A cast iron sculpture of a cowboy contemplating a bucking horse greets visitors at the entrance of the Wyoming Honor Farm in Riverton, Wyoming. An inscription reads, “There is nothing better for inside of a man than the outside of a horse.” The farm is not an ordinary farm, it’s also a low security prison where the inmates are rehabilitated though the labor of agricultural work as well as the powerful power of animal therapy, training or “gentling” wild mustangs.
Inmate, Travis Bogard (L) talks about the temperament of a yearling he trained with a prospective buyer at the Wyoming Honor farm.
Inmate Travis Bogard, standing in a coral of leggy yearlings, said that trainers with experience can train a horse, from “wild to saddle” in about two months but for novices, it takes longer. He explained that the yearlings were still too small to ride and that many of them had arrived to the farm without their mothers. In some cases the inmates have to bottle feed the foals.
The training starts with the horse and the inmate building trust through physical proximity and touch. For many inmates it will be the first time they have ever touched a horse.
Next, the horses are slowly introduced to halters, saddle blankets, saddles, a snaffle bit is placed in its mouth. The goal is to teach the horse to be gentle and familiar with humans. Once the horses accept a saddle on their back, its one step closer to being able to sit on their backs and ride off.
Rick Conner, shares a tender moment with a gelding named Nine-Ball he trained.
Wild horses and burros are descendants of animals released by or escaped from Spanish explorers, ranchers, miners, the U.S. Cavalry and native Americans. Horses and burros were crucial to survival for settlers and pioneers, who depended on them for transportation and agricultural chores. American wild horses were once at the brink of being eradicated. In recent years, however, they have flourished under the protection afforded by federal laws passed in 1971, the “The Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971 .” The act covered the management, protection and study of "unbranded and unclaimed horses and burros on public lands in the United States."
Since then, The wild horse and burro population has expanded to over 81,000. The BLM now battles balancing, managing, protecting, and controlling the herds. Given that wild horses and burros have no natural predators in the American West, herd populations double about every four years.
An inmate smiles as he watches horses he’s helped train get auctioned to bidders.
One inmate, Jesse Fretter, said “When I first came up here, I had no intention to join this horse program, and then they heard I could ride and they said ‘hey come on.’ As soon as I hit leather, everything melted away, it was just me and the horse and that’s how I spend my days. I’m blessed, how could I not be? There are 100 horses out here, I and I get to ride anyone I want.”
A woman with a blue manicured nails pets a yearling’s muzzle.
In each auction about 50 horses and a few dozen burros and yearlings are adopted. Earlier in 2019 a gelding fetched a record price of $5700. All the money goes to the BLM, who pay the prison a daily fee to board the horses.
Inmates handle horses in a pen.
Dusty Davison, an inmate rides a trained wild mustang around a pen during an auction to demonstrate the horse's rideability.
With the expanding population of feral horses the Bureau of Land Management adopts out about 4600 horses and burros every year in to private care. The American Wild Horse Group has been critical of the Bureau of Land Management's other proposed methods, including a variety of “inhumane, unscientific and publicly unacceptable methods.” These practices include surgical and chemical sterilization, culling or sale for slaughter of 100,000 mustangs and burros annually.
A gelding is bid upon.
Bidding underway at the auction.
Nicole Fader reacts with joy at her successful bid to adopt a silvery mustang named Cloud.
Serial adopter Nicole Fader reacted with tears of joy at her successful bid to adopt a silvery mustang named Cloud. Fader said she felt an instant bond with the horse when she saw him at an auction earlier in the year, but due to a clerical mix up she was not able to adopt him at that time. She and her husband Nick, traveled three hours from Lyman, Wyoming to try again, and adopted Cloud for $1500. The Faders have six other horses that they take on pack hikes in the mountains and said that all of their horses were acquired through BLM wild mustang programs. Some of their horses were wild when they got them, and they worked to train and "gentle" them. The Faders said they have hired professional trainers to help but they do the "groundwork" themselves. Nick explained groundwork constituted teaching the horse things like, "Don't be rude," and "Don't bite me."
Cloud is seen peering out of the Fader’s horse trailer on his way to his new life.
Once they got to Fader’s ranch, Cloud met his new horse brothers and sisters and became very attached to Nicole, who changed her facebook profile photo to an image of her new charge. “ He’s doing wonderfully,” she said “ He’s a total sweetheart and follows me constantly, even leaving his food to come to the fence and wait for me whenever he sees me.”
Leah Huckaby, in a horse themed t-shirt. Her father, James Huckaby, owner of the Stacked Heart ranch which specializes in rescuing wild mustangs took home two geldings. He said of the horses, that this was either the best day, or worst day of their lives.er father
Dusty Davison, (R) pulls a BamBam a burro, that refused to get in to a horse trailer, living up to the burro stereotype.
The federal government says Arizona public lands can support a maximum of 1,676 wild burros. However in 2017 an estimated 6,241 burros roaming the state.. While all the horses at auction came from the Wyoming, the burros were imported, some from Arizona.
Burros are often kept as pets, admired for their adorableness. Gary Adles made a successful bid for the burro Bam Bam, who was on her way to becoming a pet and a companion to horses on a ranch. Aldes explained his love of, “Donks” saying “ They’re fun! Fun little buggers to be around – we had one years ago, a little brown jack donk, and I’d holler his name and he’d come running like a dog.” Other adopters plan to use the burros for hunting, packing killed animals and supplies on long hikes.
A horse is led through a chute to a waiting trailer, en route to his new home.
Billy Terhune, a former inmate at the Wyoming Honor farm, poses for a portrait with Pard.
Former inmate, Billy Terhune, was once a construction worker, but while incarcerated at the Honor Farm he learned to train horses.
Terhune said he thrived in the program and felt fortunate to have his life redirected by it, “It was a really good program for me, in fact, I’ve decided to become a horse trainer over the deal. I’ve been riding horses my whole life, but never really got to know the inner workings of it, and I learned that there. It’s intriguing, very fulfilling and very rewarding.”
Terhune traveled to Riverton with his family, where his parents bid on and successfully bought Pard, the horse he trained for him. “The mission was to get Pard. I really connected with him. Some other guys had him and were having problems, in fact, they called him “knuckle.” I got in the round pen with him and started working with him, introducing him to saddles and so on. I was talking to him as I put a saddle blanket on him, he sniffed it and looked me in the eye for about 10 seconds, and from them on he trusted me. So I’m like, I’m coming back to get you buddy.”
Terhune joked he was in town to break his horse out of jail.