“We've got two kinds of horses here: ornery horses and scared horses,” says the cowboy. “The scared ones are tougher.”

The cowboy is Chris Hord, an inmate at the California Correctional Center in Susanville, Calif. He's got three months to go on a five-year, seven-month sentence for a check forgery conviction. He—along with some two dozen other inmates—participates in a vocational training program at the prison in which inmates learn to train wild horses.

It's a cooperative effort between the California Department of Corrections and the Bureau of Land Management, which manages the nation's wild horses. The BLM supplies the horses and feed and the prison supplies the inmates.

In Nevada, there are more than 23,000 wild horses—more than half of the nation's 42,000. They aren't considered a problem by most people, but as winter comes on, especially in places where the high desert and urban areas meet, wild horses and people bump heads. Other groups, such as the Nevada Cattlemen's Association, clash with the animals more frequently.

Most of the horses, which are rounded up by the BLM, go to the Palomino Valley Wild Horse and Burro Placement Center, the nation's largest wild horse facility, north of Reno, but some eventually pass into the CCC's five acres of iron corrals and into the hands of cons like Hord.

Horse Cents
The BLM's mission with regard to wild horses is to protect, manage and control the wild horses and burros on public land at population levels that will ensure the number of horses is in balance with other uses, such as cattle ranching. Since wild horses have few natural enemies, the idea is to remove the younger animals from the wild and adopt them out to keep the number of horses from getting out of control.

Sharon Kipping, manager of the Palomino Valley facility, says that she has 1,697 horses and burros at the corral.

“In this facility we adopt about 200 head out a year,” she says. “Four thousand to 4,500 are prepared to be adopted out back East.”

The horses stay in Palomino Valley for a minimum of four to five weeks. Their age is determined by their teeth. Then they are given shots and are freezemarked (similar to a brand, but it's very cold. It kills the horse's hair, and when it grows back, it's white). Most are sent back East, but some go west and are staged at the Litchfield, Calif., corral, which supplies the horses to the California Correctional Center.

“If the adoptions worked, it'd be great,” says Betsy Macfarlan, executive director of the Nevada Cattlemen's Association, based in Elko. “Part of the problem is they bring in the younger and better-looking horses, which leaves the genetic duds out in the breeding pool.”

Macfarlan says if the horses can't be adopted out, they should be killed for the good of the species.

“It's an emotional issue for many people,” she says. “They don't want to see the horses removed for human consumption and dog food. There's an entire herd of genetically blind horses in Utah. Nobody will adopt a blind horse, so they can't be gathered. They [BLM] used to put down the genetically inferior and lame animals, but because of the pressures put on by animal rights groups they can't even do that. I think it's pretty inhumane to leave a blind horse in the wild.”

Macfarlan says because the federal government keeps cutting the BLM's budget, the agency doesn't have enough money to keep the horse population down. The BLM will be allowed to gather about 3,300 horses this fiscal year (which began on Oct. 1), but there were approximately 5,000 foaled last year, according to Macfarlan.

“Let's face it,” she says. “It's a competing herbivore out there. While the cattle herds are moved around to prevent over-grazing, the horses just migrate. They just go back to where they've grazed and graze it again. Cattle don't paw for food, but horses will paw to get at a plant's roots.”

Another part of the problem with the adoptions, according to Macfarlan, is that people are afraid to adopt the wild horses for fear they won't be able to get rid of them. She mentions the California ballot measure, Proposition 6, which voters approved Tuesday, making it illegal to sell horses or horsemeat for human consumption, and she suggests it will make people shy away from adoption.

As point of fact, Prop. 6, does not forbid the sale of horses for slaughter, only for slaughter for human consumption (people in France and Belgium eat horsemeat). Its passage may even boost the horse-flesh industry in Nevada.

People who adopt wild horses also fill out an 11-point statement of understanding that says adopted horses “cannot be sold, traded or given away” until title passes from the BLM to the adopter after one year.

Horses auctioned only get a nickel to a half-dollar per pound, according to Lela Smith of Gallagher's Stockyard in Fallon.

“We do a brand inspection, and sellers have to have proof of ownership. If they have proper ownership papers, then they can sell at public auction,” Lela Smith says.

“We do a brand inspection, and sellers have to have proof of ownership. If they have proper ownership papers, then they can sell at public auction,” she says.

The minimum cost to adopt a wild horse is $125, and they must be kept for a year. At around $900 a year in feed, it's not likely that a horse will be adopted to sell.

Still, wild horses sometimes end up at the slaughterhouse, says vocational instructor and horse trainer Tom Chenoweth of the California Correctional Center.

“It happens more than BLM likes to admit,” he says. “People find out they don't have the time or the skills, and they sell them to the first horse trader who comes along.”

The BLM will, however, keep up with the horses that are adopted. Last year, there were more than 1,100 compliance checks in California.

Horse Whisperers
Since the BLM in Nevada rounds up 4,000 horses a year and does not kill or sell them for slaughter, there are many horses that need homes.

That's where the CCC and Chenoweth come in. He instructs inmates like Hord to train horses, which makes the horses more domestic and thus easier to adopt out.

Hord, inmate number J09728, is in charge of a horse named Scooter. Scooter is one of 15 wild horses being adopted out that have been in the program for about three months. The vocational training program at the prison has been going since 1987 and has gotten about 60 horses a year adopted out. Scooter's number is 93211054, and if all goes well, his sentence at the California Correctional Center ends today.

Hord is an unlikely cowboy. He wears a white ball cap, sunglasses, prison denim blues and an olive-drab coat to keep off the early autumn chill. He's an old-timer in the program—having been involved for a year and seven months—which brings wild horses from Nevada and California and inmates together in order to “gentle” the horses (the word “break” isn't used).

“They're looking for this program to change people. All programs like this will do is get people outside of the chaos inside those walls,” Hord says, indicating the prison with its guard tower and high fences topped by razor wire. “A person's got to want to change.

“Behind the walls as a yard worker, I'd have a bad attitude. Out here, you're just a cowboy,” he says.

Cowboy or not, change is what officials want. Prisoners talk about the responsibility, skills and confidence they've learned, but today the focus is more on the horses—and the way the horses have been changed.

All the horses that are available for adoption are trained to be handled, which includes haltering, leading and picking up of the feet. Most have been gentled to ride.

Horse Traders
“Those inmates are so lucky,” says one of the ubiquitous pistol-packing guards. He's probably kidding.

This is, after all, a prison.

It's also a long drive from Reno, about 80 miles on U.S. Route 395 through the Sierra and the coniferous and high desert environs that wild horses call home. The prison is outside of Susanville on Center Road.

If you mistakenly turn left at the “T,” you'll end up at the maximum-security, 325-acre High Desert State Prison, which opened in 1995. To the right is the minimum-security, 1,100-acre center that opened in 1963.

It's better to go to the right. As you arrive at the penitentiary, there's a guard house. The guards approach, ask your name, your business and whether you have weapons or medications before directing you on to the corrals. If you should wear blue jeans, you're either turned away or dressed in full-body white coveralls—and end up looking like the Sta-Puf Marshmallow Man or a member of a toxic cleanup crew.

In the small dirt parking lot outside the corrals, there are about 20 vehicles—cars and trucks, some pulling trailers. At least a third are from Nevada.

Officials and inmates are all concerned about the small turnout of potential adopters. The inmates have a lot of emotional investment in these animals and want to see them adopted rather than returned to the Litchfield staging center.

The crowd, such as it is, sits on wooden bleachers or ranges around the main corrals. There are about 40 prospective adopters all told. There are 15 prospective adoptees. The horses will be brought out one at a time by an inmate who will put each one through its paces.

Chenoweth, the boss, stands in the corral and makes some introductory statements regarding the program and general condition of the horses.

He looks like a cross between a cowboy and a cop, wearing a blue and violet checked Western shirt, brown jeans, boots and a white straw cowboy hat. He's got a graying mustache that droops at the corners and wears amber-shaded sunglasses.

“These horses are extraordinarily gentle,” says Chenoweth to the crowd, “so we're putting them up at three months instead of four.”

The first round of bidding is a sealed bid. Inmate Keith Prater brings out Trooper, a sorrel-colored stallion with a dark mane and tail. He puts his hands over the horse's body and lifts each of the horse's hooves to show the horse is accustomed to people. He then mounts and rides in a rough circle before walking the horse over a foot-high hurdle.

“You don't have the problems with inbreeding, and you don't have to pamper them as much as the fancier horses,” says Cynthia Runnels. “What the inmates have done with these horses is a miracle.”

As Chenoweth's monologue progresses, the parade moves forward horse by horse—some are more trained than others and can work close to the corral fence. All are stallions and most are 2-year-olds. Rebel, at 7, is the oldest. To the unskilled eye, the wild horses look like domestic horses, maybe a little smaller.

When problems surface—for example, if a stirrup falls off—Chenoweth walks out to assist. Some of the inmates have been in the program only a couple of weeks and appear more nervous than the horses they are riding. There's a group of 18 inmates sitting on the fence near the gate where the horses enter. Since the inmates also are on display, there isn't a lot of horseplay going on. The guards and crowd comment on the horses and riders.

One rider, Dooney Hale, gets special attention from a guard.

“This guy here has talent,” the guard says. “When he gets out he could go to work with somebody as a trainer.” The guard adds that Hale had never worked with horses before entering the program.

The irony of convicts training these symbols of freedom in the West is not lost on the guard. “I guess it's the trade-off for the other horses to remain free on the range.”

The final horse is 4-year-old Bobo, exhibited by inmate Raymond Brackett. Bobo seems to be the most popular with the crowd, and as the sealed bids are opened a bit later and written on a large board, Bobo's got four bids: $500, $375 and two at $250.

The high bidders are allowed to pass on their bids, which then go on to the next highest bidder and so on. The bidding then goes to an auction with a minimum bid of $125.

“The Lone Ranger'd be hard pressed to get a horse out of this bunch,” says one of the onlookers.

In the end only five horses are adopted.

Horsepower
Cynthia Runnels, who lives in Red Rock, adopted Joe for the cool sum of $150. She's a member of the Back Country Horsemen, a group of horse owners who do once-a-month rides and camping trips. She says she wanted a horse that would carry a pack as well as a rider.

“The wild horses are sturdier,” Runnels says. “For horses to get to this age and have survived in the wild, they've got to be tough. I just love the mustang. You don't have the problems with inbreeding, and you don't have to pamper them as much as the fancier horses. What the inmates have done with these horses is a miracle.”

Joe, whose travels took him from the high desert to prison and back to the high desert, is going to have a happy ending.

He may not be the only one whose story ends well.

Richard Holcomb, an inmate serving time on a possession of methamphetamine, will go home Christmas day. Holcomb says Chenoweth's horse-training program has done wonders for him and other inmates.

“This'll turn a person who's sour in there to somebody who is sweet out here,” Holcomb says. “You're doing something that you want to do instead of something you're forced to do. I've learned responsibility and that I can do things without drug enhancement.”

“They learn some skills they can take outside with them,” says Chenoweth. “The life skills they learn are the most important. I've seen many who are sorely lacking in life skills. They learn communication skills and the benefits of working hard on something. They learn the gratification of a job well done.”

Hord, the forger, says he has picked up a life skill or two from Chenoweth.

“I've learned to get my own checking account,” he says.

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