Word spread that the Canadian government planned to exterminate them. Many were killed and used to make dog food, even glue.īy 1977 there were only four left, on the Lac La Croix First Nation in Ontario, just north of the U.S.-Canada border. Only about 180 Ojibwe horses remain, mostly in Canada.īut their population dwindled in the first part of the 20th century. And she started a nonprofit called The Humble Horse, to raise awareness about the breed–which is also known as the Lac La Croix pony, and to help revive it. She brought them to a farm owned by a friend outside River Falls, Wisconsin, where Loerzel moved last year with her husband. There are fewer than 200 of the endangered breed remaining, which is native to the forests along the Minnesota-Canada border. A rare Ojibwe horse foal named Animikii - which means “thunderer” in the Ojibwe language was born in late July 2022, at The Humble Horse, a small nonprofit outside River Falls, Wisconsin. Earlier this year, the 28-year-old graduate student in social welfare at the University of Washington raised money to rescue six of the horses from a Canada rancher who could no longer afford to keep them. Loerzel has taken that teaching to heart. “I think when people think about Native people and their horses, they think of Lakota people or southwest people, but he would tell me, don’t forget that we are horse people too,” said Loerzel, a descendant of the White Earth Nation. Em Loerzel grew up hearing stories about the Ojibwe horse from her uncle, about small ponies that would roam free near Ojibwe communities tucked among the forests and lakes along the Minnesota-Canada border, and help with tasks such as hauling wood and trap lines.
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