"You Can't Save Them All..."

This is the story of Ranger, a very old mustang stallion who lived for decades in the wild and rugged Virginia Range Highlands, just outside of Reno, Nevada.

We don't know exactly when Ranger's story began, but we do know that he was, for many years, a savvy and successful herd stallion with his own band of mares and foals. The range is no doubt dotted with his progeny, while the scars that pepper his body are evidence of the many battles he fought to keep his family together.

A bay stallion with his herd grazing in the Highlands. Sure looks like a younger version of Ranger -- could be one of his many descendants. 

Ranger's advanced age (estimated to be somewhere between 25 and 32) is a testament to his remarkable mental and physical prowess, as well as his incredible survival instincts. Unfortunately, old age is an foe that will eventually bring down even the toughest stallion, and Ranger was no exception. Inevitably, he grew slower and weaker, and some years ago, he lost his family to a younger, more vigorous stallion. Driven out and alone, he attempted to join up with the small bands of "bachelors" (usually younger stallions who have not yet attained any mares of their own), but the bachelors, possibly seeing a slow old horse as a predator magnet, drove him off as savagely as the stallion who had taken his mares.

Still, Ranger survived. Vulnerable and desperately lonely, he wandered the harsh terrain, covered in bite and kick marks from his attempts to get close to other wild horses. Each winter grew harder as arthritis crept into his joints, and he began struggling to keep weight on as his teeth began to fail. This was his life for years.

When I first saw Ranger, in the front yard of the property where my horses are boarded, he looked like a soul not long for this world. I noticed him immediately, as it was mid-summer in a year where unseasonable rains had created fantastic grazing conditions, and the other wild horses in the area were sleek and almost plump. Ranger, on the other hand, looked far too thin and downright sickly. His ribs were prominent, his head was hanging low, he had strange lumps in his throat, his left eye was crusty and painful looking, his flanks were sunken (indicating dehydration), he was dripping saliva from his mouth, and his whole demeanor was one of depression and ill health.

Ranger's poor condition stood out in stark contrast to the other mustangs in the area.

His left eye, which he kept squinted shut much of the time.

My first thought (a selfish one, I admit) was that I was none too happy to have a sick mustang hanging around near my horses. My boys often sniff noses with the wild ones through the fence, and if one of them was carrying something, my horses could easily catch it. I decided to spend a little time observing the horse in order to better assess the state of his health.

What I saw was disheartening. Like all the wild horses, this one spent the majority of his time nibbling the natural forage that grows around here, but it soon became obvious that while he was trying to eat, he could neither chew nor swallow the food he took into his mouth. Instead, he would wad it up and spit it out, a process called "quidding" in the horse world. A horse that quids its food has some kind of major problem going on in its mouth, usually related to its teeth. The teeth could be misaligned, they could have sharp points causing pain, or they could simply be so worn down due to age that they don't function properly anymore.

Then there was the dripping saliva.  He was drooling at a rate of about one drip per second, and while horses can drool for reasons such as poisoning or choking, my money was on some kind of pain issue related to his teeth -- though the swellings in his throat made me wonder if he was having difficulty swallowing in general.

Without getting a look in the horse's mouth, there was no way to tell what the issue really was, but there was no question that this horse had a serious problem that was most likely the cause of his poor condition. I watched with a heavy heart as the little stallion gave up trying to eat the tough native plant material and instead attempted to attain what nutrients he could by consuming a pile of dried horse manure.

I then used the zoom lens on my camera to get a closer look at his squinting eye, and noticed that he had white hairs sprinkled over his face. This boy was old -- old and in trouble. We had been hearing about El Nino conditions setting us up for a particularly hard, snowy winter, and I imagined this already malnourished fellow would not make it to Spring. His death, when it came, would be a hard one.

A horse that starved to death in Winter conditions. Was this to be Ranger's fate?

All of this was sad to see, but I didn't really think there was anything I could do to help him. While I went about my barn chores, I thought about giving him some hay, even though I was fairly sure he wouldn't be able to eat it, and even though I had always made a point not to feed the wild horses -- which is actually illegal to do in our area.I was thinking about becoming a criminal by giving him some soaked grass pellets, but by the time I got back out front to take another look and possibly offer the horse some food, he was gone.

Out of sight was not out of mind in this case, as I kept thinking about the little bay stallion and wondering how he was faring. Then, a few nights later, I pulled up at the barn for my horses' late night feeding and there he was, hanging out by the fence with Rogie, my mini donkey. Rogie is a true social butterfly who loves to make new friends, so it did not surprise me that he was standing there giving comfort to this sad, lonely creature.

I was, however, a little surprised that my two horses were allowing this to happen. Normally, my horses don't let the wild ones get too close to Rogie. They are both extremely protective of him, and Gryphon (who is huge compared to the mustangs) will charge the fence, doing his best impression of a fire-breathing dragon to scare the wild ones away. My guess was that they didn't see Ranger as much of a threat, and so allowed him to stand close to the fence near Rogie.

This scene -- Ranger hanging around near the fence with his little buddy -- was repeated several times over the next little while.

Ranger lowers his head in a gesture that shows he is non-threatening

Turns out I was not alone in being worried about Ranger. Several other people I spoke to who had seen him in the neighborhood were also very concerned about him, including an equine veterinarian who spotted him near the barn. After talking it over with some friends, we decided that letting a horse starve to death before our very eyes was simply not humane, and we needed to see if there was anything we could do for this horse.

To make a long story short, we went through the proper channels and obtained permission to contain Ranger if we could, and the government would then send up an agent to assess him and see what should be done. I envisioned several possible scenarios:

•  We would discover that the horse had dental problems that could be fixed, get him treated, and release him. This was what I hoped for, but I knew it was probably a long shot. 

•  We would discover that the horse's teeth were worn down to the point of no return, meaning there was nothing an equine dentist could do to make any difference. 

•  We would not be able to get anywhere near the horse to try to figure out what the problem was.

I had already spoken with the excellent equine dental specialist, Scott Greene, DVM, to see if a horse like this could even be worked on, and if so, if he would possibly be able to do it.  He told me that he had worked on wild horses before, but only at the Carson prison, where they have a squeeze chute (a device that holds the horse very tightly so that it cannot struggle or get away) which allowed him to get close enough to the horses to knock them out with anesthesia, which is necessary in order to do dental work on such wild animals. Without a squeeze, Dr. Greene would be unable to sedate the horse, so even looking in its mouth would be impossible. Taking Ranger to the prison for treatment might be possible, but I wondered what that kind of stress would do to the old boy.

I had to admit that there was also the possibility that the government might decide that the only option was to put Ranger down. I hated to think about that, but even as I recoiled from the notion, the rationalist in me knew that a quick death at the hands of an experienced range manager would be far more merciful than leaving the horse on the range. Dr. Greene had told me that starving to death is a horrible, slow, torturous way for a horse to die, so to me, there really wasn't any choice in the matter. I decided that we should try to catch Ranger and at least see if there was some way to help him.

The timing, for me, was terrible: we were in the middle of a very time-consuming and stressful house build, and I already had so much on my plate that I was only managing to sleep about five hours a night. And, it didn't help that there were plenty of naysayers dropping negative comments.

One said, "You're going to try to help a mustang stallion who has been wild his whole life -- and with all you have going on? You must be nuts."  To which I replied, "Clearly."

Another said, "You know you won't ever be able to ride that horse, so rescuing him is pointless."  To which I replied, "An act of compassion is never pointless."

Still another said, "There are dozens of old horses like that on the range; you can't possibly save them all." To which I replied, "True -- but what if we can save just one?"


Thus, with the help of a few volunteers and the generosity of the owners of the barn where my horses live, we went ahead and set up a catch pen.

The catch pen we set up for Ranger.

 
Then we waited, hoping Ranger would show up again and that we would be able to get this wild stallion into the pen......and hoping that if we did, we would somehow find a way to save him.