March 2008 Email Update Part 1

March 5, 2008

Dear Friends of Cloud and his family;

In February I trailered Trace to Montana and for five days we searched for Cloud with no luck! However, we did see Bolder and his family in the red desert and Flint alone on a snow swept ridge halfway up Sykes Ridge.  (continue)

Makendra Silverman, who works for Taurus Productions (my film company) and for The Cloud Foundation, and I traveled north with Trace and my Spanish mustang endurance horse, Flint (not to be confused with wild Flint). Big Flint was born and bred on the Brislawn’s Cayuse Ranch in the northeast corner of Wyoming. The Brislawn’s raise their horses in family bands on their 3,000 acre ranch so it is the next best thing to being wild. I first met Flint when he was three days old and I was filming for “Year of the Mustang” for Marty Stouffer’s Wild America series on PBS in 1994. Both wild Flint, Cloud’s step-son, and big Flint are grullos but big Flint has more white as you can see in the photo.

Each morning we would trailer the horses out from Lovell to the base of the horse range. There was too much snow to even drive in to the Red Buttes so we began from the gate of the range and started riding, me on Trace and Makendra on Flint. It was a wonderful adventure and we discovered the trails that the wild horses use to travel from the Red Desert up to Cougar Canyon and beyond.

On our second day, we traveled across the desert near the mouth of Big Coulee, the immense canyon separating Sykes and Tillett ridges. Bolder! We could see Bolder and his family traveling uphill and out of sight. We followed their tracks in the snow. The trail skirted deep drifts, led over rock slabs, past red sandstone outcroppings and yellowish limestone buttes.

Soon after we started uphill we noticed we were being followed. It was Bristol, a grullo stallion who had been with a young mare all fall and winter. But, today he was alone. Maybe that’s why he was following us. Bristol and big Flint looked like brothers—small,  compact grullos, stylish little Spanish horses. We stopped Trace and Flint on a narrow saddle that dropped into a grassy valley. Bristol kept coming, making a loop around us and descending into the meadow that leads to the edge of lower Cougar Canyon.

We never caught up to Bolder and his family and we lost their trail when it started to snow and we were forced to turn back. But, from the brief look at the band, we could see that everyone was accounted for and looked fine. Bolder is dark this winter. Makendra teases, “Instead of Bolder, we should call him Smolder.” His once golden coat has darkened as his personality grew tougher. He is a combination of ashy grey and palomino.

As in January, Shaman was no longer with them. In January we’d seen the old stallion up on Sykes alone, his dun coat shining in the sun. I don’t know if he will try to win back his family in the spring. Time will tell. We’re anxious for May to come as Bolder should have his first foal with Cedar, his gulla mare.

On our rides we saw Sitting Bull, his mare and foal from Christmas of 2006, bachelor stallions, and a couple of other small bands. Most were in the lower Sykes area or the red desert. From lower Sykes, we glassed over to Tillet Ridge and spotted Cloud’s mother with Diamond, Cloud’s older brother.  I was convinced that Cloud was higher on Sykes, so on our fifth day, we started riding early and got up to the windswept ridges where we had a close encounter with Morning Star’s band. The dark bay stallion eyed us suspiciously and moved across the ridge top with his family which includes one of the two foals born in September. The small filly was a ball of thick, dark hair. Her mother looked lean, but that would be expected of a nursing mother in the dead of winter. I think they will survive unless there are huge, wet winter snows and extended cold. As I watched them moving away, I wondered how Cloud’s mare, Aztec and her baby, Shadow, are faring.

Morning Star trotted out and sparred playfully with the older black bachelor, Tony. The snow flew up as they reared up and spun around. Obviously, these stallions are in good health and were in high spirits on such a warm winter day.

We glassed the ridges of Sykes from a good vantage point and spotted distant dark dots. Clearly they were horses, but not the pale palomino we had hoped to spot. On a finger-like ridge top a bit closer to us we saw Flint grazing alone. Cloud’s step-son looked very fit, so I imagine he will come into spring in great health, and perhaps this will be his year to win a mare. I hope so. 

The journey back down the mountain trail led us into upper Cougar Canyon and then up along the canyon edge. It was a spectacular ride through deep snow. We got off and walked most of the way back to the Red Desert as the sun was setting over the jagged Beartooth Mountains at our backs with the last rays of sunlight hitting the tops of the Red Buttes ahead of us.

It was dark when we got back to the horse trailer. We unsaddled Trace and Flint talking about how well these two horses had done over a tough five days, barefoot with just their natural rope hackamores. The only thing that seemed to rattle Flint was his first sighting of bighorn sheep. He snorted as the small herd moved past him through their rocky landscape to nibble on mountain mahogany bushes.

Trace wasn’t bothered a bit by the bighorns. Nothing much bothered Trace. Nothing much ever does. He is my steady boy. . . and this is, after all, his home.

Happy Trails!
Ginger 

Click here for a special alert from Ginger  

(Note: Cloud was seen after we left. He was not high on Sykes as I predicted but across Big Coulee on Tillet Ridge, not far from where we had seen his mother. I wonder how they cross what seems an impassable canyon to get between the ridges. But that will be a ride for another day. According to Matt Dillon, director of the Pryor Mustang Center in Lovell, Cloud and his family looked well.)

PS: If you are close to the Boulder, Colorado area please click here to learn about a special presentation by Ginger Kathrens at Naropa University on March 28th.