The Grim Reality
In 1988 Dayton Hyde saw something that both shocked and dismayed him - a feedlot filled with mustangs captured on public land.
Dayton Hyde said, "These horses were shipped in by the Bureau of Land Management. They were captured in Oregon they were captured in Nevada and captured in Wyoming. Nobody wanted them. They were too old or too plain or some of them had bad knees. Nobody wanted those horses.
"When I first went there and looked at the horses, it tore my heart because of the sadness in their eyes and I'd never seen that. It was new to me."
When he saw those captive horses Dayton Hyde believed he'd been right when he warned Wild Horse Annie that the law she helped pass would have unintended consequences.
"She was a lovely person who really cared about wild horses. As much as I loved her I think there was a sense of impracticality because time has borne out exactly what I told her would happen. You cannot protect a species and do them a justice with protection without having predators. You're going to end up with too many. And at that time there were a few islands of pretty darn good mustang blood but when that law came through it protected an awful lot of puddin' foots and they went into the wild horse herds and thus further diluted the mustang blood. It's awfully easy to pistol whip the government but I think there ought to be a law if you're going to criticize a government you better come up with solutions that do work," said Dayton Hyde.
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