sciences link (above) includes a link to the brief summary of the report: http://dels.nas.edu/resources/static-assets/materials-based-on-reports/reports-in-brief/wild-horses-report-brief-final.pdf

*** Updated to add this link, by the always-thought-provoking Andrew Cohen of The Atlantic: http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/06/after-wild-horse-report-jewell-faces-first-moment-of-truth-at-interior/276545/

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/independent-panel-readies-review-blm-mustangs

http://www.returntofreedom.org/national-coalition-calls-on-interior-secretary-to-halt-wild-horse-roundups-in-wake-of-scathing-independent-report/

http://m.sltrib.com/sltrib/mobile3/56416617-219/horse-report-wild-horses.html.csp

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/06/05/horse-burro-blm-nrc/2388947/

http://hsus.typepad.com/wayne/2013/06/nrc-gets-it-right-in-panning-blm-wild-horse-program.html

Practically speaking, what will it mean? Time will tell.

Comments : 7 Comments »

Categories : Advocacy, Apollo, Education, Fertility control, Killian, Mustangs, Partnership, PZP, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Tenaz, Wild horses in the news

Pati Temple Memorial Benefit Bash

5 06 2013

Monday’s event to honor the National Mustang Association, Colorado chapter’s Pati Temple was a great success! A huge, heart-felt thank you to all the friends and family of Pati – and David – Temple who donated items to the silent auction and/or attended the bash. Your attendance and contributions go a long way toward helping us continue our advocacy on behalf of our Spring Creek Basin mustangs!

Durango photographer Claude Steelman donated a print of his outstanding photo of our handsome Traveler (left) and two of his photography books, including Wildshots, pictured. Bayfield artist Sarah Rose donated a print of her beautiful painting of Spring Creek Basin’s Aspen, right.

NMA/CO board member Karen Keene Day donated this stunning painting of Traveler. It’s based on a photo she took of him and his band in 2004.

Susan Thomas and NMA/CO board member Nancy Schaufele (in purple) check out silent auction items.

Nancy marks the final bids at the end of the silent auction. Kennebec Cafe, one of Pati’s favorite restaurants, provided a really beautiful setting for our event; many thanks for the great food and wonderful setup!

Kathe Hayes with San Juan Mountains Association shows off Alice Billings’ donated painting of Temple, wild filly in Spring Creek Basin named in honor of Pati and David. Kathe was the high bidder on the painting!

In addition to Nancy and Karen, many thanks to NMA/CO board members Tif Rodriguez and Lynda Larsen – and, always, David Temple – as well as our event planner, Tina Roth, for making this such a memorable and successful event in Pati’s memory.

Pati was an exceptional woman who fought for the well-being of animals and people whenever she saw a wrong. We think she would have loved this party. The worst part of it was that she wasn’t there to enjoy it with us.

Comments : 3 Comments »

Categories : Advocacy, Education, National Mustang Association/CO, Partnership, Pati Temple, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Work projects

How does your donation to NMA/CO help the Spring Creek Basin mustangs?

28 05 2013

This question was asked recently, and answering it gives me another chance to let local folks know about the Pati Temple Memorial Benefit Bash we will hold next week, Monday, June 3, at the Kennebec Cafe in Hesperus, Colo. Follow that link for the details and to purchase tickets if you haven’t and plan to attend.

Now, on to an answer(s) to the question!

First, see this page, compiled last year by Pati, for a list of the National Mustang Association, Colorado chapter’s past accomplishments: http://www.nationalmustangassociationcolorado.org/nmaco-accomplishments.html

As it says, NMA/CO has spent nearly $100,000 to date on projects that directly benefit the mustangs of Spring Creek Basin! We rarely do fundraisers, relying mostly on memberships and donations. Administrative expenses are low, mostly what we put toward mailing newsletters. We had T-shirts and hats printed for the adoption in 2011, and we’ll soon have a link to purchase them through the website.

Fence repair and maintenance is ongoing through volunteer labor. As a result of their partnership with us as part of Disappointment Wild Bunch Partners, BLM received $25,000 last year through the Director’s Challenge grant, which purchased some materials to be used in a project on the basin’s southeastern boundary line (read about alternative spring break and University of Missouri students’ work here – https://springcreekwild.wordpress.com/2013/03/26/alternative-spring-break-day-1/ – and here – https://springcreekwild.wordpress.com/2013/03/27/12368/). I fix fences as needed while I’m in the basin doing documentation. Sometimes we use materials provided by BLM, other times by ourselves.

We also are continually encouraging BLM to look at water-enhancement projects. More than a decade ago, NMA/CO paid for a water catchment to be built in Spring Creek Basin, and it supplies the mustangs’ only clean source of water (all others being extremely alkaline, at least). We have a signed agreement from about 12 or 13 years ago with BLM to construct at least one more catchment, but it has never been built. I think the catchment cost about $10,000. Several years ago, we also started talking to BLM about water guzzlers (such as those installed on Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Range) to add to the horses’ quality of water. Those are about $8,000-plus. NMA/CO also has purchased parts for the catchment’s troughs, which work on floats.

NMA/CO contributes funds to combat noxious/invasive weeds in Spring Creek Basin (knapweed, tamarisk, musk thistle, etc.).

A decade or more ago, NMA/CO was able to purchase the cattle AUMs from one of the two ranchers who held permits in Spring Creek Basin. With the help of the National Mustang Association, we were able to retire those AUMs permanently. In the process, BLM conducted a grazing EA (not sure the exact reference) and then drastically reduced the remaining AUMs and changed the timing to dormant-season grazing only – Dec. 1 through Feb. 28. For the last several years, NMA/CO has been trying to buy or trade for the permit in Spring Creek Basin to also retire those AUMs, with the goal of no cattle grazing in the basin. As BLM itself says, managing wild horses is easier when the mustangs are the priority. The permittee is willing, so we are trying to work with BLM to accomplish this goal.

NMA/CO also is asking BLM to consider the use of bait trapping in the basin, instead of helicopter-driven roundups to complement the use of fertility control. We submitted a proposal for a program using native PZP that was implemented at the 2011 roundup. To bait trap requires the use of a facility in which to hold horses as they are trapped. This facility requires a chute and pens. We recently purchase a chute ($18,000) with donated funds from the National Mustang Association (of which we are a chapter). Our primary goal in fundraising currently is to purchase the required infrastructure for this facility so BLM won’t have only the option of using a helicopter and won’t need to transport one or two horses at a time – as they’re trapped – to Canon City, which is full, as most/all of BLM’s facilities seem to be. NOTE: NO ROUNDUP CURRENTLY IS PLANNED FOR SPRING CREEK BASIN. We are planning this now to have the facility in place so a future EA can include it in the planning process. As BLM said in 2011, bait trapping was not considered because it wasn’t in the EA. It wasn’t in the EA because no facility was available. However, note that we started asking specifically for bait trapping in 2008.

Enhancing water sources, retiring the remaining cattle AUMs, establishing a fertility control program and making bait trapping the priority for roundups all were Pati Temple’s goals for the Spring Creek Basin herd. In addition to the accomplishments made for the mustangs during Pati’s lifetime, we plan to accomplish these goals in her honor.

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Categories : Advocacy, alternative spring break, Director's Challenge, Disappointment Wild Bunch Partners, Education, Fence work, Fertility control, Four Corners Back Country Horsemen, Mesa Verde Back Country Horsemen, Mustangs, National Mustang Association/CO, Partnership, Pati Temple, PZP, Roundup, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Water, Water catchment, Work projects

La Fragua bachelors

5 05 2013

These bachelors were in an area called La Fragua Canyon (or very close). Family bands and at least one lone bachelor (Anthony’s “favorite” bay stallion!) also were in the area.

I was intrigued by the “white” horses with a few bands. They seemed young to be so completely “greyed out.” So I walked out into this sage flat to get a better look … and I discovered that the “white” horses actually are pintos.

Do you see the darker shading on his cheek? Pink skin on his muzzle. Black hairs in the middle of his tail.

This side, no pigment on his face.

This made me realize in a flash that the “grey” pinto stallion isn’t grey at all. I’m not sure what you’d call this pattern? The white gene clearly is dominant over the dark/black color gene? (**Update: See the comments for a website link to more color info. This color pattern likely is “sabino white” or sabino “maximum white.”)

Of all the horses we saw – 105 – only one looked like a true grey. Quite a difference from grey-dominated Spring Creek Basin.

Colorwise, the Jicarilla has many bays (all shades), sorrels (at least one handsome boy I’d call a liver chestnut) and blacks, some duns and buckskins and palominos. Lots of pintos.

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Categories : Advocacy, Carson National Forest, Education, Jicarilla Wild Horse Territory, Mustangs, New Mexico, Partnership

Inclusive exclosure

4 05 2013

Sean Kelly, wild horse coordinator for the Carson National Forest’s Jicarilla and Jarita Mesa wild horse territories, points out plant usage to New Mexico volunteer Tyler Sharpe while Farmington BLM rangeland management specialist Jeff Tafoya talks to volunteer and advocate Barb Kiiper with the Jicarilla Mustang Heritage Alliance at one of the exclosures in Spring Creek Basin during our tour this week. There are five of these in the basin, as well as some smaller “cages.” They fence off a small section of land so range folks can determine impacts of grazing – and not.

I need about 13 more hours in the day to get to more photos from these tour swaps – which were fantastic! We met lots of people and learned some of the challenges our respective herds face. The New Mexico herds – BLM and Forest Service – apparently are way over AML. They’re seeing effects on both the horses’ condition and condition of the ranges because of it. The Jicarilla and Carracas Mesa ranges are rugged, and that’s being gentle. They need to remove hundreds of horses, but BLM’s Canon City short-term holding facility can’t take them – no room at the inn. They are removing some horses periodically; the Jicarilla Mustang Heritage Alliance recently adopted four to train and adopt to permanent homes. The biggest question they all seem to face is this: They know a roundup and removal of many, many horses is needed, but what to do with all those horses?

There’s apparently quite a bit of controversy around the removal of horses there to get to a balanced herd population, and I’ll be the first to admit I don’t know or understand all the details. To start the learning process was one of the goals of this tour swap. And it was good to meet the knowledgeable, caring folks on the front lines and hear their concerns and challenges.

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Categories : Advocacy, Carson National Forest, Education, Jicarilla Wild Horse Territory, Mustangs, Partnership, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area

Spring Creek Basin Mustangs