Category Archives: Wild Horse Sources

The BLM Agrees to Support Madeleine Pickens’ Wild Horse Eco-Sanctuary

“A Dream Come True!”

Dear Our Fabulous Wild Horse Supporters,
We are SO excited to FINALLY announce the best news we have had to share with you in over 2 1/2 years!

OUR MUSTANGS ARE GETTING THEIR SANCTUARY AND HAVE THE BLM’S SUPPORT!

Over the past three days, I have been to meetings in Sacramento and again in Washington, DC.  I’ve met with BLM Director, Bob Abbey, and Deputy Director, Mike Pool, along with the Wild Horse and Burro team. The BLM has officially agreed to support going forward with the development of the wild horse Eco-sanctuary for the horses in holding! Also in DC, I met with Congressman Jim Moran, who had already given his blessing, but is submitting legislation to members of Congress on behalf of these wild mustangs. We are so thankful to him and his staff for their efforts on the wild horse and burro issue. All the meetings were fabulous and we could not be happier about the news!

Continue reading The BLM Agrees to Support Madeleine Pickens’ Wild Horse Eco-Sanctuary

New Freedom Fund Foal!

Trigger's mare Evita foaled in August and we've named the newest member of the Freedom Fund bands "Pistol".

Introducing Pistol

One year ago this week the BLM roundup of Cloud’s herd began and 57 wild horses in Cloud’s herd lost what they value most: their freedom and their families. It was only with your help and immediate action that people working with the Cloud Foundation were able to adopt and purchase four family bands after the disastrous roundup. Because of your generosity, Pistol lives with both his mother and his father – growing up as close to wild as possible.

I first filmed Pistol’s father, Trigger, when he was just a few days old for the National Geographic special “Horses”, so it was very special to meet Pistol at this age – he looks very much like his father did! Trigger is the only offspring of the stallion, Challenger, who was struck and killed by lightning in 1999, as portrayed in Cloud: Wild Stallion of the Rockies. With such a small herd now remaining in the wild, the removal of Trigger and his band is especially detrimental to the unique Spanish genetics of the Pryor Mountain herd.

It is my hope that Pistol and his sister will be allowed to return to the wild someday and continue Challenger and Trigger’s legacy.

Many Thanks for your continued support.

Happy Trails,
Ginger

Please continue to support the Freedom Fund horses with your tax-deductible donations. Click here to learn more.

Join the Cloud Foundation on Facebook, Twitter & visit our ever-expanding website & the TCF blog for more news, action alerts, photos & event postings!

Thank you for your continued support!

The Cloud Foundation

107 South 7th St

Colorado Springs, CO 80905

719-633-3842

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The Public Has Spoken – Our Pony Express Goal Has Been Exceeded!

Dear Supporters,

Wow! What amazing supporters we have! On August 1st, we gave you a goal of 20,000 letters to take with us for our Pony Express Mustang Delivery to Washington. Our deadline was set for September 1st.

We just wanted to let you know that we have completely blown our goal out of the water with the overwhelming response from so many wild horse supporters! Just over this past weekend, we received 7,234 letters from so many of you, which brings our current count to 26, 995!

*Keep the letters coming and each of you can stand as a voice for each individual mustang that has been rounded up by the Bureau of Land Management and the ones left on the range. We are their voices, their spokespeople.

Continue reading The Public Has Spoken – Our Pony Express Goal Has Been Exceeded!

PZP in the Pryors

Bolder & Texas, a ten-year-old mare who has foaled only once, PZP'd again last fall in the roundup

Comments on BLM’s Plan to Extend Infertility Drug Use through 2015 Due by September 16th

Dear Cloud Supporters;

Mark your calendars. Comments regarding a five-year plan to continue the use of Porcine Zona Pellucida (PZP) infertility drugs on Pryor wild horse mares are due on September 16. The initial scoping letter from the Billings BLM was mailed on August 18.

As a result of aggressive infertility applications delivered via shots last fall and dart guns this spring, 52 mares on the mountain are cycling monthly (coming into estrous or heat), being bred, and defended by their band stallions.

Makendra and I were in the Pryors last week for 5 days and I witnessed more societal disruption than I have seen in over 16 years of documenting these horses. Currently, it is a herd in chaos. 60% of the 18 bands we observed have had some kind of disruption. Three band stallions have lost their families all together. Some band stallions have benefitted from the intense competition — like Cloud, who won a new mare. This high degree of disruption has taken place just since our last visit in July.

Continue reading PZP in the Pryors

Upcoming Interview Schedule with Madeleine Pickens and Pony Express Update

Dear Humanitarians,

Here’s an update on the Pony Express Campaign:

We have been sent 17,351 letters! You all have been fabulous in sending the letters and promoting the campaign! Keep them coming. We’re in the home stretch now. We need 20,000 by September 1st. It takes less than a minute to click here and send your letter to us. Please do this for our wild mustangs and for future generations so that they can see these majestic creatures thriving in their natural environment.

A huge thanks to all the organizations that have added the Pony Express to your websites, blogs, and E-blasts, we truly appreciate every single one of our supporters!

I will also be a guest on Mr. Wayne’s Radio Show on Restless Republic Radio at 11:15am PST on Thursday, August 26th. He is the Host for The Green Revolution Show.

Continue reading Upcoming Interview Schedule with Madeleine Pickens and Pony Express Update

Don’t Fence Cloud’s Herd In, by Ginger Kathrens

Photos by The Cloud Foundation

The Fight to Save a Legendary Wild Horse Herd

The Custer National Forest awarded a contract on August 6, 2010. It calls for the building of new, bigger, stronger, longer fence to prevent the Pryor Wild Horse Herd from grazing on their mid-summer through fall pastures atop their mountain home. The first question I am always asked is “Why?” To answer honestly, I am not sure what is pushing this kind of expensive and unwanted project. But, to even try to answer the question requires a bit of a history lesson.

The wild horses of the Pryor Mountains, known as the Arrowhead Mountains to the Crow Indians, have been documented as living in this area since the early 1800s. But, they probably have lived here for far longer. The Arrowheads were the sacred heart of Crow Indian country, and the Crow tribe possessed the largest horse herd in the West. The wild horses are likely descended of their treasured war ponies.

It is also likely that they are the descendants of the horses of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The famous explorers had traded for Shoshone and Nez Perce stock and on their return trip from the West Coast in 1806 they put Sgt. Nathaniel Pryor in charge of bringing the horses back to the Missouri River. While camped in the Arrowheads, the Crow Indians stole all the horses. The mountains were subsequently named for the hapless Sergeant.

Continue reading Don’t Fence Cloud’s Herd In, by Ginger Kathrens

California’s Wild Horses & Burros Need Your Help

Photos by Craig Downer

BLM conducting a bloody 2000+ mustang and burro roundup

California doesn’t have many wild horses and very few wild burros left but that, along with a public outcry, has not stopped the Bureau of Land Management from rounding up thousands more of California’s wild equids. The BLM, responsible for managing most of the remaining wild horses and burros in ten Western States, are now running horses ten miles or more over rough volcanic terrain with helicopters. Horses bleeding from their noses in the thick dust, very young foals separated from their mothers, a mare with a broken leg and a colicking mare have been observed by a dedicated team of advocates observing the Twin Peaks roundup.

California has lost 16 of the original 38 wild horse herds designated for protection in 1971 and over 2/3 of the public land tagged for wild horses and burros has been taken away from these celebrated icons of the West. Now BLM is working fast to remove 1855 mustangs and 210 wild burros from the Twin Peaks area, just north of Susanville, California. The roundup is scheduled to last 45-60 days and BLM aims to leave only 450 mustangs and 72 burros on this 1250-square mile range, larger than the state of Rhode Island.  Almost all the mares returned would be given infertility drugs and a mere 72 burros is not a genetically viable population in this beautiful area designated principally for their use.  Over 32,000 privately-owned cattle and sheep are permitted to graze annually on the Twin Peaks area. Revenues generated yearly from livestock grazing fees are estimated at $120,000 while the cost of rounding up/processing of 1,980 wild horses and burros would be 35 times the annual grazing revenues – over $4 million. Over 38,000 wild horses are in government holding while less than half that remain on the range and BLM plans to complete the removal of 12,000 wild horses and burros this fiscal year alone.

Continue reading California’s Wild Horses & Burros Need Your Help

Oppose Massive Roundup of Nearly 1,600 Wild Horses in Wyoming’s Red Desert

Last week, at least 54 members of Congress wrote to the Interior Department demanding a halt to the wild horse roundups. This important action would not have happened without your voice opposing each of these unnecessary roundups. While the BLM is moving forward with its wild horse roundup schedule, despite overwhelming public and Congressional opposition, we must keep up the pressure.

In October, the BLM plans to remove nearly 1,600 wild horses – 80 percent of the estimated mustang population living in the Adobe Town and Salt Wells Creek Herd Management Areas in the pristine Red Desert region of Wyoming. This is another unnecessary roundup to cater to the private livestock industry, which uses the same lands for cheap grazing. Click here to take action to oppose this roundup.

In Defense of Animals
3010 Kerner, San Rafael, CA 94901
Tel. (415) 448-0048 Fax (415) 454-1031
idainfo@idausa.org

It’s Official! The Mustangs Are Going to Be in the Rose Bowl Parade on New Years Day!

Saving America’s Mustangs is thrilled to officially announce that the mustangs will be in the Tournament of Roses Parade on New Year’s Day! Please watch on Saturday, January 1, 2011 at 8 a.m. (PST), along with 53 million spectators from around the world, as we celebrate the New Year at the 122nd Rose Parade. The parade is well-known for amazing floral floats, high-stepping equestrians, and spirited bands. We will get double the exposure as our national icons are featured in the equestrian side as well as the float side of the parade!

Accompanying our mustangs in the parade will be: our retired military service dogs, members of several Native American tribes, dancers, Active Military Personnel, Wounded Soldiers, and Veterans! A very patriotic tribute to our American heritage!

Please share this with your friends and family. We would love to wave to you in the stands as we trot by, but if you can’t make the parade in person, please watch it live on television!

Continue reading It’s Official! The Mustangs Are Going to Be in the Rose Bowl Parade on New Years Day!

We’ve Heard You – Get on Board the Pony Express by September 1st!

Dear Friends, Supporters, and Future Supporters,

We have heard you voice your complaints about the roundups.

We have listened to you share so many of your personal stories about your own adopted mustangs.

We have all sent thousands of letters via fax, email, and USPS to our Government officials, even to the point of their phone lines being unplugged and emails shut down due to the high volume of wild horse supporters on this issue.

We are doing all of these things daily, but there still has been NO change.

It’s time for the PONY EXPRESS!

I will personally hand deliver each and every letter that you write, via the Pony Express (one of our beautiful mustangs), to Washington DC. I am setting a goal of 20,000 individual letters to take with me. Americans, international supporters, animal activists, anyone who would like to tell President Obama, Secretary Salazar, and Bob Abbey that we aren’t going to sit by waiting until these roundups are over is encouraged to write. This is a very important issue to hundreds of thousands of people that have pleaded with our government to stop gathering our wild horses.  This way they cannot unplug their phones, make their website impossible to send a comment to, or delete emails. These are GOING to get to Washington. I promise you that!

Continue reading We’ve Heard You – Get on Board the Pony Express by September 1st!