Nicole and her Mustang in the Great Outdoors

By Special Contributor Paula Cook

Nicole Melton knows what a good horse is worth. As a third-generation hunting guide with her family-owned Bighorn Outfitters, she uses horses and mules on a daily basis to transport hunters, fishers and adventure-seeking pack trips through the awe-inspiring ruggedness that is Idaho’s River of No Return Wilderness.  

Based out of the tiny town of Carmen, Idaho, about five miles north of Salmon, Bighorn Outfitters is the only licensed outfitter in the 275 square mile permitted area. They offer outdoor experiences to their customers that take full advantage of the area’s spectacular wilderness and sense of ruggedness that the American West is famous for. 

One of the key components of that experience?  The horses. “We pride ourselves on having well-trained, reliable horses that not only are enjoyable to our customers but also make the guides’ jobs so much easier because we don’t have to worry about how an animal will behave during our trips,” Melton explained. Her favorite go-to mount?  A formerly wild mustang she adopted two years ago at a BLM adoption event held in Challis, Idaho.  

“We get our horses and mules from a variety of avenues,” said Nicole, “but the attributes that are needed in a successful outfitting horse are many of the same characteristics that you see in the wild horse herds that live in our rugged mountains.”  A good outfitter horse must be sure-footed and strong, as well as level-headed in the face of the unexpected, attributes that Melton says her mustang Bridger has in spades. 

Proper care of the string of horses and mules that enable the Melton family’s livelihood requires having some bench strength; there need to be enough animals to rotate through to allow each to have rest days, giving them much needed down time from the rigors of their jobs.  Keeping the riding and pack strings fully staffed is part of Nicole’s job during the winter season, when the extreme weather shuts down the family business and their focus turns to maintenance and planning for the next season. 

“A big part of the reason I chose to adopt Bridger, as a young horse that I knew would require a lot of training, was the cash incentive offered by the BLM. Knowing that I would have the money to help support his training and care while he was being prepared to join me out on the job gave me a feeling of confidence. I was willing and able to take on a completely untrained horse knowing that I wouldn’t have to spend our company resources supporting an animal that wouldn’t be ready to use for another year or more.”  

Melton said she used part of the incentive from adopting Bridger to purchase various training aids to help gentle the gelding, and the rest of the incentive helped to purchase feed and routine veterinary services for the horse.

Would she participate in the program again?  “You bet!” said Melton. “In fact, I have two additional mustangs that I am working with right now to prepare them for starting work in the backcountry with us. The incentive program makes adopting these already-desirable horses even more of a win-win for us and for the animals.”