RVETS

05/24/2026

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rco1jWKrwWM
If I don't post it you may not know about RVETS Brooke USA funded project working with the Two Powers Land Collective and the Blackfeet Community College in Browning, Montana. This is innovative project, to improve the availability and quality of hoof care on the Blackfeet Reservation, is being headed by Drs. Tarek Isham and Jamie White. It all got started when a videographer and good friend of RVETS, Dawn Perrine, met Lynn Mad Plume, the founder of Two Powers, a horse based, native people led, program to improve the lives of young people on the reservation. You'll love the interview with Lynn, a brilliant Blackfoot who is making something wonderful from a personal tragedy.

"The Blackfeet Community College USDA Extension Program would like ...

05/15/2026

Waiting for their turn in Charco de Sierra
This is from a while ago, but it is so typical of Guanajuato. Rocky hillsides, mesquite and maguey, everything made of brick or stone, and it runs on b***os. The RVETS México team is all about equids, but we are not “species specific”. A cat vaccination, a cow cesarian, a dehydrated kid, a “dog-hit-by-machete”, a ewe needing some help lambing, or a cactus spine in any part of any creature you might choose. We would set up after a long drive down a dry creek bed, up a hillside, and through the narrow trails between little houses. As if there had been some kind of massive public relations campaign, everybody in every little canyon, mountain top, or rancho just seemed to know we were there without a word being spoken. From the kids and abuelas with their b***os to the young guys with their caballos, they rode, hiked, and galloped onto whatever spot they could find. Horses tied to b***os, tied to mules, tied to b***os, tied to a flimsy little water starved maguey bush would soon be populating the spaces in between the boulders. Boxes of equipment and supplies spread across the hillside the eager students and their supervisors started spreading out, reading the “papelitos” that held the key to the order that patients would be seen. Physicals were happening, mouths examined, and judgements made on the sedation/anesthesia protocol for surgeries. While this b***o does not look thrilled about its small scruffy burden, all will be handled gently, with respect, and on their way back to the mountains soon enough.

05/14/2026

Dentals from North to South
Horses, donkeys, and mules rely on their teeth to do their amazing trick of turning “plant” into “animal”. From the northern plains to the jungles of Central America, and everywhere in between, the complex anatomy and physiology that allows simple chewing to happen provides a critical point at which veterinarians and dentists can improve the lives of the draft animals that serve rural communities. While improvements in technology and science have brought hypsodont dentistry (hypsodont = the kind of teeth that equids have) into a whole new realm in the last 50 years, somebody still has to go out there and open that mouth (“a dark and dangerous tunnel”), have a good look, and do something about it! Just look at these “number 11” points! Would you like to chew up your evening ration of hay, pasture, or rastrojo with daggers like that? That is why RVETS is on the Reservations, in the Sierra Gorda, and anyplace else that we can possibly go to provide that dental care. More importantly, our students are learning that you have get out there in the prairie, the desert, the mountains, or wherever and do the work, fix the teeth, and help the animals and their people.

05/11/2026

"The Blackfeet Community College USDA Extension Program would like to extend our sincere appreciation to everyone who helped make the Hoof Care and Trimming event a success"!!!! That's the news from Montana. That is RVETS' Tarek Isham DVM on the left with the chaps. He and Jamie White DVM had been at Blackfeet doing veterinary work and teaching hoof anatomy and trimming techniques. Great job Tarek! The fellow in the middle, who I have yet to meet, is a "disabled" veteran, who works as a farrier, despite having lost a leg for his country. THAT is impressive! RVETS will be continuing this program, and extending it to other reservations. This is the sort of thing that gives one hope for the future.....e

05/11/2026

In so many parts of the world horses are not an accessory or a pet. They are essential to the livelihood of people, especially in rural communities that rely on them for transportation and work. Whether bringing clean water to a home or a bit of leña (firewood) to cook tortillas or ten gallons of milk to sell at the crossroads in Chalmeca, horses, mules, and donkeys are still the primary source of motive power in the global south. Would it be better if the folks in La Fonseca or Carmelita or Augustine Gonzales or Uaxactun or Landa Matamoros used vehicles with internal combustion engines? I don’t know, but it would cost them more, require that they become dependent on outside corporations, force them to damage the land building roads, and maybe lose a little of their souls by cutting ties to creatures that have served man for millennia. Would that be worth it? Would it be worth the increased carbon that our cars and trucks spew into the atmosphere? These are philosophical questions for which our clients and our veterinarians have no time. We are busy helping this young wrangler fulfill his mission of keeping his valued equid friends healthy. That is why he has brought his parent’s string of horses and mules to get their checkups, dentals, hoof trims, and general care. Sometimes it is just the simple things that fulfill a greater cause. This proud young man sits tall in his saddle, a picture of confidence and responsibility. Should we not all do what we can to help him? In return there are so many things about life that he can teach us.

05/09/2026

World Donkey Day, May 8, is a perfect time to talk about how RVETS helps one b***o and one person at a time. This distinguished old gentleman lives in the dry, bolder covered mountains near Agustino Gonzales, México. Year after year, we go to the dusty football pitch and do the dentals, geldings, and other treatments on the horses, b***os, and mules of the folks who live in this hard land. This Viejo (old one) rides his b***o out of the hills every year to get it vaccinated and have its teeth examined. It rarely needs treatment, as regular exercise and coarse natural diet takes care of that. Yet our elderly client wants to make sure that his trusted friend is in good shape. He will tell you that he could not possibly survive without his dependable “ATV wheel chair”. Along with his dog, the handsome b***o are his family and his friends. Around the world, in a thousand different cultures, man, dog, and b***o are the same. RVETS is proud to help where we can. Please help us do this, by going to https://www.rvets.org/donate and supporting our work. Thank you, the donkeys thank you…

05/08/2026

Tomorrow!

Here is the agenda for the Hands on Trimming and Hoof Care Demo happening this Friday at the new Agricultural Building on the East end of campus (towards the fence with a tipi painted on it)!

05/04/2026

Don't miss this collaboration!

& LOW-COST EQUINE VET SERVICES
📍 Coming to the Blackfeet Nation

📅 Monday, May 11 & Tuesday, May 12

✨ Services Available:
• Physical Exams — FREE
• Vaccines — FREE
• Hoof Trims (Farrier) — $25
• Dentistry — $50
• Castrations — $50

🚫 No one turned away due to cost. All funds support future clinics with RVETS

This clinic is about keeping horses healthy, strong, and ready to continue the work they do in our lives every day

🩺 DENTISTRY • FARRIER • VACCINES • EXAMS • CASTRATIONS 🐎

FREE & LOW-COST EQUINE VET SERVICES
📍 Coming to the Blackfeet Nation

📅 Monday, May 11 & Tuesday, May 12

✨ Services Available:
• Physical Exams — FREE
• Vaccines — FREE
• Hoof Trims (Farrier) — $25
• Dentistry — $50
• Castrations — $50

🚫 No one turned away due to cost. All funds support future clinics with RVETS

This clinic is about keeping horses healthy, strong, and ready to continue the work they do in our lives every day.

📩 Schedule your appointment:
Message us or call (406) 845-6121
*Leave a voicemail and we’ll get back to you in the order calls are received.*
Fill out this form and we'll call you back: https://forms.gle/5wyWYVGTzhgCno9P8

RVETS
Blackfeet Community College

05/02/2026

More clinics in the desert! This time the USA, Nicaragua, and México team completed 96 castrations on BLM b***os in Tucson. The patients were wild caught and not tamed in any way. With careful handling and a good crew from PVDR, the stress was minimized and there was not a single complication. This is what dedicated professionals can do with experience and horsemanship (“ass-man-ship”?). As it has always been, and will always be, the welfare of our patients is the first concern. We have to be efficient and do a good job of teaching, when that is part of the mission, but there is nothing more important than maximizing the safety and welfare of the donkeys, horses, mules, or other animals to whom we dedicate ourselves. These b***os will go on to be trained and adopted, enriching the lives of those who become their guardians. While one might wish that wild b***os could stay that way, this is the world in which we live. It is up to us to make their lives as good as we can. The RVETS team are some of the best and kindest people that I know. Please help them keep doing what they do so well.

04/28/2026

Collaboration at Navajo between RVETS, the Equitarians, and Animal Rez-Q is just another way that we help animals and their human communities. Pictured here is very tanned, happy, and dusty crew of veterinarians, technicians, and farriers out in the vastness of the Navajo reservation in Arizona.
That’s the RVETS trailer on the right, full of equipment and supplies, with a typical Indian Health Service (IHS) brick hospital in the background. That’s Victor Urbiola MZV, from Mexico, with the big smile and the shades, standing next to Rich Fisher DVM, equine dentist extraordinaire and RVETS board member. Looks like Rich might have gotten a little too close to some horse teeth, given the bandages on his hands. Kneeling in front, all the way from Wilsall, Montana, is Tarek Isham DVM and Jamie White DVM PhD, the RVETS crew from the Northern Plains. Mark Anderson DVM, with the ball cap to Rich Fisher’s left, is a part of the American Association of Equine Practitioners’ Equitarian Initiative who volunteers at Navajo and also in Central America. Others are from Animal Rez-Q , the product of Glenda Davis RVT, the Navajo who ran the tribe’s veterinary services for years, and decided to start an animal health non-profit just for reservations in her “retirement”.
These experienced professionals have come together to help out on the Navajo rez to care for the horses and donkeys owned by tribal members. These are ranching, herding, and working equines in the best sense of the word. Because we all care, we all work together, sharing resources and knowledge, and not caring who gets the credit or the donors. This is how it should be done!