sierra

Sierra is a beautiful dun mare born in 2018 and rounded up in Utah. Fate threw her together with two other mares from two other states, Cheyenne and Snow. All three mares are very pretty in totally different ways. Sierra is definitely the wildest. Their bond was forged by surviving the most heartless animal cruelty from the roundups to criminal AIP adopters to the kill pen, where we found them. It is our promise that they will know only love, respect, and kindness for the rest of their days.

Like thousands of mustangs, Sierra was dumped in a kill pen by unscrupulous adopters in the BLM’s Adoption Incentive Program (AIP). Touted as a way to give mustangs and burros good homes, it pays adopters $1000 per animal. More often, what it really does is pay middlemen to take wild equines off the BLM’s hands and dispose of them - no questions asked. In this case, a group of adopters broke the law by adopting 4 federally-protected mustangs each, then breeding them to add body weight to their meat price.

It was hard to watch Sierra, Cheyenne, and Snow in the video from the kill pen. Nervous and jumpy, very defensive, they stayed close together. We don’t think they had ever met humans that had any respect for them from the day they were rounded up. Yet they were amazingly trusting and cooperative about being loaded and hauled one more time, never knowing what would be waiting at the next stop. Sierra was given the time she needed to enter the trailer and she did when she made up her own mind to do it. As soon as she leapt off the trailer at Skydog, we could see she knew that something was different. The sense she got from her new equine neighbors must have told her she had nothing to fear. Soon she gave in to the simple pleasure of having a good roll and washed off the filth of the pens with some good, clean mud.

Sierra is full of surprises - quite literally. We knew Cheyenne and Snow were expecting, but Sierra tested negative. As her friends’ bellies swelled, Sierra gained some weight, but she had come to us so thin that we didn’t think anything of it. She certainly did not look like she was carrying a baby - famous last words! On May 3, we couldn’t believe our eyes when we found her standing proudly with her beautiful, peaceful newborn mule, Shasta, at her side.

Our normal procedure is to gentle pregnant mares, if it doesn’t stress them, so we can bring them into the barn when their time is near. Those first 24 hours after delivery are delicate and critical, so gentling them helps assist with veterinary care, should it be needed. Because Sierra was keeping a big secret, we did not do this with her. These three mares are very wild and only come near people at feeding time. After Shasta was born, we brought them all in as a precaution.

Sierra had her baby the wild way. She’s protecting and caring for Shasta, who was lucky enough to be born into a family with doting aunties ready and waiting. And pregnant. Playmates will be here any day now to launch a Skydog Mother Foal Playgroup along with Lacey and Blossom.

#skydogsierra

 Helping Mustangs & Burros

In addition to supporting our work by donating, becoming a patron on Patreon or sponsoring a Skydog, there are several important pieces of legislation to protect American equines currently moving through Congress. It only takes a few minutes to contact your Rep and Senators and urge them to support these bills:

Save America’s Forgotten Equines (SAFE) Act of 2023 (H.R. 3475 in the House / S.2307 in the Senate). This bill will shut down the slaughter pipeline that sends some 20,000 American horses and donkeys to savagely monstrous deaths in foreign slaughterhouses every year.

The Wild Horse & Burro Protection Act of 2023 (H. R. 3656) This bill will prohibit the use of helicopters or fixed-wing aircraft in the management of wild mustangs and burros on public lands, and require a report on humane alternatives to current management practices.

Ejiao Act of 2023 (H.R. 6021). To ​​ban the sale or transportation of ejiao, a gelatin made from boiling donkey skins, or products containing ejiao in interstate or foreign commerce, which brutally kills millions of donkeys primarily for beauty products and Chinese medicine.

You can Contact Members of Congress by calling the Capitol Switchboard (202) 224-3121‬, submitting contact forms on their individual websites, or sending one email to all three simultaneously at www.democracy.io

See our How to Help menu for other actions to ban zebra hunting at US canned hunt ranches, stop production of Premarin & other PMU drugs, and defund the Adoption Incentive Program.