Rod Cameron grabbed the mustang’s hind leg and the mare pulled away, her leg pistoning a hammer blow that sent him scuttling out of the way.
Even with a tranquilizer in her system, 9-year-old Wyomie wasn’t going to let him trim her hooves without a fight.
“The hind feet will hurt you; the front feet will kill you,” the farrier said. “They go after the head.”
Wyomie, who came to Zuma’s Rescue Ranch near Louviers from 3-Strikes Ranch, an Alliance, Neb., property where she and other mustangs suffered near-fatal neglect, needed the pedicure.
Hooves are like fingernails; they grow constantly. In the wild, mustangs like Wyomie run on hard-packed earth that wears the thick hooves down, said Jodi Messenich, who owns Zuma’s with her husband, Paul.
Her time in the Nebraska sand hills had led the mare’s hooves to grow to a dangerous length.
“You get a lot of tendon and soft tissue damage from the feet not being in the right place,” Messenich said.
Authorities found 74 dead animals on the 3-Strikes Ranch, owned by Jason Meduna, 42.
The Bureau of Land Management annually reduces the size of mustang and burro herds on federal land in 10 states, including Colorado. The animals are offered for adoption through various programs. Some unplaced animals ended up at Meduna’s 2,000-acre ranch, where they were to be trained and offered again for adoption.
Habitat for Horses removed more than 200 mustangs, burros and mules, many of them barely alive, from 3-Strikes at the end of April.
Meduna has been charged with one count of animal cruelty and is free on $2,000 bond. Morrill County Sheriff John Edens said he expects the district attorney to file more charges.
Eighty-four of the animals were taken to the Cleveland Amory Black Beauty Ranch in Texas, an animal sanctuary run by the Humane Society of the United States and The Fund for Animals.
When Wyomie and five other mustangs arrived at Zuma’s, bones jutted from their emaciated frames and they were infested with worms and lice.
The mustangs have put on some weight since coming to the Douglas County ranch, but their ribs still stand out in bony relief.
Wyomie and another mare, Topaz, gave birth shortly after arriving at Zuma’s. Two other mustangs are expecting in June.
As Cameron clipped the thick overhang of hoof from Wyomie’s front feet, her moon-eyed colt — Bad Boy Bandit — clung to her side, dancing away when Cameron came too close.
In another paddock, veterinarian Gary Pallaoro struggled to plunge a syringe into the thick jugular of 11-year-old Topaz.
With the drug coursing through her veins, the horse collapsed and her foal let out a high-pitched squeal.
“These horses are just especially afraid of everything and everyone,” Pallaoro said of the mustangs. “Jodi definitely got the hard core.”
Tom McGhee: 303-954-1671 or tmcghee@denverpost.com
