Hello and Happy Monday!

Did everyone survive the Verizon outage?  My phone just got out of SOS mode!  How did we ever survive without all this technology?!

It has been an extremely busy couple of days.  There is a TON we are working on, but I want to share what I can with you today.  I will have more to share tomorrow and I am sure Wednesday as well.

Before I do that, I want to go over exactly what is at stake.

And before I do that, I do have a few mushy words to say.

When this all started over 2 years ago with the proposed management plan and then the announcement of the planned removal of the entire herd of horses, just like Friday, I literally fell to my knees.  

Slowly, over the course of the last 2 years, we have built up and absolutely AMAZING group of allies!  It is sooooo incredibly heartwarming – there will never be proper words to say thank you to everyone.  Those people are standing ready, willing and able to help us now.  A few shout outs:

Holly at Bice Policy Group – we have shifted gears, and she helped me out yesterday ASAP and today I gave her a new ask for another ASAP project.  She made a few other amazing offers on ways that she can help.  She is an angel for sure!

I don’t talk enough about my dearest friend Mary.  This woman has been down in the mud with me long before the “official” fight started.  We have been talking and strategizing all weekend.  She also is a fantastic editor! I am thankful for you Mary and our friendship!

Jen has been working hard on updating our website.  She made an alert front and center on our website with our Fact Sheet – so everyone can see and understand the fight we are currently in.  She is also working on a few NEW reels for us that will highlight Dr. Dan Baker’s words on the efficacy of hand injecting GonaCon into mares. We appreciate Jen so much!

I was able to call on a few friends with credentials that helped me with a project for tomorrow.  I am so thankful for them and will share more on this tomorrow!

Truly, the list can go on and on from other advocates sharing our petitions and posts to each and every one of you who are working as hard as we are to save this historic wild horse herd.

Last, but never least, I do have to say THANK YOU to another dear friend, Jeanne.  Our hearts connected over these horses, and she has been a Godsend in my life.  I have no idea how many times I called her over the weekend – either to yell, cry, or run ideas past her and get her opinion.  I appreciate you JT 😉

Thank you to everyone who takes a moment to send an encouraging message.  Today was especially hard to acknowledge every one of them, but please know we read them all and they all mean the world to us!

As I talk about the latest proposed actions by the park, understand that what I am sharing is coming from an hour + meeting with Superintendent Nancy Finley and Dr. Blake McCann. 

Theodore Roosevelt National Park’s latest plans are to round up the entire herd of horses with helicopters.  While they have the horses, they plan to draw blood and check the overall health of the herd.  They also plan to administer GonaCon to the mares.  In one sentence by the park, I was told mares who needed boosters.  In another sentence, I was told ALL mares.  It doesn’t really matter, trust has been broken so badly, I feel we should just go with ALL mares. Then up to 15 mares who are not responding to GonaCon will be removed along with their offspring.  There was another conversation where 2021 Stallion Chance’s removal was being discussed.  In my honest opinion, NONE of these horses are safe from an upcoming removal. 

I said before, I would not have a problem with them rounding up the horses to gather data.  Now I do.  I don’t trust them.  It was also said many times in the conversation that they have enough data to make determinations on horses to remove, in some cases going back 12+ years.  Then, by your their own admission, there is no reason for this round up.

I’m sorry – other than to hand inject the mares with GonaCon. 

I am sure horses like Stallion Brutus or Mare Snip’s Gray, who are not in the best of health, will not survive this round up.  How many times have we seen the BLM find it “necessary” to shoot injured horses, or horses with an existing injury, even though they were living just fine in the wild.  Other horses, who may be injured as they are being chased through the rugged terrain would be shot as well.

Then, when all of the mares who ARE responding to GonaCon already are hand injected with GonaCon, the herd stops reproducing.  ¼ of the herd is 15-25 years old.  Those 40+ will die soon and we will be down to about 160 horses.  Another 60 or so of those horses are 10+ years old.  So, within the next 10 years or so, we will be down to about 100 nonreproductive horses – depending on how many die in this round up. 

Keep in mind, we also more than likely have lost 3-year-old Stallion Ace and 4-year-old Mare Birdie who have not been seen for quite some time.  I guess on the plus side, this round up will answer the questions on those horses for us. 

As these horses slowly die off one by one, the park will FINALLY get to that 35-60 horse number they have been striving for since 1978!

Blake is consistently arguing with me over the number of horses needed for genetic diversity.  He INSISTS that number is much lower than the 150-200 that other experts say. 

I am NOT an expert in this field and have offered that if he wants to continue to argue this point, I would be more than happy to set up a Zoom with some expert friends who have more data than I do.  Superintendent Finley said that they would consider that.  I guess we will see.

Then as the horses that we know and love.  The horses that make up North Dakota’s ONLY wild horse herd die off and what made them unique to begin with also dies with them, the park will go to the BLM and bring some horses in or get some domestic stock.  To them, this checks off the box of having horses in the park.  It doesn’t matter to them if we lose Red Face, Copper, Sidekick, Guardian, Sweetheart, Strawberry, Silver, Satellite, Blaze, Cocoa or so many other’s blood lines forever.  It simply matters that there are horses in the park. And when those BLM or domestic horses die off, we just bring in more.  A horse is a horse is a horse.  We can’t have all these “emotions” we have for them dictating who gets to stay in the herd. 

I am willing to bet that it matters to all of you though.  And then when people stop coming to see these amazing wild horses because the blue, bay, and red roans are all gone along with the paints that make this herd so iconic, at some point they can let those 35-60 just die off and FINALLY be rid of these invasive horses once and for all. 

THIS is NOT managing the horses.  This is the park STILL just managing the numbers.

Remember, Superintendent Finley is asking us to understand and “tolerate” these plans, even if we don’t agree with them. 

My friend Steve sent me an email today.  He ended it with this line:

I’m not a big Star Wars fan, but please keep hope alive in the face of the forces of darkness. You and your citizen advocates are certainly the last hope those sacred living beings have. I pray for your strength as you fight the good fight.

I always appreciate Steve as well. 

So that is the fight in a nutshell.  I hope that makes the severity of the next few days clear.  PLEASE send the emails.  PLEASE sign the petition.  These do matter – I PROMISE EVERY LITTLE THING MATTERS RIGHT NOW!

As for what is happening that I CAN share:

• We have an Op-Ed circulating.  It will appear as a full page in the Bismarck Tribune on Thursday.  Other papers will hopefully also run it as well.  Our friend Brenda at the Towner County Record Herald said they will publish it in their paper on Saturday.  She is also going to call in a few favors with a couple of small neighboring papers as well. We appreciate Brenda so much!
• We continue to talk to the press.  Today made it hard for them to connect with members of the park and Hoeven’s office.  I think we will start seeing some news on all of this tomorrow and Wednesday.  We will share links when we have them.
• I did talk to Hoeven’s office today – only through email because of the phone situation.  Nothing to report yet, but we will keep you posted.
• I did manage to talk to one of our state legislators.  There is something they may be able to do to help.  I need to talk to a few others but – just know something IS brewing there!
• I have a very important meeting tomorrow.  I will share the details when I have them!
• Superintendent Finley invited me back for the promised meeting this week.  She wanted to meet today or tomorrow, I let her know my schedule is extremely busy – we have a date on Wednesday afternoon.  We will update you on how that goes. 
• We emailed members of the Medora Chamber of Commerce and today we did an e-blast with the Dickinson Area Chamber of Commerce alerting them of the park’s proposed actions.
• Letters to the Editor about the park’s plans for the horses are starting to be printed!  THIS is a HUGE way to help!  Please see our blog for ways to send your letters to North Dakota newspapers!

There is more that we cannot share at this moment, but we promise to update you as soon as we can!

THANK YOU!

THANK YOU!

THANK YOU – for all of your continued help and support!

Remember: We are fighting for these historic wild horses with every fiber of our being because if this roundup is allowed to happen, all we will be left for us to do is sit and slowly watch this herd die off over time until all of the remnants of the horses we have come to know and love are gone. 

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