Friday, July 06, 2012

Write me to Freedom: plea from fictional foal's real twin

Dear Readers, This book cover shows Tempest, daughter of the Phantom Stallion and Dark Sunshine. In my stories, she lives in captivity despite her mustang heritage, but her welcome to the world was marked by quiet care, full-time nuzzling, milk from her mother and love. This photo by Laura Leigh, shows a tiny mustang foal who looks a lot like Tempest. Range-born, her peace lasted until predator helicopters stampeded her on new hooves, with her terrified herd, to a place where she was separated from her mother, slammed into a noisy truck with other bewildered babies and taken to one corral after another. Now, she is at BLM's Palomino Valley wild horse corrals, where, according to BLM records, 3 foals have been found dead in their pens. Will this foal survive to remember the range? If I could, I'd write open the gates to freedom for her and the other Jackson Mountain mustangs.

Labels: BLM, Jackson Mountain roundup, Palomino Valley, RainDance, Tempest, wild foals

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Posted by Terri Farley @ 9:18 AM   0 comments

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Wednesday, March 23, 2011

WILD FOAL WATCH


all photos by Karen Hopple

Dear Readers,
Visitors to the Bureau of Land Management's Palomino Valley hoped to see spring foals. They did, and here's how one described the wild horse corrals, "...filthy, with standing water from the storm that smelled like cesspools. The horses were a mess, covered with mud and feces...The strangles is spreading... heard coughs in every area of the center."
Disheartened by the condition of the captive horses, the visitors drove out of town to see how mustangs on their own had weathered the high desert storms.
The free-roaming horses were doing just fine. Foals nursed, studied the two-legged newcomers and hopped like bunnies over sage brush.
Back at Palomino Valley, the captive foals huddled low in the mud, trying to stay alive.






WHY?
Free-roaming mustangs sought natural shelter and higher ground away from rain run-off. The only shelter at Palomino Valley covers hay bales and a work area where stallions are castrated. In the corrals, there is no shelter and BLM failed to use on-site trucks and bulldozers to cover even the muddiest areas, so that newborns could nap on dry dirt.

I've been accused of cruelty because I favor mustangs running free -- searching out their own food, shelter and safety.
Take a look at these photos and judge for yourself which horses are happier.
Next, take action. Use this simple form to tell BLM this is not the way you want millions of tax dollars spent. It's easy, just : click here to say LET 'EM RUN!


all photos by Karen Hopple

Labels: BLM, Palomino Valley, shelter in captivity, weather conditions, wild foals

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Posted by Terri Farley @ 3:42 PM   1 comments

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