Missouri Trainer Seeks Wyoming Curly-Haired Mustangs for Rehabilitation Program

A Missouri horse trainer is eager to adopt as many curly-haired Wyoming mustangs as possible, believing they would be ideal for a prisoner rehabilitation program similar to Wyoming’s Honor Farm, Cowboy State Daily reports.

Curly-haired mustangs are intelligent, resilient, and forgiving, making them well-suited for novice trainers, according to Candida Haasch, who runs the Warriors of the Rainbow Horse Sanctuary in Missouri. She is working with the Missouri Department of Corrections to establish a program modeled after Wyoming’s Honor Farm, which pairs low-risk inmates with mustangs to help rehabilitate them through horse training.

Haasch, who has trained several curly-haired mustangs, believes they could play a key role in helping inmates develop responsibility and emotional connection through horsemanship.

“When they train those horses, they lose their hearts to them,” she said. “I want my tax dollars going toward some guy learning how to tame a colt.”

If the Salt Wells Creek herd in Wyoming is rounded up this summer, Haasch hopes to adopt as many of the rare curly-haired mustangs as possible. However, the roundup is currently being challenged in court by mustang advocates, with the case pending before the 10th Circuit Court in Denver.

Regardless of the outcome, Haasch has made it clear that any Wyoming “curlies” needing homes will always be welcome at her farm.

“I can’t imagine my farm without curlies. I’ve had curlies since 1968,” she said.

Haasch’s love for horses began at an early age, despite a rough start. Given a horse at age six with no riding experience, her first attempt at training didn’t go well, and the horse was eventually sold. Determined to have her own, she saved money for six years, finally purchasing a horse at age 12—an unusual-looking mustang she renamed Inspector Sizemore.

Though initially overlooked, Inspector Sizemore turned out to be a rare curly-haired mustang with impressive agility and trainability. He went on to win competitive jumping and agility championships and was officially registered as the 430th curly-haired horse in the US.

Haasch, who overcame paralysis caused by a brain tumor, credits her passion for horses with motivating her recovery. Now, she hopes to inspire more people to become involved in horse training, particularly through prisoner rehabilitation programs.

She supports responsible Bureau of Land Management (BLM) mustang roundups but believes more effort should go into adoption and training programs to prevent horses from being kept in long-term holding facilities.

“We don’t have too many horses. We just have too few horse people,” she said.