A Special Relationship
The BLM’s horse and burro adoption program, which has placed more than 160,000 wild horses and burros since 1973, makes the animals available to most anyone who wants them and owns a sturdy enough corral.

After a year’s probation period, the adopter can do whatever he wants with the horse or burro, except “exploit its wildness,” in a bucking-bronco show for instance. Prices start as low as $125, and the bureau will even pay for gelding.

But there is a catch: the animals are entirely wild, and can take up to six months to domesticate.
“I can guarantee that when one of these animals gets off the range, no one will put a halter on it and lead it off the trailer,” Lewis says. “It’s not for everyone. And we discourage some people. If they haven’t had a horse before, we would suggest they may want to start with a horse that has already been domesticated.”

“Some of the best adopters we’ve ever had, the wild horse is their first horse.”

Some who have adopted BLM animals say “gentling” them (the term now used instead of “breaking,”) is well worth the effort.

“It’s a unique experience to have a wild animal and really be able to bond with it and gain its trust,” says Joyce North of Loleta, Calif., who adopts one to four BLM horses and burros per year. “Anyone can go and buy a horse and throw a saddle on it and ride. But with a mustang you build its trust. It’s just a very special friendship.”

“The BLM program is a sensible way to keep the wild population down and has noticeably improved the quality of the wild herds,” says Willis Lamm, who heads a network of wild-horse adopters in 22 states from Wyoming to Florida and who sometimes retrains other adopters’ problem cases.

And inexperience is not necessarily a problem. “Some of the best adopters we’ve ever had, the wild horse is their first horse,” Lamm says. “The ones we’ve seen had the worst time with … come in with a little bit of horse experience, enough to think they know it all but not enough to know what they’re doing. They have a macho attitude, they try to walk in and intimidate that horse.”