This is the hardest part of our job, dealing with natural losses. Please be warned that this is not a happy post.

Our field team recently found a deceased horse while monitoring bands out in the field. Upon further inspection, we identified the body of beloved Sunny, a healthy nine-year-old stallion (born in 2015), who was last seen in excellent condition on February 11th, 2024.

The remains were approximately 3 weeks old making it more challenging to determine what happened exactly; however, there were signs of dried blood on and near his neck and some definite caching took place at the abdomen (which was completely eaten) with lots of sticks, which indicates mountain lion presence. It is unclear whether something initially happened to Sunny before he was eaten by a mountain lion or if these fierce predators can now take down fully grown healthy horses. We cannot make that distinction at this time and are doing further research.

Many of you may remember Sunny from our posts about his severe pastern injury in 2020. We developed a deep affection for him when we closely monitored his progress. We decided against rescuing Sunny and instead made sure he was recovering day after day, which ultimately proved to be the correct decision as he made a full recovery and has been completely healthy for the past 4 years.

With Sunny’s tragic death, he ends a mare bloodline. He was the last surviving offspring of Steph, who was tragically killed in a car accident in 2018. (Since then, the road has been fenced to improve safety of the horses and people.) As a result of his mothers death, Sunny took care of his younger brother Lee, but Lee ended up disappearing, making Sunny her last offspring.
Sunny’s birth band, Kayo’s band, was also the victim of the 2016 brutal Salt River shooter who killed his band brother, Kai. In his short life Sunny endured much loss, but we also bore witness to his great happiness as he proudly pranced amongst other bachelor stallions just last month, in the hills.

We try to bring you all the herd news and we are sorry for this sad update.

Please feel free to share our herd updates, but copycat pages should at least have the decency to credit the hard work of SRWHMG, who’s field work is proprietary, and without whom horses like dear Sunny might never be found.

Sunny leaves a few aunts and uncles as well as his sire Kayo, who is a retired lead stallion.
We will miss Sunny, run forever free beautiful boy.