May Local Happenings
Local Groups and Local Partnerships
The Virginia Range Wildlife Protection Association (VRWPA) is a vital organization, based in Virginia City but with reach all over the Virginia Range. The organization helps build fences, and provide range stewardship in partnership with other local organizations. It also boasts three AWHC Fertility Control Program volunteer darters; Nancy Kilian, president of VRWPA, Elena Sullivan and Karen Roemmich, both board members. Elena and Nancy have been with the program since 2015. Karen is a recently trained darter and has been working with Nancy and Elena to get the job done in Mound House, Washoe Valley, the VC Highlands, and Virginia City. Hard work pays off and these three work very hard! Thank you for all you do!
Elena unpacking a X-caliber rifle.
Nancy out on the rage, darting horses.
Karen holding up her first dart.
Wild Horse Preservation League
Wild Horse Preservation League (WHPL) continues to work to secure a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Carson City Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to begin darting mares in the Pine Nut Herd Management Area. As with so many other groups, there is a lot of crossover. Several of WHPL members are also volunteer darters and documenters for AWHC: Director of WHPL Cathy Cottrill is a certified darter, as is Rae Hanna. Lynn Eley, Dorothy Diffenbaugh, Marty Wright, and Dorothy Nylen are all documenters for the fertility control program as well as volunteers with Wild Horse Connection on diversionary feeding projects. Diversionary feeding may only be done through the range management cooperative agreement with the Nevada Department of Agriculture.
Foal Nursery
LBL Equine Rescue is working together with WHC and AWHC in caring for rescued foals. LBL is working toward securing a free standing foal nursery to house critical babies in need of medical attention and nurturing. This major project is just in the beginning stages so be sure to stay tuned for great things to come!
In addition, LBL needs help shoring up a water pump spigot and other odd jobs around the facility that houses 30 horses saved from various hardships. AWHC is purchasing LBL a foal kit so they are ready to care for foals in need.
Britney of LBL Equine Rescue hanging out with a rescued foal in their spare bedroom. LBL is in the process of building a foal nursery
More foals, more rescues
With foaling season in full swing, the rescue team is responding to more foal rescues. The American Wild Horse Campaign is purchasing foal kits, thanks to the generous grant from the Glide Foundation. These foal kits will be used by members of the Least Resistance Training Concepts (LRTC)’s technical large animal rescue (TLAR) team. The kits will be kept stocked in order to be prepared for any rescue. In addition, a foal kit will be furnished and maintained for LBL Equine Rescue.
example of what the foal kits are comprised of.
All the supplies in the kits.
Meet Brett
Meet Brett, one of our volunteers at LBL. Brett and his wife Geigy are relatively new residents of Carson City. After raising their two wonderful sons, Dana and Troy, and finishing their careers in California, they retired to the area to live a more relaxing lifestyle and enjoy the outdoors. Not having spent a lot of time in the Carson Valley area Brett was pleasantly surprised to see the bands of wild horses roaming the ranges. “Having had a horse as a child in Michigan, seeing them reminded me how much I loved being around them. I started to do some research to learn more about the wild horses and how to get involved. I was quickly educated, and a bit overwhelmed, on all the controversy surrounding them but happy to learn of all the organizations and groups working to help them.” Luckily, a neighbor “horse person” filled Brett in on all the things going on to help the area horses and told him about LBL. After one visit Brett became a regular volunteer, helping with mucking, watering, repairing and getting acquainted with and loving all the horses. Not having worked with horses for 40 or so years, Brett was picking everyone’s brains about all the horses’ backgrounds, temperaments, and handling them. Over time he especially bonded with Sham, a 2-year-old mustang born at LBL. Sham had been haltered and worked with a bit when younger but now was happy just being admired from afar. After being easily convinced to enter Sham into LBL’s first 90 Day Mustang Training Challenge, the two of them started down their path. “Sham was a dream to work with. Once I gained his trust, he would pretty much do anything I asked of him. I could see that he really put his trust in me. If I walked up to the horse-eating tractor, he walked up. If I walked into the trailer, he walked in. Of course, there were some trying moments but with patience we pretty much worked through everything. My goal was to have him do things with me, not just for me.”
Brett, Sham and Geigy
meet sham
Shamrock (Sham) is a 3-year old Mustang gelding and stands approximately 14.3 hands. LBL adopted his dam after she was removed from Moundhouse so she could have her foal at the rescue. Sham completed our Trainer Challenge last August taking first place for in-hand training. Sham is good with his feet and stands for the farrier; he loads into the trailer; and he is ready to be started under saddle. He could be your next trail horse. Contact LBL Equine Rescue for more information or to visit this amazing Mustang.
