The Gunks Cast
The Gunks Cast
#115 Siyon Kim - Owner Yankee Folley Mustang Adoption Center
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In this episode, we sit down with Siyon Kim, founder of the Yankee Folly Mustang Adoption Center in New Paltz, New York. Dedicated to finding loving homes for America's wild mustangs, Siyon has built a community focused on adoption, education, and giving these iconic horses a second chance.
Siyon shares the story behind the adoption center, the unique challenges and rewards of working with wild horses. This conversation offers a fascinating look at the effort to preserve the legacy of the American mustang, one horse at a time.
I got Hazel mowing the lawn as of yesterday. Really? Riding the tractor by herself.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_01I was walking next to her the whole time, but you know, it was pretty good. That is good.
SPEAKER_02She gets emoji out there. That's right. The benefits of child labor is your kids get older, right? I slipped her ten bucks.
SPEAKER_01That's the only reason she did. It's amazing what kids do when you pay 'em. I I told her I was gonna give her money and she was into it. I think she wanted to ride it.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_01She was on my lap for the half of it, and then I was like, I think you could do it.
SPEAKER_02And she did it. Well, most of them grow up with those electric cars, so they should be pros at all this. She never had one of those. Oh, she didn't.
SPEAKER_05Know what I've done this summer a lot. I'm so busy here with swimming, so much happening. Weeds, everything growing, so I'll be leaving the pool for swim practice. So I'll see when the lifeguards are like, hey Paul, you had net home at noon? Like, yeah, I'm like, I'll give you 20 bucks. You swing by my house, you give me like an hour of weeding, like, I got it. And I come home, the weeds are all done. That's access to all the things. Carry some boxes downstairs for me. I'm like, I got like 12 boxes huge. He's like, I got it. Boom, here's 20 bucks.
SPEAKER_02That's so worth it. Yeah. You know, he's got like an army of kids that do work for you.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah. Yeah. You do. Yeah. When did things ever go wrong with having a huge army at your disposal? Never. Never. It's always been good. All right, are we ready to start this up? That's right. Oh, yeah. Wow. Here we go.
SPEAKER_03Good morning, everybody. Rainy Sunday. Great tunes.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, journey.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_05Well done. Well done. That's a good. It's a good news. That's the guy right there. Jeff, welcome morning to you and Tom. Good morning. Good. Good morning. Good. How are we doing today?
SPEAKER_02Doing great. Good. Sunday. We're in the rainy Sunday. Nasty out there. We're in the cave of suffering.
SPEAKER_05Some uh you know, you're suck rain. It's Sunday. You guys are getting the nerves, they're going back to work tomorrow. What are you doing tomorrow? I got off. I got off. I don't know what I'm gonna do. Well, I am from teaching. Well, once a teacher, I was a teacher, but I got a lot of stuff going on. I think I might play some golf after I ride my bike up the mountain, weather permitting. Oof, busy day. Then walk my dogs. I gotta mark the course for the recovery ride. I gotta I coach swimming. We have a we have a swim meet tomorrow in Warwick. No easy way in and out of Warwick.
SPEAKER_01No, it's a nice town though.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I guess. If you're going to hang out there. A little too swanky for me.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah. I think I remember that. Isn't the Dunkin' Donuts like in the Taj Mahal down there? It's like a nice stone building.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, check it out. I I ride in on the school bus with the team. We ride out. That's it. Yeah. Anyway, Jeff, that's his old sense. Why don't we get to our amazing guest? Could you please introduce our guest?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so um listeners, we have uh Sion Kim. Welcome.
SPEAKER_02Welcome. Welcome, Sion. Sion.
SPEAKER_01Um you are the owner and proprietor, for lack of a better term, of um what used to be Lucky Sea Farms and now is a Mustang Rescue?
SPEAKER_06With Mustang Adoption Center.
SPEAKER_01Mustang Adoption Center.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, Yankee Folly Mustangs Adoption Center. We're the only um forever branded, officially sanctioned one here in New York State.
SPEAKER_05Wow. So let's let's how first off to unpack. We're gonna get in. When when did you when did this come about? Like how long has it been there? I remember Lucky C.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, Lucky C was an icon in the neighborhood and I boarded there as a a um client, and then when the um owners retired, they put it up for sale, and I couldn't bear to see it leave because ultimately these farms just kind of get you know uh developed. So I purchased it with the idea that I'm gonna put my own mark on it. I was very naive at the time, didn't know what I was getting into. And so it's been six years later, and it's evolved and and metamorphosized in many, many different renditions, and it's finally come to what I think is what I have been dreaming about, which is a um Mustang placement facility.
SPEAKER_05So how do you get how do you uh first off, how many tell everybody what a Mustang is? You know, there's a difference. They're just like, oh, horses, what's the difference? So tell them that.
SPEAKER_06It's a horse that can have its lineage um traced back to the um conquistadors. So they've um basically been uh roaming around in the US for hundreds of years, and they're essentially wild, and there's a lot of them, and they uh reproduce every year. And so the government uh has to kind of steward their um their capacity on the public lands. So every now and again they go in and they gather them, they round them up, and then they process them and then they offer them to the public for adoption.
SPEAKER_01That's cool. And is this through like BLM?
SPEAKER_06Yes, the Bureau of Land Management. Okay, they uh oversee it all.
SPEAKER_05Could I just jump in with a strange lineage horse fact that I happen to know? Sure, please. Uh one of the reasons all these racehorses are dying is all the racehorses in the country and the world are traced back to three Arabians.
SPEAKER_06Yes, that's right.
SPEAKER_05Like our three hundred or four.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yes.
SPEAKER_05Is that correct?
SPEAKER_06Yes, the barley turk. It's true. It's true, but it's actually worse than that. I mean, well, there's a lot of stuff that goes down.
SPEAKER_05Yes. Yes, yes. I mean, that's not the only reason. Yes, yes. But that I found that fascinating when I read a book on the history of horse racing. All racehorses in this c in the world are traced back to three Arabian. Yes.
SPEAKER_01That's pretty incredible. Why why would that be the cause of their demise though?
SPEAKER_05Just besides their bread, bread with like can't I mean, isn't isn't that the thing?
SPEAKER_06Like, when you breed specifically for one characteristic at the expense of everything else, you're gonna wind up eventually having some sort of an issue, you know.
SPEAKER_05Sure. Kind of like your dog, you know, you got a muff from the shelter and like like an atom bottom goes off, and the dog's like just like hanging out, and like the purebreds are like, oh, it's got an infected toenail. Yeah. And it's done. Yeah. It's like it's sick, you're the vet, and the mutts are like rolling in the mud. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. I'm making stuff.
SPEAKER_01So our m so what is the what is the equivalent for the the the mutt of horses?
SPEAKER_06That's probably American Mustang. I mean, yeah, I mean, because uh there are different herd management areas, right? So there are different um herds um dotted around uh different states, and based on the influence, the local influence, those horses have evolved over time a little bit differently. So, for example, there's a huge cavalry um um influence in the California herds, right? Because the army was out there and their horses intermixed with the wild horses. Um, if you go to areas in Arizona, um, for example, the Salt River herd management site is really interesting because the river basically bisected this herd geographically. So um their DNA, like they're very much um traced back to the Spanish breeds that came here hundreds of years ago. So it really depends on on the area.
SPEAKER_05Wow. Hey, Jeff, we should also take the opportunity to like just dump on the conquistadors a bit. Matthew Pizarro, jackasses. Stay home next time, you jerk.
unknownRight?
SPEAKER_05Who are these jackasses? Terrible, terrible figures in history. They weren't great. No, they were awful. Even the kids in ninth grade, when you're learning about them, who were like, they were like, these guys kind of sucked. Like even the kids that were like you wouldn't expect, like, these guys are jerks. Yeah, yeah, they are. Anyway.
SPEAKER_01Conquerors. Anyway. So uh okay, so we've got the American Mustang is sort of the the mutt of the horse world. Um, and you you source these horses primarily from uh BLM, uh Bureau of Land Management, uh, which is a federal agency. Yes. And they manage public lands and the animals on them, horses and whatnot. Yes. Um and then so you bring them here and you have this whole I mean your your facility is amazing. It's it's like it's a big operation. Built more stuff down on the hill there. Yes. Um and uh so tell us, walk us through like you get a horse, or you get a couple of horses. How many horses are out there? What's the what's the process?
SPEAKER_06Well, I mean, um a semi-load is approximately 30 to 33 horses. So they bring them in three compartments, and each compartment is, you know, either mares or geldings or yearlings. Um you keep them separated. So they on we unload them into our facility and then we start to sort them into different pens. So we keep the mares with the mares, the geldings with the geldings, and so forth. Um, we have an adoption event soon thereafter. Um, we check the health of the horse, we check everything. The vet comes and checks the horse. Then uh we have an adoption event that's uh open to the public, the public comes and they can um on that day only get an approval for adoption by the BLM, select a horse, get approved for that selection, and then actually load that horse onto their trailer and take it home on the day.
SPEAKER_05The BLM has to give like a license to adopt the horse.
SPEAKER_06Yes, I mean the adoption fee is minimal, it's $125 to get a horse, right? And so the only issue is that you have to be in compliance with the with their regulations and their requirements. You can't just take a wild horse home and not be prepared.
SPEAKER_05So there's certain things that they're kind of tied up to the parents.
SPEAKER_01Well, trust me, I've uh Hazel and Tylene volunteer and help Sion and Jeff on. And believe me, how many times I've heard a horse is only $125 the last two months. I cannot believe you're depriving Hazel of the opportunity of a musk. It's like dad, it's only $125. I'm with Hazel. Yeah. We'll we'll sort we'll put a little barn in there you're back and we'll report it here. We're talking about you, Jeff. But there's a lot more to owning a horse than just buying it.
SPEAKER_05So you have 30 horses of loads. Okay. So how all long after you first off, how did you get the license? Did the BLM come in and like looked at your facilities and then they start said we're gonna have this be a center for us?
SPEAKER_06Well, I mean, um there's multiple ways to do it, but in our case, what we did is we applied for it, and the BLM has a contract with a um organization called Forever Branded. So the government can't do everything. They basically focus on the gathering and the maintenance of the horses, and then they hire Forever Branded to try to do the placement, identify the placement facilities. So we uh applied to Forever Branded, they did the initial, you know, inspection and check. Then when they said AOK, then the BLM did an inspection, and then when I got the AOK from them, then we proceeded from there.
SPEAKER_05So where is their office located around here? They have to come far or like Yeah, they do.
SPEAKER_06I mean, all these herds are out on the West Coast, right? And the public lands are out there, so most of these agencies are out there.
SPEAKER_05So speaking of herds, twice when I've been on the East Coast, I saw the wild horses, was it in Corolla on the outer banks, and then Acety? Yes, Acetig, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Um Acetigue's a little bit different. Um Chinkateague and Acetigue, um, they're kind of run by their own local um organization. They're not actually part of the Bureau of Land Management. They're I they're kind of interesting. They're the island horses, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, it's kind of interesting. Have you spent much time down there?
SPEAKER_06Not in Acetigue or Chinkateague. I would love to. I think every horse girl grows up reading Misty of Chinkateague, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Right. Right. My wife read those. Yes, yes.
SPEAKER_05Every one of us get hazel on them now.
SPEAKER_01And we did a bike ride when years ago, she might have told you this story, but we did a bike ride that was in eastern Maryland, and it rides out. It's a century ride, yeah. And it rides out, and you go and you cross over onto Assateak and you do a little piece of that and then you come back. Yeah. And we did the ride, and there's just like literally, I mean, there's horses just sitting there right now. Yeah, that's right. They're just like on the side of the road. It's like a horse. It's so odd. You don't, you know, deer, you're like, whatever, it's a deer. And but then there's like four horses just standing there. You're it's such an odd thing to see. We were riding our bike, but very cool.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Uh we were up the YMCA in Kingston coming through on a ride, Flannery and I, and Richard Miller. And they have a ton of horses that people ride. So they have a huge corral along the roads up there in the YMCA. And it's beautiful up there, the West of the branch of the Never Sink River. So we come flying out of there on our bicycles, and one horse sees us, he's sitting there eating some hay, and all of a sudden, like 30 horses get up and they start running down the fence. Oh, that's right. So, for like a half a mile, we're riding our bikes. The horses were like 15 feet away, just like running next to us.
SPEAKER_02There's a there's a reel somewhere on Instagram, I'll find it, where the guy's riding the bikes and the horse they go past a horse farm and a horse jumps the fence.
SPEAKER_06That was the chinkatique. That's the pony roundup. They do that at the gathering. They do that every July.
SPEAKER_02Oh, that's interesting. Yeah. Yeah, I want to see that, Tom. Yeah. So now are most of the people taking them for their own person or are they taking them to domesticate them, or I don't know if that's the right term, and then sell them off the okay.
SPEAKER_05So how long when you do the auction?
SPEAKER_01Oh, they m sorry, real quick. They someone buys them and then they might just turn it around and sell themselves.
SPEAKER_06Well, they'll domesticate them and then they'll offer them up. Yes. Okay.
SPEAKER_01So it's like fostering in some way, right?
SPEAKER_06Yes. I mean, you know, um, I think the public, horse mad people, um, really are in love with this idea of a Mustang, but you know, when you get your hands on them, the skill set for what to do with them is quite overwhelming. So in that situation, you know, when you have a trainer who can actually do it for you, then it really helps. So, yes, a lot of the horses do get adopted by trainers who domesticate them and trainers that are buying them. Yes.
SPEAKER_01I mean, a wild horse is probably not the easiest animal to to take on. It sounds really overwhelming.
SPEAKER_06It's like a wild deer. I mean, I mean, it's like a deer, basically. They start better than a deer. Well, yes, it's bigger, and the nice thing about them is that they have a herd dynamic, so they're socialized to be in a group situation. So that's what makes them so easy to domesticate if you know what you're doing.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Um, but they are like big deer. They startle, they spook. Um, if they've been in the wild, they're not used to any kind of you know, man-made artificial environment. So things are really upsetting. And um, people like to say that horses have, you know, two brains. You have whatever you do on this side, you have to do on that side. It's not that they have two brains, it's just that the image that's coming in from this side versus this side. So if you have just shown them something on this side and then you suddenly move it over to that side, they could have a reaction and it's perfectly normal. Um, so if you know these things and you can work with them, then it makes it much more easy to, you know, have a wild horse.
SPEAKER_01Um, when one of the things Tylene was telling me is, you know, when you go to train to put like a the bridle on them or something on their face, it's not about like walking up and just placing it on the right, which is which would be insane, right? But like the whole process of like like not that it's the bridle itself, but putting something and just touching their nose. Yes, it just touches them and then you put it down and then they get a treat, and then it just touches them, and you know, this long process of getting them uh acclimated to anything that's on their face.
SPEAKER_06Yes. So our program is consent-based, and that always causes a lot of controversy. It's a trigger word when I use the word consent, but it is in fact the right word. Um I could use the word cooperative, but cooperative doesn't actually delineate between compliance and what we really want from the horse is for them to have kind of investment in the training process.
SPEAKER_05So why is the word consent like controversial?
SPEAKER_06Well, I mean, because I think it triggers in people this idea that, you know, animals don't really know, you know, what the pros and cons are. They don't really have the ability to the liberty to actually consent. But you know, even in legal terms and human terms, right, consent is a very complicated concept. So I'm like, listen, I'm happy to have the you know, argument.
SPEAKER_05When you Yeah, makes perfect sense. When you have the auction, is this like a day thing or a weekend? How long does it take? Like how many people show up to get a horse at auction? Well, I mean or the adopt how what did you call it? Wasn't it an adoption event.
SPEAKER_06So it's not an it's not an auction event. Yeah, not an auction that you're doing. No, it's just a public adoption event where we open up the doors and people come in and you know it depends on the horse, but generally speaking, uh you can't get that close, you know. And most people they're used to, you know, purchasing a horse by touching it, feeling it, getting a vet to do a pre-check, and there's none of that happening here. You really have to look at it from a distance and kind of make a decision. So a lot of people do actually adopt. I would say half of the people that come to us adopt remotely based on video, based on our input, based on what they're looking at, that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_05So, where are the clientele that are adopting the horse? Where are these people living primarily?
SPEAKER_06Um, well, we're finding homes for them in the northeast, so they're all here in the northeast.
SPEAKER_05And now what's a what's the lifespan of a horse? About 25 or 30 years would be a long time.
SPEAKER_06Approximately 30 years, yes.
SPEAKER_05Okay.
SPEAKER_06It's a long commitment. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, really. Sounds perfect for a job. How much take Hazel right through college?
SPEAKER_00Certainly would.
SPEAKER_05You're riding to the pool be cool.
SPEAKER_01Um I was talking last night about riding a hor I don't know why it came up. We were at a dinner and someone was talking about riding a horse to work or something. Yeah. Getting a little horse and buggy.
SPEAKER_06I think that's taking it down 4455. We used to have a Mustang trainer in the neighborhood. He used to ride his horse into town, but uh, I don't know if I I think the public was really kind of mixed mixed reviews on that. Some people really liked it, some people don't.
SPEAKER_05Huh. Yeah, I I would see people like we're on the trails a lot. Yeah. I see people riding horses quite a bit when I'm riding my bike. So they're they're definitely like a washing or the preserve. I did used to see a guy on the River to Ridge all the time riding horses, but I haven't seen him in a while. And I see Anna Eichelberg, she would ride her horses down Butterville to get on the trail. So she still does that. Well, I think now she goes because she just gets on the rail trail out here because of Doug. Right.
SPEAKER_06She's actually taking over the facility that that gentleman was in.
SPEAKER_05Okay.
SPEAKER_06Um, who is now in Massachusetts.
SPEAKER_05They're good friends of mine, Tom and Anna.
SPEAKER_06Okay.
SPEAKER_05Um so anyway, pe what people get upset. You can't share the trail. So you come in from Brooklyn, you move into New Paul's, and it's great, and then it's like, oh, you're riding a horse, you can't do that.
SPEAKER_01It's like I love seeing the horses. Who does it? I'm a little uh you know, I have this conversation because Tally grew up with horses, yeah, and w we want Hazel to be comfortable around horses, so we're we're you had a great camp, right? She had a great camp going for kids, and mostly it was just being around the animals. It wasn't like a horse riding camp, it was like a farm horse farm camp, really.
SPEAKER_00Yes, yes.
SPEAKER_01And we were actually telling her uh we were talking about it one day, and she was describing it. I asked her a question, I think while she was there, and one of her friends was like, I want to do that. Like, look at her mom was like, That sounds great. And and there was like no horse riding, it was like just being around them, grooming them, scooping out the the stalls. But that's that is more of what you do when you own a horse than riding the horse.
SPEAKER_06Yes, like 90% of your time is around. I mean, we our program, it's not that we don't include the riding, it's that when you have a wild horse and you're learning to gentle them, you they're they're just not ridable, you know. It takes a while for them to get to there. And what we teach our our clients and our students is how to communicate with them because your safety, your safety really um counts on that horse understanding you and you responding appropriately to that horse. And a lot of people they miss that portion of it, they're just into kind of telling unidirectionally what the horse should do. And if the horse objects or does whatever, then there's some pain compulsion placed on that horse to submit. And so then eventually, you know, you you have just lost all the signs of the horse potentially reacting in a certain way. So it's really about safety at the end of the day.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's uh thank you.
SPEAKER_05And because my kid is there with you, and that's great to hear. Most people, the you know, most people like horses, so like if like, oh, there's a cow, who cares? There's a deer, get off my yard. I got chickens, yeah, great. But it's like, oh, there's a horse, let's go check it out.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_05You know, so there's horses around town that Ellie used to we used to walk there, like Tom's farm and up us the farm on the way up to Letup. I remember stopping. We would bring carrots and we the owners like, yeah, anytime you come by, feed the horse, that's great. And they would come out, we would sit there, the horse would come out, we'd spend like ten or fifteen minutes there. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06I mean it's a huge I mean people think of it a niche industry, but it's a hundred and twenty billion dollars.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, it's huge. Huge. Huge.
SPEAKER_06And um, you know, and I think in the American culture and our in our culture, you know, there's that whole romance with the horse and going out west and it's why we don't slaughter them. It's why we don't allow it.
SPEAKER_05Um Honestly, I agree a thousand percent, and I think I think that's one of the reasons cycling is so uh popular, is it evokes some sort of feeling of the old west that you're on a horse living your childhood like 35 miles from home and you're like, let's go. Totally. I agree with you. Um you guys ridden a lot of horses?
SPEAKER_02I've ridden horses. My aunt has a ranch out in Colorado. Yeah. So we went out once. I've only but basically no.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, same same here. And I was I was I was sharing with my with Tylene, like there's a I'm a little nervous around horses. Sure. And I that and you know, I know that animals pick up on on how people are feeling and acting, and I try to be cool and calm, but I know that I'm not, and they know I'm not, and so this has been a really fun experience because I get to go once in a while and help groom Puma, the horse that she's helping with you with. And Puma's really nice. Cool name. But um there's always like you know, I was trying to describe it to her, and I said, you know, I can walk up to almost any dog, and I I know the body language of a dog, because I grew up with dogs, and I see dogs all the time, and I know when a dog is gonna be a little bit weird, if a dog is feeling a little bit weird, I know how to kind of calm the dog down, like I'm comfortable with it. I may not be successful, but I don't know horses like that. Sure. Because I've never spent enough enough time, and so you watch people with horses and what they do, and I'm just like you know, they move their head at you, and I was like, What do I do? They turn their head quickly, you're like, Oh my god, they're huge. So it I have this weird apprehensive approach to horses, but I'm trying to get over it.
SPEAKER_06Well, we have you know, clinics and workshops and presentations for people who are interested in learning more about how to communicate with them and how to understand them.
SPEAKER_01That's great.
SPEAKER_06Um, so you know, um When do you do those? Um, we generally do it once a month. Um, we do it more frequently for our volunteers. Um we're trying to develop a robust uh volunteer team and we work with them about, you know, how and when horses come in, we also have them work with them when they're very um fresh off the range. Um so yeah, it takes time. I mean, I I was into horses as a little girl. Then, you know, life happens, right? You have children and you know, mortgage and whatever. So uh I left horses for decades. And then when my children were older, I went back to horses like a lot of us do. And when I went back, I realized I absolutely had a huge gap in my understanding and my education because I had only been in a riding program.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_06So I had the biomechanics of riding, but I had no understanding about how to communicate, and I'd only been ridding riding, you know, lesson ponies, which who already knew their job. I wasn't doing anything. Right. It was it was a real like uh deficit in horsemanship there, and I feel like that is 90% of the the industry, which is why we came in and I said, okay, well, let's try to fill that void, let's try to educate people, you know, and it's not just about balancing on top of the horse.
SPEAKER_01Speaking of ponies, really well said, I I I hope that that grows here in New Polts.
SPEAKER_06I do too, I do too.
SPEAKER_05That's really cool. Speaking of ponies, I was on the school board for many years, and people during the pandemic, they would call up and be like, oh, or after the pandemic, like we have a sir we have a therapy cat. Timmy's gonna bring it to school. I'm like, no, we don't do therapy animals, we do service animals, and the only two service animals in the state of New York are dogs and ponies.
SPEAKER_06Oh, really? Oh.
SPEAKER_05You could bring a pony to school or a dog. It's a service. Please don't tell Hazel about it. No cat no catch, no fish. I got my I got my therapy fish. Great. Be there when you get home. You could bring your pony, you're not bringing your cat.
SPEAKER_01You know, I have I did see some videos online or some memes or something about a family that had a miniature horse. And it would just like trot inside and it's like in the living room hanging out. It was so cool.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_01It looked really cool. Who doesn't love a pony? It wasn't a pony, it was a miniature horse. It was like as big, it was no bigger than Presley. I love that.
SPEAKER_06They're tiny. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And it was like this little horse. I forget it had this cool name, and it was just like it was a whole that was the name of the people floors.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, your floor is a shop. But it was cool. That's true. Waking you up, you're trying to take a nap, the pony's like going up the stairs.
SPEAKER_04Like, pony.
SPEAKER_05Um Do you have a background in how like what's your background? I know you wrote as a kid and you were into it.
SPEAKER_06I do. Okay. No, I do not actually. Um I what I my background was in education.
SPEAKER_00Okay.
SPEAKER_06So early childhood development. Um, I was a teacher, I was an educator, um, and then decided I wanted to get out of the classroom and do more one-on-one work. So I went into speech language pathology and I did that. So that's my professional training. Um, the horses were always a passion on the side. And so for decades I had all this theoretical training on horsemanship, but didn't actually, I wasn't actually able to apply it until I got the barn, until I actually got my own horses. So I would say um kind of the the you know mix of application and theory really happened about six years ago.
SPEAKER_05Okay. So this is like this is your full-time gig right now.
SPEAKER_06Yes, yes.
SPEAKER_05And how do you have how many full-time workers? Do you rely on volunteers? Are you taking a lot of people?
SPEAKER_06I rely primarily on volunteers, and then we have, you know, wranglers, seasonal wranglers who come in and out, you know, and help. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. So how do you like to become a seasonal wrangler? How was that work? What's the wrangling season?
SPEAKER_06The wrangling season is whenever we get a load and we have to start so sorting them and loading them.
SPEAKER_05So there's people in town you can look up, like, hey, whatever your name is.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah, definitely.
SPEAKER_05You know, I was a I was a seasonal wrangler at all uh uh in the North Island, New Zealand for a brief time. I was there and we were just looking for odd jobs, and a guy picked us up hitchhiking, and he was taking a load of sheep to a farm, and he's like, they need some ranch hands, and we went to a ranch and they had a cattle drive, so to speak, and they separated all the calves out from the new and horses. And our job was to we lived in the bunkhouse and we branded animals like like five farms for like three weeks. It was cool. I mean I was like a cowboy for three weeks, living my dream.
SPEAKER_06It is so unheard of to be able to do something like that now with you know you know the liability issues and everything. So we're really, really careful about how we integrate our volunteers with the with the Mustangs.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I bet. So this is kind of fascinating. You've had you've had some or at least at least one, or maybe a few that were a little more wild than than the others. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Uh yeah, every now and again you get some that really fight domestication. Um, I mean, this is like a do-or-die situation, right? I mean, they've been moved out of their habitat, they're never gonna go back, right? So they're either gonna get domesticated or they're just not gonna make it. So we're doing everything we can to give them every option to make it. So every now and again you'll get one that is just fighting it and they will do they will kill themselves before they will do it. Really?
SPEAKER_05Why are they getting removed? Like tell us where they're getting taken from. Are they like just in people's yards and people like, we've got to get rid of this horse.
SPEAKER_06Well, I mean, uh to hear stories from folks out in Wyoming, uh, apparently the public lands and the private lands, it's like a checkerboard, right? So horses don't really uh respect boundaries of what's private and public. So there's been this huge movement in Wyoming to move certain herds out of there completely because, you know, there are these boundaries that are getting crossed over. But generally speaking, the reason they get moved is because um they're overcapacity. I mean, this is a huge controversy. There was just a documentary that came out recently called Blue Zeus um and a New York Times article that came out three weeks ago, I think it was.
SPEAKER_05Blue Zeus.
SPEAKER_06Yes, blue Zeus. Um, and then um that was on the heels of this uh New York Times article that's with Blue Zeus as the article or the documentary? That's the documentary, and uh the article in the New York Times was talking about um sending these Mustangs to slaughter secretly, you know, like sending them out so that you know the government get rid of them. It's a very controversial topic. So I mean, briefly, the controversy is that um the cattle ranching um um lobbyists, their interests are taking precedence over uh the natural, you know, um uh horse habitats. And that the horses are getting pushed out. I mean, that's I mean basically the here's my feeling.
SPEAKER_05Now I know I'm just a rube from upstate New York when it comes to the horse management, but it's like freaking you live in Wyoming, buddy. Well, you can't live with horses, that's why you live there. It's like why you gotta kick the horses off the property. What are they doing? Eating your garden? Actually, what are so the hell's wrong with them?
SPEAKER_01What are the nuance what are the nuisances that horses are causing that people are like, there's too many?
SPEAKER_06I mean, I get that I think the primary argument really is that the public lands for grazing is not an unlimited process.
SPEAKER_05So they want to paddle the cattle on the grazing property.
SPEAKER_06Yes, and gotcha it's a very complicated argument. It's a very complicated argument because you know, we do imbue the government uh with the power to kind of like steward all of this stuff over the public lands, right? So now, you know, the cattle ranchers um they they need to make cheap beef, right? The consumer wants their beef affordable. Well, how to make it affordable is to cut costs and feed. How do you cut costs and feed? Take them out to the public lands and let them graze, right? That takes your your feed costs down exponentially.
SPEAKER_05You know, historically speaking, when you think of and you talk about cattle ranchers, they're not evoking a lot of positive images.
SPEAKER_06No, they're hardworking folks and you know, they're thinking I'm bringing the cattle industry down on the ghost cast.
SPEAKER_05No, no.
SPEAKER_06You know, really, really the the argument isn't look, they're bad apples in every um bad actors in every group, right?
SPEAKER_05Even the ghost cast.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_05And there's only three of us. Tom. Um shape up, Tom.
SPEAKER_06But the truth is the the issue is much more complicated, right? If the consumer, if this is the market, the market demands, you know, cheap beef, you know. Um, I'm not sure how you resolve this issue. Yeah. It can't be done through legislation. You're asking the federal government to legislate, but what it really will wind up doing is crossing the line of people's personal agency, right? I mean, this is the issue.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, we should yeah, I you're right. It's a complicated issue. It's probably been going on. Decades.
SPEAKER_01I mean, it's probably a hundred years.
SPEAKER_06Oh, yeah, it's been going on for a really long time. Yeah. The Wild Horse Act was in 1971. So yeah, this has been in the public life for a long time. And there are devoted, devoted um advocates who have taken um photos of herds for decades, and they know exactly which herd and which horses and what the what the group is. And when the government comes in and takes that group, it causes a huge I mean this is hundred years old, like grazing right.
SPEAKER_05Yes, yes. Shoot a shoot out at the okay corral, which really it wasn't at the okay corral, but that's what this is all about. We're animals grazing.
SPEAKER_01So the government comes in and takes a whole herd. Yes. Wow. Yeah. And then uh eventually, I mean, those get hopefully repla uh you know, rehomed to places like you and then to eventually an owner.
SPEAKER_06Well, that's we play a very we're a drop in a bucket, really. I mean, a lot of them do go to long-term facilities where they live out the rest of their lives. Okay. Um, you know, right now the government has slated close to 14,000 horses to be gathered. Um you know, that's a plan. I don't know if they're actually gonna get it. Um you know, it we would have this problem even if we didn't have um the interests of the of the cattle ranchers involved, right? Because there is an overpopulation, there's no apex predators to take these horses down. So so ultimately we would have a little bit of this issue no matter what.
SPEAKER_05And um that's and also that's a geographical thing. Like in the Northeast, it's hard for us to imagine a horse. It's kind of like you go to Australia, there's a kangaroo problem. Like literally. Right. Like people are hitting them in their cars, and I'm so so I suppose out west there's horses all over.
SPEAKER_06I mean, it's a vast I mean, they're millions and millions of acres of public lands. So yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah. So now what do you do if you if you don't get them adopted the first day? So now you're gonna hold you're gonna hone them as for a while until you can get them adopted, or are you gonna Yes, yes, yes. So you'll domesticate them in that process on your own?
SPEAKER_06It depends on the horse. So one of the things that we do is if the horse has been there for two months and has not been adopted, then we'll get the our hands on that horse and gentle them. Okay. And then that makes the horse a lot more ex you know, accessible to the public. So yeah, we hold on to them.
SPEAKER_02And then you try to recoup some of that with the adoption fee as you go on.
SPEAKER_06We actually we don't own any of the horses. The horses are actually owned by the government. So everything goes through them. Um we are just facilitating it, you know, putting the matches together and that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_05So if one of these horses I mean, could you drop one of these Mustangs off like in a like a neighborhood? And could it survive? Like would a Mustang just be able to hang out in New Pults and like survive?
SPEAKER_06Um I think it would be we're densely populated, so it's so no, probably not. Um we would wind up that horse would probably wind up getting hurt at some point or crossing into somebody's private property. I will tell you though, that we did have a horse that got out. Um that was a three-day, three-day experience trying to get that horse back.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I heard this.
SPEAKER_06I heard that. We thank the local neighborhoods who have helped us, who helped us round up that horse and bring it back.
SPEAKER_01Did this was this the horse that jumped like an eight-foot fence or something?
SPEAKER_06No, that's a that's a different one.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_06No, the one it was a big jump. No, the one that we had that got out, um, she was a surrender, so somebody had adopted her, had been unsuccessful at domesticating her, um, surrendered her to us, and we um had her in domesticated fencing because that's where she had lived for the four years, and she hightailed it out, crossed the Wall Kill River, went all the way into Gardner. She was eight miles away.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_06And it was in the it was in the winter when we had those heavy deep snows when, you know, it was like probably two feet up.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Um, and she was all the way out in some by the Gardner Transfer Station. Um, not by any accessible road. We had to probably hike about a mile out with to to get her. Wow. She was not she was, I mean, she wasn't halterable. You couldn't just put a halter on her and lead her out, you know, it was it was difficult.
SPEAKER_01How did you get her out?
SPEAKER_06We took a decoy gelding out there who's really, really chill and a bunch of alfalfa, and we basically spent probably three hours just baiting her all the way across with this gelding until we finally got her onto the road and then up the road to a local farmhouse that allowed us to kind of corral her. It's really pretty wild.
SPEAKER_05That is pretty wild. Wow. Did you find a home for this horse?
SPEAKER_06Yes, we did. Yes. She was gentled by the end of it all, and yes.
SPEAKER_01So the term gentled, uh, tell us about that.
SPEAKER_06Well, um, it's a process of basically um domesticating the horse, and the word that used to traditionally be used is braking. Um we kind of moved away from that because that just, you know, yeah, it invokes a totally different yes, and we we do a process, you know, um we we focus very heavily on um positive reinforcement um in our training process. So uh old uh breaking techniques were primarily positive punishment and negative reinforcement, and that's not really what we do.
SPEAKER_05Okay. So, Jeff, if you join the rodeo, you could go for a job and make sure you don't go up and say you're breaking a horse breaking horses, you're gentle.
SPEAKER_01If I show up at a rodeo, they're gonna put me in a clown outfit. Kick me out into the pen.
SPEAKER_04Jeff's in the giant barrel with the ball, the bull's hammering a crazy.
SPEAKER_01Take one look at me and be like, this guy doesn't belong here. Put him in a clown suit. It's a dangerous job of rodeo clown. That's why they'll do it. Yeah. Um, so um you also have like some crazy donkey at uh, right? Don't you have the crazy donkey? The mule. The mule. Yeah. Sorry, the mule.
SPEAKER_06So the mule is a uh byproduct of a horse that was um in a neglect situation. It was a Mustang that was in a neglect situation. The BLM came in and um seized that mare, but she happened to be pregnant by a donkey, so she wound up having a mule baby, and he was so cute, we called him Button. Um, because and then we got our hands on them, right? Because they'd been surrendered. And um his name is Button, because he was so cute as a button. He's not cute as a button in his behavior. He's pretty different.
SPEAKER_05Aren't aren't mules like they're they're serious animals, they're smart, they're like hardworking, or right?
SPEAKER_06Don't they get I think that was the reason for the hybrid, right? I mean, people wanted the bit ability and the agility of a horse, but they wanted the kind of stable, like uh unspooking temperament of a donkey, so that's why they they did that. But every now and again, um you don't always get that golden middle, right?
SPEAKER_05Yeah. I know there were periods in the like, you know, we're talking civil war type stuff where the U.S. Army, they were like, we just don't do horses, we do mules.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah. Because they're tough. They're tough and they're hardy, um, and they're a little bit more biddable than donkeys.
SPEAKER_05Even some generals would get the scorn of their troops because they were like, I'm on a mule. So they'd come ripping into battle on a mule. Like literally.
SPEAKER_01What's the uh I forget. So a mule is a donkey, a product of a donkey and a horse. Yes. And a donkey is just donkey and donkey.
SPEAKER_00Yes, that's right.
SPEAKER_01Donkeys who just exist on their own. Yes, yes. Okay. I'm getting a little like.
SPEAKER_06So it's a cross it's a cross breed. A mule is a crossbreed. Rule is a crossbreed. Yeah, it has to be it it's generally intentionally done. It's minister, yeah. Very rarely just just happens. It does occasionally happen in nature, but that's not very often.
SPEAKER_01I see. It's more purposeful to produce a mule. Yes, it is. And and they're mostly for for that purpose, for working. Yes.
SPEAKER_05Work or I don't think they're are they as purposely made now as they were, say, a hundred years ago or oh gosh, I don't think so.
SPEAKER_06I mean people I mean in the US, if you go in anywhere else, right, you'll see that um riding horses and using horses is still very much a part of the community here. In in the US, it's been completely overtaken by cars. It's the horses are purely a recreational and luxury uh item now. It's not, you know, a work, a workhorse the way it used to be.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, unless you so I guess in certain specific communities, which we have some here. Sure, sure. The Mennonites and the Amish, yes. Yeah, you'll see horses routinely on roads. But that's about it.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, my chiropractor used to play polo, and he told me, he's like, Yeah, I got a horse. Then I had to get two horses because you can't have the horse go all day playing polo, and then he goes, Then I gotta pay a guy to take care of the horse. And he's you paid for all that, by the way. Yeah, I know I paid for that. Yeah. Every click in my neck I pay for it. But it's amazing what people pay.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02You know, to have he had to have two horses to play all day polo, and then he had to pay somebody to watch the horses. And he's gonna pay somebody to come take the horses out, ride them for them because you can't get there. Right. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And and so let's talk a little bit about because it reminded me of your the volunteer crew that you have. How many volunteers do you have?
SPEAKER_06I have about six right now.
SPEAKER_05Okay.
SPEAKER_06We'd like to double that.
SPEAKER_05So basically, people just email your farm like, hey, I'm looking to help out. Yes, yes, that's right. And you work a schedule out for them. Yes. You could do once a week, twice, whatever.
SPEAKER_06Usually it's once a week, and I assign a horse to them. And uh they come in once a week and they uh groom the horse and they handle the horse. So kind of thing.
SPEAKER_05Puma is the horse that you guys got.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Now that's your that's your horse though, right? That wasn't one of the Mustangs that came in. That was your horse or yes.
SPEAKER_06We had a well, you know, before we became Yankee Folly Mustang Adoption Center, you know, we were evolving from Lucky C, which was in fact a show barn. So I had horses um from that purchase. So we have lesson horses and we have other horses that were part of that kind of lesson program.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_06Which is really defunct at this point.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. It's a great that indoor facility though, is pretty spectacular.
SPEAKER_06Thank you.
SPEAKER_05You need Jeff, you need to get a horse assigned you that's like really cantankerous. I'm not like names like Diablo. No one will go near it. Like give it to Jack. Yeah, give you give me button. So can we hit on, and I know, I mean I mean, let's cause you're in the know here with the horse culture. Let's talk a tiny bit about horse racing. Oh boy. It's terrible, right?
SPEAKER_06Yeah, you know, whenever you're trying to make a profit uh off an animal, a living creature, it gets pretty dicey, right? Yeah. So you know, racing in and of itself, I don't think is a bad sport. I think um the way that it's conducted is an issue.
SPEAKER_05So they're not sure it's dirty and there's allegations of doping with horses, just like that.
SPEAKER_06Absolutely. In any competition there's going to be. But aside from though those variables, right? Yep. If we were just looking purely um at uh science-driven, research-backed evidence, horses at two years old, they're babies, um, their joints aren't fused yet. There's all sorts of you know, growth plates that are still, you know, um loose. And um, to put a horse under that type of rigorous training, you're basically asking to break it. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_05Like it's just yeah, yeah, yeah. I totally get what you're saying. I mean, and that's the knock, you know, the two, three-year-old, that's when they're racing at their prime.
SPEAKER_06Yes, they are. They are.
SPEAKER_05What when is a horse physically at its prime? Like if you were to own a horse, like if you have a dog, people like, oh, seven, eight, nine years, the dog is like in its prime, it's mellow, it's still very active. When is a horse, what how old is a horse in their prime?
SPEAKER_06Like, you know, I would say that a horse starts its maturity probably at age four. Okay. Uh, depending, you know, it really depends on the discipline, right? So if I'm just a trail rider, you know, like I want to just ride my horse, you know, on trails, then um I'd probably start training it at three. And by the time it was four, it would be good to go to pretty much anywhere, right? Um if I'm jumping, if I'm a show jumper, um a horse's um SI joint doesn't really fuse until they're about six, right? So it's hard to ask people. I mean, it's not hard, but people don't like to have to wait for a horse to grow till it's six. You have to feed it and care for it and do all this stuff and not get any kind of return for that length of time is a huge investment. That's why they start so early at jumping them when they shouldn't. Physiologically, you shouldn't, but people do. Yeah. So then you wonder why at you know, nine years old, ten years old, eleven years old they're they're breaking down and now you're shooting them up with steroids in order to keep them together.
SPEAKER_05Aaron Powell If you own a horse, how often do horses need to be ridden? Like for I know they could get exercise on their own, but like how often should you be riding a horse?
SPEAKER_06You know, this is a it's really situation dependent, right? Because horses are made to travel 15 to 20 miles a day to get their forage and their minerals and their water. And we put them in a domesticated situation where most people have these like postage stamp size paddocks where they place the horse. Now, if I'm a horse and I'm energy conserving, right? Because I'm only gonna run when I'm getting like, you know, attacked, then I'm gonna stand by the water trough and the hay trough. I'm not moving my butt. I don't care if you give me a hundred acres. I'm not roaming around there if my food's right here in the front. So really you have to be able to, as an owner, um, determine, okay, how much exercise does my my horse need? You know, and what kind of physical shape is it in, right? It's it's a lot of stuff goes into it that I think we ignore. And that's one of the things with our program, we try to bring that all to light for our clients.
SPEAKER_05And I I think one of the reasons people really love horses is they have a tremendous, each horse has a very different personality, much like a person.
SPEAKER_06They do.
SPEAKER_05So people could connect with a horse, you know, so like his I mean, even like historical race horses, some were like sleepers, well-beloved, playful, some were mean or angry. Yeah. So people could really identify with an individual horse.
SPEAKER_06Yes, yes, they can. Um, you know, it really requires you when you're with a horse, you know, we as we as humans, we we really um rely on our linguistic capacity, right? And with horses, it's all nonverbal communication. So you have to suddenly really quiet yourself and really think about every little finger movement, you know, your your distance between you and the horse, what you're what you're saying, how that feels. Like it takes it it puts you in a different space. Um, and I think that's why it appeals to a lot of people, right? Because that it's very um focused, calming, in some ways, very meditative work with an element of danger where you know if you're not paying attention, you're gonna get clocked.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, for sure. That that's what I was referring to. Turn your back. With with that, you know, I don't have that with a horse, you know, no, having been around that so that that nonverbal and the movements you make, I'm very aware of like where I am in proximity to the horse and what I'm doing and how I'm moving. I always cringe when I see somebody walk behind a horse. I'm like, oh, you just I can't do it. Like I'm really nervous about it. Don't turn your back on the horse. But but what I've learned is like, you know, they they know you're back there. The reason they freak out is you just appear back there, or you're doing, you know, you you're touching them and and they didn't know you were there. But it you know, what I've seen is like Tanya will walk by and kind of put her hand along the horse, walk behind, and the horse is just like, oh, I know you're going back there, I know you're coming around. And sort of what I've gained from it. But still I'm like I'm like, go around the front.
SPEAKER_06They have a blind spot in the back, right? The horses, their their eyes are on the side, so this is their vision. So they're blind right here in the front directly, and then they're blind right in the back. So when suddenly, you know, uh they're not seeing anything and something shows up, they'll that could that could start away.
SPEAKER_05That's spook them. Yeah, I got a cool story about some horses. You ever hear of a horse a race horse called Seabiscuit?
SPEAKER_06Yes, of course.
SPEAKER_05Right? Who have so I read I researched some stuff on Seabiscuit. It was an amazing horse with a wonderful personality. So I'm like, where did this ranch go? So I looked it up, and the owner died, you know, they played the movie, and you know, it was Jeff Bridges. Great movie if you've never seen it. You it's cool. And basically the ranch has been turned over to like a preserve where all sea and it's forever free out in California, and all the horses on it, there's hundreds of horses that are all Seabiscuit's descendants, roam this property and it's maintained by volunteers. Oh wow in one of the old barns that Howard owned. So then I started looking at this charity, and there's this program called Amazon Smile. Have you ever looked? If you just type in Amazon Smile, it's Amazon, but the Amazon Smile is linked to a charity. Oh. So anytime you buy something on Amazon, it will donate to this charity. So I looked up through Amazon Smile, and one of the charities is the Seabiscuit Foundation. So I buy all my Amazon stuff through Amazon Smile because the prop, some of the sale I go to the Seabiscuit Foundation. It's pretty cool.
SPEAKER_06It's a lovely book, actually.
SPEAKER_05It's a it's an amazing. It's a great book if you've never read a good book. I mean, read this book or check the movie out. Hazel would love it. It's a wonderful book and movie. I'm sure that's not the atypical racehorse story that was beloved. No. No.
SPEAKER_06No, there's I mean, I think the racing industry It's gotten dirty. It's pretty dirty. I think close to 26,000 foals a year. I mean, it's a it's it's a machine.
SPEAKER_05I mean, honestly, Jeff, you're a cyclist, so you know how dirty professional cycling is. Yeah. Racehorsing is right there with it.
SPEAKER_01No doubt. Yeah. There's a lot more money in in horses.
SPEAKER_05Probably worse because the people, the horses can't speak out.
SPEAKER_01Right. Right.
SPEAKER_05And they die. Yeah. There's there's there's uh tracks across the country where horses are mysteriously dying every year. And last year, Santa shut down a racetrack to investigate it.
SPEAKER_06Yeah. They die on the track while they're racing, while they're running. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Tragic. It's terrible. Um well thanks for taking us there.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah. Check out Amazon Smile. No, I will check it out. I didn't I never heard of that. That's pretty cool. Watch the movie Seabiscuit. It's a real feel-good movie. You'll love the movie.
SPEAKER_01I mean, I've I've I remember it. Yeah. I don't know if I don't think I saw it. And I I'd rather read, I think I'd read the book. The book is a wonderful book.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. It's the same vein as like Boys in the Boat. You know, it's a historical thing. It's great. Both great books.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. All right. So, Sion, what um what's next for the Yankee Folly Mustang Rescue?
SPEAKER_06Well, I think what we like adoption. I keep saying rescue, but it's we do rescue too. Um we want to branch out further, so you know the facility does the placements, but then we want to do, well, after placement, what happens, right? So there's a lot of activities that you can do with your Mustang. Uh one of them is um endurance racing. So, you know, um, we'd love to sponsor at some point in the future an endurance race with with the Mustang so those people who have adopted can come and do this 10K, you know, in Mohawk or something like that.
SPEAKER_05I would love to be involved in that. So make sure if this happens, I'm I'm in and I will help organize it because I organize events and I organize cycling and running events, and this is how the Western States got started. Human race and a horse, the most sought-after endurance race in the world. So the Western States would hunt was originally a man versus a horse.
SPEAKER_06Um, there's another race, uh Running with Burroughs.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know.
SPEAKER_06So yeah, yeah, there's a book called Um Running with Sherman, and it's running with the Burroughs.
SPEAKER_05I read it.
SPEAKER_06That's another thing we'd like to because there the BLM doesn't just oversee the wild horses, they also oversee the burrows. So occasionally you get burrows um in the mix. So I think that would be enormously fun if we could uh have a race like that.
SPEAKER_01So so would it be what your vision is what? Like you're on the horse or you're running running side by side?
SPEAKER_06So in running with the burrows, you're running side by side with the horses. It could be either or.
SPEAKER_05Okay. So you'd run maybe with a horse, you're holding the tether, or you're writing the phone.
SPEAKER_06Or you or we would do, you know, a more traditional type of endurance run, which is I could find 15 people right now that would run with a horse or run against a horse.
SPEAKER_05I could call them right now. McGrew, I'm like, McGrew, meet me out of river to ridge. You're gonna race a horse. You got a 15 miler against a horse.
SPEAKER_01He's already in his car saying, okay, where do I meet you?
SPEAKER_05Yeah. So listen, if you pull this off, you gotta let me know.
SPEAKER_06I would very quickly up, yeah.
SPEAKER_05And it could be a fundraiser for like your farm.
SPEAKER_06Sure.
SPEAKER_05It'd be amazing. And I'm telling you, this would create a buzz. I'm really into this.
SPEAKER_06We would love to do that. It would, you know, and have more programs, right? Like you'd like to reach out to the school districts and you know offer um programs where um kids can um have a more up and close personal interaction with the horse. Um, you know, it's there's a very strong therapeutic aspect to our training program. So I think it would, you know, be great for kids too.
SPEAKER_05I think that'd be cool. Jeff Ruddford School Board would make that happen.
SPEAKER_02I was just gonna say, too bad we don't know anyone who's got any connection to school. We just got agriculture. So a lot of schools are bringing agriculture.
SPEAKER_05I'll start harassing the superintendent for you. I guess we're gonna do that. Well, that might be good.
SPEAKER_02Even if they're just coming on a site visit, just be part of the program, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I think it's great. You get the kids out of the classroom. Well, really, what are they doing anyway? You're teaching them some crap. Yep. I mean, it's important, but like too much school. No what's wrong with school with too much school.
SPEAKER_02Well, it's too much inside, too. It's important. Go out and meet the horse. Go meet the horse. What's the problem? Kids are too much inside. They need more outside. And you can raise a horse.
SPEAKER_05Right. I love this. I love listen, I love the idea of people taking the horse and running. It's very exciting.
SPEAKER_06It's really especially nothing like it. It's not yeah, and the burrows, it's it's really funny to watch people try to drag their burrows to the finish line. It's really funny.
SPEAKER_01I I read I read Running with Sherman. He did great. Talney's reading it right now. At least it's great. It it was a great book. Um all his books are good. But like, yeah, he's a great author. Yeah. Um, but I had never known that was a thing. So to learn all that and then learn what they went through and talk about time to put top putting hay in the barn. Like literally, that was yeah, that's a lot to get to even just to get the thing to move.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01At all.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01Right? Yes. Like it would just stop on some of the runs and be like, I'm gonna eat this bush here, and there's nothing that guy could do to get that thing to move at all.
SPEAKER_05The next guest we have coming in here, Cody, he's an endurance runner. When we get the cast go, we'll throw it. He'll be like, This sounds great. But like the like I said, the original West r endurance run, Hundred Miler, the Western States, was about a guy versus a horse. And the first few years, that's how it went.
SPEAKER_01I can't imagine the horse would not win.
SPEAKER_05No, it's it's just I don't know who won if it was a horse or not, but I think uh they had to go from one farm to wherever they were going, it was a hundred miles.
SPEAKER_02That's long way to win. Like you said, it probably stopped because the horse doesn't care about winning the hundreds. That's right. You know, if the horse is set, you that guy'd be long gone. And the horse blow them away.
SPEAKER_05The guy was gone. The horse's like, I'm s I gotta eat.
SPEAKER_02Can we at least bring back donkey basketball?
SPEAKER_05Remember that? Did you have that?
SPEAKER_02We had that at Walk Hill when we were. Yeah, they bought the ponies in the in the gym. No, it's a donkey. They bought the donkeys in and then they rode the donkeys and played basketball.
SPEAKER_05Huh. It was a fundraiser.
SPEAKER_06Wow, that sounds like a lot of fun, actually.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, they have it up they have it up north because I told Redmond about it because they were looking for one. But there's a piece of where people think it's and I don't know this, so I think it's a functive.
SPEAKER_05It was a function. But it was a brand.
SPEAKER_02That's cool.
SPEAKER_05They were on like miniature little donkeys.
SPEAKER_06So basically they were that might have been the reason right there because of the weight differential.
SPEAKER_05They're running around and people are like shooting baskets. It was pretty cool. I've seen that.
SPEAKER_01Uh there's a there was a guy who owned um a 9W in like Ulster Park or something, and he had a couple donkeys.
SPEAKER_06Donkey Park. Donkey Park. Steve. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And he would like people he would take them. He needed help, so people would volunteer and they'd take them for walks.
SPEAKER_06Yes, they would.
SPEAKER_01And he'd do a hike, and you could just walk the donkey. I did that with uh not the llamas. We did it a couple times. It was cool.
SPEAKER_02Not llamas. What's the other one? Not the llama. That was happy as pack at the end. No, no, it was llamas in in Connecticut near um God, where is it? It's like an hour away. My daughters want to go, so I bought them, and you walk the llamas around. That's cool. And then you get to a spot and the lady's like, wait a minute, everybody stop, and she goes, poop. And they all pooped at the same time. No lie. She had them while they all were on key on it. It was kind of cool though. Huh.
SPEAKER_05That's the biggest pack animal in the North America before the horses showed up with the conquistadors. The llama. Really? Yeah. That's the Colombian exchange, the good and the bad that came with, you know, that guy. You know, the exchange between the old and the new world. And one of the things that was a positive, I guess, for the new world was they bought horses with them, which were instrumental in the development of the Western Hemisphere to some extent. Crazy. They got chocolate and coffee.
SPEAKER_01Potatoes. So um see on um w one of the things we do on our podcasts is as we kind of approach the end, um I don't want to take a we could talk about this all day, probably.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, this has been a fascinating class.
SPEAKER_01Really appreciate you being here. But we ask our guests uh three questions. Three they're always the same three questions.
SPEAKER_06Oh no.
SPEAKER_01So now you're in the hot seat. Um they're easy, they're fun questions. Um what kind of what kind of TV shows, what was your favorite TV show when you grew up? Did you watch religiously? Oh wow. If you watched TV. I'm assuming you're all the same thing.
SPEAKER_06There were like three channels and three networks. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Um they had good TV shows.
SPEAKER_06Gosh, I love Saturday morning watching uh the Bugs Bunny cartoons.
SPEAKER_05Oh, Bugs Bunny, Looney Tunes.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, that's probably what I watched a lot.
SPEAKER_05Okay. You know who I kind of liked on the Looney Tunes, but now he's like, he was a bad guy. Foghorn Leghorn. Yeah. He was cool. He was great.
SPEAKER_01All those things don't hold up anymore.
SPEAKER_06They don't, they don't, none of them do, really.
SPEAKER_01They're really cringy. Yeah, he was yeah, they they're cringy. Very cringy. But okay, yeah, Foghorn Leghorn. He was cool.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, he was cool. He's like, I say, I say, I say, boy. He's like hitting the dog, he's like always wailing on some of the two by four. No, just the he was an aggressive guy.
SPEAKER_01The violence in those cartoons was out uh unreal. Unreal. Um, okay. And then uh like, do you have like a guilty pleasure song that you're singing only when you're in the car by yourself? I don't sing, so that's well, that's even more of the reason that you'd have this secret song. Oh gosh. Um, Toxic by Brittany Spears?
SPEAKER_05No, I told you, I like Call Me Maybe. Call Me Maybe, that's right.
SPEAKER_06I pull up the people in the car, I'm like You know, I go through phases where there's certain songs that's here um that I really, really like, and then it but it just never fade away. Yeah, they fade away. So right now I think I've been listening to Birds of a Feather by Billy Eilish. That's my secret on on repeat.
SPEAKER_05I know it. I know it.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Birds of a feather. Okay, I don't know.
SPEAKER_05I gotta listen to it on the way home. Birds of a feather, I know the song. I don't know it. This is on the swim team playlist. There you go.
SPEAKER_00Birds of a feather. Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_01I don't really know Billy Eilish very well. I don't listen to it. Because you're old, Jeff. I thank you.
SPEAKER_05You're old, all right? I know. Jeff's like, what happened to Joe Cacker? The Beatles. I'm with you, Jeff. The kids, I mean I am too.
SPEAKER_01You know what? I was uh I was in California earlier this summer, and I was uh talking with my brother and his son, and and we got I don't know how we got on the topic, but we started telling him about Huey Lewis in the news. Huey Lewis. And we were like, he was like, I have no idea what obviously he's you know, he's twenty twenty-two years old, he has no idea what that is. So we we pulled up a couple songs, like I Want a New Drug. Did he know the songs at all or no? No, he might have been like we when we described one was in like a movie that he saw, he was probably like, uh Yeah, most of the kids now back to the future, they know the song from there.
SPEAKER_02Right because they're watching the old movies.
SPEAKER_05Good music, but good movies, kids will know it forever.
SPEAKER_01It sent me down this uh Hugh Lewis rabbit hole, and I was listening to it a lot.
SPEAKER_05It was fun, he was great for a while. But uh yeah, they like so Billy Eilish, you know, the the swim team, the kids that put the playlist on and like, do you know this song? I'm like, no. No, I mean I've heard it because I have kids and I was in high school kids. Yeah, yeah. And I they were shocked the other day when they're like, I'm like, who is this? Like, this is Taylor Swift. I'm like, I really only know one Taylor Swift song. And they're like, that's not true. I'm like, it is. I don't know. I'm like, is this Katy Perry? Like, this is Taylor Swift. I'm like, I don't know, Katie Perry.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so um this is our favorite one, our favorite question. If you had a sandwich named after you, what would be on it?
SPEAKER_06Oh boy. Um my favorite sandwich right now, and this is a plug for Frank's Fresh, is um a caprazi sandwich. It's like pesto, mozzarella. Yeah, it's amazing. Tomato uh on a panini.
SPEAKER_05That's that's a that's a great sandwich.
SPEAKER_01Panini? Uh what's that? Like a focaccia kind of bread or like a pita?
SPEAKER_06Yeah, it's just toasted. Toasted.
SPEAKER_05You're pressed, it's a pressed sandwich, yes. It's a pressed sandwich.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I've made one before.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah. Ah, well, you seem like either like what's a panini? Oh no, I mean this guy, where the hell did this guy come from? I don't know what a panini is.
SPEAKER_01And then the bread. Like what are we? I'm breaking it down. So, okay.
SPEAKER_06It could be a ciabatta. Oh, there you go. Right?
SPEAKER_01Okay. Yeah, that's usually what I'm using.
SPEAKER_05Little like uh from like soil and big glaze, like uh darkened balsamic glaze on that.
SPEAKER_06Oh, that's yeah, sure. That's great too.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, right. So we we've been gathering up all these samples. One of the podcasts we did, um, we made, we went back and looked at like two years worth of answers. And we had a friend come and the guy as our as like a guest host, and then the our the person we were uh interviewing. Corbett. Yeah, Corbett was their guest host.
SPEAKER_05Speaking of friends, is this a time we should mention Jake Mellinger as being the great human? He's a great guy. Yeah, great guy. Love that guy.
SPEAKER_01Um so we made, we all picked our our favorite that somebody had named was their sandwich, and then we made them on the cast and ate them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And some were very, very good. Some were terrible. One was really awful.
SPEAKER_05But we by and large have gotten wonderful sandwiches, but we've gotten some interesting ones. Was it Monastero? It was like fluff.
SPEAKER_00Oh, fluff one, yeah.
SPEAKER_05Marshmallow fluff. Uh, we've had the sandwich you described was great. We had Russ Clun was like bacon. Nothing else. Inch of bacon.
SPEAKER_01Pajardi, right? Who was like specifically, he was like a quarter inch of salami. Yeah. And then another quarter inch of cheese.
SPEAKER_05I was like, and you're like, oh my God. Wow. It sounded good. I mean, I would eat it, but the the basil or the the pesto tomato, that's a fine sandwich right there. You can't go wrong at any time. You know, good.
SPEAKER_01Well, thanks for coming on and telling us all about this amazing place or listen.
SPEAKER_05This has been an amazing cast. Thank you for coming here.
SPEAKER_06Thank you for having me.
SPEAKER_05Uh please don't hesitate to reach out if you ever need anything uh with help of the farm. I mean, maybe Ella would be into this too. Let me let me talk to Ella about that. But I really like this idea. You should do it never over.
SPEAKER_06Oh, I totally want to do those.
SPEAKER_05I'm in. I'm your organizer. I have lots of events I organize in the community for fundraisers.
SPEAKER_06Awesome.
SPEAKER_05Sweet. Cleanse your guy. Jeff, you're on board with that. You're on the race committee. All right. Let's do it. How are you, Tom? Let's do it.
