26 February 2010: CALICO HAS LOST ITS LIGHTNING - LIGHTNING LOSES ALL

QUESTION:HOW DO YOU MARGINALIZE LIGHTNING?

                  LIGHTNING of the Calico Mountains

                                           ©2009 Photography by Craig Downer

                   Here is the powerful, charismatic Lightning, who stood watching the two-leggers, confident but alert and protective as he observed the men in his world. 

ANSWER: TWO HELICOPTERS, THE BLM, AND $67.5 million.

                      ©2010 Photography by Elyse Gardner

            In October 2009, this extraordinary stallion captivated Craig Downer, who was out on a bittersweet trip  visiting the wild horses in the Calico mountains.  Craig named him "Lightning" both for the distinctive markings he bears and for his energy and magnetism.  Lightning pranced, cavorted, and sparred with a visiting Mahogany stallion.

            The immense roundup in the five contiguous Herd Management Areas comprising the "Calico Complex" was scheduled to start in two months, with a goal of denuding the mountains of 2700 out of her supposedly 3095 horses.  Like many of us who love these horses, wildlife ecologist Craig Downer wanted to see them living free in the mountains as intended.  

            Of all the bands and stallions Craig captured on film (the best way to capture a wild horse!), Lightning stood out from the rest. He was extraordinarily beautiful, this king of his mountain:  fit, with bold white lightning spears adorning, sizzling on his lovely form.  

             Lightning's majesty and aliveness depict a palpable example of equine power and grace.  Being such a compelling presence, this exemplary stallion was featured in a moving YouTube slideshow by Laura Leigh, using Craig Downer's photographs, with a stirring song by Lacy J. Dalton.  It is embedded below, toward the end of this post, courtesy of Laura Leigh.

                         ©2010 Photography by Elyse Gardner

          The six-week roundup took its wicked toll, stripping the sparse, wild Nevada mountains of the equine beauties who animated them while enriching the soil and the spirits of all fortunate enough to witness their peaceable presence.  

          In our disturbing visits to Fallon we had nevertheless been relieved:  we had not seen Lightning at the Fallon holding facility.  Then on Sunday, February 21, 2010, the first official Sunday tour, we were in front of the stallion pens.  Only a few minutes earlier people had been talking with Craig about Lightning.
          To my dismay, I heard Craig quietly say, "Oh, there's Lightning.  There he is." My heart sank.  "Craig has got to be wrong," I thought.  The horse had similar markings, but he looked so big... so different.  
           But there is no mistake.  Lightning has been run off his mountain.
                          ©2010 Photography by Elyse Gardner

                I figured out what was different, what was missing:  his purpose.  The mountains.  We -- humanity -- have deprived him of his purpose.  We have stolen his reason for living.  And only we -- humanity -- can restore it.

               The wild horse's power in free movement and his obvious familial bonds are thrilling and display his completeness in his element, fulfilling his reason for being.   Their perfection and presence is riveting; their right to be wild is compelling and ever so obvious when we see wild horses in the wild.   They are fulfilling their purpose, meeting multiple needs -- theirs, ours, the environment's -- in being wild.  It is so missing, palpably absent, when they are just...there...in the holding pens. 

              That thrill of seeing a wild horse, the excitement and deep satisfaction of watching a band in the wild -- that thrill is gone, replaced with a sense of wrongness, when we look at wild horses in pens.  That feeling of happy wonder we get watching the fabulous "Cloud" movies (see end of post to learn how to view Cloud's movies) , is utterly absent; it is so blatantly missing when they are just...there...in the holding pens. Seeing Cloud in the Britton Springs holding facility, and seeing Conquistador there with tags around his neck, waiting for "adoption" -- like that noble stallion would want to be adopted by the likes of us! -- is one of the most deeply sad things I've ever seen.  What a relief that they are free today.
             To the casual city dweller looking at the holding pens at Fallon, what's the big deal?  What's to see?  It's just a bunch of horses crammed into a pen.  Wild, eh? "Looks like any other horse to me."
            The world is deprived of a fulfillment, of something spectacular.  We grieve the loss deep in our souls.  Creation itself is offended.  Imagine using the Grand Canyon as a waste dump. Or the oceans as a waste dump...oops, now we're hitting close to home. 

       The very sight of wild horses in the wild invigorates. 
                               ©Photography by Elyse Gardner

              Indeed, wild horses in the wild are a gift, a fulfillment, the sight of which acts as a balm and restores our souls.  The loving wag of a welcoming dog's tail, the purr of a devoted cat, the sight and assured presence of wild horses in the wild are treasures without which we humans would be bereft.  Art in motion, God's 6-dimensional, living, breathing, exquisite art.  And we are changed by beholding this beauty, breathless at the wonder of it.  

             Like ballet dancer Rudolf Nuryev driving a bus;  like lions in cages.  Like Yo Yo Ma with no cello, no music; Stravinsky sans violin; Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash with no guitar; Diana Krall with no blues or piano (she was MADE to sing the blues).  When we see anyone, be it person or animal or plant, fulfilling its intended purpose, there is a deeply edifying satisfaction we feel in our very souls.  

             Ken Salazar, and the BLM party line, think they can take the wild horse from his home and family and he will still retain his magic.  But they will have removed him from his purpose.  Moving them to pastures and creating entirely nonreproducing herds destroys their social structure and removes them from their purpose.  I've heard them at Advisory Board meetings discuss ideas about gelding the stallions and returning them to the "wild":  well, the only wild thing about that is that we would even give that a second thought.  Wild horses are all about stallions forming and protecting family bands.
            Is there nothing sacred?  I suppose there are those who will mock me for that statement, but running this majestic stallion off the mountain -- depriving the mountain of this horse and his family; taking his family from him and him from his family -- has got to be one of the ugliest examples of man's arrogance and coarseness.  It's akin to catching and clipping the wings of our great iconic American eagle and putting him in a cage.  
                                ©Photography by Elyse Gardner

             Craig was so quiet about it.  We all were.  Somehow you picture a scene like this as being so much more outwardly dramatic.  But I've learned to be still, to take it in, to put it on my camera, and then to take action, baby.  Get in the solution.  
               I quietly grieved afresh the magnitude of BLM's colossal sweep, vacuuming up these healing, reseeding animals who break through ice so they and other, smaller animals can drink, paw through snow so they and other species can eat, consume dead, dry grasses, greatly reducing fire danger.  
              The grief multiplied as time went on.  I've noticed that about this work I do:  it hurts more, not less, fueling my determination to work diligently and purposefully for the sake of Lightning and his extended family of horses and burros.   We can do this together.  

                                       ©2009 Photography by Craig Downer

 ©2009 Photography by Craig Downer

                               ©2009 Photography by Elyse Gardner

(About the video below:  Since BLM only allowed observation of the roundup three days a week, I was not there to see or film when Lightning and his family went through this ordeal.  But this was his herd area, and he very well could have, and probably did, run the course you see here.  The still photos at the conclusion include photos from a couple of  the Calico HMAs, not only this running herd.  --EG)

Video by Elyse Gardner

                                ©2010 Photography by Elyse Gardner

             Two stallions died on Saturday, February 27.  Why?  Where?  Horses continue to die almost daily at Fallon.   Many are still not adjusting to the feed.  I continue to respond to all action alerts and call upon my senators to tell them I am opposed to Secretary Salazar's plan and asking them not to fund it.  I hope you will do likewise and give Lightning and his band a voice.
  *   To view the "Cloud" films, here's the PBS link:  http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/category/episodes/by-animal/horse/      
The first one is Cloud, Wild Stallion of the Rockies; 2) Cloud's Legacy: The Wild Stallion Returns; and 3) Cloud, Challenge of the Stallions
        Give yourself a treat -- and you can invite family and friends if you like; there are no terrible scary things -- and watch these amazing horses.  Ginger Kathrens has woven together hundreds of hours of topnotch film, and narrates these extraordinary documentaries on this famous herd. 
         DVDs of these Emmy-winning series, which have extra material on them -- can be ordered directly from The Cloud Foundation.

Calico Roundup 1 February 2010: Granite Range Says Farewell to Many Horses

UPDATED:  1 FEBRUARY 2010:  VIDEO OF SNOWY MOUNTAIN ROUNDUP; 

ALSO,

THIRSTY HORSES:  JOG/RUN FOR MILES, GIVEN NO WATER, LEFT OVERNIGHT AT TRAP

                                ©Photography by Elyse Gardner

                     Above is the trap site.  We are looking at -- trying to, anyway-- the newly captured horses being loaded onto trailers to be taken to the temporary holding area.  

                                  ©Photography by Elyse Gardner

Here is the temporary holding area from our new, distant vantage point behind the yellow tape, I'm estimating 60 to 75 yards away.  Below is the closest I can get via my zoom lens.

                                  ©Photography by Elyse Gardner

Maximum zoom

Above you see what were some very thirsty horses.  We had over an hour of waiting at this temporary holding area, a lot of time to watch these horses who, curiously, remained in these temporary holding pens.  They had been captured yesterday.   

But the huge truck/trailers had been loaded with the horses captured yesterday and had left for Fallon, as usual, before we arrived. We passed them, as always, on the drive in. Why were these horses still here? 

©Photographs by Elyse Gardner

So these approximately 30 horses were left.  Sue Cattoor informed us that they were the last group from yesterday to be rounded up.  These horses had spent Sunday night at the trap site in the trap pens and had -- shortly before we arrived -- just gotten to this temporary holding area where we were seeing them Monday morning. There is no water at the trap pens.


©Photography by Elyse Gardner    THE TRAP PENS
As I hope you can see, the trap pens are narrow, small pens just intended for the initial trapping of the horses and shaped to facilitate the separating of the wild horses back into their individual family bands.  (A "band" consists of one stallion and his mares with their youngsters, and maybe some young stallions up three years old if they've not yet been kicked out by the reigning stallion.)   A band can be one stallion and one mare, or up to one stallion and 10 or more mares, indicating a happy and powerful stallion.  


When two or more bands are driven in together, they need to be separated immediately because the stallions will fight to protect their mares from another stallion.  When stallions are together without mares, however, they generally get along fine after what can sometimes be a debate about who's in charge. 


These pens also have little areas to separate out the foals from the adult horses.  They are designed to trap, separate, and load the wild horses into the trailers and are not at all intended as overnight accommodations.

Sue Cattoor informed us that yesterday, the weather had turned very mild, and by the afternoon when these horses had been driven in, the ground was so soft and muddy, all the trucks got stuck and could not haul the horses away from the trap site.  She said these horses were fed, spent the night at the trap, and in the morning if the ground hadn't hardened up enough, they were going to release them. But the ground was hard in the morning, so they were brought here where we were looking at them.  I asked if they were given water.  She said no, no water.  But they were given hay.  

The horses having the conversation in the video below are stallions.  The mares are in the foreground pen.  Foals are out of sight, but they are in a pen way off to the left, separated from the mares and stallions by at least one empty pen.   

An investigator from Last Chance for Animals was there observing.  He asked about this.  Sue Cattoor assured him that a study shows horses can go 24 hours without food or water without showing negative effects.  

               Consider:  These horses had last had a drink sometime before hearing the ominous drone of two helicopters that were about to take them for the run of their lives.  Their adrenalin starts pumping, and they start to try to lose the helicopter(s).  For miles.  The day they were rounded up was not a public observation day.  Even if it were, we have no idea how far these horses start out from the trap.  So assume they tried to outpace the helicopter(s) for anywhere from 3 to 10 miles.  

Then consider that they are very thirsty, breathing hard.  (We don't know how hard they're breathing because we are never permitted close enough to document this; in the Pryor Mountains after an 11-mile or more run, it was 135 respirations per minute a full 35 minutes after they were caught; normal is 8 to 20 respirations per minute.) 
Stressed, thirsty, and exhausted, then they are fed hay, a completely new and far richer food than any they have encountered since the summer.  Consider that at the Fallon holding facility, horses continue to be "found dead" several times a week, and the most common cause is attributed by the vet to "failure to adjust to dietary change."

So these wild horses have just been given a real prescription for colic, or "failure to adjust to dietary change."  

Imagine the sled dogs at the Iditarod, or even your own dog(s), running for one to two hours, then given no water for the next 16 to 18 hours but given alien food.  

Why is it all right to do this to horses?  If it were any other animal, groups would be shouting "animal cruelty,"  "criminal neglect."  And so it is.  We will endeavor to follow these horses as they now live in Fallon and hope they make a smooth adjustment after what surely was a very unpleasant start to their captivity.  Unfortunately, there are no identification tags or marks on them to make them easily identifiable.  But we do have plenty of photographs and video of these individuals, so we will be following up.

THE DAY'S ROUNDUP

Relocation of the trap site to Granite Range today.  

BLM has restricted public observation viewing access even further at the temporary holding areas and at the actual trap site (see above). These restrictions were initiated by the contractors.  There is yellow "caution" tape strung in a perimeter 50 yards or more away from the temporary holding pens, making it impossible for me -- or anyone -- to see the horses in any kind of real detail without binoculars or to take reasonably detailed documentary photographs.  

I will not for now address precipatory events, only just to say that our continued, unabated interest and presence seem to have resulted in decreased access. Up to this point, Winnemucca on-site BLM staff -- Gene Seidlitz and Lisa Ross -- had at our request from time to time asked the contractor to allow us closer access. They have now been told all negotiations for closer access are to cease.


We climbed hard in deep snow to find a way to see the horses coming in.  The topography of the sites selected for us by the contractor the last two times have only allowed us to see the horses being pressured into the traps in the last 100 yards or so.  We were able to hike about 20 minutes in the snow, up the side of a tall hill (mountain!), so I was able to shoot this film.  BLM staff and public observers all got a real workout getting up there.  

Following in deep footsteps...

                          ©Photography by Elyse Gardner

    ©Photography by Elyse Gardner  

Two helicopters were working these horses, who were pretty spent by the time my camera and I picked them up.  If you watch carefully, you can see where they turn right, heading toward the camera, and enter a pretty solidly white area, lifting their feet higher as they lawnmower through this deeper snow.  We had a long climb to get up to our vantage point for this film, and a lot of the snow we had to traverse was knee deep.  From my personal experience walking through it, that is real exercise and pretty tiring.  


It took about 1.5 hours or more for the helicopter to bring the horses in to this point.  Not knowing how fast they were moving, it's hard to know how far they came.  As you can see, the helicopter was hanging back initially, but the horses were still moving very fast. 


Then the foal caught my eye, toward the very back of the long string of 50-plus horses. This little one is so tired, he's working his little tail like a pump to just keep going, valiantly keeping up with the adult horses.  I can feel his staunch determination to run until he simply cannot, run no matter what, just run, just stay with them, stay with them, stay with them.

Video by Elyse Gardner

These horses were gorgeous and healthy.  Again and again, I see how they know how to live in their habitat.  These horses are not even close to starving.  They are well muscled and beautiful.  I am not close enough to document respirations and detailed sweat patterns or easily see leg or other injuries, but I can certainly see muscles and basic conformation.  


BLM website tells us a horse was kicked in the eye in the trailer on the way from the trap to the temporary holding area; she was then euthanized at the holding area.  Mystery solved: We were delayed getting back to the temporary holding area -- BLM staff told us we were going back there but then BLM drove us past the entrance and pulled to the side of the road and waited five to ten minutes before bringing us in.  No one explained why.  I didn't know about this until I read it on the website. 
I wonder if this is the transparency BLM and President Obama keep talking about, if after-the-fact, spoon-fed information constitutes the President's definition of transparency.  


I will continue to do what I can to be your eyes and ears and heart on site.  I hope we can work together  with BLM to truly protect and preserve our wild horses   i n    t h e     w i l d.


For the wild horses in the wild with their humble burro friends,
Elyse Gardner