_______________________________________________________________

EQUINE EXPERTS SEEK HELP
IN AIDING HORSE OWNERS

Posted February 5, 2012

This is from The Daily Sentinel's "Horseplay" section today. 

After End of the Trail Horse Resuce of Olathe announced last month it was forming the Western Slope Hay Bank to help struggling horse owners feed their animals, the response was dramatic — especially from Mesa County.“I’d say 75 percent of all the people we’ve given hay to have come from Mesa County,” said Kathy Hamm, executive director of the Olathe-based nonprofit. “In the last month (since news of the hay bank was published in The Daily Sentinel) we’ve sent to Mesa County about 3,000 bales of hay.”

The need locally isn’t limited to hay. Over the past year, Hamm said, her organization has taken in or placed in foster homes about 20 head of horses from Mesa County.

“We’ve turned away 40 or 50 more because of a lack of funds, lack of foster homes or lack of hay,” she added.

End of the Trail Horse Rescue, which grew out of Hamm’s other organization, Dream Catcher Therapy Center, has operated for a half-dozen years in Montrose County. It takes in unwanted horses and rescues neglected horses primarily from Montrose and Delta counties. It has also begun working in the Ouray-Ridgway area.

But the biggest boom in equine need of late has been in Mesa County. That’s why Hamm’s group has been working with a trio of local veterinarians to establish a Mesa County chapter of End of the Trail Horse Rescue.

The veterinarians are Dr. Bob Bessert of Desert Springs Veterinary Clinic in Fruita, Dr. Braden Shafer of Shafer Equine Services and Dr. Brian Wiseman of Amigo Animal Clinic. They are involved with the American Association of Equine Practicioners, which has been dealing with the issue of unwanted horses nationwide, Shafer said.

Even though a number of Mesa County residents have expressed a desire to help with the Mesa County chapter, Hamm said it’s been slow going to get it fully functional.

“We’re trying to get more people who are go-getters and want to be involved,” she said. “We need people to be engaged. We need land. We need foster homes. We need hay.”

One reason for the greater demand is the state of the economy. But education is an equally big problem, Hamm said, a sentiment that was echoed by Shafer.

Many people move to a few acres in the country and think it would be great to have a couple of horses, they said. But they don’t understand the amount of care and money that horses require.

“People know dogs and cats live 10 to 15 years,” Shafer said. “They don’t understand horses can live 30 years.”

He also noted how many new horse owners aren’t aware of proper horse care.

“I visited with one gentleman after his neighbors called concerned about the condition of his horses,” Shafer said. “He had good hay, but he hadn’t dewormed his horses and he didn’t believe in trimming their feet.”

As most horse owners know, frequent deworming and regular hoof care are critical to a horse’s health, and to preventing serious and costly medical problems.

Hamm said her group has received donations to provide more education service for horse owners.

Also, Dream Catcher Therapy Center plans to begin offering weekly mental health equine therapy sessions at a facility on Orchard Mesa.

Additionally, the Mesa County chapter of End of the Trail Horse Rescue will soon begin holding regularly scheduled meetings in the evening in Grand Junction, and hopes to attract more members.

The organization and local veterinarians will keep trying to recruit volunteeers and foster horse caregivers to help meet the needs of unwanted and neglected horses and to help educate horse owners in Mesa County.

If you are interested in helping, contact Kathy Hamm at 970-323-5400. Email her at khamm@dctc.org. Visit the group’s website at http://www.dctc.org.

_________________________________________________

Click here to download expo flier

_______________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________

'QUACK AND TRACK': THE INTERNATIONAL
IMPACT OF U.S. HORSE SLAUGHTER BAN

Posted January 31, 2012

A Toronto restaurant plans to reintroduce horse meat to its menu Thursday, according to this article, in combination with duck meat. The entre will be called 'Quack and Track.'

Horse meat was dropped from the menu last year, according to the story in the (Toronto) Star.com, because of news reports that many of the horses slaughtered for meat in Canada came from the United States after long and grueling and often cruel truck rides. And there were concerns about whether some of the meat was safe for humans to eat.

The U.S. General Accounting Office concluded last year that the de facto ban on horse slaughter in this country simply pushed horses to Mexico and Canada, often for those terrible truck rides mentioned above. The ban was lifted in a Deparment of Agriculture funding bill late last year, although no slaughter plants have reopened in the U.S. as of yet.

But the restaurant's owner in this story said he believes that will occur and will again make horse meat more suitable as restaurant fare.

Click on the link below to read the entire article.

Toronto Star.com article on horse meat

_______________________________________________________________

JUDGE WON'T HALT NEVADA
WILD HORSE ROUNDUP

Posted January 28, 2012

Interesting that the same judge who issued an injunction to halt a Nevada wild horse roundup last fall refused to do it again this week. In fact, based on the quotes in this story, he sounds a bit peeved about being asked to do so.

It's part of the continuing battle over how to manage federal lands for wild horses and other uses. To read more at the Boston Globe website click on the link below.

 

 

Boston Globe article on wild horse roundup

_______________________________________________________________

FOAL OF THE YEAR?

Posted January 25, 2012

This photo is of Rachel Alexandra's new foal, born Sunday near Lexington, Ky. Rachel Alexandra was the thoroughbred racing's Horse of the Year in 2009. The sire of her colt was Curlin, Horse of the Year in 2007 and 2008. Obviously, the youngster comes from some pretty good genetic stock.

To read more about Rachel Alexandra's first foal, click on The Washington Post link immediately below. But to read more about where the speed gene originated, read the post just below this one.

Washington Post article on Rachel's foal

_______________________________________________________________

THE ORIGIN OF THE SPEED GENE

Posted January 25, 2012

For years, a lot of racing experts have argued that more of a horse's speed is handed down from his dam, not his sire, even though it is the stallions that usually generate big news and big bucks in breeding. This study suggests one ancient mare may be the source of all modern thoroughbred's speed.

I love scientific efforts like this one, that try to use modern technology to track historical mysteries, which couldn't have been solved with earlier science. Click on the link below to read more.

Irish Times.com article on the speed gene

_______________________________________________________________

ROCKY MOUNTAIN HORSE EXPO COMING IN MARCH

Posted January 22, 2012

As mentioned in the post below, March is shaping up to be a busy horse month, and one of the big events is the annual Rocky Mountain Horse Expo, March 8-11 at the National Western Complex in Denver. The event is sponsored by the Colorado Horse Council and features a number of exciting and informative events. I'll post more later, but for now, click on the link below to read the Horse Council's January newsletter with details about the Expo.

Oh, and this wonderful photo came from the newsletter.

Colorado Horse Council January newsletter

_______________________________________________________________

BUSY YEAR FOR BACK COUNTRY HORSEMEN

Posted January 21, 2012

It looks like the Grand Mesa Back Country Horsemen have a busy spring and summer scheduled. This is from President Terry Gray's message in the February newsletter.

"The President’s Saddlebag
I would like to welcome Scott & Jennifer Fogarty.
   2012 dues are now due so, please mail them in or bring to next meeting on February 6, 7 PM at the Mesa Mall meeting room. Please remember if you joined after October you will not need to pay until 2013.
I am in the process of contacting committee members to see who is still interested in working on their committees. If you are interested in working on a committee please let me know and we will try to put you on that committee. We need someone to volunteer to take over the library.
   I would like to thank Penny Ackerman for her hard work last year and last year’s Board as most of the goals that were set,  were achieved. So thank you everyone who worked so hard on our projects.
   It looks like we are going to have another busy year. We are going to put on a program for the Glade Park Elementary School. The Fruita Co-op has ask us too return this year and participate in their Co-op Country Day March 24. We have been ask to have a booth at The Horse Expo March 24 & 25 as both of these are on March 24,  I would like to ask for some additional help. We will possible have additional other educational programs throughout the year.
   We are going to host the Back Country Horsemen of Colorado Leadership Clinic June 16 and need volunteers to help.
   We need your help to keep working on the right to ride in the National Forests, as there are groups that would like to keep us off these trails. I have an  article put out by the BCHA 02/12007 titled Why We Need the Right to Ride Protection. The following are excerpts from that article.
   In 1956 when the First Wilderness Bill was introduced by Senator Hubert Humphrey stated that "existing uses and privileges are respected in this bill.”  “This bill will not interfere with but will perpetuate, the present multi-purpose administration of these National Forest  areas."
   A travel management plan for White River National Forest had areas of the WRNF closed to horse use in some these areas. The proposal creates new areas where hikers will not run into stock (limiting current horse access). challenged and changes have been made. The WRNF was not the only NF to have issues on trail use in this article detrimental to horse use.
   Jan has information on the GMUG travel plan coming up. There are a very large number of trails on this travel plan. So you might offer to help him with the trail inventory.
   This is the reason we all need to continue working to keep this from happening. So please renew your membership and try to get others to join as the more of us there are the bigger voice we have. "

_______________________________________________________________

TORNADO TWINS A CSU SUCCESS STORY

Posted January 20, 2012

I posted something about this shortly after these twin horses were born almost three years ago, to surrogate mothers after their real mother was killed in the 2008 Windsor tornado. Doctors at the CSU Vet School's equine reproductive lab harvested eggs from the mother, named Tuesday, before she was euthanized due to a broken leg.

The Denver Post has updated their story, now that the foals are three-year-olds, and tied it to the fire that destroyed the lab last year, and efforts to raise money to rebuild it. It's an interesting story.
The link is below.

Denver Post article on CSU Equine Reproductive Lab

_______________________________________________________________

WHAT'S WRONG WITH WAR HORSE?

Posted January 18, 2012

My wife will tell you that I'm a sucker for horse movies of nearly any sort. From "The Black Stallion," to "Secretariat," I'm usually lined up early to see a horse pic. So, my daughter Kara (the other horse nut in our family) and I were eager to see Steven Spielberg's "War Horse." I'd read a lot about the play, and the trailers for the film looked great.

But Kara and I both walked out of the theater very disappointed. For a variety of reasons.

First, it seemed like Spielberg couldn't decide whether to make a Disney-style, feel-good fantasy like "E.T.," or a gritty war movie like "Saving Private Ryan." The result is it switches back and forth from hoaky, feel-good scenes to gruesume war scenes with little rhyme or reason. And human characters come and go so quickly (mostly go as war victims) that you don't know whether you're supposed to like them or not.

Second, I don't mind a horse fantasy. "The Black Stallion," after all, did things that most of us know a horse is never going to do. But what Joey, the War Horse, does was too incredible for me to suspend my disbelief.

Finally, I can think of only one other movie where I felt like the director was so blatantly trying to manipulate my emotions, and I didn't like that one either. I expected "War Horse" to be a tear-jerker -- sort of "Black Beauty" and "Ol' Yeller" rolled into one. But instead of getting teary, I got angry about feeling so manipulated. The "Gone With the Wind" sunset at the end was particularly annoying.

Speilberg is a great filmmaker, but this wasn't his best effort. And if you want a great, upbeat horse movie, go rent "Seabiscuit" again.

_______________________________________________________________

BUDGET CUTS MAY ELIMINATE
DENVER'S HORSE PATROL

Posted January 17, 2012

This is no great surprise, given the budget problems all levels of government are facing, but it's still unfortunate. Police horse patrols have long been an important community relations tool for municipal police departments. But they are costly to maintain, and only useful for law enforcement in limited purposes.

Below is a link to the article that appeared today in The Denver Post.

Denver Post story on horse patrol

_______________________________________________________________

Digital Journal article on Neville Bardos

_______________________________________________________________

NEW FORM OF EQUINE HERPES
DISCOVERED IN CALIFORNIA

Posted, January 15, 2012

A new variation of equine herpes, which apparently mutated from last year's deadly EHV-1 virus that struck across the West last May and June, has been discovered in California.

This is from the Moorpark Patch:

"Five new cases of Equine Herpes Myoencephalitis (EHM), also referred to as neurological Rhino, a mutated form of the Equine Herpes Virus 1 (EHV-1) were reported at a facility in California by the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA)."

Below is a link the complete article. Let's hope it doesn't cause problems like EHV-1 did last year.

MoorparkPatch story on equine herpes virus

________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________

Jim Farmer competing on Isabell

LAST GVDS DRESSAGE SHOW OF THE SEASON

Posted October 15, 2011

This weekend marks the final Grand Valley Dressage Society dressage show for 2011. It will include championship rounds for the season on Sunday.

I was out to shoot some photos of Jim Farmer and his horse, Isabell, for a Nov. 6 article in Horseplay in The Daily Sentinel about Western Dressage. Jim and Isabell were the only competitors in that division this weekend, but they're hoping more people will take it up next year.

By the way, the extended covered arena at Mesa County Fairgrounds is wonderful for a variety of events, such as this weekend's dressage show. But it sucks if you're a photographer trying to get well-lit photos of an event.

_______________________________________________________________

Penny and Mark Ackerman head up the trail in the Hunting Grounds

Sharon Roper, overlooking the Gunnison River

_______________________________________________________________

GVPC HALLOWEEN FUN SHOW

Posted September 25, 2011

The Grand Valley Pony Club's Fifth Annual Halloween Fun Show is scheduled for Saturday, October 29 at the Mesa County Fairgrounds. The show includes a costume contest, jumping classes, barrels and pole bending and a variety of other contests for entrants and their horses.

To download a flier and entry form, click on the link below.

Click here for Halloween Fun Show flier

_______________________________________________________________

BACKCOUNTRY HORSEMEN NEWSLETTER

Posted September 25, 2011

The September newsletter for the Grand Mesa Back Country Horsemen is out. Click on the link below to download a copy.

It looks like they have plenty of activities scheduled for the coming month. However, because of damage to the trail in the Dominguez Canyon area west of the Bridgeport Bridge, the October 8 trail ride may be moved to a different location.

Click her to download September GMBCH newsletter

_______________________________________________________________

Rita and Callie at finals in Texas. Photo by John Tupa

Rita and Callie trot over rails in trails course

_______________________________________________________________