Posted on 02/11/2007 8:19:55 AM PST by canuck_conservative
SUNDRE, Alta. -The killing grounds extend for 1 kilometres along the top of Parker Ridge, a rugged landscape 40 kilometres west of Sundre where grizzlies, wolf and cougars prowl.
Sixteen wild horses have died here since 2004, but not in the jaws of predators. The horses have been shot by a human enemy, their carcasses left to rot and be scavenged. For one horse, the bullet entered its withers, just behind the neck, causing instant paralysis and an agonizing death. Its slowly escaping body heat melted the snow around it, leaving a perfect impression of the horse in the frozen ground. Another, a foal, was dragged by the killer and placed alongside its dead mother.
The horses' bones are still visible through the snow, lying just off a logging and oil service road that winds through this untamed country about 130 kilometres northwest of Calgary. There are not many wild horses left in Alberta, and some say those on Parker Ridge are part of the last truly wild herds in the province. Except for one stallion so elusive it's called Ghost, the horses on Parker Ridge are wary, but curious.
When approached, they stop pawing through the snow for grass and watch intently. In winter, they prefer open meadows, avoiding the protection of the trees because the sound of snow falling through branches obstructs their hearing. With no young to watch this time of year, and with the stallions quiet after their summer battles for mares, many of the horses will allow humans to come within 50 metres before running off.
They would have been easy prey.
The latest to be slaughtered were two adults and two seven-month-old foals found Jan 23. Bob Henderson was able to identify them by the markings on their heads, which had not yet been ravaged by eagles and wolves.
"There was still skin on the faces. My reaction was real hurt. Anger. Being a cop all those years, I'm able to turn it off. But my wife, she just cried for the longest time."
Henderson, a retired, 26-year veteran of the Calgary Police Service, knows these horses better than anyone. He first saw Sundre's wild horses in 1972 while on a hunting trip.
"They just awed the hell out of me. I knew then what it meant to be free."
After retiring from the Calgary police force, he moved to Olds, Alta., where he now works selling agriculture supplies. He rides Parker Ridge on horseback with his wife, Doreen, whenever he gets the chance.
President of the 300-member Wild Horses of Alberta Society (WHOAS) since its inception in 2002, Henderson is devoted to protecting the horses, which the society believes may be descendants of the original Spanish mustangs brought to North America in the 1500s by the conquistadors. Blackfoot raiders introduced the mustangs to Alberta in the 1700s. Explorer David Thompson recorded horses in the Sundre area in 1808.
Years of police work have convinced Henderson the horse killings are the work of one person.
"If it was random, it would be all over the place. These take place in the same area, roughly at the same time of year. This is a serial killer who takes great glee in this. We've collected $10,000 in reward money. We're hoping someone will come forward. A person like that can't be very well liked. A person who harms animals will often move on to abuse humans, usually children."
Cpl. David Heaslip, an RCMP livestock specialist, is not as convinced.
"I think it's more than one person," says Heaslip, the lead investigator on the case.
Two bullets have been recovered from the scene of the horse killings, but for evidentiary reasons, Heaslip won't comment on the calibre. He has analyzed horse carcasses for bullet trajectory, point of entry and DNA, in the same way homicide investigators sift through a murder scene.
"When a bullet enters the stomach, it hits this mass of food, kind of like hitting a sandbag. The bullet can either go up or down. We got lucky, two of them went down and were recovered."
The latest police evidence in the case, released Wednesday, was gathered from the the site of an illegally killed moose near the horses' carcasses, a shooting that may be related to the horse killings. The evidence includes a silver Timex wristwatch with an Atlanta Falcons logo, a wax paper food wrapper with the words "Stuffed Biscuit, $2.49" printed on it and two clear plastic containers with the words "sausage and egg" and "730" handwritten on them. Linda Edgar, a clerk at the Fas Gas Sundre Service, says the handwriting is hers. Police say they will sift through surveillance video from the gas station for leads.
As an Albertan, Heaslip says he takes the shootings of these wild horses personally because they are such iconic symbols of the West.
"In Alberta, we are lucky to have mountains and foothills and wild animals. I see this and I say, 'Shame on you for dirtying up my day.' "
Heaslip is particularly perturbed at the manner in which one of the horses died.
"Imagine if you were shot behind the neck. Immediately you would lose all feeling and your legs would give out. That's what happened to this horse. It took some time to die. It laid down and the snow melted under it, leaving an exact impression of its body."
With the recurrent nature of the killings and recent widespread media coverage, Heaslip thinks the killer or perpetrators might be watching developments in the case.
"This is the type of person who is probably reading all the newspapers," Heaslip says. "If they are, I'm telling them: do the right thing and turn yourself in.
"These horses will watch you and run off maybe 100 metres and think they are safe. And some, big, hairy guy pulls out his big gun and shoots them. That's a big, brave man, eh? Well, I have a message for whoever is doing this:this is not going to go away. We are not going to close this file. Every time they see a police officer step out of a vehicle, it might be me."
There are roughly 200 wild horses on Parker Ridge, a dominant geographical feature that stretches north and south for nearly 50 kilometres west of Sundre. The horses do not roam the area in one large herd, but in 20 to 30 small groups of between four and 10 horses each. There are also a few bachelor herds made up of two or three young stallions.
With Henderson as our guide, we recently located about 30 horses in four herds over the course of three hours. It was a bit like going on an African safari, Alberta-style, except that, unlike the governments of Kenya and Tanzania, the Alberta government doesn't seem to realize similar tourism value in its wildlife. There is no legal protection for the horses and yearly roundups are allowed.
In this foothills Serengeti, we saw three moose and observed one young stallion in the far distance rolling in the snow. Henderson knows the location of a silverback grizzly and where to find a large wolf pack. He's seen cougars and knows of one that took down a horse.
He has seen stallions battle each other in summer. "They roar and snort and squeal. Stallions actually squeal when they fight."
Although fierce combatants, he has also seen stallions protect the young, weak and injured. He has even seen young stallions protect older injured stallions that were once their rivals.
Henderson has observed the horses' unique role in the ecosystem. In winter, rival stallions will allow their herds to co-mingle for survival and deer will sometimes take refuge among horse herds to escape wolves.
"They've evolved in this secure little niche, up until now."
He once watched a stallion defend its herd against a large black bear, but trees obscured most of the battle. Later, he saw the same stallion with scars across its chest and a severe wound on its nose. It survived and still roams the area. Henderson calls him Scarface.
Henderson has seen Ghost several times, but only for a fleeting moment.
"He doesn't give you a very good look at him," says Henderson, who once snapped a photo that he enlarged. The horse's face is almost totally obscured by a shaggy mane that frames its head like a long wig. In the photo, Henderson could make out two beady eyes through the hair.
Other than the town of Sundre, the only thing resembling civilization out here is the Bearberry Saloon, which is attached to a gas station. There are small farms and acreages, but once you begin to ascend Parker Ridge, there is nothing except several remote natural gas-compressor stations and extensive logging activity. To the west is forestry reserve and, beyond it, Banff National Park.
As with bears and other large predators, wild horses have disappeared from the Alberta prairies and now take refuge in these foothills. The last prairie horses were rounded up from the Suffield military range in the mid-1990s. There are some wild horses near Grande Prairie and some in Kananaskis, likely escapees from the Stoney and Tsuu T'ina First Nations reserves.
Unlike those horses, WHOAS does not regard the Sundre horses as "feral" horses, which implies they were domestic animals that reverted back to a natural environment. These, the society believes, have evolved as wild, free-ranging horses. They are smaller and stockier than domesticated pasture horses, with slightly convex "Roman" noses to assist grazing. Their feet are wider, the manes shaggier, and most have a telltale dark dorsal stripe down their backs. Their tails reach nearly to the ground. These traits are all indicative of Spanish mustang ancestry, according to researchers.
Critics say the horses need to be managed to prevent them over-running and damaging the environment, but Henderson disputes such claims. Unlike cattle, he says the horses manage their own grazing by constantly moving in small groups. They do not eat reforested seedlings unless starving, and their constant pawing exposes grass for deer.
The provincially sanctioned roundup - a permit costs $280 - results in a limited number of the horses to be sent to slaughter or sold for breeding. WHOAS would like a moratorium on the roundup to allow the horses to widen their gene pool.
"WHOAS has never said that the horses should be left totally alone, but we think their numbers should be allowed to recover," Henderson says. "They are not over-running the ecosystem."
According to Ontario researcher Robert Alison, there were millions of wild horses in North America around 1800, but their numbers have declined dramatically.
"The gene pool is already at a critical low," he wrote in an August 2000 paper. "The few horses that remain are a vital genetic reservoir of a stock so important in the legacy of the Canadian West."
As a species, horses originally evolved in North America. They disappeared from the continent 8,000 years ago but not before making their way to Eurasia over the Bering land bridge. The Spaniards returned them to North America in the 1500s.
In addition to the Sundre horses, about 70 pure wild horses can be found in B.C.'s Chilcotin Mountains, according to Alison, as well as smaller numbers scattered in Alberta. None of them are protected by provincial or federal law.
"Wild horses in Canada are considered escaped domestic animals, not wildlife," according to Alison. "Their stigmatization as feral escapees from farms and ranches, although of dubious foundation, robs them of specific protection."
The Sundre killings, however, can be prosecuted under Section 444 of the Criminal Code, which carries a penalty of up to five years for anyone who willfully kills or maims an animal.
Henderson wants to see the horses protected under their own legislation.
"They are perfectly adapted to fit their environment," Henderson says. "What we are fighting is attitudes. It's how you perceive things. They represent part of our history and they are beautiful."
rremington@theherald.canwest.com
Calgary Herald © CanWest News Service 2007
You guys might find this interesting.
Well, we know (s)he's a loser.
They are foreign invaders anyway.
Saddle thread ping?
Well, if someone is breaking a law by killing the animals, arrest and prosecute them. End if story. Apparently law enforcement has not done its job.
These animals are livestock. Don't cause them unnecessary pain and suffering, of course, but they are property. They are non-native and if problematic, should be removed. By killing them, if necessary. I guess I'm a neanderthal, but I grew up in the country, and have no romantic attraction to the beasts.
There is a special place in hell for someone who would shoot a horse, especially a 7 month old foal. This kind of brutality makes me physically ill.
"They are foreign invaders anyway."
So are European-descended human immigrants.
I wonder why they can give out details on all kinds of evidence they've found but can't/won't give out information on the bullets recovered.
By your logic, so are all humans in North and South America, Europe, and Asia. All humans except those at single spot in Africa.
Your observation of just "European" is colored by P.C. gobbly-gook.
I'm confused about one thing, though . . . The article makes reference to a "Parker Ridge" in that area, but I always knew Parker Ridge as a landmark some 50+ miles away from there, along the Icefields Parkway in Banff National Park.
Vandalism.
My first horse was a mustang that had been running in Northern Nevada. He was shot in the neck by a vandal, but managed to run until he collapsed on a friend's property there. They managed to rehab him, tame him, and they sent him up to me.
We went thousands of miles together...
They are not indigenous. they strip away the food for the indigenous species such as elk, bighorn sheep,etc. The need to be at least controlled. if that means opening a season or rounding them up for sale then so be it.
http://www.environment.gov.au/biodiversity/invasive/publications/humane-control/hor004-trapping-feral-horses.pdf
An interesting aside ... when the Ford Mustang was designed, the creator (Lee Iacocca ((sp??)) the logo was supposed to be the P51 Mustang, not the horse ....
How wonderful for you and that beauty!
You being a beauty, too, of course!
Better nip this in the bud, or else the estrogen crazed horses-uber-alles brigades will put enshrine these stupid pests in your national constitution and really wreck your range.
You should see the destruction left by "wild" horses in Nevada. We have over 50% of all "wild" horses in the western US in Nevada and they utter wreck the range, springs, trees, you name it. The "wild horse Annie" types will hear of no sound management proposals, thinking that these creatures are "threatened." What the WHOA types never tell you is that "wild" horses have almost no predators (other than mountain lions in high country) and left unchecked, their herd size will increase 17 to 21% every year until they encounter a hard winter or starve themselves in population collapse. By the time the latter option has happened, everything else on the range is starving too.
Then when the WHOA types start seeing how they horses starve, they'll saddle you with paying for round-ups and adoption centers. And for the horses that people won't adopt (which is the vast majority of horse gathered off the range), they'll force you to create "refuges" where the government pays private operators to graze the stupid beasts, with vets caring for them, year after year after year, at a cost of over $3/head/day.
I'm warning you: get on top of this fast, or otherwise you'll see the biggest flap and stupid tax-funded programs to care for these stupid creatures that you've ever seen, because politicians are too cowardly to tell a bunch of weepy-eyed women to "shut up, grow up and sit down."
The wild horse situation in Nevada is my "Exhibit #1" on why the 19th Amendment to the US Constitution was our single biggest mistake as a nation.
There's good management, and there's vandalism. This is vandalism.
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