Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Dqwannabe
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Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Postby Dqwannabe » Mon Oct 22, 2018 4:39 pm

I love to (virtually) horse shop. I'm frequently checking out the BLM adoption site and I've seen some beautiful movers, usually from the Beattys Butte herd, but I've heard the Triple B horses would make nice sporthorses as well.
It's kind of a pipe dream of mine to get a gentled mustang as a dressage prospect. Have any of you had any experiences - or know anyone who has - with this?

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StraightForward
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Re: Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Postby StraightForward » Mon Oct 22, 2018 4:58 pm

Sent you a pm
Keep calm and canter on.

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Chisamba
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Re: Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Postby Chisamba » Tue Oct 23, 2018 3:29 am

I have adopted and worked with four. 2 were fabulous, one I lost due to a colic while the horse was still wild enough to make treatment impossible, and the fourth was very complicated.

The one to get is the plain Jane sitting in the corner looking bored. That shows the relaxed disposition.

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Re: Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Postby exvet » Tue Oct 23, 2018 12:56 pm

As others I've witnessed both good and not so good results. Like all horses, they are individuals and much depends on their experience as well as yours. We get a fair number of well handled individuals through this area that are coming from one of the handling programs including the prison system. Many of those are good trail horses, the movement is variable and not the program's focus of course. At least coming out of one of the programs you get a better idea of how they will handle themselves when asked to perform.

blob
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Re: Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Postby blob » Tue Oct 23, 2018 1:58 pm

I adopted off an Internet adoption in 2011. I still have the mare, though I did not initially intend to keep her. But she is far more talented, intelligent, and practical than I could have imagined. She's the safest, easiest horse I've owned and has by far the best feet. We've been successful in the show ring. We're working on changes now, with hopes of showing third in 2019. And she has already started early work on pi/pa, which comes very naturally to her.

Now, they show short videos for Internet adoption horses, but when I adopted I did so based on just a picture.

Like any mutt, conformation varies greatly, and like any horse, so does personality. But all I've known have settled into domestic life except one who was gathered at age 12 and gelded then. I think it was just a hard age to transition so much. Also the only ones I've seen who have not done well in a riding sport are ones that were clearly not built in a balanced form. A lot of them are built better suited to western disciplines, but not all of them.

Happy to answer more questions, but in general it's something I would recommend. The younger they are, the easier they are. Pay attention to conformation, talk to folks who have horses from that same HMA (they tend to be similar), and plan to spend a lot of time on the ground in the beginning.

ETA: the program also helps safeguard against bad fits/poor situations. If you do an online adoption the horse will be shipped to the adoption location closest to you if you choose. If when you go to pick up the horse it's not what you wanted for any reason you can either get a refund on your adoption fee or swap that horse out for another you prefer that is still available for adoption. After getting your mustang the BLM still owns the horse for the first year. In that year the BLM can check in on you to make sure the horse is being well taken care of, but also if the horse is not working out for any reason you can return the horse to the BLM or help find a new adopter (the new adopter will have to pay a $25) rehoming fee. You can't sell the horse in that first year. But you can get it back to the BLM if it's not a good fit.

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Re: Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Postby Canyon » Tue Oct 23, 2018 11:10 pm

I know several local people who have trained mustangs in lower level dressage.

JB (Jail Bird) Andrew was shown to FEI, in the Denver area. Here are two articles about Andy -
http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/horses/arti ... rse-tuxedo
https://www.classicalequestrian.com/jb-andrew

BLM just gathered some horses from our local herd, too many horses for the range conditions after a long drought. Friends of the Mustangs is a group that works closely and amicably with the BLM. The group spends a lot of time monitoring the horses on their range and knows quite a bit about each horse - sire, dam, personality. If you want a mustang that is not a complete unknown, I would contact that group. Their web site has a write up and pictures for each horse - http://www.friendsofthemustangs.org/upc ... vents.html .

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StraightForward
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Re: Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Postby StraightForward » Fri Oct 26, 2018 6:24 pm

blob wrote:I adopted off an Internet adoption in 2011. I still have the mare, though I did not initially intend to keep her. But she is far more talented, intelligent, and practical than I could have imagined. She's the safest, easiest horse I've owned and has by far the best feet. We've been successful in the show ring. We're working on changes now, with hopes of showing third in 2019. And she has already started early work on pi/pa, which comes very naturally to her.


I would love an update on your mare when you have a chance. I think of her frequently when people discuss mustangs and dressage. Last I remember, she was first-levelish. It's exciting to hear that she is continuing to progress!
Keep calm and canter on.

blob
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Re: Anybody have thoughts on the BLM mustang adoption program?

Postby blob » Mon Oct 29, 2018 2:27 am

StraightForward wrote:
blob wrote:I adopted off an Internet adoption in 2011. I still have the mare, though I did not initially intend to keep her. But she is far more talented, intelligent, and practical than I could have imagined. She's the safest, easiest horse I've owned and has by far the best feet. We've been successful in the show ring. We're working on changes now, with hopes of showing third in 2019. And she has already started early work on pi/pa, which comes very naturally to her.


I would love an update on your mare when you have a chance. I think of her frequently when people discuss mustangs and dressage. Last I remember, she was first-levelish. It's exciting to hear that she is continuing to progress!


I too am excited that she's continuing to progress and so happy to hear that you remember her and our journey. I feel really quite lucky to have ended up with her.

We had a bit of a slow down in our training for a few years and stayed 'first-levelish' during that time. I moved cities, moved jobs a couple times, and we moved barns a few times as well. It led to a lot of inconsistent riding on my part and then we ended up a training program that wasn't quite right for us. Fast forward to this past year when I've been able to ride a lot more and we've found a trainer who has been working well for us, who we work with a couple times a month. The biggest challenge with her is that she's so smart that it's easy for her to get bored. When she gets bored, she loses motivation, and all our work just becomes blah. So, with the help of the new trainer and some creativity on my part, we've been working to keep mentally engaged and actively learning while still finding ways to take the time to build strength as we move up. And it's been really fun to watch her get excited about learning new things. We introduced some baby passage work to help her get more suspension, cadence, and strength into her medium trot (we have a tendency to get quick and downhill). The first few weeks, it's ALL she wanted to do, like she unlocked this fun trick and just wanted to show it off.

We got back into the show ring this year as well after a bit of a hiatus and did some first level and then moved on to second level. We qualified for regionals, but didn't end up going because I started teaching changes in September and come October, I had temporarily lost my counter canter. I likely could have spent a few weeks schooling CC and getting it back, but I didn't want to mess up the progress we were making towards changes and it just seemed like not the right time to tell her 'no, no we're not going to change after all'. And so, I am now in the strange space of trying to get our changes confirmed. There are days I have them, there are days don't. But our progress towards changes feels mostly in the right direction. And she's been patient and forgiving of me as well as we work through all of this together.

I'm hoping that in the next couple years I can get my bronze her. I would really love to be able to have that accomplishment on a horse I gentled and started myself.

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