Newly donated land in Montezuma County is poised to change how local advocates respond to wild horse removals from public lands.
For the first time, a 10-acre property provides the Colorado chapter of the National Mustang Association with a permanent home to place captured horses while they await adoption.
The Douglas family donated the Cortez parcel this year. The property sits on the family’s land. In their honor, once the facility is built and finished, it will be named the Douglas Family Wild Horse Training and Transition Facility.
“Having our own property really changes the future for National Mustang Association,” said Bonnie Anderson, association president and board member. “They are just a family of animal lovers. … It was at the point we were getting so stressful trying to place these horses, and it’s like: ‘We have to get our own land.’”
Laurie Newton, a board member, added: “It’s a transition facility, not a holding facility – we’re acclimating them before they go to their next home.”
The association, founded in 1997, has long focused on fertility control, habitat improvements and advocacy to keep wild horses on the public-land landscape.
But advocates say as more horses, particularly those not protected under federal law, are removed from areas such as Mesa Verde National Park and Canyons of the Ancients, the group’s efforts have shifted.
Anderson said the nonprofit is working toward full ownership of the animals, a step made possible with the new facility.
“Before it was having volunteers doing fertility control, fencing, water patchments, and now we’re transitioning to taking ownership, so they don’t end up at the sale barn,” Anderson said.
Unclaimed, free-roaming horses are at the center of a sensitive debate nationwide. The issue now includes the Bureau of Land Management’s recently announced summer and fall plans for a roundup of 14,000 horses across the West.
Locally, the debate focuses on strategies for managing about 200 horses living at Canyons of the Ancients, around a dozen in Weber Canyon and an unknown number in Mesa Verde National Park. Mesa Verde has removed nearly 60 horses over several years in coordination with the association through bait trapping.
Land managers fear herds, which they categorize as feral because of their once-domesticated status or bloodlines, may overgraze already drought-stressed land. Population growth and inbreeding are also concerns.
Advocates push for fertility control and low-stress capture methods, while federal agencies often rely on removals. Both sides say resources are stretched thin.
BLM officials plan to meet with the association next month to further discuss coordination.
For years, the association has taken in captured horses from Mesa Verde or BLM land, typically securing lifelong placement with private landowners, trainers or horse sanctuaries.
“For older horses, we want to send them to sanctuaries because those are harder to train. They’ve spent their whole lives a long time out in the wild,” Anderson said, explaining it is also harder to place pregnant mares, and in many cases, mares are pregnant.
Anderson herself has rescued numerous wild horses. On the family’s ranch now is Delia, a pregnant mare from a recent roundup who is in her third trimester.
Anderson said Delia’s current condition is a sharp contrast to before.
When Delia was captured last August, she was bone-thin. “You can’t imagine, like every bone,” Newton added, explaining she was taken to a temporary holding site at another ranch.
Now, as Delia nears her due date, caretakers are carefully monitoring her to limit stress. They have opted to delay transport to a Maryland adopter that specifically takes in blind horses.
With space for about 35 to 40 animals, the association plans to provide intake and veterinary care, along with gentling and basic training.
Over time, organizers say the facility could support community outreach programs, education initiatives and youth involvement. The association also hopes to incorporate equine therapy for adults through a program called H.O.O.V.E.S, which uses horses in healing-assisted programs to help veterans process trauma or reduce PTSD symptoms.
“The horse really does bond with you … it almost ends up like, ‘I have a purpose for you,’” Newton said.
So far, the association has raised money to build a pipe perimeter around the new land and is seeking additional donations to bring electricity, water and a functional septic system to the property.
The group estimates it costs about $6,000 to care for and prepare each horse for adoption, a figure organizers say underscores the ongoing need for fundraising and support.
“We’re always looking for volunteers,” Newton said. No experience is required. In some cases, the work simply involves sitting near a horse pen as a calming human presence to help build trust.
awatson@the-journal.com
