|
Wild horses on Flathead Lake
January 12, 2009
The Kalispell office of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks delivers what visitors to Wild Horse Island expect to see—wild horses. “It’s important to preserve the island’s namesake,” says the division’s assistant park manager Dave Landstrom.
According to FWP, the Flathead Indian tribes used the island in the middle of Flathead Lake as a means to protect their horses from raiding bands of Blackfeet Indians. Later, a dude ranch and Arab-horse breeding business operated on the island; when the owners left and FWP gained control of the island, park officials discovered a horse and a mule.
In 1982, upon the death of the mule, FWP officials collaborated with the Bureau of Land Management to release three geldings, taken from the Pryor Mountain National Wild Horse Range, to keep company with the then 28-year old stallion.
Ten years later, the department released another three geldings, bringing the total population back to four, after three others had died. The newer three came from BLM preserves in southern Wyoming, the Mojave Desert in California and eastern Oregon. Today, the four still roam the island together in various-colored coats like those the Indian ponies might have worn. They share the land with bighorn sheep and mule deer, leading a peaceful life with old-age their only predator. For more information about the island and its horses, call FWP at (406) 752-5501.
|
|
