HUMBOLDT — If he had his druthers, Dave Gant would have “horse whisperer” emblazoned on his work shirt.
He can’t remember a time when horses weren’t a big part of his life, said Gant, who spends his workaday life tending to business at D & D Propane in Humboldt, where he sells propane and bulk fuel.
All day Sunday he will offer advice and help to area horse owners in how to train their steeds in a fundraising project for Chanute’s Bit and Spur Saddle Club, of which he is president. Cost will be a free-will donation by all comers to benefit the club.
“I’ll help people get their colts started,” Gant said, and also “help people who have older horses” that aren’t well-trained or have developed problems. From the human side of the equation, he said, some owners understandably “just don’t know how to go about training or handling their horses.”
“We’ll talk about how to get a horse to relax and how to get them to use the thinking side of their brain instead of the reacting side,” he said.
Gant will encourage participants to “take what they learn home with them and continue it with their horses.” He will make himself available for a refresher if needed.
The Bit and Spur arena is a mile east of the Chanute Walmart. More information is available from Gant, 620-432-6098, or from Gay O’Rourke, club secretary, 620-305-9015.
GANT, 53, works long hours, volunteers and hunts big game with zeal enough that he has been employed to guide hunts and is a recreational runner.
He also squeezes in a little farming, and likes any opportunity to kick back and have a conversation, often dominated by horse lore.
Gant doesn’t back away from a challenge, which explains why he has done so well in horse competitions over the years, including last year when he finished eighth in the world in the Extreme Challenge Horse Association championship in Topeka. At the Topeka event were 100 of the country’s best horsemen, taking on races that included such things as charging through a water obstacle and various jumps.
But, it isn’t competition that feeds Gant’s equine love affair.
“Dad (Bob Gant) always had horses around our place” in Petrolia, he said, which had him riding as a toddler.
Nowadays, Gant has four horses of his own on a small farm near Humboldt. Each gets its fair share of exercise with rider on its back, and often that isn’t Gant. The horses are gentle and well-mannered, which leads Gant to toss neighbor kids aboard without a second thought.
HIS WAY with horses — the whisperer’s way — was never more evident when last year Gant took on a mustang, fresh from a Bureau of Land Management herd, that never had been touched by human hands.
“Within an hour and a half I had the mustang broke and was riding it,” Gant recalled.
The process was part of a Mustang Makeover Challenge, in which participants have 90 days to take home an untouched mustang and get it ready to compete in saddle competition.
He finished 12th of 46 in the mustang challenge and part of the deal was for him to find the horse a good home where it would be appreciated. That was done when a Texan, who wanted a horse to hunt from, watched as the mustang stood placidly as Gant shot a rifle from its back and, dismounted, fired a round behind its front legs.
It generally is accepted that more horses are alive in the United States today than at any other time in history, including about 30,000 mustangs that run wild on BLM properties in vast areas of the West.
“They (BLM) are looking for ways to thin the mustang herd,” Gant observed. “Anyone who wants one can pick up a mustang by contacting the American Mustang Foundation.” Cost runs $150 to $175.
If anyone hereabouts were willing to adopt one of the spirited feral horses for the nominal fee, Gant’s concern runs deep enough he’d be willing help the new owner with training.
