 |
View the list of upcoming broadcasts and screenings of High Plains Films.
|
 |
|
|
|
"Wild About Horses"
The Packet & Times; Orillia, Ontario; March 11, 2001
by Joelle Kovach
He's one of the world's foremost experts on wild horses, and he lives here in Orillia. Local wildlife biologist, Bob Alison has been lobbying the Canadian government to legislate protection of the last wild horses in this country.
There are only about 400 left in Canada, Alison said. "They've been shot in BC for dog food very frequently," he said. We have no laws against killing wild horses here, says Alison - and for 20 years, he's been writing on the eminence of extinction of these animals. Two years ago, he wrote a paper for the federal government to consider. "They wrote back and said, 'Thanks.' That was the end of that," Alison said.
But his efforts have not gone totally unnoticed: a documentary film crew from Missoula, Montana made the trip all the way to Orillia Saturday to interview Alison for an educational film they are making about the world's dwindling number of wild horses. Doug Hawes-Davis, president of High Plains Films, said he and Dru Carr, cameraman/editor, had to scour the entire continent to find experts on wild horses.
"There are very few who are knowledgeable in this field in the whole world," Hawes-Davis said. "Only a handful." High Plains Films is a non-profit organization that makes nature and society documentaries. For this particular film, they traveled to Wyoming, Nevada, California, Arizona, and Ontario in search of experts. They also interviewed an archaeologist who studies extinction at the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa. Hawes-Davis tracked down Alison thanks to an expert at a historical center in Wyoming. That expert had read Alison's writing on wild horses on the internet.
Alison says there are only three herds of wild horses left in Canada - two in British Columbia and one in Alberta. Those herds suffer because people basically see them as vermin, Alison says. The horses in Alberta have traditionally been shot by people looking to make a quick buck - they bring the carcasses to a canning factory in Calgary. "Horses are the victim of a smear campaign," Alison says. People really don't want horses running through their properties and fields, according to Alison. But he doesn't think they cause any real grief to people. Why should the government save the horses? Alison says because they have been living in Canada long enough to be a part of our heritage. "We've got 500 years of heritage we could obliterate with the stroke of a pen," he said. "It's very hard to bring something back once it's gone."
|
|
|
|
