Tales from the Trails

The Tales from the Trails blog pulls together wild horse and burro stories from across the Bureau of Land Management. These are stories about our work to manage and protect wild horse and burro herds on public lands, how animals are cared for in our off-range holding facilities and where they end up after they've been adopted to a good home. 

With kindness and patience, a wild horse or burro may be trained for many uses.  Wild horses have become champions in dressage, jumping, barrel racing, endurance riding, and pleasure riding, while burros excel in driving, packing, riding, guarding, and serving as companion animals.  Both wild horses and wild burros are known for their sure-footedness, strength, intelligence, and endurance. Contact the BLM or visit an event or facility near you to learn more about how you can bring home your own wild horse or burro. 

Send us your story!

If you're a proud partner to a wild horse or burro, we want to hear from you! Tell us about your trek "from wild to mild," a competition you won, or just tell us about why you're proud of your wild horse or burro.

Send your written stories and photos to wildhorse@blm.gov with the subject line MY WILD HORSE (or BURRO) STORY. For best results, stories should include your and your horse or burro's name, location (state) and at least one good photograph of the animal, you with the animal, or some other activity you'd like to convey. Please include at least one photograph depicting the freeze mark. Stories should be 300-500 words in length.

Two wild horses, one with a rider.

My Wild Horse Story: Lona and Diablo

I've been an adopter for many years and have a passion for America's Living Legends, in the wild as well as domesticated once-wild horses. I adopted my first two mustangs under my parents in 1977 and have been smitten with mustangs ever since.
Burros being pet outside a facility.

Wild Burros Bring Joy to Assisted Living Facility

Two volunteers for BLM California, Karin Usko and John Auborn, have done some fun things with their adopted burros. They are TIP trainers, BLM ambassadors at adoptions, parade participants, pack burro racers, founders of the California Breakfast Burritos (a pack burro training group that runs with their burros in the morning before breakfast), and they sometimes take their burros to the local farmers’ market!
A burro on a lead in a parade.

My Wild Burro Story: Alicia and Nestor

Gathered as yearling in Arizona's Cibola-Trigo herd management area on September 2010, B61AAAAAR, now known as Nestor, was not readily adopted. For the next seven years, Nestor lived in holding pens in Arizona and Colorado. One day his luck finally changed when a Colorado TIP trainer named Nicki Creasey selected him for her Burro Base Camp program.
Girl with haltered horse in a field

My Wild Horse Story: Katie and Marty

“He’s going to outgrow the pony soon, and we just don’t have the money for a Jr. High Rodeo horse,” I whispered to my husband as we looked through the panels at a small bay mare with a big head and even bigger eyes.