Don't Blame the Horses

Like most young girls, I went through a "horse book" reading phase.  (I think it came somewhere between Nancy Drew and the teen romances.)  One of my favorites was Misty of Chincoteague, a story about the wild ponies of Chincoteague.  Chincoteague is in Virginia, but I was pleased to find that North Carolina has its own wild ponies and horses.

There are herds of wild horses and ponies all along the coastal areas of North Carolina.  Descendants of the mustangs brought to the Outer Banks in the 1500s, the horses lived on the barrier islands for centuries.  As the area became inhabited by more people, the horses became a tourist attraction.  Our family vacationed every year in Nags Head, then a quiet family beach just south of the areas where the wild horses roamed.  Imagine my delight when we would drive north and actually see the wild horses running across the sand.

Today the wild horses, especially in Corolla, NC are in danger.  Their major problems date to the expansion of Highway 12 in 1988.  Before that time there were no paved roads to Corolla.  Other herds in NC are federally protected, but the mustangs in Corolla do not enjoy such protection.  The size of their State sanctuary has shrunk as the number of vacation homes has risen.

The expansion of the highway naturally brought expansion of development.  Now the horses are being called nuisances, competing for limited wildlife resources reduced by the over building in the area.  The people came, the people built, and the horses are the losers.

Current plans (backed by the federal government) are to reduce the Corolla herd to just 60 horses.  With the human expansion, the horses are now described as feral animals, not native to the Outer Banks and a danger to native wildlife.  Opponents of the reduction plan fear that a 60-horse herd leaves them vulnerable to inbreeding and other problems related to a very small gene pool.  It appears that the intention is to leave enough horses to attract tourists, yet not inconvenience the people who have built their colorful beach houses in the area.

Both photographs from the Internet with no credit given to the photographers.

I have mixed feelings about the horses.  Truly they are not native, but they managed to survive without significant environmental impact for more than four hundred years.  The environmental impact in this case is caused by humans moving further and further into the previously undeveloped areas causing all wildlife to have to compete for the few remaining natural resources.  I do NOT have mixed feelings about the over development along the fragile Outer Banks.  On a visit there last fall, I was appalled at the number of houses and condos dotting the area.  Given a false sense of security with no major hurricanes in the recent past, people have built on unstable areas.  I saw houses built on land that I remember as inlets.  That is the way of the sea.  The Outer Banks have historically changed and will continue to change in the future.  New inlets will cut through and establish new islands.  Sands will shift and land will be lost.

[Disclaimer:  I must admit to a very selfish reason that I detest the unsafe expansion of homes along the Outer Banks.  In North Carolina, insurance companies are allowed to underwrite policies across the risk spectrum of the state.  Therefore my insurance is much more expensive, since I help to pay the cost for the insurance on the beach homes.]

I have no answers for the problem, but I can assure you the horses are not at the root of the problem.  The people are the root cause.  I give you this fact:  Corolla has a year-round population of fewer than 500 people.  There are 1,300 (yes, one thousand and three hundred) homes in the Corolla area.  You tell me...is it the horses or is it the people?

Minor and Major Frustrations

Sipping our morning coffee and still talking, my friend and I watched the dawn. Both of us saw something on the deck in the early light. It was climbing near the closed umbrella.

We have a large umbrella on a rolling plant stand. We use it when we are grilling in the rain. Otherwise, it stands idly in the corner. I grabbed the camera hoping to capture the small critter. Yep! It was another flying squirrel. Dang those little rascals. We are doing everything we properly can to discourage them, but we do live in the woods you know.

The squirrel had plans to climb inside the umbrella, perhaps to rest for the day.






He began to crawl inside, totally unaware of my presence.

He saw me and began to climb the outside of the umbrella.

He couldn't quite make it, and I photographed him in the act of falling down.

He landed on a footstool and scampered away before I could re-focus for a clear shot.

He quickly climbed to the deck railing and soared gracefully to a tree. Drat those things! They are really frustrating.

So, you might ask, what is the major frustration? It's the senseless and disastrous oil spill from the offshore rig in the Gulf of Mexico. While I am pleased that the incident is being widely reported, my blood boils every time I see or hear any details about the spill and the havoc it is creating for the environment and for the economy. (You don't think for a moment the oil company is going to absorb the financial loss, do you?) And what about the destruction of the marine life? And the people whose very livelihoods depend on the marine life? And the birds who will be stuck in the sticky goo? And the people along the Gulf coast whose beaches will be covered? And the air pollution from the planned burn? I could go on and on.

Photograph from the Associated Press

Hey! Congress and President Obama...could you possibly re-think the expansion of offshore drilling? Oh, and you had better re-define the phrase "fail safe." Especially as used in the fail-safe robotic method of immediately capping these oil rigs at the source.