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Just this past week news has been coming that the once great Hairpin Cavy horses are now starving. At one point and time this herd was known to produce ranch horses with great foundation quarter horse bloodlines. Now they are left to fend for themselves and are staving to death. Below are articles from the Billings Gazette about what has and is happening to help these horses.

The Yellowstone County Attorney’s Office on Friday filed five primary misdemeanor counts of animal cruelty and five alternative counts against James H. Leachman of Billings.

But the legal action may have come too late to save many of the estimated 450 horses starving to death on a ranch east of Billings.

Two horses were humanely shot by a county sheriff’s lieutenant last Saturday. Unless the surviving horses are fed, Shepherd veterinarian Jeff Peila said the horses will start dying in droves within the next two weeks. It isn’t clear who will feed the horses or if they can be adopted.

Leachman, who bred cattle in Montana for nearly four decades and turned to horses when his cattle empire collapsed, faces a total maximum of five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

Yellowstone County Attorney Scott Twito said the charges are part of what may be the largest horse abuse case in Montana history.

“This is just a horrible situation, and we’ll try to do whatever we can to help the horses,” he said.

Twito said that as soon as possible he would call a meeting of the government agencies involved, along with ranchers surrounding the former Leachman Home Place Ranch, which has about 9,400 deeded acres and 30,000 leased Crow tribal lands.

The five primary charges of negligently failing to provide veterinary care, food or water to helpless animals are “stacked” so they collectively carry a maximum five-year, $5,000 penalty. The charges can be converted later to a felony charge.

The five dead horses cited as evidence include a young mare with what appeared to be a broken leg on Dec. 29 and later found dead Jan. 15; a black mare nursing a colt; an old bay mare nursing a colt that couldn’t walk because marking bands placed on her front legs strangled her circulation as she grew; a buckskin mare with a colt with a severe cut tendon; and a 1- to 2-year-old black-blue roan mare that had been walking on her ankle bone for a year after apparently breaking her leg.

Peila, who examined the horses Dec. 29 at the request of investigators, said about 350 of the horses in the 2,600-acre Tschirgi pasture hadn’t eaten much for a month.

“It’s horrible. They’re all starving to death,” Peila said Wednesday. “The first time I was up there Dec. 29, (the horses) were running the fence. They wanted out. They had nothing to eat then, and their condition has really deteriorated.”

Leachman was served with the charges early Friday evening and will be ordered to appear in Justice Court.

He said Friday evening that he expects to be vindicated. He said Turk Stovall, who is managing the Home Place Ranch with his wife, Jenny, has been interfering with the horses.

“Part of the interference inflicted by Stovall on me includes the unauthorized and inhumane moving, intermingling and locking up of my horses. That has included, but is not limited to, the very same horses referred to in the charges: all the horses who had been sorted off by us in case they needed professional care or needed to be disposed of,” Leachman said.

In a lengthy interview with The Billings Gazette on Dec. 4, Leachman denied that his horses were starving. They have always ranged on winter pasture and done well on the Home Place ranch 16 miles east of Billings along Highway 87E, he said. But he lost his ranch last July at a U.S. Marshals Service foreclosure sale when the neighboring Stovall family paid $2.6 million for the ranch. Getting the money to buy it back by July is his focus.

“My game plan now, in general, is to get through the redemption of the ranch and plan on having an orderly horse sale, which would probably entail or include a reduction in the horse numbers,” he said. “And ideally, I would have a nucleus to go forward.”

All the horses were meticulously sorted for a fall sale, he said, but the Stovalls mixed them up again and they keep moving his horses around without his permission, so he doesn’t know where they all are to feed or doctor them. Leachman said the Stovalls are jealous of his skills with genetics and for years have been out to get his ranch and his Crow tribal leases.

The Stovalls can’t feed the horses because they don’t own them, are wary of getting sued, and need the hay and land for their own livestock. Leachman was supposed to remove his horses six months ago when he lost the ranch, Stovall said, a point Leachman disputes. And Stovall is frustrated at the slow pace of public agencies in dealing with the horse problem that has been festering for at least a year.

“We’ve got to protect our grass and all the hay we bought for our cows,” Turk Stovall said. “We’ve done about everything we can think of.”

Stovall and his hired hand could gather up the horses in a day, but a roundup doesn’t seem to be in the cards, either.

“We’re trying to get this done as fast as possible,” Twito said. “It is frustrating, but at the end of the day, this could have been taken care of by Mr. Leachman.”

On Jan. 15, Peila, along with a deputy county attorney, two sheriff’s deputies and a Montana Department of Livestock manager, returned to the ranch with legal authority to deal with the worst of the horses. The vet had Yellowstone County Sheriff Lt. Kent O’Donnell mercy shoot an old bay mare that Peila called a “sack of bones.” The mare lies in a prairie dog town in the Fighter pasture, but the body hadn’t been touched yet — the coyotes, cougars and magpies were apparently spooked off by the hum of the high-voltage power lines overhead.

O’Donnell also shot a mare that had been walking on her ankle bone for a year or more after apparently breaking her leg as a baby.

This is big country and finding the bodies ate up a half-day, covering 30 miles in a chained-up pickup. One banded horse was found near Woody Mountain.

“I saw that horse standing on the hill by Woody Mountain, the magpies pecking at him, and two days later I found him lying in the draw, feeding the coyotes,” ranch hand Kenny Kukowski said.

All ranchers lose a small percentage of stock running on the range, but this death could have been avoided, Peila said.

“It’s poor livestock management to band the horses and turn them out into the damn wilderness,” he said.

No one yet knows how many horses are roaming the vast range, including deeded and Crow tribal lands near the Pryor Mountains. What is different about this winter is that these horses cannot roam freely to find grass because Leachman doesn’t control the land anymore.

The Stovalls started calving heifers last week, so most of the horses are confined on the Tschirgi with no grass left. Only yucca spikes, wisps of cheat grass and sagebrush — a last meal for a horse — poke through the snow and ice. Winter coats can hide a lot, but these pasture horses show sucked up bellies, skinny necks and protruding hip bones.

More than 100 horses have broken through barbed-wire fences and are roaming on neighboring ranches or on Crow tribal land where they have a much better chance of surviving the winter, Peila said.

After telling a bankruptcy judge last winter that he had no income after the collapse of the Leachman Cattle Co., and a price collapse in the horse markets, Leachman said he would hold his annual fall Hairpin Cavvy sale.

That didn’t happen.

“I planned on having a sale this fall, I just couldn’t have it. Sure, I could have it if I wanted to sell my horses for 200 bucks,” he said in December.

On Dec. 3, the horses in the pasture were wild and strong enough that they ran through 2- to 3-foot drifts to flee when they spotted a pickup a mile away. Last Saturday, a band of mares barely moved when the truck came within 150 yards.

Who is in charge of ensuring the health of the horses isn’t simple.

The joke among ranchers on the reservation is that there is little law out there, due mostly to the checkerboard mix of deeded or private land and Crow tribal lands. And the fences follow the water and grass, not property lines, making it tricky to know whether you’re on private or tribal lands.

Because the Crow Tribe is a sovereign nation, county, state and federal officials have limited authority on lease lands.

“The sheriff won’t come, the Crow tribal police won’t come, the BIA won’t come and the brand inspector won’t come, but the FBI will come if you die,” the joke goes.

The reality is that multiple law enforcement agencies are players on the reservation.

The Yellowstone County Sheriff’s Office is in charge of animal abuse cases, but it isn’t set up to handle horses.

“Look at us. Do you see any cowboys here or horse trailers?” then-Undersheriff Seth Weston said in December when it was becoming clear the horses were in danger.

The Sheriff’s Office is in charge of the investigation, and the Montana Department of Livestock is assisting.

Last fall, Montana Department of Livestock Eastern Area Manager Travis Elings hauled his personal water tank to 14 Leachman stallions that were apparently living on morning dew.

“It was a bad, bad deal. Them horses were thirsty, thirsty. We had to beat them off with ropes to fill the tanks,” Elings said in December.

Leachman said his horses had water until Stovall’s hired hand moved them into a pasture without water.

What happens next with the horses isn’t clear. Twito said his office lacks the authority to pay for a roundup.

“If you look at the roundup provision in statute, it requires the adjoining landowners or livestock association to pay,” Twito said. “If I could wave a magic wand and help those horses, I would in a heartbeat, but I’m bound to enforce the law.”

In December 2008, Yellowstone County rescued about 200 neglected dogs and 30 other animals on Linda Kapsa’s Ballantine farm and fed and cared for the animals until the case was concluded and the animals could be adopted. The cost of caring for the animals topped $255,000, including $44,000 in donations.

But horses are a lot harder to handle.

The U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs, which apparently manages the Tschirgi pasture on tribal lands, and the Crow Tribe haven’t responded to Freedom of Information Act letters or recent requests for comment.

“In my opinion, the BIA has the easy power to snap to it, but nobody wants to pay the bill to feed those horses and to deal with Leachman,” Peila said.

Each horse needs 30 pounds of hay a day, he said, which would run $1,600 to $1,800 per day to feed all of them. That doesn’t include vet fees and the costs of hauling hay and water to the remote Crow Reservation hills. The horses are eating snow now, but they can’t eat hay without water to drink or they’ll die. Hay has no moisture, grass does.

“Now is the quiet downhill. A month ago, they were not that bad. Now, they’re really suffering,” Peila said. “I think we’ll see a lot of dead horses in two weeks and a lot of suffering in between.”

Although he admits it’s a long-shot politically, the vet said time has run out, so in his opinion all the horses in pasture need to be kicked out to other ranches and tribal lands to survive until July when the ranch redemption issue is settled.

“These are his horses, and as the owner, he is responsible to God and everybody to take care of those animals,” Peila said. “It appears for some reason Leachman is neglecting everything and waiting for someone else to do something.”

Thank you to NILE for stepping up to the plate and helping these horses. Below is the article from the Billings Gazette

Hay is on the way to the hundreds of hungry horses on the former Leachman Cattle Co. Home Place ranch east of Billings.

In what has been dubbed Operation Home Place, Justin Mills, executive director of the Northern International Livestock Exposition in Billings, said Monday that a Red Lodge couple at the Valley M Ranch has donated 100 tons of hay to help the struggling horses. As soon as volunteers can find a semitrailer, probably Tuesday, the hay will be shipped to Billings.

“We’ll get it right out there,” Mills said. “If we can get some hay into those horses, everything will be fine.”

That’s because there’s been a warm snap and the ice has melted, so the estimated 350 horses in one pasture now have water to drink, but they need to haul water tanks out to the ranch in case freezing temperatures return, he said.

Estimates run all the way from 300 to 400 horses to 700 head running on half-a-dozen ranches at the former Leachman Home Place ranch 16 miles east of Billings along Hwy. 87E.

Yellowstone County Commissioner

The NILE office at MetraPark is the staging area for donations of hay and water tanks of at least 100-gallon capacity. And financial donations will be run through the NILE Foundation, a nonprofit 501c3 organization.

But anyone wanting to donate hay or tanks should call first, Mills said.

The Yellowstone County Sheriff’s office is in charge of hauling the feed and water tanks to the ranch.

On Friday, the Yellowstone County Attorney’s office charged James Leachman with five primary counts of animal cruelty and five alternative counts. Leachman, 69, is scheduled to appear in Justice Court on Friday at 3:15 p.m. He faces a total of five years in prison and a $5,000 fine, and the charges could be upgraded to a felony. Charging him with five “stacked” misdemeanors carries tougher penalties and could result in a faster resolution of the case than a single felony count.

“This was the smartest way to go and will result in the quickest action,” Twito said.”This is a tough situation out there with the horses.”

Turk Stovall and his father, Jay Stovall, who bought the ranch last July at a U.S. Marshall foreclosure sale, thanked public officials for getting involved. But they also want to work on a long-term solution for the horses roaming some 40,000 acres south of Billings, including getting them off the land. 

“There are horses scattered all over. Five different ranches have horses on them,” Turk Stovall said Monday. “Nobody knows what to do with the horses.”

The Stovalls bought the ranch from the Leachman Cattle Co. LLC. And, James Leachman, who owns the horses, was supposed to move his livestock, but didn’t. Leachman and his limited company have until July to come up with the $2.6 million, plus other foreclosure costs, to buy his ranch back.

Last week, Shepherd Veterinarian Jeff Peila gave about 350 horses in one pasture about two weeks to live if something wasn’t done.

However, after looking at them on Sunday, the NILE’S Mills said unseasonably warm weather has melted much of the ice in the pasture, providing drinking water, and exposed some patches of grass.

 “The colts have good condition on them and the mares are a little thin,” Mills said.

How they do from now on depends a lot on the weather.

The Stovalls said they have been feeding the horses their grass for half a year and welcomed the help.

“This makes my heart feel really good. It’s been going on a long time. Them horses have been in bad shape for a long time,” Jay Stovall said.

The NILE is coordinating the effort to collect hay and water tanks, but the Yellowstone County Sheriff’s Department is in charge of getting the food to the ranch. No one should bring anything to the Rimrock Arena at MetraPark without first calling the NILE office.

“The hay needs to be good grass hay or grass alfalfa hay,” Mills said.

An estimated 300 to 400 horses are scattered widely over four townships on the former Leachman ranch, surrounding ranches, farmland and Crow Tribal lands 16 miles east of Billings on Highway 87E. But Billings attorney Jon Doak, who represents the Stovalls, said evidence presented in the personal bankruptcy of Leachman indicated there may be 700 horses.

The NILE fielded about 100 calls all weekend from people wanting to help.

“We’ve got a notebook page with three columns, two of them full. And that’s just one person’s notebook,” Mills said. “There were two of fielding calls and one just checking the messages.”

The Yellowstone County Sheriff’s Department also fielded numerous calls. About a dozen people offered hay and water troughs, so far, and about 50 water tanks are needed, said Capt. Bill Michaelis.

With all the offers of help, Michaelis said people should call the NILE first before dropping anything off.

“Hay and water troughs are what we need and we don’t want to have an overabundance of stuff out there,” he said.

The plan is to put the water tanks in four-wheel drive pickups and drive them out to the ranch, but those remote roads turn to mud and gumbo quickly, so timing is important.

“We’re going to have to handle delivery of the stuff,” Michaelis said. “We’ll have to get out there early in the morning when the ground is frozen, then we can move around a lot easier.”

To help, call the NILE office at: 406-256-2495.

Las Vegas was the place to be January 3-6 for the Summit of the Horse (SOH). People from all walks for life and all backgrounds joined together to work on solutions for the battered horse industry.

We all have heard the saying “If you can talk the talk, then walk the walk?” Now that the SOH has ended the work has really just begun. I unfortunately was not able to attend, but have been anxiously waiting what program(s) foundation(s) would derive from SOH.

 I know in my wide world of horse people there are those that will say, “My horse(s) will never go to slaughter.” But what we have to remember is that in this day and age a job loss, medical problems, etc. can turn a person’s world upside down, and the horses have to go. After time it is very easy to loose track of a horse either through it being resold or loosing track of the person that bought the horse. There fore, the Do Not Slaughter Registry would give an owner a way to safe guard against their horse going to slaughter. (Here is the link for you to view it in context http://www.united-horsemen.org/unified-equine-programs/national-do-not-slaughter-registry/)

 The Do Not Slaughter Registry in simplicity is a complied listing of horses that are not to go to slaughter. At some point and time an owner put this horse in the Do Not Slaughter Registry, there fore when it is scanned at a slaughter house the owner listed for the horse would be contacted, and then be able to buy the horse back for the costs that had been incurred.

 Of course for me I always go, “This sounds great, but how much is it going to cost, is their going to a one-time fee, will the auction house have to pay a fee and how will that be structured, etc”. I know this program is still in its infancy stage, but those costs are what will either make or break this whole program. If the costs are too high there is no way for it to come to life.

 But even with those “questions”  this is a step in the right direction to meet in the middle on this highly heated subject. Once again I look forward to reading your views.

Every year we get a so called do over. It’s is a time to reflect on our past and look forward to the future. So now it is time to set some new goals for 2011. A good new tool in reaching your goals is write them down and put them where you will see them daily. This helps to keep you motivated, and you can cross off each goal reached on by one. Here are some of my goals with the horses for 2011:

• Enter in a roping. It’s time to leave the comfort of our arena at home.
• Help my husband more when he is training the horses. I tend to let him do it all and I need to get out of my fear of riding the young ones.
• Continue my learning to become a better horseman.
• Help my children with learning more about horses.

These are just a few of my goals. What are yours?

Most days I sit here and I have no idea what to blog about. My entire way of life has been involved with agriculture here in Nebraska. Most of my memories as a child are being with my Dad & Granddad on the family farm. We had row crops and raised livestock.

 Yet, it seems as an adult my life really hasn’t changed that much. I enjoy the spring when the cows calve and wathcing calves running around. The time that is spent with my children showing them first hand how to care for the animals, and why it is so important.

 The Humane Society of the United States is now targeting our great state of Nebraska. HSUS has one or two bills being prepared for the legislature on the care of cats and dogs. The introduction of bills on smaller animals is how HSUS gets their foot in the door. HSUS the starts lobbying for the passing of the bills on chicken, pork, then other livestock production.

 Nebraskans need to stand together and let those that we have voted into office know that we will not stand by and watch our way of life disappear before us. Let HSUS know that Nebraskans cannot be swayed HSUS advertising.

 I want to say thank you to Gov. Dave Heineman and state Sen. Tom Carlson for taking a stand to support the agriculture in Nebraska, and to the Kearney Hub for publishing the article on this issue. You can view the article on their web site http://kearneyhub.com/news/local/article_0054fa30-0a85-11e0-b077-001cc4c03286.html .

Sue Wallis, Representative in the Wyoming Legislature, was one of several state representatives to sponsor a bill that allows disposal of stray horses in early 2010. Ms. Wallis is also the founder of United Horseman, which is organizing the upcoming Summit of The horse. Many people from all aspects of agriculture are teaming up in Las Vegas from January 3-6 to discuss the hurdles the equine industry is facing today. To learn more about the Summit of The Horse please visit their web site at http://www.united-horsemen.org/summit-of-the-horse/ .

 I for one am anxiously waiting to learn about what solutions can be brought to the table to help the equine industry.

Through the years team roping has evolved from a competition between ranch hands to a multi-million dollar industry. This past week my husband competed at the Cinch USTRC National Finals of Team Roping in Oklahoma, City and we dove head first into 5 days of team roping. During this time it got me thinking “Wow! What a change in team roping.”

I know most people think of team roping as cowboy thing, but this isn’t farther from the truth. Today’s team roper is anyone from the high school quarter back, preschooler, to your own grandparent. The whole family can participate and encourage each other while roping.

 Here at the ranch our two daughters are starting to rope. Just this past summer I was able to get back out in the arena and start to practice again. (I forgot just how frustrating roping could be, but I just keep going back to the arena.) We have neighbors that are now starting to learn to roper, just because of the comradely. 

But I think the biggest change in team roping is the horses and the horsemanship. Internet, training tapes, clinics, and other material now available have spurred this changed.

 No matter how young or young at heart you are, if you want to learn to rope I suggest you give it a try. If you have any questions, feel free to ask!

 Attached are some pictures from our trim of my husband. He is riding our stallion Duns of Impact, aka Jr.

Yes, I will admit I am one of those people that love a long mane on a performance horse. The only road block is that a long healthy mane takes time, good nutrition, and proper care.

I have spent I don’t know how many hours over the years working to get Jr’s mane to the length it is. My biggest road block is that he is a rope horse with his mane on the right side. We all know that most of these horses have short manes due to their job.

Here are a things that I do to help keep Jr’s mane long & healthy:

• Good nutrition and health - No matter what nutrition is the key to having a healthy looking horse. As well as proper deworming and vaccinations.
• I very rarely brush through Jr’s mane or tail. Brushing will pull the hair out if there are tangles. There fore, always just finger through the mane.
• Condition the mane. I use a mixture of water, conditioner, little baby oil, and a splash of Listerine.
• When braiding his mane I do not leave the braids in for extended periods of time with the rubber bands. The rubber bands will damage the hair. If I am going to leave bands in I use cloth from an old sheet or pillow case.

If you have any tips or ticks to add feel free to share!

My husband and I are blessed with two horse-loving daughters. Most of our time is spent outside with the horses or something that pertains to them. Our oldest is six and has been bitten by the barrel racing & roping bug.

Even though my daughter is only six she has taught us more about patience, finding different ways of explaining a concept, and how to have fun. In the middle of summer the missing factor in our practice session was fun. Point blank she told us she didn’t want to rope any more, so my husband and I took a step back. We didn’t ask her to rope or practice instead we just let her do her own thing for a while.

Just this past month she has picked her rope back up, and the one thing we haven’t forgotten is the fun. We have mock USTRC competitions with her heading for her dad, and them making it to the short go for the saddles, and the National Shoot Out to go to Oklahoma.

The difference now is that she wants to rope, she wants to know which roping they are competing in, plus she asks her dad to come and rope!

So everyone out there add some fun to your practice time.   

 On Monday, August 30th legendary stallion Smart Little Lena was humanely euthanized after suffering from a stroke.

 Smart Little Lena was sired by Doc Olena and produced by Smart Peppy. Smart Little Lena was one of only three stallions that have won the NCHA Triple Crown. During his show career from 1982-1984 he won $743,275 in only eight shows.  His offspring have won over $26 million in cutting and $400,000 in reining.

 Before passing Smart Little Lena was cloned. The cloning procedure resulted in 5 cloned stallions. The Smart Little Lena Syndicate has decided not to show the colts, but to condition them. Also, before passing Smart Little Lena was collected and his semen frozen. Even though, “The Legend” has passed Smart Little Lena’s legacy will influence NCHA for generations.