Missy

Missy was one of our first owner relinquishments. The woman reached out to us and said she’d had Missy since she was a baby. She was born in a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) corral after her mother was rounded up. She was orphaned when her mother died of a broken neck in holding.

After she was adopted out, Missy spent the next eleven years isolated and confined to a stall. She was fed and watered, but not turned out. She had no social interaction with other horses. She was never gentled, so her hooves grew long. Her mane was a matted dreadlock. Enough to drive any sentient being out of their mind, Missy started attacking her owner. She bared her teeth like a dog, bit and kicked if anyone came near. The woman told us she wanted two things for her: to untangle her mane and see her run free with other horses.

Missy started out with us at our ranch in Calabasas before we acquired the Oregon property. She was among the first batch of rescued horses to arrive at Skydog Oregon when we began.

After so many years being penned up in isolation, Missy’s behavior was peculiar. The first time she went down a hill, she tumbled as she didn't understand ground that wasn't flat. She had no idea how to go thru a gate. Interacting with other horses was alien to her. She bared her teeth and pinned her ears at equines as well as humans.

When we got her Oregon, we turned her out with a small band of horses. When they took off running, she ran too, as if she had been doing it all her life. It was beautiful to watch them move as one, often changing direction like a flock of birds. Missy’s mustang instincts were awakened. In that moment, she remembered how to be a horse…a wild horse.

With time, she gentled down and we managed to comb out that matted mane. It took us hours to untangle and comb it through. Today, it's her glory, shiny and highlighted to perfection. It billows in the wind as she runs free.

Missy found her place in Buddy's herd with friends Lisa Marie, Love, and Faith. They taught her how to be part of a mustang family. She won the hearts of Skydog legends like Jackson and Cassidy. For a little while, Champ whisked this pretty mare away for his own. No kicks were thrown, he just separated her and ran her up to his hideout on the 2000 acres his herd shared with Buddy’s. It was a temporary hostage situation that Missy really didn’t mind - Champ knows how to pleasure his mares. It was great for her to experience this wild horse interaction.

To see her today, you would never guess at the skinny, terrified, confused horse she once was. Missy comes around to people, lets us handle her, and stands for farrier trims and shots. It's truly incredible the change in these wild horses once they know you don't care to dominate and control them. It's a spiritual axiom that when you give mustangs their freedom, they give you their heart.

#skydogmissy

Mustangs and Burros Need Your Help

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.