Wild Horses: An Excellent Defense for a Returned Native Species
January 6, 2012Wild Horses: Carol Walker will be Presenting on Wild Horses at Rocky Mountain Horse Expo
January 24, 2012
The first time I met Echo
I am writing to you today about the BLM’s plans to remove 30 young horses from Cloud’s herd this year. Many of you have already written to the Billings BLM and I thank you very much for doing that. Yesterday The Cloud Foundation posted an urgent plea to help save Cloud’s grandson Echo. If you can write again, before January 20th, please do so.
Echo Running
I was captivated from the moment I first met Echo in the summer of 2010, by his spirit, his playfulness and his beauty. Upon returning to the Pryor Mountains this last summer, one day I watched Echo come over the hill, with the presence and the energy that I found very familiar, and I said, “he is JUST LIKE CLOUD!” My next thought was “Oh no, the BLM is certain to try to take him from his freedom.”
Ginger Filming Echo
This is a video from The Cloud Foundation of Ginger’s first time meeting the colt she named “Cloud’s Echo:”
Echo and his sister Kicks Alot
Boulder moving Echo back to the band
Here is what my friend Ginger Kathrens wrote about Cloud’s Echo, and her plea to write to save Echo from being removed from his home this year:
“I know many of you have already sent in your comments to the BLM regarding the planned permanent removal of 30 young Pryor mustangs, but I’d like you to consider adding a special plea for Echo, Cloud’s little grandson (BLM name is Killian).
In April 2010, Bolder’s black mare, Cascade, gave birth to a pale colt. It was early May before Makendra and I could get up on the Pryors to look for the colt that supposedly looked like Cloud. We spotted Bolder and his family far out on a still snowy, finger-like ridge on Sykes. We could see a little colt lying in the snow under a juniper tree. He looked snow white but, on closer examination, I could see his stockings and the blaze on his face. On the tip of his nose he had a pink snip, just like his great grandpa Raven, his grandpa Cloud, and his father, Bolder.
I named him Echo because he looked so like Cloud. But, I was to learn that his resemblance to Cloud was much more than skin deep. We laughed as he ran and leapt off the ground. Outgoing is an understatement for Echo. In the months that followed I watched him develop into quite a precocious little fellow. He played with yearlings when he was just a foal. As a yearling he would march right up to band stallions. Well, I thought, you’ll become a great band stallion if you don’t killed first. His brave, yearling exploits usually ended with him running back to his mother to nurse!
Echo has unusual genetics (his mother is perhaps the only off-spring of Cloud’s rival, Mateo) and he is the only young palomino on the mountain. He is a powerful, athletic colt who will pass on his strength to his offspring—if he gets a chance.
The removal of Echo will be a personal tragedy for me. Although I believe that Cloud will live for many more years, he will not live forever. When he is gone, we will still have Echo as a physical reminder of the great stallion who inspired me, and so many of you. I ask you to speak up for Cloud’s Echo. Thanks so much for fighting for his freedom!
Echo in the grass this last summer
Here are the email, mail and fax addresses that you can write, asking to leave Cloud’s Echo (BLM name Killian) in his home on the Pryor Mountains – please write by January 20:
email: BLM_MT_Billings_FO@blm.gov fax: 406-896-5281
Mail: Jim Sparks, Field Manager
BLM Billings Field Office
5001 Southgate Drive
Billings, MT 59101
Cloud and his grandson Echo
16 Comments
I will send a letter ASP. It really upsets me that these BLM as so driven to destroy the wild horses. It is a shame we can’t do a world wide sit in and not be moved protest. A human circle around the desert to show these shameful people that we want and respect that the horses run free in there domain.
Cant they figure out another animal to attack? Where is PETA when you really need them?
We need to wake up and realize what animals are made to be reproduced rapidly that are good for us to eat…I wont say anymore. One day it will proven to the world how stupid they have been about what they eat.
What they finance for the farmers to grow that isnt good for us.
Wake up people. Think white meat.
Leave our beautiful animals alone that only want us to love them.
I have written to the above email address to leave Echo alone. 🙂 He is so precious!
First off I am a Horse owner and breeder. I love my horses with all my heart and would never want anything bad to happen to them.
When I see stuff like this that you all put out here to make everyone think that these horses are being abused and or being destroyed. The wild horses will be around for a long time yet to come as long as HUMANS stop breeding and taking up land. If these horses where not taken from the wild and the numbers kept down you would really be upset when they started starving to death because they have no food.
There is only a limited number of acres these animals have to live on. Not only is the horses living on this land but there are also Elk, Deer, Moose, and so on. If you wish to save the horses you must first start by stopping the HUMAN population from growing and taking more land. Second you need to start funds to buy more land for the horses, this land is what they live on and they need more if you don’t want them taken and put into adoption. The more land they have the more that can live on it. The only horses that do not go to adoption and that are not returned to the wild are the ones that would not survive and need to be put to sleep( to keep them from suffering).
Now I have seen some of your Videos and some of the things you think are abuse is not. A rope under the tail of a young foal is used to teach it to lead, instead of pulling on the neck and hurting it permanently. This keeps the foal from throwing itself backwards and breaking a leg, back, or neck. To me that sounds worse. They bring these young foals that fall behind in slowly and gently to keep them safe and from harm. Most will be put up for adoption unless they are to young and the mare can be found. IF the mare is unable to be found the young ones go into rehab homes till they can be adopted out.
I have adopted several Wild Mustangs and have loved everyone of them till the day they passed. These foals and young horses that leave the herd help keep the inbreeding down and help keep the herds strong. They go to good homes and are loved, they adapt quickly to being handled and enjoy their lives with their new families.
As far as Clouds Echo I do believe that it would be nice to see him stay in the wild for you do not see his coloring much any longer. As far as the rest of the 30 they have plans to take, well I see that as a blessing for the youngsters and to the entire wild horse survival.
I am sorry if this upsets some of you but you must consider what would happen if these actions where not taken. I grew up around horses in Wyo and Co. and would hate to see them suffer if nothing was ever done to keep them under control.
I have sent letters, drawn pictures, and recorded songs. I have a petition too and I will not stop fighting for the mustangs until they enjoy the same protections as other animals.
[…] https://www.wildhoofbeats.com/blog/wild-horses-stop-the-blm-from-destroying-clouds-legacy […]
In Australia – where wild horses are culled and the action is supported by ecologists – people look to America as the ideal example of how wild horses live next to mankind as an integral part of nature. Perhaps no longer so. As a Dane, I’m reminded of how some people here wish to get rid of the deers in some of the few remaining forests in Denmark in order to save the windflowers!
The wild horses are a part of America – just as the people who built it and came from outside.
America’s few remaining wild horses shouldn’t be moved around, sent to slaughter houses or castrated – because then will soon cease to exist – and along that, a historic and cultural part of America which people in other parts of the world admire as well.
In these eco conscious times – when people look to nature to find some of their lost values – it doesn’t make any sense at all that things are going in the wrong direction.
America never signed the Kyoto protocols – but at least it can save its mustangs!
I was very touched by the legacy of Echo and his story I posted on my facebook wall for everyone to please write letters. It saddens me so to wonder why humans are repeadly inhuman and selfish. All wild horses deserve to live as they are intended- wild & free. When we will figure out their early demise should never be our convinent choosing. I have my own rescue throughbreds and I couldn’t imagine how the love and respect they govern simply by their presence alone would ever be denied. I feel this same awe and respect when I watch Echo. May his life be spared and he live in freedom and safety. Susan
I hope the BLM will wise up and stop being such a toady to commercial interests. Perhaps we would need to monitor each and every wild horse-involved BLM employee to ensure that person’s fitness to work with any wild animal. The animals’ main problem is human greed and exploitation. Hasn’t there been enough suffering? There is plenty of land available for these horses to live on; we need to restrict the humans and their environment-destroying grazing animals. Filing a complaint about each and every idiotic BLM employee and making sure it is covered in the news media might be effective.
THIS MAKES ME SICK. STOP THE BLM FROM DESTROYING CLOUD’S LEAGACY. THESE WILD ANIMALS HAVE AS MUCH RIGHT TO BE HERE AS HUMANS. THEY TO ARE PARTY OF GOD’S CREATION.
I THINK WE SHOULD DROP ONE OF THESE BLM PEOPLE IN THE DESERT, AND CHASE THEM FOR 20 MILES REALLY HARD, THEN WHEN THEY GET SO EXCOUSTED THAT THEY CANT GO NO MORE, LETS RAM THEM IN THE ASS WITH THE HILLACOPTER BLADED. AND SHUVE THEM INTO A PEN WITH 100 OTHER BLM ASS HOLES AND SEE HOW THEY FEEL.
what is the status of the 30 young horses and echo?
Nothing has changed. The BLM is still planning to remove the 30 young horses this year through bait and water trapping and has made no promises about “specific horses.”
Carol I hate to here that the pryor group is still under the gun so to speak. What is it that can be done now?
Keep your eyes open for alerts from the Cloud Foundation and from http://www.WildHoofbeats.com. We will keep you posted as things develop this summer with the BLM and the Pryors herd.
way can,t anything just be free, these horse,s have hearts an faMILY YET there right are talking away with the wind they run in , let them run free!